THE LAND OF EIRE 
 
 THE 
 
 IRISH LAND LEAGUE 
 
 ■ ITS 
 
 Origin, Progress and Consequences 
 
 PRECEDED BY A 
 
 CONCISE HISTORY OF THE VARIOUS MOVEMENTS WHICH HAVE CULMINATED 
 IN THE LAST GREAT AGITATION 
 
 By JOHN DEVOY. 
 
 WITH A 
 
 DESCRIPTIVE AND HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF IRELAND FROM THE 
 EARLIEST PERIOD TO THE PRESENT DAY. 
 
 Illustrated by numerotts Fine Engravings 
 
 Comprising Portraits of the Popular Leaders and Views of the Most 
 Interesting Scenery and Antiquities of the Country. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 
 PATTERSON & NEILSON, 12 DEY STREET, NEW YORK. 
 
 RICHARD NAGLE, 11 BROMFIELD STREET, BOSTON. 
 
 BOSTON COLLEGE LlbKAKY 
 CHESTNUT HILL, MASS. 
 
Digitizad>by-ttiG'Memel! L Archive 
 in 2014 
 
 https://archive.org/details/landofeireirishlOOdevo 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 HE green isle of Erin is blessed with a wealth of superb and exquisite scenery and 
 
 legendary and historical attractions that have for years formed fruitful themes for 
 the poet, the novelist, the historian and the antiquary. The painter too, has 
 transferred to his canvas some of its best examples of natural grandeur and beauty ; while 
 the musician has wedded to its name some of his most charming inspirations. Ireland has 
 consequently become so favorably known to the wonder-seeking world, that it now allures 
 to its shores a considerable flow of the tide of travel ; and admirers of the picturesque, 
 drawn thither to view with unprejudiced eye its abrupt and noble mountains, its shadowy 
 ind secluded lakes, its romantically wild and sylvan streams, its deep-set glens and its 
 bounding waterfalls, leave with but one feeling — that if it is not the " first flower of the 
 earth" it is, without doubt, the "first gem of the sea." There is not, indeed, an island of 
 more enchanting loveliness ; yet, there is combined with its scenic charms a richness of 
 antiquity found in a profusion of magnificent ruin, and of castle, cathedral, monastery, and 
 palace ; while many of its cities, and especially its capital, possess modern edifices, which 
 display correct architectural taste and present pleasing aspects of public improvement. 
 
 A work which comprises pictorial delineations of the leading artistic features, and an 
 historical and descriptive account of such a country, fulfils a three-fold mission. It 
 refreshes the memory of the traveler, when at his domestic hearth his mind reverts to the 
 pleasures of his wayfarings ; and it affords him a store of information relative to the 
 places he has visited, which he is unable either to gather or digest while journeying 
 along. It is equally valuable to those who, unable to leave their homes, delight to wander 
 in the imagination to far-off lands, as it enables them to form some idea of their peculiar 
 characteristics ; and it appeals directly to the eye and heart of the native born, who is 
 naturally animated with that love of country which finds its inspiration in every patriotic 
 breast. The sons and daughters of Erin are renowned for their home affections, which are 
 increased in intensity when their lot is cast in foreign climes. It must be not alone 
 
ii PREFACE 
 
 their natural desire, but that of all those who claim as the home of their fathers that 
 " sweetest isle of the ocean," to possess a more substantial souvenir of their beloved land 
 than can be obtained from dreams of its "sea-beaten shore," and it is evident all will find 
 in the present work attractions that cannot fail to make it interesting and popular. 
 
 But Ireland is remarkable in her history, as well as in her scenery and antiquities, and 
 the great agitations which have stirred her people during the present century have occu- 
 pied a considerable share of the world's attention. They have left indelible marks on the 
 character of the Irish people, and it is therefore proper in a work of this kind to devote 
 some attention to them. The great Land Agitation, led by Charles Stewart Parnell and 
 Michael Davitt, has effected such changes in the relations between the various classes of 
 the population, and between Ireland and England, that it is well worthy of serious study. 
 In "the opening chapters the events which led up to it, the springs of action, the aims 
 and objects of its founders and prime movers, and. the work it accomplished, are sketched 
 from the inside, and an array of facts never before published are presented. 
 
 The reader will thus be enabled to note the changes in the public life of Ireland dur- 
 ing an eventful period, and to see the country and the people just as they are at the 
 present time. Every effort has been made, in short, to present a faithful, comprehensive 
 and complete picture of the Emerald Isle. 
 
 J. D. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Part I. 
 
 Chapter. 
 
 I. — IRELAND'S POLITICAL AND SOCIAL CONDITION, 
 
 Page. 
 
 9 
 
 The Philosophy of Irish History — Survival of an Ancient Civilization and its Influence on 
 the National Struggle — Warring Races and Conflicting Social Systems — From 'Eighty-two 
 to the Land League. 
 
 II.— A NEW DEPARTURE IN IRISH AFFAIRS, 35 
 
 The National Spirit Unbroken by the Abortive Rising of 1867 — Reorganizing the Forces 
 of Disaffection — The Manchester Rescue and the Election of John Mitchel — Rise of the Par- 
 nell Group of Irish Members — Davitt and the American Nationalists — Foundation and 
 Progress of the Land League. 
 
 III.— THE LAND WAR AND ITS RESULTS, 63 
 
 Parnell and Dillon in America — How the American Land League was Founded — The 
 Parliamentary Elections of 1880 — Davitt's Second Visit to the United States — His Return 
 and Arrest — The Land Act and Coercion — Arrest of the Members and the No Rent Mani- 
 festo — The " Treaty of Kilmainham " and the Phcenix Park Murders — General Outcome of 
 the League's Work — A New Ireland. 
 
 General Character of the Counties of Cork and Kerry — Antiquities — Tower at Kinneath — 
 Historical Notice of the City of Cork : Streets, Bridges and Public Buildings — Birthplace of 
 Distinguished Persons — Character of the Inhabitants — Suburbs of Cork — Blarney Village 
 and Castle — Tradition of the Blarney Stone — Curious Cromlech and Druidic Relics — Road 
 from Cork to Bantry — Bantry Bay — Attempted Landings of the French there — Glengariff — 
 Its Scenery — Cromwell's Bridge — The Harbor. 
 
 II. 
 
 Chapter. 
 
 I.— THE CITY OF CORK TO BANTRY BAY, - 
 
 Page. 
 
 I 
 
iv. 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 Chapter. Page. 
 
 II.— THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY, 28 
 
 Road from Glengariff — Kenmare — Town of Killarney — Ross Island and Castle — O'Donog- 
 hue's Prison — Romantic Tradition Respecting the Chief — Innisfallen, its Ruins, and its 
 Annals — Abbey of Muckross — Tore Cascade — Middle and Lower Lakes — Derrycunihy Cas- 
 cade — Taking a Stag — Panoramic View of the Lakes — Ronayne's Island — Old Weir Bridge — 
 Meeting of the Waters — Glena Cottage — View from Innisfallen — O'Sullivan's Cascade — 
 Muckross Revisited — Legend of the Yew Tree — General Remarks on the Scenery — The 
 Upper Lake — Colman's Leap — Eagle's Nest — Cave and Gap of Dunloe — Carran-Tuel — 
 Mangerton — Devil's Punch Bowl — The Beggar Nuisance. 
 
 III.— VALLEYS OF THE FLESK AND THE LEE, 
 
 Killaha Castle — Labbig - Owen — Macroom — Inchageela — Lough Allua — Gougane Barra — 
 Remarks on "Patrons" — Pass of Keimaneigh — Abbey and Castle of Kilcrea — Plundering 
 Bands of Kernes — Ballincollig — Inniscarra — "The Ovens" — Carrigrohan Castle — Love of 
 Dancing Amongst the Irish — Approach to Cork. 
 
 IV.— QUEENSTOWN AND ITS HARBOR, 
 
 The River Lee below Cork — Glanmire and Dunkettle — Blacfcrock Castle and its Associa- 
 tions — Ursuline Convent — Dundanion Castle — Little Island — Subterranean Chambers at 
 Carrigtohill — Lough Mahon — Foaty — Passage — Giant's Stairs — Monkstown and its Castle — 
 Queenstown — Ancient and Modern Yachting — Barrymore Island — Queenstown Harbor — 
 Drake's Escape from the Spaniards — Beauties of the Harbor and River Scenery — Rostellan 
 Castle — Sword of Brian Boroihme — Castle Mary and its Ancient Cromlechs — Cloyne and its 
 Cathedral — Bishop Berkeley — Turaghan, or Round Tower — Remarks on the Round Towers 
 of Ireland. 
 
 V.— ALONG THE SOUTH-EASTERN SHORE, 92 
 
 Youghal and its Collegiate Church — Residence of Sir Walter Raleigh — Introduction of 
 Potatoes into Ireland — Valley of the Blackwater — Dromana and the Desmonds — Lismore 
 and its Castle — Dungarvan — Tramore Bay — Dunbrody Abbey — Harbor and City of Water- 
 ford — Cathedral and Reginald's Tower — Villages on the Coast — Saltee Islands — Discovery 
 of Refugees — Harbor and Town of Wexford — Baronies of Forth and Bargy and their 
 peculiarities. 
 
 VI.— FROM KILKENNY TO QUEENSTOWN, 112 
 
 New Ross and its Historic Incidents — Kilkenny, its Castle and Cathedral — Round 
 Tower and other Antiquities — Its Eminent Collegians — Amateur Theatricals — Curious 
 Case of Witchcraft — Cave of Dunmore — Jerpoint Abbey — Valley of the Suir — Slieve-na- 
 man — Racing for a husband — Clonmel, the "Vale of Honey" — Bianconi and his 
 cars — Donoghmore and Fethard — Cahir — Caves of Mitchelstown — Moat of Knock- 
 graffon — Tipperary — The "Golden Vale" — Rock of Cashel — Cashel Cathedral — Round 
 Tower — Cormac's Chapel — Hore Abbey — Holy Cross Abbey — Thurles — Kilcolman 
 Castle. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 v. 
 
