Page:My Life in Two Hemispheres, volume 1.djvu/245

 hand, eventuate in sinking me still lower into poverty and (undeserved) ignominy.

"This declaration of my intentions with respect to my future purposes I give to Mr. Duffy. I mean with his permission to send similar declarations to my other literary friends, varying the phraseology of them only as his prudence may suggest. "."

I besought James M'Glashan, who, in the Dublin University Magazine, had got the profit and éclat of Mangan's best writings for many years, to encourage him in his new departure by publishing an edition of his poems, and giving him some advance upon them. After protracted negotiation I only obtained his consent by giving him a cheque for £50, to be repaid by copies of the proposed work for my friends, and the "Anthologia Germanica" was published. Mangan was eager to express his gratitude by becoming a member of the Irish Confederation; but I discouraged the proposal. His fantastic dress and eccentric habits made him unfit to mix with the crowd, and his only settled income arose from work done in preparing a catalogue of Trinity College Library, which would probably be forfeited if he became a member of a political association.

Poor Mangan confesses his shortcomings with the frankness of genius ashamed of itself, and his generous exaggeration has been made the subject of ignorant misconceptions which class him with Savage and Dermody, but whatever his secret sins might be he demeaned himself in public like a gentleman. I knew him intimately for more than a dozen years, saw him at all hours, and under all circumstances, and never once when he was not master of himself.

A practical proposal of considerable importance came from Father Kenyon. To check the flood of misrepresentation he suggested that the leading Catholic Confederates throughout the country should publish a declaration of their opinions, and a frank exposure of the calumnies to which they were subjected. While the project was under consideration he gave it a new and practical application by suggesting that it should take the shape of a memorial to the Catholic bishops assembled in National Synod, calling for their protection