Part 9 — NOTE.

It is related of Carolan, Twalogh, the Irish Handel, that in his gayest mood he could not compose a planxty on a Miss Brett, the daughter of a noble house in the county of Sligo.

One day, after a vain attempt to compose something in honor of the young lady, in a mixture of rage and grief he threw his clairsheck aside, and, addressing her mother in Irish, whispered—“Madam, I have often, from my great respect to your family, attempted a planxty to celebrate your daughter’s perfections, but to no purpose. Some evil genius hovers over me, there is not a string in my discordant harp that does not vibrate a melancholy sound—I fear she is not long for this world.” Tradition says that the event verified the prediction. See Sketch of Carolan in the Edinburgh Encyclopedia.