A young Englishman, son of “Admiral Wyville,” takes up and works a property in a remote district in Ireland. Told in first person. The chief interest seems to lie in jealousies and consequent intrigues arising out of love affairs.
“ATHENE” [see HARRIS].
AUSTIN, Stella.
⸺ PAT: A Story for Boys and Girls. (Wells Gardner). 2s. 6d. Illustr.
“One of the prettiest stories of child life. Even the adult reader will take a great liking to the lively Irish Boy”—(Christian World). By the same Author: Stumps, Somebody, Tib and Sib, For Old Sake’s Sake, &c., &c.
“AYSCOUGH, John” [Mgr. Bickerstaffe Drew]. The Author is a Catholic priest (a convert), now (August, 1915) acting as a chaplain in the British Army in France. He is one of the best-known writers of the day.
⸺ DROMINA. Pp. 437. (Arrowsmith). 6s. 1909.
The Author brings together in a queer old castle on the Western coast the M’Morrogh, descendant of a long line of Celtic princes, his children by an Italian wife, his French sister-in-law, a band of gypsies of a higher type, whose king is Louis XVII. of France, rescued from his persecutors of the Terror and half-ignorant of his origin. These are some of the personages of the tale. It is noteworthy that not one of the characters has a drop of English blood. I shall not give the plot of the story. The last portion is full of the highest moral beauty. The lad Enrique or Mudo, son of Henry M’Morrogh (whose mother was an Italian) and of a Spanish gypsy princess, is a wonderful conception. When the Author speaks, as he does constantly, of things Catholic (notably the religious life and the Blessed Sacrament) he does so not only correctly but in a reverential and understanding spirit. The one exception is the character of Father O’Herlihy, which is offensive to Catholic feeling, and unnatural. The moral tone throughout is high. One of the episodes is the seduction of a peasant girl, but it is dealt with delicately and without suggestiveness.
BANIM, John and Michael “The O’Hara Family.” John Banim (1798-1842) and Michael Banim (1796-1876) worked together, and bear a close resemblance to one another in style and in the treatment of their material; but the work of John is often gloomy and tragic; that of Michael has more humour, and is brighter. They have both a tendency to be melodramatic, and can picture well savage and turbulent passion. They have little lightness of humour or literary delicacy of touch, but they often write with vigour and great realistic power. The object with which the “O’Hara” Tales were written is thus stated by Michael Banim: “To insinuate, through fiction, the causes of Irish discontent and insinuate also that if crime were consequent on discontent, it was no great wonder; the conclusion to be arrived at by the reader, not by insisting on it on the part of the Author, but from sympathy with the criminals.”