American scholar and author, born in Philadelphia, PA, on the 24th of May 1852; graduated at La Salle College and Georgetown University, his education being specially designed for a literary career. For a while he studied law, but soon adopted journalism as a profession, editing McGee’s Illustrated Weekly successfully. He afterward traveled through the Western and Southern states and Mexico, his observations being embodied in various magazine articles and letters to the press. He next became editor of the Catholic Review, and in 1881 of the Freeman’s Journal. He furnished articles for Appleton’s Cyclopædia, and was a frequent contributor to periodical literature. He is the author of several works, including That Girl of Mine (1877); That Lover of Mine (1877); Preludes, Sonnets, Poems and Legends (1880); The Life Around Me (1880); A Collection of Stories (1885); A Garden of Roses (1886); a collection of tales of a marked religious cast; and at various intervals, Essays in English Literature; Modern Novels and Novelists; Primer of English Literature, and The Theater and Christian Parents. His more recent publications include A Gentleman, a book on social ethics, with a chapter on What to Read (1893); The Success of Patrick Esmond; The Vocation of Edward Conway, the latter an interesting picture of American life; Jack Chumleigh, a romance; A Marriage of Reason (1893); Flower of the Flock (1894); The Glories of the Catholic Church, a contribution to encyclopædic literature; and The Best Literature of the World. He was for several years connected with Notre Dame University, IN, as professor of English literature, afterward occupying a position as instructor in the Catholic University of America, in Washington. See also “Maurice de Guérin,” etc.