 Chapter. Page. 
 
 VIL— THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS r40 
 
 Old Head of Kinsale — Baltimore Bay — Cape Clear — Dunmanus Bay — Bantry Bay — 
 Harbors of Kerry — Derrynane Abbey — The Skelligs — Island of Valentia and Atlantic 
 Cable — Dingle Bay — The Blaskets — Tralee Harbor and Town — Kerry Head — Bally- 
 bunion — Mineral Wealth of Kerry — Sunken City — Loop Head — Natural Bridges at 
 Ross — Kilkee — Remarkable Cave — Bishop's Rock — Puffing Cavern — Romantic Coast 
 Scenery — Cove in Malbay — Birds of the Coast — Milltown Malbay — Lahinch — Kilfenora — 
 Cliffs of Moher — Arran Islands — Bays of Connemara — Ballynahinch — Roundstone — 
 Urrisbeg — Clifden — The Killary— Mvveelrea — Delphi Lodge. 
 
 VIII. — FROM GALWAY TO LIMERICK, 170 
 
 Bay of Galway, formerly a Lake — Town of Galway — Spanish Aspects — Origin of the 
 name — Early History — The Tribes of Galway — Sieges the Town has Undergone — 
 Lynch Castle and the Lynch Family — Tragical Story of the Warden of Galway — Col- 
 legiate Church of St. Nicholas — Queen's College — Eminent Men of Galway — The 
 Claddagh, its People and their Peculiar Customs — Population and Trade of Galway 
 — Its Commercial Advantages — Proximity to America — Natural Features — Abbey of 
 Clare-Galway — Athenry — Tuam and its Two Cathedrals — Gort — Lough Cooter and 
 its Eccentric Outlet — Cathedral and Round Tower of Kilmacduagh — Ennis — 
 Ruined Abbeys of Clare and Killone — Clare Castle. 
 
 IX.— LIMERICK AND THE LOWER SHANNON, 184 
 
 Kilrush — Scattery Island, its Churches and Legends — Grave of "The Colleen Bawn" — 
 Tarbert — Castle of Glin — Foynes — Adare, its Castle and Ecclesiastical Edifices — Castle 
 of Bunratty — Carrig-o-Gunnell Castle, and its Commanding View — Approach to Lim- 
 erick — Wellesley Bridge — English and Irish Towns — Newton Pery — Limerick compared 
 with New York — The Bridges — Historical Events and Memorable Sieges — The Violated 
 Treaty — Limerick Castle — Old Thomond Bridge and the Treaty Stone — St. Mary's 
 Cathedral — Legend of its Bells — Other Religious Structures — Public Buildings and 
 Commercial Enterprises — Limerick Lasses and Street Minstrels — Garryowen — Mungret 
 and its Monastic Remains. 
 
 X. — THE MIDDLE AND UPPER SHANNON, 204 
 
 Course of the River — Doonass Rapids — Castle Connell and its Historical Associations 
 — Killaloe — Kinkora, the Palace of Brian Boroimhe — Lough Derg — Innis-Cealtra or 
 Holy Island — Picturesque Scenery — Portumna — Archaeological Discoveries — Clonfert — 
 Grand Canal — River Suck — Ballinasloe and its Famous Fair — Battle of Aughrim — 
 Seven Churches of Clonmacnoise — Temple McDermott — Round Towers — Ancient Cross 
 — Athlone and its Brave Defenders — Lissoy, the scene of the "Deserted Village" — 
 Upper Shannon — Lough Ree — Rincruin — Roscommon — Seven Churches of Kilbarry — 
 Carrick-on-Shannon — Source of the River. 
 
 XI. — FROM THE SHANNON TO THE METROPOLIS, 225 
 
 Longford — Edgeworthstown and the Edgeworths — Multifarnham and its Abbey — Lough 
 Ouel — Mullingar— Lough Ennel— Bog of Allen — Ancient Seminary of Clonard — Dangan 
 Castle and the Wellesleys— Hill and Castle of Carbury— Maynooth Castle and College 
 —Approach to Dublin. 
 
Part III. 
 
 Chapter. Page. 
 
 I.— THE CITY OF DUBLIN, i 
 
 Ancient Divisions of Ireland — Situation of the Metropolis — Origin of its Name and 
 Important Events in its History — Population and Social Classification — Castle of Dublin, its 
 History and Past and Present Uses — Cathedral of St. Patrick, its Erection and Restoration — 
 Notable Monuments and Choral Music — The Story of " Stella " — Christ Church Cathedral 
 and its Restoration — Monument to Strongbow — Lord Portlester's Chapel — St. Michael's 
 Church and its Antiseptic Vaults — Modern Protestant Churches — Roman Catholic Edifices — 
 Trinity College — College Green and its Statues — Bank of Ireland— Old Parliament House — 
 Theatres — Royal Dublin Society — Stephen's Green — Exhibition Palace — International 
 Exhibitions. 
 
 II.— THE CITY OF DUBLIN (Continued), 24 
 
 Quays of the Liffey— Kilmainham Hospital— The Bridges — The Four Courts — Queen's 
 Inn — Royal Exchange or City Hall — Views from Carlisle Bridge— Sackville Street — 
 Nelson's Pillar — Post Office — Rotunda and Lying-in Hospital — Statues to Smith O'Brien 
 and O'Connell — Custom House — North and South Walls — Docks and Basins — Commerce 
 and Manufactures — Literary and Benevolent Institutions — Railways — Eminent Natives — 
 Phoenix Park — Wellington Testimonial — People's and Zoological Gardens — Vice Regal 
 Lodge— Origin and Beauty of the Park — The "Fifteen Acres," and the Good Old Days. 
 
 III.— THE UPPER LIFFEY AND BEYOND KILDARE, ------ 44 
 
 Beauty of the Dublin Suburbs — Valley of the Liffey — Castleknock and its Legends— The 
 "Strawberry Beds" — Woodlands — Lucan — Leixlip and its Salmon Leap — Celbridge— Swift 
 and "Vanessa" — Clane — Roman Catholic College at Clangowes Wood — Sallins — Grand 
 Canal — Naas — Falls of Poul-a-Phouca — Kilcullen — Curragh of Kildare — City of Kildare — 
 Athy — Mullimast and its Historic Associations — Moat of Ascul — Carlow — Clondalkin and 
 its Round Tower. 
 
 IV. — THE SEABOARD ENVIRONS OF DUBLIN, 57 
 
 Marino — Clontarf and its Battle Ground — Malahide Castle — The Widowed Bride — Lambay 
 — Ireland's Eye — Howth Castle and its Valiant Possessors — The Stolen Heir — Howth 
 Harbor and Ancient Abbey — Bailey Lighthouse — Historical Importance of the Promontory — 
 View of Dublin Bay — Kingstown and its Fine Harbor — Dalkey Atmospheric Railway — 
 Killiney Hill and the View Therefrom— Mock Kingdom of Dalkey -Killiney Village and 
 Bay — Ballybrack — Bray — Kilruddery House — Bray Head and its Prospect — Mount Anville — 
 Donnybrook Fair. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Vll 
 
 ^napccr. 
 
 V. — THE BEAUTIES OF WICKLOW, 79 
 
 Character of the Scenery — Dundrum — Three Rock Mountain — Kilgobbin — " The Scalp" — 
 
 Enniskerry Sugar Loaf Mountain — Glen of the Dargle — Powerscourt Castle, Deerpark, 
 
 and Waterfall— Tinnahinch— Loughs Bray— Douce Mountain— Lough Tay or Luggelaw— 
 Druidical Rocking Stone — Lough Dan — Roundwood — Mountains, Glens, and Military 
 Road— Glendalough, its Ruins, Loughs, and Legends— Round Tower— St. Kevin and the 
 Infatuated Kathleen— Glenmalure— Lugnaquilla— Rathdrum— Castle Howard— Meeting of 
 the Waters — Vale of Avoca — Woods of Shillelagh — Shelton Abbey — Arklow — Town of 
 Wicklow— Rosanna House and the Author of " Psyche "—Devil's Glen— Pass of Dunran— 
 Glen of the Downs. 
 
 VI. — THE VALLEY OF THE BOYNE, no 
 
 Historic Importance of the River — Glasnevin and its Celebrities — Trim and its Ancient 
 Castle — Newtown Trim and its Ecclesiastical Ruins — Bective Abbey — Hill of Tara and its 
 Historic Glories — Beauty of the River's Banks — Holy Wells — Patterns and the Cause of 
 their Decline — Athlumney Castle — Navan — Kells and St. Columbkille — Hill of Telton and 
 its Ancient Fair — Strange Matrimonial Custom — Church and Round Tower of Donaghmore — 
 Antiquities at Slane — St. Patrick's Defiance— Brugh-na-Boinne, the Royal Cemetery— Mound 
 at New Grange — Battle of the Boyne — Drogheda and its Associations — Mellifont and 
 Monasterboice. 
 
 VII. — THE MOURNE MOUNTAINS AND ARMAGH, 127 
 
 Dunleer and its Sovereign — Dundalk and the Last King of Ireland — Greenore and 
 Greencastle — Carlingford Magnificent Scenery — Monument to General Ross — Carlingford 
 Bay — Beautiful Ross -Trevor— Slieve Ban and Cloughmore — Kingdom of Mourne — Kilkeel — 
 Slieve Donard — Newcastle — Dundrum — Downpatrick, the Last Resting Place of the 
 Patron Saint — Mountain Seats and Villages — Rathfriland — Warrenpoint — Narrow Water 
 Castle — Newry and its Associations — Armagh and its Ecclesiastical Renown — The Modern 
 Archiepiscopal City — Portadown, Lurgan, and Lismore — Approach to Belfast. 
 
