Ireland A Poem.
Louisville, Ky: Prentice and Weissinger, 1839.
Price: $500.00
About the item
First edition. pp. [1-]79[-80]. 1 vols. 8vo signed in fours. Original blind embossed cloth, gilt lettering to upper cover , the spine and extremities faded, spine chipped at head and foot, small splits to upper joint, with some spotting. Very good copy, an unusual survival in original binding. AI 56994. Provenance: ownership signatures in pencil and in ink of Eliza Paul Gurney (1801-1881), née Kirkbride, Quaker, sister-in-law of Elizabeth Fry,
Item #267137
Verse in praise of Ireland by John Newland Maffitt Sr. (1795-1850), Dublin-born Methodist preacher who charmed large crowds in the 1830s and 1840s.
Uncommon antebellum imprint and a direct blast against the absentee landlords of old Ireland, predating the famine by iseveral years:
from Canto V. at p. 57
“On Erin’s sainted isle what hand shall dare
To rear the flag of freedom high in the air –
…
Who from the rampant lion shall reclaim
The fields still voiceful with high deeds of fame?
Not those whose vampyre appetites deplete
Their father-land, now prostrate at their feet,
The absentees from hearth, and hallowed shrines,
Dissolving Erin’s pearls in Tuscan wines”.
