and M'Gee, it seemed to me, said better and truer things than the elder poet. There was one criticism of Lover's, however, which I thought profoundly true. The best of Irish novels, he said, was Gerald Griffin's "Collegians." Best not only in the plot, which is intensely interesting, but because every class of Irishman, from the highest to the lowest, was represented in it. Carleton and Banim blundered the Irish gentleman, but the more sensitive nature of Griffin enabled him to understand society, which he had not much frequented.
Brady talked of Maxwell, and told some ugly stories of the prebend of Balla. Lover said his life was loose, but his disposition was generous. His wife's friends said that he left her to starve, but he probably did all he could for her. On one occasion Maxwell wanted Lover to spend the day with him, and as an inducement he enclosed 20 to be sent to Mrs. Maxwell. Brady said Maxwell had latterly lost all care about his reputation, and would do any sort of work for prompt wages. I said Maxwell was the antetype of Lever, and might have done quite as well if he had been half as prudent.
Lover told very well, even dramatically, a story of Sheridan Knowles concerning the responses at a baptism, in which he was a sponsor. The officiating minister, in a nervous voice, admonished him, inasmuch as he had promised on behalf of the child that it should serve God, that it was his duty to see that the infant at a proper age was taught the prayers prescribed by the Church, and all that a Christian ought to learn for his soul's health, and Knowles responded in a voice of stage thunder, "All this I will most faithfully perform." The best of the joke, added Sam, is that before the week was out he would forget the existence of his gossip and the baby. But his other stories about Knowles were of the Handy Andy species, and not very credible. Knowles (said he) had announced at a dinner-table that he was going into the country next day. "Is there anything I can take anywhere for any of you lads, or anything I can do for you in the country; I have plenty of leisure and good-will at the service of my friends." "Where are you going?" one of them demanded. "Oh," said Knowles, "that is a point I have not yet determined."
