⸺ IN THE WAKE OF KING JAMES. Pp. 242. (Dent). 4s. 6d. 1896.
A wild and nightmare-like tale. Scene: a lonely castle on the west coast inhabited by a gang of Jacobite desperadoes. Contains no historical incidents.
⸺ FLIGHT OF THE EAGLE. Pp. 298. (Sealy, Bryers). 3s. 6d. [Lawrence & Bullen, 1897]. New ed., 1908. (N.Y.: Benziger). 1.10.
The historical episode of the kidnapping of Hugh Roe O’Donnell and his escape from Dublin Castle evoked in a narrative of extraordinary dramatic power and vividness. The Author has breathed a spirit into the dry bones of innumerable contemporary documents and State Papers, so that the men of Elizabethan Ireland seem to live and move before us. The effect is greatly strengthened by the vigour and rush of the style, which reminds one of that of Carlyle in his French Revolution. The Author has peculiar and decided views about Elizabethan Irish politics. “The authorities for the story,” he tells us in his Preface, “are the Annals of the Four Masters, the Historia Hiberniæ of Don Philip O’Sullivan Beare, O’Clery’s Life of Hugh Roe, and the Calendar of State Papers, Ireland, from 1587 forward.”
O’GRADY, Standish Hayes. B. 1832, Co. Limerick. Was a fluent Irish speaker, and his knowledge of the language and of Irish traditions was, according to those who knew him, unrivalled. Evidence of this will be found in his Catalogue of the Irish MSS. in the British Museum, never finished, but, as far as it goes, a mine of Gaelic lore. Was one of the founders of the Ossianic Society. D. 16th October, 1915.
⸺ SILVA GADELICA. Two Vols. Demy 8vo. (Williams & Norgate). 1892.
Vol. I., pp. 416, contains Irish text (Roman letters); Vol. II., pp. xxxii. + 604, contains Preface, Translation, and Notes. Thirty-one tales and other pieces, all taken from ancient MSS., such as the Book of Leinster, the Leabhar Breac, &c. Fifteen are from MSS. in the British Museum. Out of the thirty-one, only six or seven had been published before. Ranged under four heads—(I.) Hagiology, or Stories of early Irish saints; (II.) Legend, historical or romantic; (III.) Ossianic lore; (IV.) Fiction, some of which is humorous. The Irish text is presented in a difficult and archaic dialect, much as if, says a critic, Robinson Crusoe and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle were to be printed in the dialect of Chaucer. The Author in his Preface discusses and describes his sources most minutely. Forty years of study intervened between the Author’s previous publication, Diarmaid and Grainne, for the Ossianic Society (1853), and this. The English of his translation, though sometimes affected, is vigorous, rich, varied, often picturesque and on the whole thoroughly worthy of the subject. Twenty-eight pages of notes and corrections. Indexes: A, of personal and tribal names; B, of place-names.
O’HANLON, Canon John; “Lageniensis.” B. Stradbally, 1821. From 1842-1857 he was in U.S.A., where he was ordained. He published eighteen important works dealing with Irish history, archæology, and especially hagiography, his great Lives of the Irish Saints, nine vols. of which appeared, being a lasting monument to his research. He died in 1905.
⸺ IRISH FOLK-LORE: Traditions and Superstitions of the Country: with Humorous Tales. (Cameron & Ferguson). Pp. viii. + 312. 2s. 1870.