In the same year, 1804, an anonymous attack upon the Irish stage in six Familiar Epistles was published in Dublin. So cruel and venomous were these epistles that one actor, Edwin, is believed to have died of chagrin at the attack upon his reputation. An answer to the libel presently appeared, which was signed S. O., and has been generally attributed to Sydney Owenson. The Familiar Epistles were believed to be the work of John Wilson Croker, then young and unknown, and it may be that the lifelong malignity with which that critic pursued Lady Morgan was due to this early crossing of swords. Sydney herself was fond of hinting that Croker, in his obscure days, had paid her attentions which she, as a successful author, had not cared to encourage, and that wounded vanity was at the bottom of his hatred.
The next book on which Miss Owenson engaged was, if not her best, the one by which she is best known, namely, The Wild Irish Girl. The greater part of this was written while she was staying with Sir Malby Crofton at Longford House, from whose family, as has been seen, she claimed to be descended. Miss Crofton sat for the portrait of the heroine, and much of the scenery was sketched in the wild romantic neighbourhood. About the same time she collected and translated a number of Irish songs which were published under the title of The Lay of the Irish Harp. She thus anticipated Moore, and other explorers in this field, for which fact Moore at least gives her credit in the preface to his own collection. She was not a poet, but she wrote one ballad, 'Kate Kearney,' which became a popular song, and is not yet forgotten.
The story of The Wild Irish Girl is said to have been founded upon an incident in the author's own life. A young man named Everard had fallen in love with her, but as he was wild, idle, and penniless, his father called upon her to beg her not to encourage him, but to use her influence to make him stick to his work. Sydney behaved so well in the matter that the elder Mr. Everard desired to marry her himself, and though his offer was not accepted, he remained her staunch friend and admirer. The 'local colour' in the book is carefully worked up; indeed, in the present day it would probably be thought that the story was overweighted by the account of local manners and customs. Phillips, alarmed at the liberal principles displayed in the work, which he thought would be distasteful to English patriots, refused at first to give the author her price. To his horror and indignation Miss Owenson, whom he regarded as his own particular property, instantly sent the manuscript to a rival bookseller, Johnson, who published for Miss Edgeworth. Johnson offered £300 for the book, while Phillips had only offered £200 down, and £50 on the publication of the second and third editions respectively. The latter, however, was unable to make up his mind to lose the treasure, and after much hesitation and many heart-burnings, he finally wrote to Miss Owenson:--
'DEAR BEWITCHING AND DELUDING SYKEN,--Not being able to part from you, I have promised your noble and magnanimous friend, Atkinson [who was conducting the negotiations], the £300.... It will be long before I forgive you! At least not till I have got back the £300 and another £100 along with it.' Then follows a passage which proves that the literary market, in those days at any rate, was not overstocked: 'If you know any poor bard--a real one, no pretender--I will give him a guinea a page for his rhymes in the Monthly Magazine. I will also give for prose communications at the rate of six guineas a sheet.'
The Wild Irish Girl, whose title was suggested by Peter Pindar, made a hit, more especially in Ireland, and the author woke to find herself famous. She became known to all her friends as 'Glorvina,' the name of the heroine, while the Glorvina ornament, a golden bodkin, and the Glorvina mantle became fashionable in Dublin. The book was bitterly attacked, probably by Croker, in the Freeman's Journal, but the best bit of criticism upon it is contained in a letter from Mr. Edgeworth to Miss Owenson. 'Maria,' he says, 'who reads as well as she writes, has entertained us with several passages from The Wild Irish Girl, which I thought superior to any parts of the book I had read. Upon looking over her shoulder, I found she had omitted some superfluous epithets. Dared she have done this if you had been by? I think she would; because your good sense and good taste would have been instantly her defenders.' It must be admitted that all Lady Morgan's works would have gained by the like treatment.
