One of Ireland's best known emigrants, the much loved Paddy Reilly, hasn't come back to Ballyjamesduff for the Christmas and New Year celebrations. And the even sadder news is that if he did turn up, all the signs are that no one would notice.
The Paddy Reilly Lounge in the town centre has been locked and silent for a couple years now, with discarded beer cans piling up in the doorway. Beside it, the Percy French Hotel, named after the man who put Ballyjamesduff on the musical map, is also shuttered and silent amid local speculation that it may soon make way for apartments.
It seems scant reward for the affectionate treatment accorded the Co Cavan town by French, who offered this advice to visitors in search of their own personal Garden of Eden: "Just turn to the left at the bridge of Finea and stop when half-way to Cootehill". But, like the rest of this Celtic Tiger republic, Ballyjamesduff in 2006 is in too much of a hurry to get romantic about itself.
Last summer, to celebrate the changing face of the town, Ballyjamesduff staged a Rainbow Culture Festival, with samba bands and dancing in the streets. As one local cynic put it: "If your man was writing that song today, it would probably be addressed to Igor Slobansky rather than Paddy Reilly, given the number of Poles, Brazilians, Latvians and Lithuanians we have working here now."
At the town's Cavan County Museum, they take a more enlightened view. A special room is devoted to Percy French memorabilia and his life and music provided the background theme for the museum's recent celebration of its 10th anniversary. Curator Dominic Egan says that if he had his way - and the backing of a generous sponsor - Ballyjamesduff would be hosting a Percy French festival and a Percy French summer school every year.
"He's an ideal subject. His life and music touches both parts of this island, from Roscommon, where he was born, to Co Down, which provided his most celebrated song, The Mountains of Mourne, and which has its own Percy French Society. Then there's the UK connection - his songs are well known there and he is buried in Formby in Lancashire. In addition to his music, he was a very talented and prolific landscape painter - they have a selection of his work on show in Bangor - so that's another area that could be explored."
Ironically, curator Egan is not from Cavan, but from Quilty, Co Clare. French has connections with that county too through his lampooning of the West Clare Railway in Are Ye Right There Michael? He had sued the railway company for loss of earnings over a cancelled performance in Kilkee when his train arrived late, following a series of mishaps that included "weeds getting into the boiler". The court awarded him £10, but the song inspired by his experience proved more valuable and long-lasting.
French, born in Cloonyquin, Co Roscommon, in May, 1854, qualified as an engineer at Trinity College and later moved to Cavan as a Board of Works official - "an inspector of drains", as he styled himself in one of his songs. During his seven years in the county he developed his interest in music and drama and also found the inspiration for two of his best songs, Phil the Fluter's Ball and Slattery's Mounted Fut.
It was also in Cavan that, at the age of 36, he met his first wife, Ettie Armytage. Her death in childbirth just a year later, followed almost immediately by the loss of their baby daughter, had a shattering effect on French. In a matter of weeks his hair turned completely white from the strain of the tragedy.
Two years later, he found love again when he met his second wife, Helen Sheldon, from Warwickshire, at an audition. They had three daughters - Ettie (called after his first wife), Mellie and Joan. After a brief flirtation with journalism in Dublin, where he edited a weekly magazine called The Jarvey, French moved with his family to England and turned to the stage for a full-time career.
He proved a popular entertainer in theatres and music halls across Britain and also toured Canada and the US, receiving what the newspapers of the time called "enthusiastic notices in the major cities of the east coast". In 1920, while performing in Glasgow, he was taken ill with pneumonia and died some days later in Formby, where the family lived. He was 65.
Percy French left behind an extensive repertoire of songs, most of them witty, some wistful, and some classics among them. Come Back Paddy Reilly to Ballyjamesduff, a lament for times past that can still cause Irish eyes to moisten, was written as a tribute to his driver, who had emigrated to Scotland.
The real Paddy Reilly did come back and is buried locally. But Percy French, whose songs have entertained generations - and still do - never did return. Even more than 80 years after his death, Ballyjamesduff surely owes him a more fitting memorial than a deserted hotel and empty lounge bar. Dominic Egan has suggested what could be done.
Is there a sponsor out there willing to help?