a child, by the aid of a Roman Catholic uncle in
high position at the French court, was effected
after adventures of the most romantic danger.

Joseph Le Fanu, the eldest of the sons of this
marriage who left issue, held the office of Clerk of
the Coast in Ireland. He married for the second
time Alicia, daughter of Thomas Sheridan and
sister of Richard Brinsley Sheridan; his brother,
Captain Henry Le Fanu, of Leamington, being
united to the only other sister of the great wit
and orator.

Dean Thomas Philip Le Fanu, the eldest son
of Joseph Le Fanu, became by his wife Emma,
daughter of Dr. Dobbin, F.T.C.D., the father of
Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, the subject of this
memoir, whose name is so familiar to English
and American readers as one of the greatest
masters of the weird and the terrible amongst
our modern novelists.

Born in Dublin on the 28th of August, 1814,
he did not begin to speak until he was more
than two years of age; but when he had once
started, the boy showed an unusual aptitude in
acquiring fresh words, and using them correctly.

The first evidence of literary taste which he
gave was in his sixth year, when he made