fate of his manuscripts and scattered writings. On the evening of the
night he died he had asked that I might come to him the next day; and my
diary of the days following his death shows how great was our anxiety.
Presently however, all seemed to have come right, for the Executors sent
me the following letter that had been found among his papers, and
promised to carry out his wishes.


'May 4th, 1908

'Dear Yeats,

'This is only to go to you if anything should go wrong with me under the
operation or after it. I am a little bothered about my 'papers.' I have a
certain amount of verse that I think would be worth preserving, possibly
also the 1st and 3rd acts of 'Deirdre,' and then I have a lot of Kerry
and Wicklow articles that would go together into a book. The other early
stuff I wrote I have kept as a sort of curiosity, but I am anxious that
it should not get into print. I wonder could you get someone--say ... who
is now in Dublin to go through them for you and do whatever you and Lady
Gregory think desirable. It is rather a hard thing to ask you but I do
not want my good things destroyed or my bad things printed rashly--
especially a morbid thing about a mad fiddler in Paris which I hate. Do
what you can--Good luck.

'J.M. Synge'