Poems

A Committee of friends and admirers of the late Denis Florence MacCarthy has been formed for the purpose of perpetuating in a fitting manner the memory of this distinguished Irish poet. Among the contributors to the Memorial Fund are Cardinal Newman, Cardinal MacCabe, Cardinal MacClosky; Most Rev. Dr. M'Gettigan, Most Rev. Dr. Croke, Most Rev. Dr. Butler, and many of the Irish Clergy; Lord O'Hagan, the Marquis of Ripon, Archbishop Trench, Judge O'Hagan, Sir. C. G. Duffy, Aubrey de Vere, Sir Samuel Ferguson, and Dr. J. K. Ingram.
Subscriptions will be received by the Lord Mayor, Mansion House, Dublin; by Dr. James Brady, 38 Harcourt-st; Mr. W. L. Joynt, D. L., 43 Merrion-square; Rev. C. P. Meehan, SS. Michael and John's; or by any Member of the Committee.


This volume contains, besides the poems published in 1850 and 1857, 1 the odes written for the centenary celebrations in honour of O'Connell in 1875, and of Moore in 1879. To these are added several sonnets and miscellaneous poems now first collected, and the episode of Ferdiah translated from the Tain Bó Cuailgné.
Born in Dublin, 2 May 26th, 1817, my father, while still very young, showed a decided taste for literature. The course of his boyish reading is indicated in his Lament. Some verses from his pen, headed My Wishes, appeared in the Dublin Satirist, April 12th, 1834. This was, as far as I can discover, the earliest of his writings published. To the journal just mentioned he frequently contributed, both in prose and verse, during the next two years. The following are some of the titles:— The Greenwood Hill; Songs of other Days (Belshazzar's Feast—Thoughts in the Holy Land—Thoughts of the Past); Life, Death, Fables (The Zephyr and the Sensitive Plant—The Tulip and the Rose—The Bee and the Rose); Songs of Birds (Nightingale—Eagle—Phœnix—Fire-fly); Songs of the Winds, &c.
On October 14th, 1843, his first contribution ( Proclamation Songs, No. 1) appeared in the Dublin Nation. Here is a song by a new recruit, wrote Mr., now Sir, Charles Gavan Duffy, which we should give in our leading columns if they were not preoccupied. In the next number I find The Battle of Clontarf, with this editorial note: 'Desmond' is entitled to be enrolled in our national brigade. A Dream soon follows; and at intervals, between this date and 1849—besides many other poems—all the National songs and most of the Ballads included in this volume. In April, 1847, The Bell-Founder and The Foray of Con O'Donnell appeared in the University Magazine, in which Waiting for the May, The Bridal of the Year, and The Voyage of Saint Brendan, were subsequently published (in January and May, 1848). Meanwhile, in 1846, the year in which he was called to the bar, he edited the Poets and Dramatists of Ireland, with an introduction, which evinced considerable reading, on the early religion and literature of the Irish people. In the same year he also edited the Book of Irish Ballads, to which he prefixed an introduction on ballad poetry. This volume was republished with additions and a preface in 1869. In 1853, the poems afterwards published under the title of Underglimpses were chiefly written. 3