But though Mr Hogan was thus employed in pursuits congenial to his tastes, and to a great degree conducive to his future eminence as a sculptor, the idea of embracing sculpture as a profession did not occur to him for several years after, nor were the requisite means of study for that profession provided for the student in Cork at this time. There was as yet in that city no Academy of Arts or other institution like those in Dublin, provided, for the use of students, with those objects which are so essential to the formation of a correct taste in the higher departments of the Fine Arts, namely, a selection of casts from the antique statues: and until such subjects for study were acquired, the efforts of genius, however ardent, in the pursuit of beauty and excellence, were necessarily blind and fortuitous. Happily, however, this desideratum was at length supplied in Cork, where a Society for Promoting the Fine Arts was formed in February 1816; and to this Society the Prince Regent, in 1818, through the intercession of the late Marquis of Conyngham and other Irish noblemen who had influence with him, was induced to present a selection of the finest casts from the antique statues, which had been sent him as a gift by the Roman Pontiff, and the value of which the Prince but little appreciated. The result was not only beyond anything that the most sanguine could have anticipated in the rapid creation of artists of first-rate excellence, but also in establishing the fact that among our own countrymen the finest genius for art abundantly exists, and that it only requires the requisite objects for study, with encouragement, to develope it. The presence of these newly acquired treasures of ancient art, which consisted of one hundred and fifteen subjects selected by Canova, and cast under his direction, kindled a flame in Mr Hogan’s mind never to be extinguished but with life, and he immediately applied himself to their study with his whole heart and soul. Thus occupied he remained till 1823, surrounded and excited to emulation by the kindred spirits of Mac Clise, Scottowe, Ford--the glorious Ford!--Buckley the architect, equally glorious--Keller, his own brother Richard, and many other of lesser names--many of whom, alas for their own and their country’s fame! paid the price of their early distinction with their lives. Well may the people of Cork feel proud of this constellation of youthful genius--a brighter one was never assembled together in recent times.