Minutes of Proceedings. 345 



mere antiquarian zeal could establish. Pifty years ago he began to 

 delight the wider public with the native tales and poems of Ireland. 

 It was well that the tales should be translated, but it was a rare 

 fortune that gave Irishmen the opportunity of hearing them told by 

 such a master of speech. In the reproduction of these old legends 

 want of knowledge and want of sympathy would be alike fatal, and 

 yet the adequate possession of both would not have sufficed to give 

 the nameless charm of many of them. That could only be given by 

 a poet, and Sir Samuel Ferguson was undoubtedly a real poet. 

 Under his hand the charm of the novelty in the story is heightened 

 by the exquisiteness of the form ; the two elements are blended into 

 a product peculiarly Irish, and of singular excellence. His last effort, 

 his version of the Patrician Documents, is a noble ending to his work as 

 a student and as a poet. 



But it is not solely as thinker and writer that we have to mourn 

 his loss. The Academy has had no truer son. Outside the range of 

 his private relations, the Academy was second only to Ireland in his 

 sympathies ; there was nothing that affected either which did not stir 

 up in him a correspondent emotion. The highest honours that the 

 Academy could confer upon him were his; but perhaps even these 

 honours were less significant than the esteem in which he was 

 universally held. And as he was honoured in his public life, so in 

 private he was equally beloved, for his heart was as large as his 

 intellect was clear. 



The following is a list of the Papers by Sir Samuel Ferguson, 

 published in the Transactions and Proceedings of the Academy. 



Papers published in the Transactions : — 



1838. " On the Antiquity of the Kiliee or Boomerang." 



1867. " On the Eudiments of the Common Law, discoverahle in the published 



Portion of the ' Senchus Mor.'" 

 1880. " Fasciculus of Prints from Photographs of Casts of Ogham Inscriptions." 

 1882. " Sepulchral Cellse." 

 1885. " Patrician Documents." 



Papers published in the Proceedings : — 



\. "On the Antiquity of the Kiliee or Boomerang." 

 I. Continuation of the above. 



B.I. A. MINUTES, SESSION 1886-7. fSSl 