 VIII— BELFAST AND THE ANTRIM COAST, 139 
 
 View from Cave Hill — Early History and Modern Growth of Belfast — Docks and Shipping 
 — Linen Trade — Public, Religious and Educational Edifices — Eminent Citizens — Commerce 
 of Belfast — Giant's Ring — Belfast Lough — Antrim and its Round Tower — Shane's Castle — 
 Lough Neagh — Carrickfergus and its Castle — Bangor — Donaghadee — Island Magee — Larne — 
 Castle of Olderfleet — Glenarm, and the Race which Won it — Nachore Hill and Garron 
 Point — Glenariff and Red Bay — Cushendall and Cushendun — Tor Head — Glendun — Fair 
 Head and its Basaltic Columns — Ballycastle and its Coal Mines — Antrim Coast Road. 
 
 IX.— THE GIANT'S CAUSEWAY, - - 163 
 
 Kenbane Castle — Rathlin Island and Brace's Castle — Carrick-a-Rede and its Flying-Bridge 
 — Dunseverick Castle — Bengore Head — The Giant's Causeway and its Fabulous Origin — 
 First Impressions Deceptive — Wonderful Natural Phenomenon — "Measurement and 
 Geometrical Characteristics — Giant's Organ, Loom, and other Curious Basaltic Conforma- 
 tions — Giant's Amphitheatre and Chimney Tops — The Pleaskin — Indentations of the Coast — 
 Dunkerry and Portcoon Caves — Wonders of the Causeway Contemplated — Dunluce Castle 
 and its Checkered History — The White Rocks and the Priest's Hole — Portrush — 
 Coleraine — Magilligan and Limavady. 
 
viii. 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 Chapter. Page. 
 
 X.— LONDONDERRY AND THE NORTHWEST, 181 
 
 The "Maiden City" — Its Early History — Londonderry and the Plantation of Ulster — 
 The Memorable Siege — Ancient Bastions and Gates — Walker's Pillar — Cathedral and other 
 Public Edifices — Loughs Foyle and Swilly — Peninsula of Innishowen — Grianan Aileach — 
 Strabane, Newton Stewart and Omagh — Enniskillen — Devenish Island, its Churches and 
 Round Tower — The River Erne — The Upper and Lower Loughs — Lough Derg and St. 
 Patrick's Purgatory — Fisheries of Ballyshannon — Donegal Town and Bay — Grandeur of 
 Donegal Scenery — Sligo — Hazlewood and Lough Gill— Ballina — Roserk Abbey — Abbey of 
 Moyne — Killala — French Invasion — Lough Conn and Mt. Nephin — Lough Cullen — 
 Castlebar. 
 
 XL— CONNEMARA AND JOYCE'S COUNTRY, 202 
 
 Historic Districts — Westport and Clew Bay — Croagh Patrick and the Prospect it Embraces 
 — Achill and Clare Islands — Grace O'Malley, the Sea Rover — Leenane — The Joyce 
 Family — The Killary — Loughs Fee and Kylemore — Pass of Kylemore — Letterfrack — 
 Lough Inagh — Maamturc and Binabola Mountains — Characteristics of the Scenery — Loughs 
 Derryclare and Garromin — Roads to Galway and Cong — Hen's Castle — Cong, its Abbey 
 and Ancient Crosses — Monumental Remains — Subterranean River — Plain of Moytura — 
 Loughs Mask and Corrib, their Islands and Fortresses — Return to Galway. 
 
THE LAND OF EIRE. 
 
 Part I— THE IRISH LAND LEAGUE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 IRELAND'S POLITICAL AND SOCIAL CONDITION. 
 
 The Philosophy of Irish History — Survival of an Ancient Civilization and its Influence on the 
 National Struggle — Warring Races and Conflicting Social Systems — From 'Eighty-two to 
 the Land League. 
 
 IRELAND occupies a position in the world which is entirely anomalous 
 and peculiar. Her geographical position gives her a climate and a 
 scenery widely differing from those of the rest of Europe, and her 
 history, politics, and social system present contrasts equally striking. 
 
 Lying outside the march of the Roman legions, she was the only 
 country of Western Europe which was able to preserve and hand down 
 to modern times an older, if less perfect, civilization, the marks of which 
 are indelibly stamped on the character of the people. In the long, dark 
 night which followed the destruction of the Western Empire she was 
 the one bright spot where liberty, literature, and art found a refuge, and 
 from the spark preserved in her schools, the light of knowledge was again 
 spread over Europe, and the rude Northern barbarians, whose sway 
 replaced that of Rome, were civilized by her missionaries. The brutal 
 and degrading feudal system obtained no foothold on her soil, and in 
 
 B 
 
IO 
 
 IRELAND'S POLITICAL IMPORTANCE. 
 
 the twelfth century the Anglo-Norman freebooters, who commenced the 
 English Conquest, found a social organization recognizing the equality of 
 man, and the people as the owners of the land. From that day to the 
 present a struggle has been going on between two conflicting principles 
 — two antagonistic systems, which are contending for the mastery of the 
 world. It is a war of races, but none the less a conflict of principles. 
 
 Thus Ireland has for centuries received a share of the world's atten- 
 tion out of all proportion with her population or the extent of her 
 territory. No country of such insignificant proportions, with the excep- 
 tion of ancient Greece, has ever played so conspicuous a part in human 
 affairs. Her misfortunes, her sufferings, the achievements of her exiled 
 sons, the social and political questions which agitate her people, her 
 relations with the greatest empire the world has seen since the fall of 
 Rome, have afforded a fascinating subject for study to European states- 
 men and thinkers for many generations. But the events of the past 
 few years have enhanced this interest, and fixed the attention of the 
 civilized world upon her with an intensity without precedent in her 
 previous history. The immediate cause of this increased importance was 
 the Land Agitation, which started in 1879, ap d nas since put English 
 statesmanship to a greater strain than anything that has occurred since 
 the wars growing out of the French Revolution. 
 
 No more remarkable change has occurred in any country in Europe 
 during this century than that which, to one who goes beneath the 
 surface, is visible in the Irish people since then. Nothing like it has 
 been seen since the great Revolution swept like a tornado over France, 
 tearing away the whole fabric of the old society, and uprooting insti- 
 tutions whose foundations had been firmly imbedded in the soil by a 
 thousand years of human toil directed by genius of the highest order. 
 
 The fact that this is only apparent to those who are familiar with 
 the politics and social life of the country, the thoughts and hopes and 
 impulses of the people, is, in some degree, owing to the process by 
 which it has been brought about. No visible, tangible thing has been 
 knocked down or destroyed, no new institution has been built up. The 
 change is in 7neris minds, and is still going on. It is the mental revolution 
 which always precedes — and must always precede — the overturning of old 
 political or social systems, and the substitution of a new order of things. 
 
A GRADUAL PROCESS OF CHANGE. 
 
 1 1 
 
 But this revolution has not taken place in a day. Although only 
 visible since the starting of the Land League, the process of change has 
 been going on for generations. The events, the ideas, the causes which 
 led up to it, have been in steady operation for centuries and the out- 
 come is as clear, natural and logical as anything within the reach of 
 human knowledge. The movement which has so agitated Ireland and 
 fixed the attention of the world upon her, was as much the result of those 
 that preceded it, and of the causes from which they sprang, as the ripe 
 grain is the result of the seed sown by the husbandman. No new idea 
 had come into Ireland, no sudden impulse had seized upon the people, 
 no prophet had arisen to preach a new political or social creed ; but 
 ideas and principles planted generations ago, and nurtured in blood and 
 tears and unparalleled human suffering, had commenced to bear fruit. 
 The Anglo-Norman Conquest, the four centuries of incessant struggle 
 that preceded the final defeat of O'Neill at Kinsale, the Reformation, the 
 plantations, confiscations and butcheries of the Stuarts and of Cromwell, 
 the Penal Laws, the short lived Independence of the Irish Parliament, 
 the pitchcap, the gibbet, and the slaughterings of '98, the Emancipation 
 and Repeal movements, the Famine of '47, Young Ireland, Fenianism — 
 all contributed their share to bring about this state of things and to 
 shape the thoughts and feelings of the people. 
 
 But the more recent movements have had decidedly the deepest 
 influence, as they were themselves the latest product, the fullest develop- 
 ment, up to their time, of a steady and certain progression of events. 
 The Land League was a product of Fenianism, as the latter was a 
 product of Young Ireland. Its principles, no matter how modified by 
 time and circumstances, it derived from the literature of Young Ireland, 
 and its organization directly through its founder, from Fenianism. To 
 ignore this fact is to ignore the true significance of the new situation. 
 
 The history of this change is the history of Ireland during three 
 eventful years ; but, to properly understand it, a rapid survey of the 
 events which preceded it, and of the conditions of politics and society 
 prevailing at the time this great movement began, will be necessary. 
 
 Three years before, to judge by whatever of political life was visible 
 on the surface, Ireland was practically dead. Hardly a ripple of activity 
 disturbed the placid surface or showed there was any life below. No 
 
12 
 
 AGITATION'S, CONSPIRACIES AND COMPROMISES. 
 
 one who knew the people, it is true, doubted for a moment the existence 
 of the old dislike for English rule, the old longing for a separate 
 national existence, on the part of the great majority of the people. 
 But, for the moment, it did not show itself in public acts. Whatever 
 of activity there was, consisted of quiet, steady work and organization, 
 with a view to the future, rather than a lively interest in the events of 
 the day or a hope of any immediate results. A period of unwonted 
 calm had set in after the partial collapse of the Fenian movement, and 
 Isaac Butt's weak and half-hearted Home Rule agitation had fallen flat. 
 Started immediately after the Disestablishment of the Irish Protestant 
 Church, it for a time attracted a few dozen Conservatives, angry with 
 England for depriving them, more in appearance than reality, of their 
 old ascendency ; but the advent to power of a Tory Cabinet brought 
 them back to the old flag, and they have ever since remained on the 
 side of the English connection. Butt's ill-defined and cumbrous plan, 
 which he called Federalism, but which had nothing in it to justify the 
 title, had no charms for the people; and, although, for the time, the most 
 popular man in Ireland, he failed to make his organization strike its 
 roots in the country. It died with its founder. The Irish people have 
 never liked compromise movements, and it is probable they never will. 
 Their ideal, which has been handed down with singular fidelity from 
 generation to generation for many centuries, is absolute independence ; 
 and the great majority of those who cannot see any chance of the 
 proximate realization of that solution of the national problem, prefer to 
 look for some temporary good from the foreign government rather than 
 lower the national demand. The only serious compromise ever proposed 
 was Repeal of the Union ; and that, it must never be forgotten, includes 
 the independence of the Irish Parliament. No man who has had an 
 opportunity of conversing with old Repealers among the peasantry could 
 fail to note the strong preference they entertain for Separation, and the 
 almost religious reverence for the memory of the United Irishmen, who 
 were all Separatists and Republicans. Since 1782, when the modern 
 school of Irish Nationalism was founded, revolutionary attempts aiming at 
 separation and agitations for redress of minor or class grievances have 
 succeeded one another with unerring regularity, the only exception being 
 the Repeal movement — and Repeal is Separation in a modified form. 
 
