Though come of a Dublin family, and otherwise Irish by descent, Mr Johnson was born at Broadstairs in Kent (1867). He first became known to the reading public, as a poet, by his contributions to _The Book of the Rhymers’ Club_, notable for their distinction of touch. Since then Mr Johnson has published much in prose and verse, though in book form he has not, I think, produced any other prose work than his admirable study of Thomas Hardy, or any other volume of poetry than his _Poems_. His work is not characterised by distinctively Celtic quality, though occasionally, as in “The Red Wind” and “To Morfydd,” the Celtic note makes itself audible. No doubt--to judge from internal evidence in his later writings--Mr Johnson’s poetic work, at least, will develop more and more along the line of his racial bent.
DENIS FLORENCE MACCARTHY. (1817-1882.) PAGE 135
Mr Maccarthy, who was a barrister in Dublin, and one of the main supports of the _Nation_, is best known by his fine translations of Calderon’s Dramas. The “Lament,” by which he is here represented, has always seemed to me his most haunting lyrical achievement. It is necessary to add, however, that this poem is somewhat condensed from the original--which is weakened by diffuseness. The score or so of lines beginning “As fire-flies fade,” have been favourites with many poets of Maccarthy’s own time and later.
JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN. (1803-1849.) PAGE 137
While it is not the case, as sometimes averred, that Mangan was, or is, to Ireland what Burns is to Scotland, it is indisputable that the claim may be made for him rather than for any other Irish poet of the Early Victorian period. In fire and energy his faculty is unsurpassed by any of his poetic countrymen, though we may dispute Sir Charles Gavan Duffy’s assertion that Mangan “has not, and perhaps never had, any rival in mastery of the metrical and rhythmical resources of the English tongue.” Mangan was the child of a small tradesman of Dublin, where, in 1803, he was born. From childhood, fate dealt hardly with him. Abandoned in his early boyhood, he was indebted to a relative for his education; but when, in his fifteenth year, he became a copyist in a lawyer’s office, at a small pittance, his kindred discovered him and compelled him to share his meagre gains with them. For ten years thereafter he toiled in this bitter bondage. In his own words:--“I was obliged to work seven years of the ten from five in the morning, winter and summer, to eleven at night; and during the three remaining years, nothing but a special Providence could have saved me from suicide.” No wonder that, from an early period in his life, he found relief from his misery in drink; but it was misery and unbroken ill-fortune and adversity, much more than the curse of his fatal habit, that really killed him. There is a period in his life which is a blank, “a blank into which he entered a bright-haired youth and emerged a withered and stricken man.” His first chance for a happier life came with his appointment to a minor post in the University Library of Dublin, and it was during this time that most of his best work was done. His highest level is reached in his brilliant free paraphrases of German originals: _Anthologia Germania_ (1845). His later years were darkened by the worst phases of his malady, and he died (as in most part he had lived, in misery and poverty) in Meath Hospital, in his forty-seventh year. He has written one lyric that Irishmen will always account immortal: “Dark Rosaleen”--a wild and passionate rhapsody on Ireland herself. “Dark Rosaleen,” “Silk of the Kine,” “The Little Black Rose,” “Kathleen Ny Houlahan”--these were at one time the familiar analogues of Ireland. Of his Oriental paraphrases the most stirring is “The Karamanian Exile.” Strangely enough, Mangan’s Irish renderings are less happy than those poems which he based upon German and Oriental originals; but sometimes, as in the beautiful “Fair Hills of Eiré, O!” after the Irish of Donough mac Con-Mara, he has bequeathed a memorable lyric. Of poems that are strictly original, nothing seems to me more characteristic of Mangan than “The One Mystery” (see p. 142).