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Of James Power, “honest James Power” as he is called in England, it is here unnecessary to say any thing more than that he lived and died respected. And that for twenty-seven years he was the publisher of Thomas Moore’s most popular work, the Irish Melodies.

Nothing perhaps can better impress upon the mind the rude state of the Fine Arts in Ireland, at the period when this National work was undertaken, than the representation of Hibernia as stamped upon the cover of the first edition, from the original block, which has found its way into the United States as a venerated relic. [iii] It has been said, that this wood-engraving was made for the heading of a broadside, circulated in Dublin upon the execution of the patriot, Robert Emmett, the composition of which upon very questionable authority has been attributed to Moore; although there are some reasons for believing that the design itself was made and executed by the learned Irish Antiquary, Doctor Petrie. However this may be, the impression of the woodcut on the Street Ballad of 1803, and that which appeared on the cover of the Irish Melodies which the Messrs. James and William Power published in 1807, are unquestionably from the same block; for no one then thought it worth while to stereotype a fac- simile, nor indeed until the genius of Stothard in 1821 had sublimated this rude allegorical figure into a more refined being; and one not unworthy of association in design with the polished verses of Moore.

The relative situations of Author and Publisher perfectly justify the statement made in a recent number (CLXXXV) of the Quarterly Review, that “Mr. Power seems to have been [iv] the person deepest in his (Moore’s) personal confidence — most employed in all his concerns, and for many long and straggling years, while Moore looked so gay and prosperous to the world, his only resource for his daily bread.” The same grave authority has called Moore, “Mr. Power’s Advertising Van” during his annual monthly “revelation” of himself in London; as the poet’s friend, Rogers, shrewdly termed Moore’s restless appearance in the gay and brilliant circles of the Metropolis, about the month of June, when he entered into the absorbing vortex of London society; and which will account for so few of his letters in the Power Correspondence, being dated in that month, although several flying notes without date may be correctly assigned to this period. Copies of the graceful caricature of Moore, etched or lithographed by Crofton Croker, are now not to be found; although some are known to exist with comments upon them by the learned Doctor Maginn, the facetious Hook, and Mr. Wilson Croker, which have stamped the recollection of the plate deeply into the memory of the Literature of England.

Moore was represented as a winged Grecian Youth, culling flowers in a garden as he flitted through it, and balancing himself by a ponderous wine pitcher on the right side. Maginn’s comment was a bitter sarcasm.

[Greek: “Bp&fiara dia yaXaKrog Kal juleXitoq yevo/iej/a’”]

That so valuable a series of letters as Moore’s Correspondence with Mr. Power, illustrative of the personal history and habits of the poet, should have been dispersed by unreserved Public Sale, has been and still is a matter of regret, which, although it had been spoken of generally in that feeling, no one stepped forward to prevent by securing the whole mass of letters [v] and preserving them entire; and they are now irretrievably dissevered.

Copies of all these letters having been made, they were, at the request of Mrs. Moore, furnished to her for Lord John Russell’s information : and his Lordship having, from about twelve hundred, selected fifty-seven only for publication in the Memoirs, Journal and Correspondence of Thomas Moore, several of which fifty-seven letters his Lordship printed with omissions, the British public, as well as ourselves, are under an obligation to Messrs. Puttick and Simpson, the eminent book-auctioneers of London, for calling attention to this fact, and who, instead of having, as the London Athenaeum, which strangely contradicts itself, asserts (2nd July) “over-catalogued” the collection sold by them, have done the utmost within the limits of their power to preserve a general recollection of its most valuable contents. Indeed the same critical paper of the previous week had the candour to acknowledge that Messrs. Puttick and Simpson have been considerate enough to give us in this catalogue a taste of Moore’s Correspondence with Power in several “well-selected extracts.” And in conclusion terms the Catalogue in question a “ curious” one.

In the opinion of the Quarterly Review there is no duplicity. It truly predicts — “As to this Power Correspondence,”

”We confidently expect to hear more than the Auctioneer has told us.”