SIR CHARLES GAVAN DUFFY. 
 
A GLANCE BACK TO 'EIGHTY-TWO. 13 
 
 When the people think of self-government they think of" complete Na- 
 tional Independence ; and when defeat or disappointment shatters their 
 hopes, their attention is turned to their personal or class interests, and 
 then Catholic Associations, Anti-Tithe movements or Tenant Leagues are 
 the result. 
 
 Glancing back over the last hundred years, we find nine great move- 
 ments among the Irish people looking to the political or social ameliora- 
 tion of their condition, viz.: the Volunteers of 1782; the United 
 Irishmen; the agitation for Catholic Emancipation; the Anti-Tithe 
 War; the Repeal Agitation; the Irish Confederation, or Young Ireland 
 Movement; the Tenant League; the Irish Revolutionary Brotherhood, 
 generally called Fenianism ; and the Land League. Of these nine 
 movements, five were for National Independence in a more or less 
 absolute form, and four for the redress at the hands of the British 
 Parliament of grievances affecting the majority of the population. 
 In all cases the demand for the lesser thino- followed an unsuccessful 
 
 O 
 
 effort to secure the greater. A knowledge of all these movements 
 is necessary to a thorough understanding of the condition of Ireland at 
 the present time. 
 
 The first of these, that of the Volunteers, was very remarkable, 
 and has left a lasting impression on the political feelings and the 
 intellect of the Irish people ever since. The great majority of the 
 population, the Catholic masses who inherited the hopes and aspira- 
 tions, the loves and the hatreds as well as the religion, of the old 
 race, were at that period sunk in poverty and enforced ignorance. 
 The dark night of the Penal Laws had left its mark upon them, and 
 they were utterly without political life. There was no cohesion, no 
 leadership, no common ground of action among them, except a sense 
 of intolerable wrong. With few exceptions the only educated men 
 among them were the priests who had been brought up in foreign semi- 
 naries. The whole educated class — the descendants of the old chieftains, 
 who included all the trained intellect of the race at that time — had been 
 swept away at Limerick ; and the spirit and manhood and enterprise that 
 from time to time had grown up among the people during the Penal 
 times, had sought a field for its energies, and, in very many instances, 
 won distinction, in France and Spain and Austria. This constant drain 
 
14 
 
 THROUGH THE NIGHT OF THE PENAL LAWS. 
 
 on the intellect of the race produced a very marked effect. Robbed of 
 their land, deprived of every opportunity of educating their children, shut 
 out from every avenue of advancement in professional and commercial 
 life, deprived of all voice in the public affairs of the country, they had 
 lost everything but the quick natural intelligence and the physical cour- 
 age which have characterized the race in all ages. They had also pre- 
 served another quality — the result, probably, of the two just mentioned — 
 which, perhaps, has had a greater effect in enabling them to live through 
 their misfortunes — the faculty of absorbing and assimilating foreign races 
 settled among them. This has been a characteristic of the Celts in all 
 ages and all climes. A by no means inconsiderable proportion of the 
 Catholic peasantry of Ireland to-day are unquestionably descended from 
 the soldiers of Cromwell and of William III., who were planted among 
 them to hold the country for England, and men with unmistakable 
 English names constantly figure in anti-English movements of all kinds. 
 But those who were thus absorbed during the Penal days were naturally 
 victims of the disadvantages which affected the old race and the only- 
 immediate consequence was the alteration in the numbers of the friends 
 and the foes of the British Government. The land, the trade and 
 manufactures, the professions, the magistracy, the administration — the 
 whole wealth, power and education of the country, were in the hands 
 of a foreign colony, partly English, partly Scotch, but recruited some- 
 what by accessions from the old race, and beginning, almost unknown to 
 itself, to assume an Irish character. 
 
 Perhaps no such spectacle has ever been presented in any country, 
 and certainly not in modern times, as that afforded by Ireland during 
 the last two centuries; and it is in this respect the Irish question differs 
 from the Polish, the Hungarian, the Italian and other national ques- 
 tions of recent years. The mass of the people were of one race, one 
 religion, and clung with stubborn tenacity to their own ideas of govern- 
 ment, of law and, above all, the tenure of land. The aristocracy, the 
 land-owning class, the commercial and professional classes, were all of 
 foreign origin, regarded themselves as a foreign garrison, and were sus- 
 tained in their ascendency only by the military force of a powerful 
 empire. They monopolized all the education in the country and rigidly 
 excluded the majority from any of its benefits. The contest was unequal 
 
THE DAWNING OF NATIONAL LIFE. 
 
 >5 
 
 — poverty and ignorance on the one side ; wealth, education and foreign 
 support on the other — and the gradual uprising of this old race from 
 its position of degradation, its self-emancipation from the intellectual, 
 moral and physical shackles imposed upon it, is one of the most instruc- 
 tive spectacles of modern times. No stronger evidence of the tenacity 
 of racial characteristics and racial genius can be produced than is 
 afforded by a careful study of the history of Ireland during the last three 
 centuries. 
 
 Ireland, so situated, so divided, so politically prostrated, awoke in 
 1782, after a troubled sleep of a century, began to know herself, and 
 commenced that long and painful progress upward to nationhood which 
 is yet going on, and the end of which the Irishmen of the present 
 generation think they see clearly before them. And it was the boom of 
 American cannon which sent the first thrill of life to her heart ; it was 
 the fires lighted at Lexington and Bunker Hill from which the flame of 
 liberty that has since sent its fierce glare through the land, received the 
 spark which ignited it. 
 
 Although Ireland had at this period a nominal Parliament, it had no 
 real power. Representing the English colony alone, it was unable to 
 guard the industries of the country — the exclusive property of that col- 
 ony — from the effects of Imperial legislation aiming at their destruc- 
 tion. Although obliged to contribute to the support of the Imperial 
 army, Ireland was at the mercy of any foreign enemy that might appear 
 on her coasts. The strain of the American Revolution had crippled the 
 military resources of England and the country was almost denuded of 
 troops. The people were disarmed, unorganized, and the executive utterly 
 helpless, when the arrival of a French fleet on the northeastern coast 
 spread consternation and dismay in England and in the English colony in 
 Ireland. Had Ireland been then as she has been many times in recent 
 years, the Irish question would have been settled in a campaign of a few 
 short weeks, and the miseries that have since afflicted the country and 
 drained it of the flower of its population would have had no existence. 
 If she were then as shew as from 1879 to I S82, the absence of the Eng- 
 glish troops would have sufficed without the advent of an invading force. 
 As it was, the great majority of the people would have welcomed the 
 French with open arms, had they landed, and considered any change as 
 
1 6 
 
 EFFECT OF THE VOLUNTEER CONVENTIONS. 
 
 a blessing. But, without organization, arms or leaders, and sunk in 
 hopeless ignorance, they could do nothing but look listlessly on, hoping 
 for the best. 
 
 The Protestant colonists sprang to arms, and, for the first time in 
 their history, began to think, and feel and act as Irishmen. It was the 
 dawning of a new era for Ireland. The danger of invasion being past, 
 the military organization was preserved, and the people given the habit of 
 coming together. A new focus of public life was created, discussion of 
 public affairs naturally followed, and discussion soon convinced thousands 
 of young Irish Protestants, of English and Scotch descent, that Ireland 
 had interests totally distinct from those of England, and that the peo- 
 ple of Ireland alone were competent to take care of them. A sense of 
 the danger they had escaped opened the eyes of many to the folly of 
 persecuting the Catholics, and more cordial relations began to be culti- 
 vated between the hitherto warring sects. The meeting of a convention 
 of the Volunteers was the introduction of a powerful political weapon 
 into a country unused to liberty and unfamiliar with the methods of 
 popular politics. In a few short months Ireland leaped from the most 
 backward and unprogressive position in Europe, to the first rank of 
 democracy ; and, in spite of unparalleled calamities and a terrible succession 
 of misfortunes, she has ever since preserved the impulse then given. She 
 began then an amalgamation of the conflicting races and various political 
 forces within her borders which has been many times arrested and 
 impeded by English statesmanship and English influence, but which the 
 best intellects and most devoted patriotism in Ireland have continued to 
 cherish to the present day as the only hope of their country. 
 
 Demand after demand was made on the English Government and, as 
 the forces at its disposal could not cope with the armed Volunteers, it 
 was obliged to yield ; but with the settled purpose of taking all back 
 on the first favorable opportunity. In this way "Free Trade" — not the 
 thing designated by the term to-day, but the removal of restrictions 
 and prohibitions specially enacted for the destruction of Irish trade — was 
 conceded, and the Independence of the Irish Parliament followed. 
 
 The lesson drawn from these events by the ablest intellects that 
 Ireland has since produced is that England, in her hour of difficulty and 
 danger, yielded to the threat, and the presence, of physical force what 
 
EIGHTEEN YEARS OE PROGRESS. 
 
 17 
 
 she had denied to the most eloquent appeals for justice. Thomas Davis, 
 the Protestant poet, and the apostle of the modern school of Irish 
 National thought, puts the matter in language that will always appeal to 
 the Irish popular mind, in a few simple lines: — 
 
 " Remember still, through good and ill, 
 How vain were pray'rs and tears ; 
 How vain were words, 'till flashed the swords 
 Of the Irish Volunteers ! " 
 
 And O'Connell, who was not a revolutionist, but a man of peace who 
 preached the doctrine that " no amount of human liberty was worth the 
 shedding of one drop of blood," kept continually reminding the Irish 
 people that " England's difficulty is Ireland's opportunity." 
 
