'The Invisible Prince;' and indeed he was for
long almost invisible, except to his family and most familiar friends,
unless at odd hours of the evening, when he might occasionally be seen
stealing, like the ghost of his former self, between his newspaper
office and his home in Merrion Square; sometimes, too, he was to be
encountered in an old out-of-the-way bookshop poring over some rare
black letter Astrology or Demonology.

To one of these old bookshops he was at one time a pretty frequent
visitor, and the bookseller relates how he used to come in and ask with
his peculiarly pleasant voice and smile, 'Any more ghost stories for me,
Mr. -----?' and how, on a fresh one being handed to him, he would
seldom leave the shop until he had looked it through. This taste for the
supernatural seems to have grown upon him after his wife's death, and
influenced him so deeply that, had he not been possessed of a deal of
shrewd common sense, there might have been danger of his embracing some
of the visionary doctrines in which he was so learned. But no! even
Spiritualism, to which not a few of his brother novelists succumbed,
whilst affording congenial material for our artist of the superhuman to
work upon, did not escape his severest satire.

Shortly after completing his last novel, strange to say, bearing the
title 'Willing to Die,' Le Fanu breathed his last at his home No. 18,
Merrion Square South, at the age of fifty-nine.

'He was a man,' writes the author of a brief memoir of him in the
'Dublin University Magazine,' 'who thought deeply, especially on
religious subjects. To those who knew him he was very dear; they admired
him for his learning, his sparkling wit, and pleasant conversation, and
loved him for his manly virtues, for his noble and generous qualities,
his gentleness, and his loving, affectionate nature.' And all who knew
the man must feel how deeply deserved are these simple words of sincere
regard for Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu.

Le Fanu's novels are accessible to all; but his Purcell Papers are now
for the first time collected and published, by the permission of his
eldest son (the late Mr. Philip Le Fanu), and very much owing to the
friendly and active assistance of his brother, Mr. William Le Fanu.

THE GHOST AND THE BONE SETTER.

In looking over the papers of my late valued and respected friend,
Francis Purcell, who for nearly fifty years discharged the arduous
duties of a parish priest in the south