 His mother, Mary Kain, was a native of Ballybane, close to Galway city in Ireland.He was educated at the Erasmus Smith School in Galway, Coláiste Iognáid (the "Jes"), and later enrolled in Queen's College Galway, where he studied English literature, history and political economy.While a student at the college, he acquired a considerable reputation as an orator, and was a frequent contributor to meetings of the college's Literary and Debating Society, of which he became vice-auditor for the 1864–1865 session.