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to my father and James McConnaughty. He did not attend school, for he was fully supplied with the treasures of learning, and his conversation, abounding in good sense, was enlivened by sallies of wit expressed with such elegant simplicity, that even I, a child, understood and admired them. I cannot but think that in his vigorous turn of mind and extent of genius he strongly resembled the great Burke. His letters at the same age are fully equal, and very similar in style, to those of our dear honoured Edmund. But Wrightson was early crushed into the grave. Burke grew and flourished, the ornament of an admiring world! Let us hope that their spirits have met in that kingdom where human policy and human acquirements are no more.

Richard Shackleton's intimacy with Edmund Burke commenced when Edmund was the pupil of old Abraham Shackleton, from whose school he entered Trinity College in the year 1744. He came to Ballitore with his elder brother Garrett, and his younger brother Richard, on the 26th of Fifth-month, 1741. They had been when very young at school with an old woman who was so cross, and they resented her crossness so much, that one holiday the three little fellows set out for her cabin with intent to kill her. As her good genius would have it, she happened to be from home, and their fit of fury evaporated before the next opportunity. Garrett Burke, who had a great turn for humour, was an eminent lawyer, and died before my time. His brother Richard could not be excelled by him in the