The present volume, although entitled “Notes from the Letters of Thomas Moore to his Music Publisher, &c,” is considerably more than a mere reprint of the London Auctioneers’ Catalogue, now not to be procured, except at an extravagant price, in so much esteem is it held, and so eagerly are copies sought after. The reader is here presented with an amplification of Messrs. Puttick and Simpson’s carefully compiled and valuable record. All Lord John Russell’s omitted passages have been supplied from the original letters, by our correspondent; and why these omissions should have been made at all, but to create suspicion, any one who will take the trouble to peruse and consider them can scarcely understand. But [vi] suspicion once aroused more frequently terminates in minute and unsatisfactory inquiries, than in agreeable results.

Lord John Russell’s selection for book-making purposes having been completed from the Power Correspondence, and after it had been subsequently sifted by no unfriendly hands towards Mr. Moore’s memory, to detect offensive personalities, that certainly could never have been intended for publication, in any shape, removed all difficulty or delicacy in the disposal of a mass of original letters, for what they would produce as Autographs to the legal representatives of Mr. Power. And the letters with a quantity of Manuscript Music and other matters were sold on the 23rd, 24th, and 25th June, 1853, by public auction in London; under advice, that, if any valuable property existed in them, it was desirable to ascertain the exact amount, and to apportion it accordingly in cash to those entitled to the same, instead of leaving them in ignorance, or perhaps leading them into dispute upon a vague idea of the probable proceeds.

The sum the letters produced was not what had been anticipated, and certainly not one-fifth of their value to any one capable of using such sterling materials in a systematic biography; but a self-satisfied nobleman had undertaken the troubless “task” of printing an “apocryphal” autobiography, fanciful recollections, and painful reminiscences, not always, it appears, correct, set in the tinsel decorations of an Epicurean Poet; for no one will deny Moore’s claim to that title, in whatever light they may be pleased to view his poetry.

The following pages will enable those who desire to do so, readily to supply the omitted passages in vols. I. and II. of the Biography of Moore, as it has appeared in London. It is not our province to criticise Lord John Russell’s judgment, nor the portions of a disjointed work discreditably edited by him; but if England can produce no better historians than Lord John Russell and Lord Viscount Mahon, the sooner regular Professorships of History are established the more beneficial it will be for all concerned, as the latter Professors may be discharged at the will of the public, and the former Professors [vii] be thereby checked from discharging their own titled will at the public.

It is however creditable to Lord John Russell’s candour that he admits the difficulty felt by him in arranging in sequence the undated letters of Moore; although the apology appears very like a sobbing school boy’s “very sorry, Sir,” as by the slightest trouble nearly every one might have been satisfactorily assigned to its proper place from internal evidence. Messrs. Puttick and Simpson, however, seem to have felt the same difficulty; but although there is little excuse for the former act of negligence in the Editor of an expensive work, there is perhaps some for a hastily got-up Auctioneers’ Catalogue, should not all the lots be placed in strictly chronological order. In Lord John Russell’s publication four hundred of Moore’s letters are huddled confusedly together. In Messrs. Puttick and Simpson’s, nearly three times that number have been arranged into years, with something like attention to accuracy of date; and then generally into monthly lots, averaging about a weekly letter from Moore to Mr. Power for a quarter of a century. Letters dated only with the day of the week or undated follow annually the letters with absolute dates, and appear to be from the context, with few exceptions, correctly placed. And then come annually in Messrs. Puttick and Simpson’s arrangement reference to the letters printed by Lord John Russell, and, however injudiciously garbled by his Lordship, judiciously numbered for reference.

The Sale Catalogue therefore, so far as it went, afforded so excellent a foundation for the life of Moore, which has still to be written in a truthful condensed and intelligible form, that it has been thought better to preserve the lots in the same order in which they were originally grouped for sale by the Auctioneers, supplying some remarkable passages and adding a few illustrative notes, which did not come within the Auctioneers’ province. Of these, attention is requested to the following.

The suppressed Preface to the second number of The Irish Melodies is alone a remarkable document. The note at p. 24, [viii] upon the rhymes “kist all” and “crystal,” is curious. The reports of the trials of Power versus Walker at p.31, and of Power versus Power at p.88, are important as to the question of copyright. Lord Byron’s suppressed verses on Moore at p.42, and Mr. Crofton Croker’s Byronic hoax upon Moore at p.84, are singular literary documents. The minute account of Moore’s visit to the South of Ireland at p.103, by O’Driscol, the Chief Justice of Dominique, cannot fail with the other illustrations and comments to give this Volume a permanent interest in the annals of literature, so long as the lives of Moore and his contemporaries are objects of public enquiry.