American Opportunities

Draft Poem

Draft of a poem in three stanzas handwritten by Patrick MacGill to Nina Duchess of Hamilton and Brandon. Signed and dated by MacGill to July 28th 1935, it is written on headed paper, ‘Paradise Lodge, Idyllwild-near-Hemet, California’.

With permission from Donegal County Archives

Draft Poem
With permission from Donegal County Archives

Draft Poem

Draft of a poem in three stanzas handwritten by Patrick MacGill to Nina Duchess of Hamilton and Brandon. Signed and dated by MacGill to July 28th 1935, it is written on headed paper, ‘Paradise Lodge, Idyllwild-near-Hemet, California’.

With permission from Donegal County Archives

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MacGill again used his favourite character for his first attempt at script writing for the theatre production Moleskin Joe. A second play, Suspense, was presented at the Duke of York's theatre, in London in 1930, and later went onto Broadway in August of that year. Later that same year Suspense was adapted to film and MacGill moved with his wife Margaret and family to America. This was during the period of the Great Depression and so not an easy time to seek a new career.
In 1934 The Glen of Carra and Tulliver's Mill were published. In the latter book, MacGill depicts English characters in an English setting, dealing with the descendants of the Tullivers created by George Eliot in The Mill on the Floss. It is suggested that Margaret Gibbons, herself a romantic novelist, known commercially as Mrs Patrick MacGill, had set up a drama school in California, where they moved so MacGill could pursue a writing career in Hollywood.

Transcript:

Paradise Lodge
Idyllwild-near Hemet
California

To Nina,
Duchess of Hamilton and Brandon

Down by the dappled fields of June when sickles have an edge
The mavis keeps the rowan spray, the linnet keeps the hedge
The robin in its doublet red, with voice, full-throated, sings
A roundelay of happiness with all created things
The mavis and the cusky-doo in chorus sweet and clear
Perched on the ash like singing lamps upon a chandelier.

But afterwards the Calvary upon the moor and moss
The many featured agonies, the Stations of the Cross
When cruel gun and strangling gin have wrought {fell} havoc there
Destruction in the shearing shard, damnation in the snare
And taken now the berried lane in twilight Coolth and hush
No more is heard the vesper prayer with in holly bush.

But you, with ear to hear and heart of sweet beneficence
Whose path is in the foggy dew by stile and gap and fence
Who save the rabbit from the snare and tend the broken wings
And succour all that droop and fall, benighted hapless things
The wide world's end hath haven sweet, the blessings and the
smile
But you within your loving heart, have heaven all the while

Patrick MacGill
July 28th 1935