The Romance of the Irish Stage. By J. Fitzgerald Molloy.
2 vols. (Downey and Co.)—Mr. Molloy's volumes take in, more or less exactly, the eighteenth century, the happy age before the gaiety of Dublin had been eclipsed by the Union. They are not limited by the boundaries of the theatre. The Irish stage, says Mr. Molloy, must be regarded "as the central object in a picture of the Irish capital at the same period." This the reader may thankfully accept, for it !gives him some good stories which he might not otherwise have heard. It is not easy, perhaps, to see what the stories about Dean Swift have to do with the Irish stage, no, for instance, when he cut the silver lace off the hat of a farmer's son ; but we are in Ireland, and it would be ungracious to be particular. But of genuine theatrical celebrities we hear a good deal. Peg Woffington, Kitty Clive, Susannah Cibber, Thomas Sheridan, Foote, Garrick, George, Anne Bellamy, cum muitis etas, appear in Mr. Molloy's pages, along with a miscel- laneous crowd of divines, dandies, and we know not what else. Dip into the volumes where we will, we find something to amuse.
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