7 am glad that you thought of me at Kilkee The blind wave feeling round his long by the great deeps. The sea is my delight ..." sea-hall (Tennyson to de Vere, October 1849) in silence'.lz The poet had to abandon his plans to visit Dingle and Glengarriff (A.T. wrote 'Glengarry') 'for want of time'.13 By mid- September he was at the Victoria Hotel, Killarney,I4 from whence he wrote two letters to de Vere, presumably on the lfred Tennyson, (A.T.), poet same day. He arrived at Cork by but not yet Poet Laureate or Thursday, 22nd September, from which Lord (these honours would port he sailed for Bristol on the following follow later in 1850 and in day. Such are the meagre facts concerning 1884 respectively), paid A.T.'s first Irish tour. He does not state three visits in 1842, 1848 and 1878 to that that he visited Sir Aubrey at Curragh "dreadful countsy",l that "horrible island"2 Chase, which seems strange, and one - Ireland - which he wished was in the would think that had he done so, he would middle of the Atlanticn,j and if not below have mentioned it when writing to Sir the surface of that ocean, at least "a Aubrey's son. On the other hand the late thousand miles away from Englandn.4 great Kilkee historian, Monsignor Ignatius As Hallam Tennyson, eldest son and Murphy, stated (in an article "Kilkee", secretary to the poet, intimated in the published in All About Kilkee, Kilkee Memoir,Vnformation on the Irish visits of Development Association, 1982, 73) that 1842 and 1848 was very limited, though "Lord Tennyson, the poet visited Kilkee we have more documentation for his 1878 several times and stayed at Moose's Hotel. visit. However the publication of the first With Tennyson was his poet friend and volume of Tennyson's Letters in 1982, ably Alfred Tennyson. more frequent visitor, Sir Aubrey de edited by Lang and Shann~n,~has given Vere". As Sir Aubrey died in 1846, Fr. us some new information about the earlier lodged, but were unable to find each other Murphy's statement must refer to the 1842 tours but has added nothing further on as Alfred forgot to give Aubrey his friend's visit. As Moose's Hotel did not open until A.T.'s Kilkee visits. address. In fact when writing later to de the summer of 1843,15local tradition at It was Aubrey Thomas de Vere (1814- Vere (who was still in England) from Kilkee that Tennyson stayed at the West 1902), poet - son of another bard and Killarney in mid-September, A.T. again End may be correct - Sykes' House has baronet, Sir Aubrey de Vere of Curragh forgot to give Aubrey his friend's address, been mentioned and this was probably Chase (the de Veres wrote "Currah'), Co. which necessitated a second epistle from tsue also for A.T.'s 1848 visit. Kilkee is not Limerick, who first suggested to A.T. that there with the required information. mentioned by A.T. in his (surviving) he should visit Ireland in the autumn of Thus it was that A.T. set off alone by correspondence of 1842. It should be 1842. de Vere went to Cambridge ten the Liverpool packet on the Irish Sea noted, however, that A.T.'s letters to his years after A.T. entered and there the crossing to Dublin, where he arrived early friends at this time are generally brief and Limerickman made lasting friendships on the morning of Thursday, the 8th appear rushed. He gives no information with Thackeray, Edward FitzGerald, September.9 From there he wrote to on, or description of, the places he visited Carlyle, Frederick Pollock, Spedding and Henry Lushington's brother, Edmund - beyond stating that he was there, nor does others. Aubrey, like his father, was a great "What with rain in the distance and he mention meeting any Irish or Anglo- admirer and friend of Wordsworth, and he hypochondriacs in the foreground I feel Irish people. His 1842 letters give the it was who first introduced A.T. to the poet very crazy. God help all".1° He left that impression of one preoccupied with whom he would eventually succeed in the night for Limerick. His plan of itinerary business affairs. While on his one-day Laureatship. Like Wordsworth, de Vere was to go via Limerick to Killarney, but we Dublin visit he wrote that 500 of his was also friendly with Sara Coleridge, only know from one of his letters that he visited books16 were sold and he hoped that "the daughter of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the Ballybunnion caves (or 'Ballybunion' wood-works17 would make a sensation". both members of Wordsworth's circle. de as A.T. wrote it) "but could not get into the They did not, and they proved a bad Vere has stated that it was "in 1841 or finest on account of the weather".ll investment for A.T. as well as for his 1842 that I first met the P~et".