Scene: Wexford, the year of the rising. The Author banishes all romance and artistic glamour, and deals with the horrors of the time in a spirit of relentless realism. Quite apart from historical interest, the book is thrilling as a story of adventure. The tone is impartial, but the writer clearly means the events and scenes described to tell for the Irish side. The New Ireland Review says that “it sketches the origin and course of the Wexford insurrection with a conscientious accuracy which would do credit to a professed historian”; and it praises the Author’s “exceptional literary ability” and the “intense reality of his characters.” “Rather more than justice is done to the English authorities (e.g., Castlereagh), to the Irish Protestants, and even to the government spies.”—(Baker, 2).
⸺ CAMBIA CARTY AND OTHER STORIES. Pp. 230. (Maunsel). 1s. 1907.
Close descriptions of lower and middle classes in modern Youghal. In places will be unpleasant reading for the people of Youghal. Picture of Cork snobbery decidedly unfavourable to Cork people, and on the whole disagreeable and sordid.
BUGGE, Alexander, Professor in University of Christiania, ed.
⸺ CATHREIM CELLACHAIN CAISIL: The Victorious Career of Cellachain of Cashel. Pp. xix. + 171. (Christiania). 1905.
The original Irish text, from the Book of Lismore, is edited in a scholarly way and accompanied with an English translation, notes, and index. There is an interesting introduction. It is a story of the struggles of Cellachan and the Danes in the tenth century.
BULLOCK, Shan F. Born Co. Fermanagh, 1865. Son of a Protestant landowner on Lough Erne. Depicts with vigour and truth the country where the Protestant North meets the Catholic and almost Irish-speaking West. There is at times a curious dreariness in his outlook which mars his popularity. But his work is “extraordinarily sincere, and at times touched with a singular pathos and beauty.... He writes always with evident passion for the beauty of his country, and an almost pathetic desire to assimilate, as it were, national ideals, of which one yet perceives him a little incredulous.”—(Stephen Gwynn).
⸺ THE AWKWARD SQUADS. (Cassell). 5s. 1893.
The Author’s first book. Has all the qualities for which his subsequent books are remarkable. It is a study of the people of his native country—the borders of Cavan and Fermanagh—their political ideas, general outlook, humours and failings, their peculiar dialect and turns of thought. Four stories in all:—“The title story,” “The White Terror,” “A State Official,” “One of the Unfortunates.”
⸺ BY THRASNA RIVER. Pp. 403. (Ward, Lock). 6s. Illustr. 1895.