The Irish standard., 1899-06-03
PROMINENT LEADERS IN LITERATURE
Conspicuous Individuals in the
Political World.
AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF The AUTHOR
Interesting Events of the Last
Half a Century.

Justin McCarthy's promised book OF
"reminiscences has been eagerly awaited
by the reading public. He has been in
the midst OF the making OF great events,
and has mingled with almost all the
people worth knowing or worth observ-
ing in the literary and political worlds
OF nearly half century, His genial
good nature, his large tolerance, his
breadth OF views have interested him in
the best that could be seen or said even
OF those from whom he differed in the
long course OF a varied life. He has had
an eye for the bright and the noble side
OF things, as well as for the permanently
interesting and the substantially great
His geniality has been reflected in his
style-that lanbent, lucid, quiet prose
that has made such an excellent vehicle
Tor the communication of his high and
pure thoughts about men and events on
many occasions hitherto. As might have
been anticipated, to dip into these vol
umes is like taking chair in cosy
nook with an old friend who has ranged
from San Francisco to Constantinople;
who has talked with politicians of all
ranks and parties and orders from Bis
marck to Biggar, from Kossuth to Car
narvon; who has been of Irish politics
from the days OF Meagher to the present
hour; who was in Clonmel when the
'4S men were being doomed, and has
been up O night with the Irish battalion
in Westminster; who carried to Glad
stone, with Michel's approval, the great
intransigeant's estimate of his policy,
and brought to Parnell the Conservative
lord-lieutenant's good wishes for home
rule. He has cllatted of literature with
Browning and Bright; he reported as
junior Isaac Butts cross-examination
of Anthony Trollope; he met Edmund
O'Donovan in Constantinople on his
way back from Merv, and gossiped with
George Meredith on the back benches
during the Parnell commission. He in
terviewed Bismarck, he welcomed Kos
suth, he supped with George Eliot, he
discovered Kipling. He has written
history OF his own times in England
that will be to the twenty-6rst century
what Burnet is to the nineteenth; and
he leaves here gallery OF Irish portraits
OF the men of the eighties and nineties
that will be their vindication to all time
against the slanders OF the hour. All
comes from the table of his memory"
the memory of mind whose balance
is never broken by malice or unchari-
tableness, says the Dublin Freeman's
Journal. Even where he criticises and
condemns it is with a recognition of
side of the question or character not or
dinarily taken into account Thus OF
Froude, the historian, whose methods
and work he submits to searching and
damning analysis, he has few stories
to tell that show Froude not altogether
as bad as Froudc painted himself. Upon
one occasion he got into dispute with
Froude over his depreciation OF Wolfe
Tone:
II asked him how it was that he came
to dislike Wolfe Tone so much. Froude
assured me, with his blandest and most
gracious manner, that, so far from dis
liking Tone, he had great admiration
for him. Then we came to particulars.
asked him why, if he admired Tone, he
had been at such pains to picture Tone
as an ignoble and worthless creature,
and why did he try to make him out
to be drunkard? I. appealed to
Froude's own judgment, and asked him,
as man and brother, to tell me what
was the fair and obvious inference as to
a mans character, who, during the days
of Pitt and Fox and Sheridan and Dun
das, had been at the pains to note in his
diary the fact that on certain occasions
he had got drunk. Did Pitt, did Fox,
did Sheridan 1 asked, ever take the
trouble OF making an entry in his diary
to the effect that he had been drunk?
Was it not the custom OF those eminent
persons, and of most OF the men in
whose society they moved, to get drunk
night after night? Is it not, then, only
reasonable to deduce from Wolfe Tones
special entries in his diary the conclu-
sion that the occurrences were unusual
events in his life?' Froude listened to
my arguments with an amused attention,
and said at last, Well, I dare say you