Letter I. From Patrick Magan, Esq., to the Rev. Rich- Letter III. From Miss Fanny Fudge, to her cousin, Miss Kitty -. Stanzas (enclosed) to my Sha- Letter IV. From Patrick Magan, Esq., to the Rev. 650 Fro Patrick Magan, Esq., to the Rev. ......... 55 GEXERAL INDEX.. 737 PREFACES TO UNIV. OF CALIFORNIA THE COLLECTED EDITION OF TEN VOLUMES, PUBLISHED IN 1841, 1842. PREFACE ΤΟ THE FIRST VOLUME. FINDING it to be the wish of my Publishers that at least the earlier volumes of this collection should each be accompanied by some prefatory matter, illustrating, by a few biographical memoranda, the progress of my humble literary career, I have consented, though not, I confess, without some scruple and hesitation, to comply with their request. In no country is there so much curiosity felt respecting the interior of the lives of public men as in England; but, on the other hand, in no country is he who ventures to tell his own story so little safe from the imputation of vanity and self-display. The whole of the poems contained in the first, as well as in the greater part of the secon "olume of this collection were written between the sixteenth and the twenty-third year of the author's age. But I had begun still earlier, not only to rhyme but to publish. A sonnet to my schoolmaster, Mr. Samuel Whyte, written in my fourteenth year, appeared at the time in a Dublin magazine, called the Anthologi,-the first, and, I fear, almost only, creditable attempt in periodical literature of which Ireland has to boast. I had even at an earlier period (1793) sent to this magazine two short pieces of verse, prefaced * Some confused notion of this fact has led the writer of a Memoir prefixed to the "Pocket Edition" of my Poems, printed at Zwickau, to state that Brinsley Sheridan was my by a note to the editor, requesting the insertion of the "following attempts of a youthful muse ;" and the fear and trembling with which I ventured upon this step were agreeably dispelled, not only by the appearance of the contributions, but still more by my finding myself, a few months after, hailed as "Our esteemed correspondent, T. M." It was in the pages of this publication,— where the whole of the poem was extracted,— that I first met with the Pleasures of Memory; and to this day, when I open the volume of the Anthologia which contains it, the very form of the type and color of the paper brings back vividly to my mind the delight with which I first read that poem. My schoolmaster, Mr. Whyte, though amusingly vain, was a good and kind-hearted man; and, as a teacher of public reading and elocution, had long enjoyed considerable reputation. Nearly thirty years before I became his pupil, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, then about eight or nine years of age, had been placed by Mrs. Sheridan under his care;* and, strange to say, was, after about a year's trial, pronounced, both by tutor and parent, to be " an incorrigible dunce." Among those who took lessons from him as private pupils were several young ladies of rank, belonging to some of those great Irish families who still continued to lend to Ireland the enlivening influence of their presence, and made their country-seats, through a great part of the year, the scenes of tutor!"Great attention was paid to his education zy his tutor, Sheridan." |