 The chief events of this period are all too well known to need 
 recapitulation here. They have only been mentioned thus far so that 
 their effects on the minds of the people, and therefore on subsequent 
 events, down to our own time, may be noted and their significance under- 
 stood. The political awakening of the Irish people in 1779-82 was 
 due to the intellectual revival which preceded it by some years, and the 
 oratory of Grattan and Burke gave a tone and inspiration to the political 
 thought of Ireland which have continued down to the present day, even 
 when those affected by it are partizans of the English connection. The 
 habit of discussing the affairs of the country, acquired in the Volunteer 
 Conventions, developed ideas of liberality and produced the effort to raise 
 the Catholics to a position of equality with the Protestant Colony, and 
 the students of the University — the future leaders of thought in the 
 country — began to be affected by it. The corrupt and venal Parliament 
 even felt the contagion, and, for a time, under the spell of Grattan's elo- 
 quence, became in a sense patriotic. It at least looked after the com- 
 mercial interests of the country, and the unexampled prosperity Ireland 
 enjoyed during the eighteen years of its existence has given a prolific 
 theme to the partizan of Repeal or Separation ever since. Had it 
 emancipated the Catholics, it would, have become a body really repre- 
 senting the nation; and the Irish people would have had the means of 
 working out their own regeneration, and obliterating the effects of six 
 centuries of incessant struggle and of foreign domination. 
 
 The failure to emancipate the Catholics made the Union possible, 
 c 
 
i8 
 
 THE UNITED IRISHMEN. 
 
 and drove the more liberal and generous of the Protestants into a con- 
 spiracy to sever the connection with England entirely and establish an 
 Irish Republic. It was the first serious attempt to fuse the various ele- 
 ments of the Irish people into one homogeneous whole, to break down 
 sectarian barriers, and to raise for all a common ideal of an Irish Nation, 
 where all men should stand on a footing of equality. A few thousand 
 Catholics had been admitted into the Volunteers ; but the first place 
 where Catholics, Protestants and Dissenters ever met, on an equal 
 footing in large numbers, was in the lodges of the United Irishmen. 
 Started by Protestants, whose intellectual eminence would have made 
 them, with Grattan and a few others, the leaders of the country, had 
 not the Parliamentary system introduced from England been a sink of 
 corruption, that organization was led by them to its close, and large 
 masses of Protestants in the North flocked to its ranks. The Presby- 
 terians, in particular, coming, as most of them did, of a kindred Gaelic 
 race, having suffered persecution for conscience sake, and felt the iron 
 grip of the foreign landlord almost equally with their Catholic neighbors, 
 coalesced more easily with them and formed the flower of the United 
 Irishmen in Ulster. The names of McCracken, Munroe, Orr, and 
 Porter — the latter a Presbyterian minister — are cherished as fondly by 
 the disaffected Catholic to-day as those of his own creed and race ; while 
 there is hardly a Catholic " martyr " held in such reverence as Tone, 
 Emmet, and Lord . Edward Fitzgerald, who were all Episcopalian Protes- 
 tants. Among the leaders, in fact, there were only two men of any 
 prominence with distinctively Irish names — Arthur O'Connor and John 
 Keogh, the latter only being a Catholic — so completely had the intellect 
 of the old race been dwarfed by the fiendish system of excluding the 
 light of knowledge ; a system introduced by English statesmen who are, 
 even to-day, regarded by their countrymen and by a large portion of the 
 outside world, as champions of human liberty. 
 
 The contagion of the French Revolution spread into Ireland, and 
 many of the leaders of the United Irishmen were imbued with its prin- 
 ciples. Lord Edward Fitzgerald, the son of the Duke of Leinster — 
 coming of the proudest and most powerful of the Anglo-Norman families 
 settled in Ireland — publicly renounced his title in Paris, and Arthur 
 O'Connor, with the blood of Irish chiefs for countless generations in his 
 
POLITICAL AND SOCIAL REGENERATION. 
 
 *9 
 
 veins, was a democrat of the most extreme type. The memory of the 
 old tribal system of land tenure had always survived in Ireland, and the 
 stimulus received from France and America naturally brought the 
 enrolled peasant to think of the lot that awaited him under the Republic 
 which he hoped to see established. That he would allow the land 
 system to remain as !t was, if success crowned his efforts, was out of 
 the question, and the very first thing he might be expected to demand 
 would be the confiscation of the estates of those who had fought or 
 worked on the side of England, and of those who were English. As the 
 great majority of the land owners were of this class, the leaders of a 
 successful revolution would have naturally imitated the example of the 
 French in regard to the emigrant nobles, and sold their estates for the 
 payment of war debts. A complete social revolution must, therefore, 
 have followed a successful political revolution, and the Irish Land Ques- 
 tion would have been settled in accordance with the ideas and interests 
 of the Irish people, and under the leadership of the highest intellect and 
 purest patriotism the country has ever produced. This character the 
 leaders of the United Irishmen unquestionably deserved. 
 
 But treachery followed the United Irishmen at every step, and the 
 hopes of the people were drowned in the blood of fifty thousand slaugh- 
 tered men. The Union followed, and a period of gloom and despond- 
 ency, broken only for a moment by the desperate attempt of Robert 
 Emmet, set in. But the seed sown during the eighteen years that 
 preceded the Union had sunk deep into a fertile soil, and was destined 
 yet to bear fruit. 
 
 That the intention of the United Irishmen was to confiscate the 
 property of all who took the side of England during the struggle, there 
 can be no doubt ; but, if the leaders had any qualms of conscience on 
 the subject, the people had none, and never had any. Independent of 
 the natural objection of one race to be ruled by another, and of the sen- 
 timent of nationality, which is peculiarly strong in the Irish race, the 
 agricultural classes of Ireland have, ever since the consummation of the 
 conquest, had the strongest possible reasons for wishing to rid them- 
 selves of an intolerable land system. The primitive tribal system had 
 survived longer among them than in the case of any other people, 
 except their kinsmen, the Scottish Highlanders, and with less admixture 
 
20 
 
 FOR LAND AND LIBERTY. 
 
 of feudalism than with the latter. The methods of its abolition were 
 fresh in the popular memory ; not, as with the rural classes of the con- 
 tinent, blotted out by ages of serfdom and ignorance. The ignorance of 
 the Irish dated only from the introduction of England's Penal Code. 
 Tradition with them was peculiarly strong and singularly accurate. 
 They remembered the pedigree of all the neighboring landlords, and 
 could tell the particular foreign intruder from whom each was descended. 
 The humble occupation of the man who had fought his way to rank in 
 Cromwell's army, or whose adroitness at manufacturing evidence or false 
 swearing had procured him an estate, were not forgotten when the pre- 
 tensions to " aristocratic blood " of " the man at the bier house " were 
 discussed at the cabin fireside, and the last occupier who had held of 
 the clan could be in many cases named. 
 
 The strufjcrle with the English invaders had been as much a ficrht 
 for land as for political supremacy, and, therefore, every uprising of the 
 people after the conquest partook largely of an agrarian character. The 
 hope of driving back to England, or to perdition, the foreigner who 
 played the rural tyrant and made their lives miserable, had as much to 
 do with stimulating the Irish farmer and agricultural laborer to partici- 
 pation in revolutionary conspiracies, as any idea of the benefits to be 
 derived from National Self-Government. No man born and brought up 
 among the poorer agricultural class in Ireland, or who has had much 
 personal intercourse with them, can have any doubt on this point. The 
 writer, who comes of that class, and from a district that performed its 
 share in the rebellion of '98, has had frequent opportunity of con- 
 versing with many survivors of that troubled period, and hearing from 
 their own lips of the hopes they cherished of ridding the country forever 
 of the " cursed foreign landlords." Many a tale has he heard of pitch- 
 capping and gibbeting at the bidding of the local landlords, in command 
 of yeomanry corps, for reported threats about dividing up neighboring 
 estates. The landlords have always accused the people of entertaining 
 such intentions ; it is their constant fear — and the landlords know the 
 people as well as the people know the landlords. 
 
 Many of the leaders in more recent Irish National efforts have not 
 cherished such projects, and would have conscientious scruples about car- 
 rying them out ; but, in the event of success, they would have been 
 
THE ANTI-TITHE WAR AND ITS MEANING. 
 
 2 I 
 
 pushed aside to make room for men more in harmony with the popular 
 will. But the great majority of the leaders of these movements were 
 men of advanced ideas on the Land Question ; and the uncompromising 
 hostility of the landlords, as a class, to every National effort would 
 have, of itself, provoked measures of retaliation and confiscation. If, by 
 a miracle, a remnant of landlordism should survive an Irish Revolution, 
 subsequent legislation by a democratic National Assembly would obliterate 
 every vestige of a system which has inflicted such miseries on the 
 country 
 
 The '98 movement gave this anti-landlord spirit a considerable im- 
 petus, and the Anti-Tithe war was one of the consequences. It is a 
 great mistake to regard that movement as simply a sectarian one. It 
 was as much agrarian as sectarian, and its national bearings were by no 
 means unimportant. Augustin Thierry, who had a wonderful faculty for 
 grasping the true spirit of Irish history, remarks, in his great work on 
 the Norman Conquest, that the Reformation was resisted in Ireland 
 mainly for the reason that it was English — because an attempt was 
 made by a hated foreign enemy to force it down their throats. The 
 parson was always regarded by the Irish peasant as an Englishman, an 
 official of the English Government, his religion was treated as an English 
 intrusion and the tithes as a tribute levied by a foreign enemy. The 
 exactions of the system were of a most harassing and vexatious nature, 
 inflicting enormous hardship and annoyance, and keeping constantly before 
 his eyes in a clear and tangible shape, the loss of a large proportion of 
 the fruits of his hard labor. It appealed to his national feeling, by 
 reminding him that the system was sustained by foreign bayonets alone, 
 and that if Ireland had a native government the nuisance would be abol- 
 ished at once. And if at any time the opportunity had offered and the 
 people had arms enough to warrant the attempt, the provocations of the 
 tithe-collecting would have been stimulus enough for an insurrection that 
 would aim to abolish all other English institutions, as well as tithes. The 
 National question is never absent from an Irish agitation, no matter what 
 its immediate object. 
 
