Between his marriage in 1880 and the departure of Sir William Gregory to Ceylan, where he was to serve as governor of the colony, Lady Augusta Gregory began drafting a text to which she gave the mysterious title of ‘Carnet of an emigrant’. At that time, she was about 30 years old, although early to undertake a retrospective life: but the work it produces is a remarkable mixture of reminiscences, portraits and poetic vision of existence, which, however, continues to be characterised by a strong truth and a desire to reveal the truth. Although it was not published and received little critical attention, the work provides the basis for what became Lady Gregory’s preferred means of expression: she was going to draw the dramatic and prose works for which she became famous. Lady Gregory named her story ‘Carnet of an emigrant’, perhaps because the second volume (the trial, written by hand, occupies three booklets) tells her stays in Italy, France and Egypt before her marriage; and because she left Ireland for England and Europe for some time after her marriage. But the title could also refer to a permanent exile of the soul, far from the place and time that appears in the narrative. James Pethica also suggested that ‘Carne’ had started almost immediately after its connection with W.S. Blunt and that his title suggested psychological and sexual exile in relation to its past existence.