~Certainly However, Hallam Tennyson tells us that in family. both were corresponding by July 1842.8 one of these caves 'he made the following Referring to Kilkee in his Lost Ireland, Prior to their intended Irish tour they had lines which occur in Merlin and Vivien. Laurence O'Connor wrote: "In 1842 arranged to meet in late August or early Tennyson mooched around here alone, September '42 at Henry Lushington's 'So dark a forethought rolled about his having failed to contact his fellow poet rooms at Mitre Court Buildings, The brain, Aubrey de Vere".18 No source-reference Temple, London, where A.T. sometimes As on a dull day in an ocean cave for this statement is given. Likewise, Brendan Lehane stated that "Tennyson came here [Kilkee] twice",lg again without source. Another article in All About Kilkee stated that "Lord Tennyson visited Kilkee three times"20 and added, incorrectly, that Alfred Perceval Graves "met Tennyson one day at the Pollock Hole~",~1which error has been verified (perhaps with poetic licence which often dispenses with historical accuracy) by Chriostoir O'Flynn: "Here Alfred Percival [sic!] Graves Met Lord Tennyson ..."22 Another modern Irish poet, James Liddy (who was born within a few hundred yards of the aforementioned Pollock Holes) has referred to "the three segre- gated swimming pools - the Pollock Holes - in which Tennyson and a multiplicity of bishops used to take plunges ir1."~3The latter statement is correct, the former without foundation and a misreading of what Graves actually wrote. These statements about A.T. meeting Graves at Kilkee refer to the Poet Laureates last visit Mt. Trenchard, near Foynes, c.1900. to Kilkee in 1878 and shall be dealt with Photo by Philip G. Hunt. (Limerick Museum) under that heading. Cruise's hotelHZ8at Limerick. Here he carving by machinery' scheme.34He was visited a book-shop and in another shop, now being lionised in London, 'bedined he tells usz9 "I went to buy some of the usque ad nauseum', he said.35 He had Another English literary figure who was pretty Limerick gloves, (they are chiefly written to Edward FitzGerald that he also on an Irish tour in 1842 was William made, as I have since discovered, at planned to go to Italy "if I could find Makepeace Thackeray (1811-1863), a Cork). I think the man who sold them had anybody to go with me, which I can't, so I friend of both Tennyson and de Vere. a patent from the Queen, or His Excell- suppose I shan't go, which makes me hate Thackeray was A.T.'s junior by two years ency, or both, in his window: but, seeing a myself and all the worldn.j6 He also felt, and although both were in Ireland at the friend pass just as I entered the shop, he according to Hallam Tennyson, about this same time, they do not appear to have brushed past, and held his friend in time, a desire for "a lonely sojourn at met. Thackeray spent a much longer time conversation for some minutes in the B~de".~~"I hear", he said, "that there are in Ireland. Thackeray, who had some street - about the Killarney races, no larger waves there than on any other part strange and eccentric family connections doubt, or the fun going on at Kilkee. I of the British coast: and must go thither with some Co. Cork gentry, was in Ireland might have swept away a bagful of walnut- and be alone with God".38 However, de from July to November, travelling from shells,jOcontaining the flimsy gloves; but Vere persuaded him to visit his family Dublin to Cork (where he reached before instead walked out, making him a low- home at Curragh Chase. He had missed the 23rd July) via Rathcoole, Naas, bow, and saying I would call next week. Tennyson on his lonely visit six years Kilcullen, Carlow and Waterford. He spent He said, wouldn't I wait? and resumed his earlier. de Vere told A.T. that the waves several days in Cork and journeyed on to conversation; and, no doubt, by this way of were far higher in Ireland than at Bude, Killarney (he was there on the 15th doing business, is making a handsome "and the cliffs often rise to 800 feet and in August) via Bandon, Skibbereen, Bantry, independence." Thackeray travelled on to one spot, Slieve League, to 2,000".3gA.T. Glengarriff and Kenmare, where he took a Gort (via Ennis, which he described) and however, set conditions for his stay at jig to Tarbert.