In an article called 'My First Rout,' which appeared in The Book of the Boudoir (published in 1829), Lady Morgan describes a party at Lady Cork's, where she was lionised by her hostess, the other guests having been invited to meet the Wild Irish Girl. The celebrities present were brought up and introduced to Miss Owenson with a running comment from Lady Cork, which, though it must be taken with a grain of salt, is worth transcribing:--
'Lord Erskine, this is the Wild Irish Girl you were so anxious to meet. I assure you she talks quite as well as she writes. Now, my dear, do tell Lord Erskine some of those Irish stories you told us at Lord Charleville's. Mrs. Abington says you would make a famous actress, she does indeed. This is the Duchess of St. Albans--she has your Wild Irish Girl by heart. Where is Sheridan? Oh, here he is; what, you know each other already? Tant mieux. Mr. Lewis, do come forward; this is Monk Lewis, of whom you have heard so much--but you must not read his works, they are very naughty.... You know Mr. Gell; he calls you the Irish Corinne. Your friend, Mr. Moore, will be here by-and-by. Do see, somebody, if Mrs. Siddons and Mr. Kemble are come yet. Now pray tell us the scene at the Irish baronet's in the Rebellion that you told to the ladies of Llangollen; and then give us your blue-stocking dinner at Sir Richard Phillips'; and describe the Irish priests.'
At supper Sydney was placed between Lord Erskine and Lord Carysfort, and was just beginning to feel at her ease when Mr. Kemble was announced. Mr. Kemble, it soon became apparent, had been dining, and had paid too much attention to the claret. Sitting down opposite Miss Owenson, he fixed her with an intense and glassy stare. Unfortunately, her hair, which she wore in the fashionable curly 'crop,' aroused his curiosity. Stretching unsteadily across the table, he suddenly, to quote her own words, 'struck his claws into my locks, and addressing me in his deepest tones, asked, "Little girl, where did you buy your wig?"' Lord Erskine hastily came to the rescue, but Kemble, rendered peevish by his interference, took a volume of The Wild Irish Girl out of his pocket, and after reading aloud one of the most high-flown passages, asked, 'Little girl, why did you write such nonsense, and where did you get all those hard words?' Sydney delighted the company by blurting out the truth: 'Sir, I wrote as well as I could, and I got the hard words out of Johnson's Dictionary.' That Kemble spoke the truth in his cups may be proved by the following sentence, which is a fair sample of the general style of the book: 'With a character tinctured with the brightest colouring of romantic eccentricity The Wild Irish Girl was followed by Patriotic Sketches and a volume of poems, for which Sir Richard Phillips offered £100 before he read them. A little later, in 1807, an operetta called The First Attempt, or the Whim of the Moment, the libretto by Miss Owenson and the music by T. Cooke, was performed at the Dublin Theatre. The Duke of Bedford, then Lord-Lieutenant, attended in state, the Duchess wore a Glorvina bodkin, and the entertainment was also patronised by the officers of the garrison and all the liberal members of the Irish bar. The little piece, in which Mr. Owenson acted an Irish character, was played for several nights, and brought its author the handsome sum of £400. This, however, seems to have been Sydney's first and last attempt at dramatic composition. The family fortunes had improved somewhat at this time, for Olivia, who had gone out as a governess, became engaged to Dr., afterwards Sir Arthur Clarke, a plain, elderly little gentleman, who, however, made her an excellent husband. Having a good house and a comfortable income, he was able to offer a home to Mr. Owenson and to the faithful Molly. For the present, Sydney, though always on excellent terms with her brother-in-law, preferred her independence. She established herself in lodgings in Dublin, and made the most of the position that her works had won for her. Her flirtations and indiscretions provided the town with plenty of occasion for scandal, and there is a tradition that one strictly proper old lady, on being asked to chaperon Miss Owenson to the Castle, replied that when Miss Owenson wore more petticoats and less paint she would be happy to do so. Yet another tradition has been handed down to the effect that Miss Owenson appeared at one of the Viceregal balls in a dress, the bodice of which was trimmed with the portraits of her rejected lovers!