Since the very successful four-volume Cabinet of Irish Literature, published in 1912 and long out of print, there has been no publication which demonstrates the growth, variety and achievement of Irish writing in the nineteenth century. There are no anthologies available which are suitable for students, senior school children, and general readers. The proposed volume remedies this situation. Taking in prose, poetry, and drama, this volume not only contains work by major authors but also includes less obvious material gleaned from sources such as letters, diaries, court reports, newspapers, and journals. This accessible anthology, introduced and annotated by two leading scholars of Irish literature, is destined to become standard reading for a generation of students and general readers. This, the first of three volumes, spans the first third of the nineteenth century. It documents Ireland's significant literary contribution to an age of invention, with Thomas Moore's romantic Melodies,