ersion to pen,
ink, and paper, in perfect independence of which, all his compositions
were completed. It is impossible to describe the jealousy with which
he regarded the presence of writing materials of any kind, and his ever
wakeful fears lest some literary pirate should transfer his oral poetry
to paper--fears which were not altogether without warrant, inasmuch as
the recitation and singing of these original pieces were to him a source
of wealth and importance. I recollect upon one occasion his detecting me
in the very act of following his recitation with my pencil and I shall
not soon forget his indignant scowl, as stopping abruptly in the midst
of a line, he sharply exclaimed:

'Is my pome a pigsty, or what, that you want a surveyor's ground-plan of
it?'

Owing to this absurd scruple, I have been obliged, with one exception,
that of the ballad of 'Phaudhrig Crohoore,' to rest satisfied with such
snatches and fragments of his poetry as my memory could bear away--a
fact which must account for the mutilated state in which I have been
obliged to present the foregoing specimen of his composition.

It was in vain for me to reason with this man of metres upon the
unreasonableness of this despotic and exclusive assertion of copyright.
I well remember his answer to me when, among other arguments, I urged
the advisability of some care for the permanence of his reputation, as a
motive to induce him to consent to have his poems written down, and thus
reduced to a palpable and enduring form.

'I often noticed,' said he, 'when a mist id be spreadin', a little
brier to look as big, you'd think, as an oak tree; an' same way, in the
dimmness iv the nightfall, I often seen a man tremblin' and crassin'
himself as if a sperit was before him, at the sight iv a small thorn
bush, that he'd leap over with ase if the daylight and sunshine was in
it. An' that's the rason why I think it id be better for the likes iv me
to be remimbered in tradition than to be written in history.'

Finley has now been dead nearly eleven years, and his fame has not
prospered by the tactics which he pursued, for his reputation, so
far from being magnified, has been wholly obliterated by the mists of
obscurity.

With no small difficulty, and no inconsiderable manoeuvring, I succeeded
in procuring, at an expense of trouble and conscience which you will no
doubt think but poorly rewarded, an accurate 'report' of one of his most
popular recitations. It celeb