The author describes himself by initials

The work is in all likelihood in the handwriting of an amanuensis, being written throughout in copper-plate of an extremely clear and readable type ; and the whole is in an excellent state of preservation. The contents are, however, in a sense written anonymously, the lettered title on the backs of the bound volumes being merely “ Travels by T. W.,” while on the written title-page within the author describes himself by initials only, and in the body of the work the identity of the principal persons mentioned is sought to be concealed in a like way. There is one remarkable instance, however, where the writer lays the mask aside, and where his name and that of his fellow traveller, Hugh Moore, appear in full.

This is in the copy of the Certificate given to him by the Superior of the Convent at Nazareth which bears witness to his having visited that city in March, 1789. Whaley’s sudden death at an early age may have interfered with the publication of the Memoirs, but the idea of making them public does not seem to have been abandoned even after his death, for there are many indications in the manuscripts themselves which strongly support the theory that the first volume at least was prepared for the printer. In it are found occasional erasures, while other words have been superadded in a different hand, obviously with a view to toning down some personal revelations which were calculated to hurt the surviving members of the family. I shall have occasion later on to refer to these alterations in greater detail, as the necessity for making them will be better understood after a perusal of the main incidents of Whaley’s life and travels.

Richard Chapell Whaley

Thomas Whaley, in Ireland commonly known as Buck, or Jerusalem Whaley, was born in Dublin on the 15th December, 1766. He was the eldest surviving son of Richard Chapell Whaley, of Whaley Abbey, co. Wicklow, and of Dublin, M.P. for co. Wicklow, 1747-60, a man of considerable property and of ancient descent, whose ancestors had settled in Ireland in the time of Oliver Cromwell, to whom, indeed, two of them were closely related.