 It is not intended here to go minutely into the events of the Anti- 
 Tithe war. It is enough to say that it practically existed from the fall 
 of Limerick and either smouldered, or took a more or less violent form, 
 
22 
 
 CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION AND THE LAND WAR. 
 
 according to various circumstances. It went, to a great extent, hand in 
 hand with the Emancipation agitation, and must not be judged exclu- 
 sively by the events immediately preceding O'Connell's unfortunate 
 compromise which allowed the tithes to be converted into a rent charge, 
 collected in cash by the landlord. This added another to the many 
 grievances laid at the door of the landlord, and since the Disestablishment 
 of the Protestant Church the feeling has been intensified by the fact that 
 rents were not reduced by the amount formerly paid to the parson. 
 
 The Emancipation struggle, up to the Clare election, had less direct 
 connection with the Land Question than any movement which had taken 
 place in Ireland since the English invasion, except in the fact that the 
 landlords were the leaders of the opposition and the farmers the chief 
 supporters of the agitation. It was mainly an effort on the part of the 
 Catholic middle classes to open for themselves, without any change of 
 Government, avenues of advancement which were then closed to them. 
 The Catholic Relief Act, while its good moral effect on the people can- 
 not be doubted, has also had the effect of enabling Catholic lawyers and 
 needy country squires, who profess a very fervid patriotism at the hust- 
 ings, to climb to place and power by servile obedience to ministerial 
 wishes in the House of Commons, and has given the rebels of later times 
 the privilege of being found guilty through the efforts of Catholic Crown 
 Counsel, and sentenced to the old punishments by Catholic judges. It 
 has bribed the Catholic educated classes to separate themselves from 
 their less fortunate co-religionists, and forced the latter to look for their 
 leaders from among their own ranks. But its most important effect was 
 in the disfranchisement of the Forty Shilling Freeholders — the very men 
 who had sent O'Connell to Parliament. The influence of this act on 
 the status of the Land Question was enormous, and it was felt fifty years 
 later as much as immediately after its passage. 
 
 While the Irish Parliament was in existence, the landlord with politi- 
 cal ambition was tempted to multiply the number of small holdings on 
 his estate, and to cultivate friendly relations with his tenants, so as to 
 increase his influence. After the Union, as the number of Members of 
 Parliament was reduced — those from agricultural constituencies being only 
 sixty-four — this stimulus to the preservation of good relations was con- 
 siderably lessened, and with the abolition of the Forty Shilling Freehold 
 
LOSS OF THE FORTY SHILLING FREEHOLDERS. 
 
 23 
 
 franchise it disappeared altogether. Evictions and rack-rents had been 
 common enough before ; but since then, they have been carried out on 
 such a scale as to drive out of Ireland the flower of the population, so 
 that at last Ireland presented a spectacle never before witnessed, viz., 
 that of having within her borders scarcely a third of her living people. 
 
 The system of failing to renew leases on their expiration, also 
 received great encouragement from this source, the feeling of insecurity 
 was increased, and an immense number of men evicted from small hold- 
 ings and too poor to emigrate, were yearly thrown on the labor market. 
 Then, confining- the franchise to a few thousand men, over the great 
 majority of whom the landlord's lash was constantly held, had a fearful 
 tendency to demoralize the public life of the country, and to develop a 
 spirit of slavish servility among the voters. With the increased intelli- 
 gence among the people, brought about by the National and Christian 
 Brothers' school, and by recent political events, a restoration of the 
 franchise to its old standard would simply revolutionize the Parlia- 
 mentary representation of Ireland, and bring to the front a class of 
 Members, who, if they could do nothing in the English House of Com- 
 mons, would at least give voice to the opinions of the vast majority 
 of the people. 
 
 During the Repeal movement the Land Question began to be intelli- 
 gently discussed, and the brilliant writers of the Nation devoted much of 
 their attention to it. John B. Dillon, one of the founders of that journal, 
 and father of John Dillon, the famous Land League leader, was, accord- 
 ing to Sir Charles Gavan Duffy, more affected by the social misery caused 
 by English misgovernment than by any purely sentimental idea of nation- 
 ality, and his views had considerable weight with his colleagues. Born 
 and brought up in the west of Ireland, where landlordism had reduced the 
 people to a condition of appalling misery and degradation, his heart bled 
 at the sights he saw around him, and he determined to make an effort to 
 mitigate the suffering, if he could not remove the cause of it. He was 
 the first man who brought the Land Question forward in a clear and 
 definite shape, and gave it a foremost place in Irish National politics. 
 The wrongs of the tenants were exposed, and a glare of public opinion 
 was directed on the doings of the landlords to which they had not been 
 accustomed. The people were told their rights in plain but eloquent 
 
2 4 
 
 TEACHINGS AND INFLUENCE OF THE "NATION." 
 
 language, and the happier lot of the agricultural classes in France and 
 Prussia was pictured in a manner calculated to stimulate the ambition of 
 the same classes in Ireland. The farmers were taught to look forward 
 to the acquisition of Self-Government as the sure and certain means of 
 regaining their own rights, and the establishment of Repeal reading- 
 rooms was the first step toward popular organization. These were not 
 confined to the larger towns, and, in those where the farming element 
 was well represented, as was the case with many, the articles on the Land 
 Question were publicly read, and the doings of the neighboring landlords 
 discussed. It was the introduction of a more healthy political life than 
 had been seen in Ireland since the days of the Volunteers ; and, but for 
 the dreadful famine which followed, and enabled the English Government 
 and the Anglo-Irish landlords to shatter the people's hopes, and send 
 two millions of the race to paupers' graves or the emigrant ship, the 
 result must have been of incalculable benefit to Ireland. 
 
 A newspaper went a long way at that time in Ireland, and the 
 influence of the A T atioii was by no means to be measured by its actual 
 circulation. In fact, a paper with ten times its circulation since then 
 would not exert one tithe of its influence — except, indeed, under circum- 
 stances which are not likely to exist. It gave tone to the whole National 
 thought of the country, and its influence was felt in every corner of 
 the land. One of the earliest recollections of the writer is a scene in 
 a thatched cottage, where some twenty or thirty stalwart, frieze-coated 
 men sat round a turf fire, eagerly listening while the Repeal Warden 
 of the district read the paper from beginning to end for their edifi- 
 cation. Probably not two other copies came to the parish. And this 
 was the case from end to end of Ireland. 
 
 The purely political portion of the Nations teachings has not so 
 much connection with the object of the present sketch, and therefore 
 its bearing on the Land Question alone will be kept in view. Duffy 
 wrote, in an early number, an article on "The Rights and Wrongs of 
 Property," which, if written in Ireland in 1882, would have sent the 
 author to Kilmainham Jail. Speaking of the oft-quoted saying that 
 "property has its duties as well as its rights," he said: 
 
 " Let us lose no more time in vain attempts to explain obligations 
 which their blunted moral sensibilities can no way comprehend ; let us 
 
THE RIGHTS AND WRONGS OF PROPERTY. 
 
 25 
 
 give Mr. Drummond's overwrought axiom a perpetual holiday, and, 
 instead of weeping appeals, which fall upon them like dew upon a 
 desert, let us thunder in their ears that we have rights which we 
 understand and will maintain. Let us tell them that this land is ours 
 not less than theirs ; that it is chargeable with the support of us, the 
 men whose toil and sweat made it fertile, before all other incum- 
 brances, whether rent, tithes or taxes ; that the feudal system, which 
 gave the life of the serf to the disposal of his lord, was not a jot more 
 barbarous or irrational than the right they claim to exterminate their 
 tenantry ; that we see no moral distinction between the edict of the 
 brutal baron that hung his offending vassal on the next tree and the 
 ejectment of the ruffian landlord, which turns out his tenant to die by 
 the wayside ; and that as soon would we permit the revival of the one 
 tyranny as the continuance of the other. * * * The day for puling 
 and whining has gone by. We must speak out like people asking 
 their own and no more. We must declare, in the simplest and shortest 
 terms, that the enormous prerogative of property and the interests of 
 society are incompatible, and that the time is when one or the other 
 must give way." 
 
 And Dillon, in an article on the "Prospects of England in 1842," 
 writes : " Every place is filled with our enemies, from the judge to the 
 perjured spy, who is paid with the people's money to swear away the 
 people's lives. Yet what of these ? They are but straws upon the tor- 
 rent of oppression which deluges this land and covers its disfigured 
 aspect with unseemly ruin. Look upon our fertile fields and ask — did 
 that God, who created them so fair, curse them from the besfinnine, and 
 
 9 9 o o 7 
 
 doom them to be forever the abode of hunger, and misery and despair ?" 
 And again, a little later on, he wrote an article on " Aristocratic Institu- 
 tions," in which the following striking contrast occurs : " Let us, in the 
 first place, observe the vast numbers of people who pass their whole 
 lives in idleness, serving the public in no way, doing mischief or doing 
 nothing — let us mark the wealth, the pomp, the pride, the magnificence, 
 and boundless profusion of this idle, useless class — let us observe them 
 in possession of palaces and chariots, of wines and costly ornaments, of 
 everything that can minister to vanity or to luxury ; and turning from 
 this vision of dazzling splendor, let us next observe the condition of the 
 
2 6 
 
 YOUNG IRELAND AND THE LANDLORDS. 
 
