THE SUMMER FÊTE.

TO THE HONORABLE MRS. NORTON.

For the groundwork of the following Poem I am indebted to a memorable Fête, given some years since, at Boyle Farm, the seat of the late Lord Henry Fitzgerald. In commemoration of that evening—of which the lady to whom these pages are inscribed was, I well recollect, one of the most distinguished ornaments—I was induced at the time to write some verses, which were afterwards, however, thrown aside unfinished, on my discovering that the same task had been undertaken by a noble poet,[1] whose playful and happy jeu d'esprit on the subject has since been published. It was but lately, that, on finding the fragments of my own sketch among my papers, I thought of founding on them such a description of an imaginary Fête as might furnish me with situations for the introduction of music.

Such is the origin and object of the following Poem, and to MRS. NORTON it is, with every feeling of admiration and regard, inscribed by her father's warmly attached friend,

THOMAS MOORE.

Sloperton Cottage,

November 1881