A .FAMOUS POEM.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 473, 3 April 1909, Page 9

A .FAMOUS POEM.

A correspondent sent us some time ago apropos of a poem of Charles ' "IVolfo's. reprinted m Tub Dominion, a clipping which told the familiar . but exploded story that The.Burial of Sir John Moore", was not an original composition by Wolfe, but a translation from the French. The following, from the "Standard," incidentally notes the origin / of this curious error: "It may easily have escaped the memory of many people who, a few weeks ago, were celebrating the centenary of Corunna, that

tho Rev. Charles Wolfe's well-known lines 011 tho burial of Sir John Mooro were only by a pure accident preserved for the.admiration of posterity. The story, however, has been told niore than once, and is repeated by Mr. 0. Litton Falkinor in his introduction to a littlo volume, .just published by Messrs. ■Sidwiclc and Jackson, which contains all of Wolfe's poetry that has been rescued, from oblivion. . Shortly after his death Captain Medwin in his 'Conversations of Byron,' a discussion which had taken place between Byron, Shelley, and others, 011 tho subject of lyrical poetry. Shelley extolled the merits of Coleridge's verses 011 Switzerland. Some of the party maintained that there ivas nothing to match Monro's Irish melodies. But Byron, who had como across Wolfe's linos, without knowing the name of their author, pronounced them to bo perfcct. Shelley thought they might be Campbell's; but Byron said No—or Campbell would have claimed them. Against his verdict on 'The Burial of Sir John Moore' there is 110 appeal; and it securcd their preservation, for sinco then they liavo been reprinted over and over again. Tho curious thing is that it took some timo to establish Wolfe's rights, as their author; and to this day people arc apt to bo puzzled by Father l'rout's facetious attempt to prove that they wcro merely imitated from a Frehch original which lie wrote himself. Nor is this the only mystification connected with tho history of the poem. Even Mr. Falkiner does not tell us when and where it was first printed. "Eventually it found its way - into the: papers, from which it was copied into 'Blackwood's Magazine'; -but tho question is: Which journal had .the honour of. first giving it to the world? .'According to tho. notice of Wolfe in the (Dictionary of . National-Bio-graphy,' also 'written by Mr. Falkiner, it was published in the 'Newr.v Telegraph' 011 April .19, 1817; but.a contributor to 'Notes and Queries' stated not .very long, .'ago, that Currick's 'Morning Post,' an Irish journal, was first in tho field two years earlier, and that ho had road it .in its columns. When, however, another investigator looked up tho file at tho National Museum in Dublin —tho British Museum does not possess it—he could find no ' trace of tho verses.; But some miscreant had cut out extracts' from, two issues: thoso of July 21- and December 7, 1815; and it may bo that lie had hit 011 this particular contribution. .Wolfe took orders and died at tho .age of. thirty-one of consumption, his death, it was thought, being hastened by a disappointment in iove. Tlio friends of a young lady to whom, ho had paid his addresses refused a piarriagc owing to his lack'of .means... Thero is nothing, in his other -writings comparable,with tho lines on Sir 'John Moore; but these, have ensured him a lasting fame. My;..Falkiner. .gives'..a .collotype reproduction of a'transcript of them in tho author's own : handwriting,, now religiously kept among the archives jorthe. Royal Irish Academy."