 People, who produce, by their labor, the materials of all this splendor— 
 the state of abject misery to which they are reduced — the unlimited 
 power which landlords and their agents have over them — their unculti 
 vated minds — their physical sufferings — their haggard looks — their naked 
 children — their wet potatoes — their hovels — their rags — and their beds of 
 straw. Let us contemplate all this without prejudice, and as if from a 
 distance, and then put the question : Were the laws which have brought 
 this state of things into existence made for the good of the People f * * * 
 Let us search for the root from which this crop of misery has sprung, 
 and pluck it forth gently, if it will come — if not, why, tear it forth with 
 a strong hand." And he answers, in plain English, that the cause of all 
 this is in the existence of a landed aristocracy. " Where this exists," he 
 adds, " there is neither economy in government, nor freedom or happi- 
 ness in society. You may have the forms of liberty — you cannot have 
 the substance. Those who have the land will ultimately have the 
 power." 
 
 Thomas Davis, having vainly tried to nationalize the landlords by 
 appeals to their humanity and patriotism, at length gave up the task in 
 despair, and in a little poem called " A Scene in the South," gave vent 
 to his feelings in the following lines : 
 
 "God of Justice," I sighed, "send Thy Spirit down 
 On these lords so cruel and proud, 
 And soften their hearts, and relax their frown — 
 Or else," I cried aloud, 
 " Vouchsafe Thy strength to the peasant's hand 
 To drive them at length from off the land." 
 
 From Davis to Mitchel and Fintan Lalor was only a step, but the 
 distance traversed in that step was enormous. It was a natural develop- 
 ment of the ideas enunciated by Duffy, Dillon and Davis in the Nation, 
 but the dreadful scenes of the famine of 1847 had steeled men's hearts, 
 aroused their passions, and suggested swift and stern remedies, rather 
 than the slow process of legislative change. No such awful example has 
 ever been presented in human history, no such striking and terrible con- 
 demnation of a whole social and governmental system has ever been 
 recorded as was furnished by that sad and dismal epoch. A country 
 producing grain and beef, and other provisions, sufficient to feed twice 
 as many people as it contained within its borders reduced to the direst 
 
A FAMINE MADE BY MEN. 
 
 extremities of famine, with all its attendant horrors, by the failure of the 
 potato crop alone, must have had something more rotten in it than that 
 crop. 
 
 There was no famine of food; it was simply one of money. If the 
 people had retained for their own use the crops raised on their own 
 farms, instead of selling them to pay rent to the landlords, they would 
 have had enough to carry them through the year, the wholesale evictions 
 that followed would have been shorn of half their horrors, and no one 
 would have died of hunger or of typhus. If the excitement consequent 
 on these evictions had led to a general insurrection it is impossible to 
 conceive — even allowing for the people being disarmed — how the most 
 wanton military massacres could have resulted in a tithe of the destruc- 
 tion of human life caused by hunger and diseases generated by hun- 
 ger, during that dreadful year. And it is equally impossible to conceive 
 how the effects of stamping out rebellion by the most profuse expendi- 
 ture of the people's blood, could have produced such utter demoralization 
 as that which fell upon Ireland in consequence of the famine and the 
 exodus that followed it. 
 
 In no other European country would it be possible for hundreds of 
 thousands of people to die the awful death of starvation while its store- 
 houses were filled with human food, and fat cattle, and provisions were 
 daily exported by the shipload to another land. The Government would 
 have found a speedy remedy, or the people would have risen and over- 
 turned it. In no other country of Europe would the aristocracy and 
 land-owning class have answered the piteous cry for bread from a million 
 hungry throats by a copious shower of ejectment papers, and stifled the 
 moans of the fever-stricken victims by the levelling of the roof-trees that 
 g&ve them shelter. In no other country of modern Europe could thou- 
 sands of emaciated corpses be flung into coffinless graves, without such a 
 social convulsion as would have destroyed the system which was the 
 cause of the evil. But Ireland was ruled from a foreign land, and her 
 land-owning class were foreigners who hated the people and spent most 
 of the produce of the soil away from her shores. The results of foreign 
 conquest and alien rule were here vividly presented to the eyes of the 
 people in one long series of unparalleled disasters, and the brightest 
 intellects among the popular leaders set to work to teach the people the 
 
28 
 
 JOHN MITCHEL AND THE FARMERS. 
 
 lesson to be derived from it. Instead of a peaceful appeal for Repeal 
 of the Union, the policy of Mitchel, Lalor, Reilly and others of the 
 bolder spirits of the Young Ireland part)' was to strike down English 
 rule and the English landlord system at one blow. 
 
 Dissatisfied with the "moderation" of the Nation, John Mitchel 
 started the United Irishman, and began at once to prepare the mind of 
 the country for the work before it. He was a writer of extraordinary 
 vigor, whose purity of style forced the cultured to read him, but whose 
 simplicity and downright directness brought him at once to the hearts of 
 the people. " Land in Ireland is life," he cried, in the second number 
 of the paper, and the keynote thus struck was continued until the 
 United Irishman was suppressed and its editor in prison. 
 
 " Land in Ireland is life. Just in the proportion that our people 
 contrive to keep or to gain some foothold on the soil, in that pro- 
 portion exactly they will live and not die. All social, all industrial, all 
 national questions resolve themselves now into this— how many Irish 
 cultivators can keep root in the earth during the present year — that so 
 the storm and blight, the famine and the black flood of pauperism may 
 not sweep them off, away into destruction and outer darkness ? Not 
 to the individual farmer only is this a life-and-death question, but to 
 society and to the nation. With the ruin of the tillers of the soil, all 
 is ruined ; in vain shall you adopt manufacture pledges, hold meetings 
 to develop resources, form companies, make speeches, insist upon national 
 rights, a national legislature, a national flag — once let the farmers be 
 swept off this Irish soil and there is an utter end of us and of our cause. 
 * * * Let the tillers of the soil be once uprooted — let the forest 
 be cleared — and the prostrate, withered nation is fit for railway sleep- 
 ers, the living forest is dead and gone, the living nation is undone for- 
 ever, and the place that knew it shall know it no more. In one word, 
 land is life ; and for the possession of land there is now a deadly strug- 
 gle going on in every part of Ireland." 
 
 In the following issue of the paper he commenced a series of " letters 
 to the small farmers of Ireland," in which they were told their rights in 
 language they were not accustomed to hear, and the identity of interests 
 between Northerns and Southerns was demonstrated with peculiar 
 force. A Northern Protestant himself, and the descendant of a Scotch 
 
THE DOCTRINE OE RESISTANCE. 
 
 29 
 
 Covenanter, he appealed to the b'lster Protestants as one of themselves, 
 and his words carried a weight that no Catholic or Southern could Q-ive 
 them. The appalling condition of the country opened men's ears to his 
 counsels, and the mind of Protestant Ulster was beeinnino- to be moved 
 as it had never been moved before. He appealed to the manhood and 
 pride of the farmers, scouting the idea that they were a mere " class of 
 the community." 
 
 " You are the whole community ; you support all classes, create all 
 classes ; if you are elevated, they are all elevated — if you are depressed 
 they are all ruined ; in you they all live and move, out of you they grow, 
 on you they continually depend, and without you they are less than 
 nothing. Yoit pay the wages of the artisan, the fees of the lawyer and 
 physician ; yott array the soldier in his gilded hardware, the bishop in his 
 alb and sleeves of lawn ; you are the »spokes in the noble's chariot wheel, 
 the jewels in the monarch's crown ; you could live marvelously well with- 
 out other classes, much better than you do now, without some of them ; 
 but they could not live without you at all. " * * 
 
 " First, there is a simple calculation to be made ; you, the men doomed 
 to destruction, are a million and more ; they, the landlords of Ireland, 
 who find you to be surplus, and declare that you and they cannot live 
 together on this soil, are, we will say, eight thousand — that is, one well- 
 born idler to one hundred and twenty-five working drudges nearly. And 
 to keep this well-born idler in the position he " has a right to expect," 
 the hundred and twenty-five workers are to perish. Here is strictly an 
 economic question (Political Economy for the millioti); and it may be 
 stated thus — are the eight thousand idlers worth keeping at this expense ? 
 do they pay ? or is there any cheaper mode of keeping them ?" 
 
 Mitchel saw clearly that the intention of the Government and the 
 landlords was to get rid of the people and that all the so-called "relief 
 measures" were simply devices to keep them quiet while the rooting- 
 out process was going on. He constantly advised the people to arm, 
 but, while keeping the eventuality of a physical struggle ever before, 
 .heir eyes, recommended passive resistance alone for the time being. 
 
 " The plain remedy for all this — the only way you can save your, 
 selves alive — is to reverse the order of payment, to take and keep, out 
 of the crops you raise, your own subsistence, and that of your families 
 
3° 
 
 APPEALS TO THE NORTHERN PROTESTANTS. 
 
 and laborers, first ; to part with none until you are sure of your 
 own living — to combine with your neighbors that they may do the like, 
 and back you in your determination — and to resist, in whatever may be 
 needful, all claims whatever, legal or illegal, till your own claims are satis- 
 fied. If it needs all your crop to keep you alive, you will be justified in 
 refusing and resisting payment of any rent, tributes, rates or taxes whatso- 
 ever. * * * You do not forget the anti-tithe movement ; you know 
 how to look on with arms folded, while the law takes its course. Let the 
 'law' execute itself in every point, and develop all its resources; let it lift 
 and carry the whole harvests of Ireland , let the law find cartage ; let the 
 law find storage ; let the law find purchasers, who will dare to buy the 
 people's food , and then, if the roads should by any chance happen to 
 have been dug up, the low grounds flooded, the key-stones plucked out 
 of bridges — or other means taken to stop the traffic called ' Commerce,' 
 which carries off your food every year to be eaten in England — why let 
 the law mend the roads, rebuild the bridges, drain the lands, and restore 
 the communications.'' After telling them that " clear steel will, ere long, 
 dawn upon you in your desolate darkness ; and the rolling thunder of the 
 people's cannon will drive before it many a heavy cloud that has long 
 hidden you from the face of heaven," he wound up with the significant 
 advice : " Above all, let the man amongst you who has no gun, sell 
 his garment and buy one." 
 
 Then he addressed a series of letters to " the Protestant farmers of 
 Ireland," pointing out the folly of their distrust of the Catholics, the 
 identity of the interests of all Irish farmers and the necessity for a 
 united effort to break down landlordism. The uses made of the Orange 
 organization by the landlord "grand masters" were exposed with merci- 
 less severity, and the loyalty of the Northern Protestants he characterized 
 as simple hatred of the " Papists." 
 
