XI.
Helen, Lady Dufferin
(Countess of Gifford).
1807-1867.
NO matter what collection of Irish ballads we take up, whether the pretty little green-bound volume at a shilling, or the coarse broadsheet at a penny, we are sure to find one or other of Lady Dufferin's songs. The Irish Emigrant is the great favourite both in Ireland and in America, but the humour and fun of Katey's Letter is irresistible, and The Bay of Dublin, Sweet Kilkenny Town, and Terence's Farewell to Kathleen are always popular whenever they are heard. They possess in a singular degree the quality of tunefulness, they are what Carlyle calls "musical thoughts,"—something that cannot be spoken, that must be sung. They sing themselves, as all true songs should do. And so while many bulky volumes of verse, which have cost their authors years of toil, have gone down into the land of forgetfulness, these
