OSCAR WILDE This Edition consists of 500 copies. Fifty copies have been printed on hand-made paper. [Illustration: 'HOW UTTER.'] Oscar Wilde A STUDY FROM THE FRENCH OF ANDRÉ GIDE WITH INTRODUCTION, NOTES AND BIBLIOGRAPHY BY STUART MASON Oxford THE HOLYWELL PRESS MCMV * * * * * TO DONALD BRUCE WALLACE, OF NEW YORK, IN MEMORY OF A VISIT LAST SUMMER TO BAGNEUX CEMETERY, A PILGRIMAGE OF LOVE WHEN WE WATERED WITH OUR TEARS THE ROSES AND LILIES WITH WHICH WE COVERED THE POET'S GRAVE. Oxford, September, 1905. [The little poem on the opposite page first saw the light in the pages of the _Dublin University Magazine_ for September, 1876. It has not been reprinted since. The Greek quotation is taken from the _Agamemnon_ of Æschylos, l. 120. ] Αἴλινον, αἴινον εἰπὲ, Τὸ δ᾽ ευ̉ νικάτω O well for him who lives at ease With garnered gold in wide domain, Nor heeds the plashing of the rain, The crashing down of forest trees. O well for him who ne'er hath known The travail of the hungry years, A father grey with grief and tears, A mother weeping all alone. But well for him whose feet hath trod The weary road of toil and strife, Yet from the sorrows of his life Builds ladders to be nearer God. Oscar F. O'F. Wills Wilde. _S. M. Magdalen College,_ _Oxford._ NOTE. M. Gide's Study of Mr. Oscar Wilde (perhaps the best account yet written of the poet's latter days) appeared first in _L'Ermitage_, a monthly literary review, in June, 1902. It was afterwards reprinted with some few slight alterations in a volume of critical essays, entitled _Prétextes_, by M. Gide. It is now published in English for the first time, by special arrangement with the author. S. M. CONTENTS. PAGE Poem by Oscar Wilde .................................... xi Introductory ........................................... 1 Inscription on Oscar Wilde's Tombstone ................. 11 Letters from M. André Gide ............................. 12 Oscar Wilde: from the French of André Gide ............. 15 Sonnet 'To Oscar Wilde,' by Augustus M. Moore .......... 89