第3章 Volume 1(3)

Now I have no doubt there will be great praises of the poem,and people will suppose,most likely,that the composition is mine,and as you know (I take for granted)that I would not wish to wear a borrowed feather,I should be glad to give your brother's name as the author,should he not object to have it known;but as his writings are often of so different a tone,I would not speak without permission to do so.It is true that in my programme my name is attached to other pieces,and no name appended to the recitation;so far,you will see,I have done all I could to avoid "appropriating,"the spirit of which I might have caught here,with Irish aptitude;but I would like to have the means of telling all whom it may concern the name of the author,to whose head and heart it does so much honour.Pray,my dear Le Fanu,inquire,and answer me here by next packet,or as soon as convenient.My success here has been quite triumphant.

'Yours very truly,'SAMUEL LOVER.'

We have heard it said (though without having inquired into the truth of the tradition)that 'Shamus O'Brien'was the result of a match at pseudo-national ballad writing made between Le Fanu and several of the most brilliant of his young literary confreres at T.C.D.But however this may be,Le Fanu undoubtedly was no young Irelander;indeed he did the stoutest service as a press writer in the Conservative interest,and was no doubt provoked as well as amused at the unexpected popularity to which his poem attained amongst the Irish Nationalists.

And here it should be remembered that the ballad was written some eleven years before the outbreak of '48,and at a time when a '98subject might fairly have been regarded as legitimate literary property amongst the most loyal.

We left Le Fanu as editor of the 'Warder.'

He afterwards purchased the 'Dublin Evening Packet,'and much later the half-proprietorship of the 'Dublin Evening Mail.'Eleven or twelve years ago he also became the owner and editor of the 'Dublin University Magazine,'in which his later as well as earlier Irish Stories appeared.He sold it about a year before his death in 1873,having previously parted with the 'Warder'and his share in the 'Evening Mail.'

He had previously published in the 'Dublin University Magazine'a number of charming lyrics,generally anonymously,and it is to be feared that all clue to the identification of most of these is lost,except that of internal evidence.

The following poem,undoubtedly his,should make general our regret at being unable to fix with certainty upon its fellows:

'One wild and distant bugle sound Breathed o'er Killarney's magic shore Will shed sweet floating echoes round When that which made them is no more.

'So slumber in the human heart Wild echoes,that will sweetly thrill The words of kindness when the voice That uttered them for aye is still.

'Oh!memory,though thy records tell Full many a tale of grief and sorrow,Of mad excess,of hope decayed,Of dark and cheerless melancholy;'Still,memory,to me thou art The dearest of the gifts of mind,For all the joys that touch my heart Are joys that I have left behind.

Le Fanu's literary life may be divided into three distinct periods.During the first of these,and till his thirtieth year,he was an Irish ballad,song,and story writer,his first published story being the 'Adventures of Sir Robert Ardagh,'which appeared in the 'Dublin University Magazine'of 1838.

In 1844he was united to Miss Susan Bennett,the beautiful daughter of the late George Bennett,Q.C.From this time until her decease,in 1858,he devoted his energies almost entirely to press work,making,however,his first essays in novel writing during that period.The 'Cock and Anchor,'a chronicle of old Dublin city,his first and,in the opinion of competent critics,one of the best of his novels,seeing the light about the year 1850.This work,it is to be feared,is out of print,though there is now a cheap edition of 'Torlogh O'Brien,'its immediate successor.The comparative want of success of these novels seems to have deterred Le Fanu from using his pen,except as a press writer,until 1863,when the 'House by the Churchyard' was published,and was soon followed by 'Uncle Silas'and his five other well-known novels.

We have considered Le Fanu as a ballad writer and poet.As a press writer he is still most honourably remembered for his learning and brilliancy,and the power and point of his sarcasm,which long made the 'Dublin Evening Mail'one of the most formidable of Irish press critics;but let us now pass to the consideration of him in the capacity of a novelist,and in particular as the author of 'Uncle Silas.'

There are evidences in 'Shamus O'Brien,'and even in 'Phaudrig Croohore,'of a power over the mysterious,the grotesque,and the horrible,which so singularly distinguish him as a writer of prose fiction.

'Uncle Silas,'the fairest as well as most familiar instance of this enthralling spell over his readers,is too well known a story to tell in detail.But how intensely and painfully distinct is the opening deion of the silent,inflexible Austin Ruthyn of Knowl,and his shy,sweet daughter Maude,the one so resolutely confident in his brother's honour,the other so romantically and yet anxiously interested in her uncle--the sudden arrival of Dr.Bryerly,the strange Swedenborgian,followed by the equally unexpected apparition of Madame de la Rougiere,Austin Ruthyn's painful death,and the reading of his strange will consigning poor Maude to the protection of her unknown Uncle Silas--her cousin,good,bright devoted Monica Knollys,and her dreadful distrust of Silas--Bartram Haugh and its uncanny occupants,and foremost amongst them Uncle Silas.