it. He feared, however, that the public might be similarly affected--a
thing which, he declared, would destroy his enjoyment of an
extraordinary performance." He admired Miss Ellen Terry, too,
extravagantly, as he admired Marion Terry, Mrs. Langtry, and Mary
Anderson later.

The death of Sir William Wilde put an end to the family life in
Dublin, and set the survivors free. Lady Wilde had lost her husband
and her only daughter in Merrion Square: the house was full of sad
memories to her, she was eager to leave it all and settle in London.

The _Requiescat_ in Oscar's first book of poems was written in memory
of this sister who died in her teens, whom he likened to "a ray of
sunshine dancing about the house." He took his vocation seriously even
in youth: he felt that he should sing his sorrow, give record of
whatever happened to him in life. But he found no new word for his
bereavement.

Willie Wilde came over to London and got employment as a journalist
and was soon given almost a free hand by the editor of the society
paper _The World_. With rare unselfishness, or, if you will, with
Celtic clannishness, he did a good deal to make Oscar's name known.
Every clever thing that Oscar said or that could be attributed to him,
Willie reported in _The World_. This puffing and Oscar's own uncommon
power as a talker; but chiefly perhaps a whispered reputation for
strange sins, had thus early begun to form a sort of myth around him.
He was already on the way to becoming a personage; there was a certain
curiosity about him, a flutter of interest in whatever he did. He had
published poems in the Trinity College magazine, _Kottabos_, and
elsewhere. People were beginning to take him at his own valuation as a