NOTWITHSTANDING the number of literary men to whom Ireland has given birth, there is very little connected with their names which conveys to us any thing of a national association; for the land of their nativity scarcely enjoys a single ray of that brilliant mind, which sheds its intellectual brightness over the sister country. Congreve was an apostate, and Swift only by accident a patriot; whilst Goldsmith was weak enough to affect an air of contempt for a people whose accent was indelibly stamped on his tongue. We could protract the list of her ungrateful and thoughtless « men of mind, even to our own day; but the task would be invidious, and we gladly turn from it to one who forms a splendid exception-one who is not ashamed of Ireland, and of whom Ireland is justly proud.—

Land of the Muse! in glory's lay,

In history's leaf thy name shall soar,
When, like a meteor's noxious ray,
The reign of tyranny is o'er :
Immortal names have honour'd thee-
A Sheridan, a Wellesley;
And still is beaming round thy shore
The spirit bright of Liberty,

For thou canst boast a patriot, Moore! Mr Moore is every way an Irishman, in heart, in feelings, and in principles. For his country he has done more than any man living: he has associated her name, her wrongs, and her attributes, with poetry and music, neither of which can ever die, while taste, patriotism, and literature subsist in the world; and whilst these survive, Ireland will form the theme of Beauty's song, and Irish music the charm of every cultivated mind. But, all extrinsic circumstances apart, there is in the melodies of Mr Moore a sacred fire, which conveys its vividness to the soul of his readers; and they must be made of sterner stuff than the ordinary race of men, if their bosoms do not glow with

liberal and patriotic enthusiasm, while they peruse the harmonious creations of a poet who has clothed the wild and eccentric airs of his country in words that burn, and sentiments that find an echo in every generous breast.

Had Mr Moore done no more than this, he would be entitled to the gratitude of his countrymen; but his genius, like his own Peri, seems never pleased but while hovering over the region he loves; or if it makes a short excursion, it is only in the hope of securing some advantage that may accelerate the removal of those disqualifications, which are supposed to exclude happiness from the limits of his country. In « Lalla Rookh» he has given his fire-worshippers the wrongs and feelings of Irishmen; while, in the Memoirs of Captain Rock,» he has accomplished a most difficult task-written a history of Ireland that has been read.

On such grounds we may well claim for Mr Moore what he deserves-the crown of patriotism; but it is not on this head alone he is entitled to our praise. As a poet, since the lamented death of Byron, he stands almost without a competitor; and as a prose-writer, he is highly respectable.

Mr Moore is the only son of the late Mr Garret Moore, formerly a respectable tradesman in Dublin, where our poet was born on the 28th of May, 1780. He has two sisters; and his infantine days seem to have left the most agreeable impressions on his memory. In an epistle to his eldest sister, dated November, 1803, and written from Norfolk in Virginia, he retraces with delight their childhood, and describes the endearments of home, with a sensibility as exquisite as that which breathes through the lines of Cowper on receiving his mother's picture.

He acquired the rudiments of an excellent education under the care of the late Mr Samuel