 " I will speak plainly," he said to them. " There is now growing on 
 the soil of Ireland a wealth of grain, and roots, and cattle, far more 
 than enough to sustain in life and in comfort all the inhabitants of the 
 island. That wealth must not leave us another year — not until every 
 grain of it is fought for in every stage, from the tying of the sheaf to the 
 loading of the ship. And the effort necessary to that single act of self- 
 preservation will at one and the same blow prostrate British dominion 
 
THE DISPERSAL OF YOUNG IRELAND. 
 
 31 
 
 and landlordism together. 'Tis but the one act of volition : — if we 
 resolve but to live we make our country a free and Sovereign State. 
 Will yoti not gird up your loins for this great national struggle, and 
 stand with your countrymen for Life and Land ? Will you, the sons of 
 a warlike race, the inheritors of conquering memories — with the arms of 
 freemen in all your homes, and relics of the gallant Republicans of 
 'Ninety-eight forever before your eyes — will you stand folding your 
 hands in helpless 'loyalty' — and, while every nation in Christendom is 
 seizing on its birth-right with armed hand, will you take patiently with 
 your rations of yellow meal and your inevitable portion of eternal con- 
 tempt ? " This was language which the British Government could not 
 endure if it hoped to preserve its authority in Ireland, and as he was 
 appealing in the columns of the same journal to the intellect and 
 national pride of the country, the United Irishman was silenced by the 
 seizure of its plant and the arrest of its editor. 
 
 John Mitchel was hurried off to a convict's cell, and in four weeks 
 after the suppression of his paper, John Martin, Thomas Devin Reilly 
 and James Fintan Lalor, resumed in the Irish Felon, the work where 
 he had been interrupted. The title was adopted in utter contempt of 
 the stigma sought to be cast upon the popular chief. The same doc- 
 trines were preached, and the policy of the party may be summed up in 
 one extract from a letter of Lalor — from whom, it is generally admitted, 
 Mitchel received the stimulus which made him write so strongly on the 
 Land Question — thus defining it : 
 
 " Not to repeal the Union, then, but to repeal the conquest — not to 
 disturb or to dismantle the empire, but to abolish it utterly forever — not 
 to fall back on '82, but act up to '48 — not to restore or resume an old 
 constitution, but to found a new nation and raise up a free people, and 
 strong as well as free, and secure as well as strong, based on a peasan- 
 try rooted like rocks in the soil of the land." 
 
 The Irish Felon was suppressed after five weeks and the Irish Tribune 
 replaced it, the same doctrines being preached by Michael Doheny, 
 Richard Dalton Williams, Kevin Izod O'Doherty, Stephen Joseph 
 Meany and others. In five weeks more it shared the fate of its 
 predecessors. The Nation, too, was suppressed, most of the leaders were 
 arrested, and the brightest intellects of Ireland were sent to herd with 
 
32 THE EXODUS AND CONSEQUENT POLITICAL TORPOR. 
 
 the worst malefactors of English society in the penal settlements of Van 
 Diemen's Land. A hopeless attempt at insurrection was made in the 
 South under the leadership of William Smith O'Brien, Thomas Francis 
 Meagher, Michael Doheny, Terence Bellew McManus and John O'Mahony; 
 but the people were without arms or organization, and it ended in the 
 capture or flight of the leaders and the utter demoralization of the 
 people. Disheartened and despairing, the people sought refuge in the 
 emigrant ship, and the most remarkable exodus of modern history set in. 
 
 The emigration was not confined to the farmers or those immediately 
 dependent on them in the country towns. Thousands of the most spir- 
 ited and intelligent of the young men of the cities and larger towns who 
 formed the backbone of the Young Ireland movement — artisans, clerks, 
 students, sons of merchants and professional men— fled the country in 
 despair, or disgusted at the bloodless failure. Ireland in a few short 
 months was not alone deprived of her leaders, but of nearly all the 
 minor men of local influence who formed the connecting links between 
 the leaders and the people. All semblance of organization, all concert of 
 action, was destroyed. Ireland might be compared to an army that, hav- 
 ing been decimated and deprived of its generals, had also suffered the 
 loss of its non-commissioned officers. All political life was at an end, 
 and a period of utter stagnation and listless despair set in. 
 
 Charles Gavan Duffy and a few of the surviving leaders of Young 
 Ireland, recognizing accomplished facts, turned their attention to the 
 Land Question, and, with the aid of some well-meaning men of less 
 advanced opinions, endeavored to improve the condition of the tenantry 
 by appealing to the English Parliament for some recognition of " tenant 
 right." The landlords, availing themselves of the departure of the fighting 
 element of the country, were evicting and levelling homesteads at a 
 frightfully rapid rate, and the population was soon decreased by over two 
 millions. Northern Protestants suffered, as well as their Catholic country- 
 men in the other provinces, and a sense of their common danger at last 
 aroused them to the necessity of united action. The Tenant League was 
 the result. Meetings were held at which Catholic priests and Presbyte- 
 rian ministers stood on the same platform and, although their demands 
 fell very far short of their rights, the good effects of union and organi- 
 zation soon began to tell. The spirit of the country commenced to revive 
 
/ 
 
 THE TENANT LEAGUE AND ITS BETRAYAL. 
 
 33 
 
 somewhat, and at the general election of 1852 a majority of the Irish 
 Members were pledged to "tenant right" and "independent opposition." 
 Ireland was again induced to put her faith in the London Parliament, 
 and she paid dearly for the weakness. The majority of those elected 
 were either landlords who had no real sympathy with the people, or 
 insincere politicians anxious to secure a place from the Government by 
 selling their country. The opportunity soon presented itself. The Eccle- 
 siastical Titles Bill was devised by Lord John Russell for the double 
 purpose of affording an opportunity for baseness and treachery on the 
 part of Catholic Members and of dividing North and South by reviving 
 religious rancor. It succeeded to perfection. 
 
 Led by the infamous Sadlier, who afterwards committed suicide on 
 Hampstead Heath, and the still more infamous Keogh, who a few years 
 ago also destroyed himself in a Belgian hotel, the corrupt section of 
 the Irish Parliamentary party commenced a vigorous opposition to 
 the bill, meetings were held all over the country and "tenant right" 
 was soon forgotten in a fierce outburst of sectarian passion. The 
 sturdy Presbyterians of Ulster, who were the backbone of the Tenant 
 League, fell back in alarm, the spirit of the organization was broken 
 and the renegade Members settled down into comfortable places under 
 the Government. Duffy, George Henry Moore, John Francis Maguire and 
 Frederick Lucas, endeavored for a time to stem the torrent, but their 
 efforts were unavailing and Duffy was compelled to seek a new home in 
 Australia. Archbishop — afterwards Cardinal — Cullen brought the full 
 weight of ecclesiastical authority to bear in the interest of the English 
 Government and the landlords, on the priests who had made themselves 
 prominent in the movement, and Ireland relapsed into the most forlorn 
 and apathetic condition she had been in since the Penal Days. All con- 
 fidence was dead, and the landlords were able to continue their work of 
 rooting out the people, disturbed only by an occasional shot from an out- 
 raged peasant's gun. 
 
 Ireland slept till the spirit of Fenianism gradually aroused her and 
 gave her the renewed political life which has throbbed in her veins with 
 ever-increasing vigor to the present day. Fenianism was not agrarian ; 
 but, as it was essentially a movement of the people, its members nearly 
 all held the national creed or the Land Question. Disciples of John 
 
 E 
 
34 
 
 THE RISE AND INFLUENCE OF FEN I A NISM. 
 
 Mitchel, who more than any other of the men of '48, gave voice to the 
 popular sentiment ; the early members were mainly brought into the move- 
 ment by men who had kept alive a remnant of an organization started 
 by James Fintan Lalor in 1849, and the destruction of the foreign land- 
 lord system was one of the cherished objects of the majority. There 
 were notable exceptions, of course, but the number was very small. This 
 spirit did not show itself in acts, because the plan of the organization 
 was purely military, and contemplated simply an armed effort to over- 
 throw English rule. 
 
 But the chief influence of Fenianism was in giving the people habits 
 of organization and of acting together, developing qualities of leadership 
 and breaking down sectarian prejudice. It found Ireland disorganized, 
 the people standing still and having no confidence whatever in them- 
 selves. It gave organized shape to the national idea, set the people 
 moving in the direction of nationality and filled them with a spirit of 
 self-reliance that has never since deserted them. It gave the young men 
 an object to work for, an ambition, a desire to do and dare and sacrifice 
 for the common good, and it brought men from all parts of Ireland 
 together. Crude and incomplete as it was, ill-directed as were most of its 
 operations, it gave a stimulus to national life that cannot be denied or 
 ignored. It failed ; but, for the first time in Irish history, the organiza- 
 tion lived through the failure, wrung important political measures from 
 the English Government, and supplied Ireland with a living, active, per- 
 manent political force which must be counted with in all questions affect- 
 ing the national welfare. Moreover, it trained a number of zealous, active, 
 intelligent workers, filled with a restless activity and a burning desire 
 to place their country among the nations. It prepared the way for a 
 combination of the forces of the Irish race at home and abroad, and 
 revived among England's enemies the habit of watching the course of 
 Irish affairs. It also prepared the way for the Land League and supplied 
 it with its founder, Michael Davitt, and the audiences that first listened 
 to his doctrines. 
 
THE INTENSITY OF FEN I A NISM. 
 
 35 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 A NEW DEPARTURE IN IRISH AFFAIRS. 
 
 The National Spirit Unbroken by the Abortive Rising of 1867 — Reorganizing the forces of 
 Disaffection — The Manchester Rescue and the Election of Jo/in Mitchcl — Rise of the 
 Parnell Group of Irish Members — Davitt and the American Nationalists — Foundation 
 and Progress of the Land League. 
 
 THE lull which followed the abortive "rising" of 1867 was very 
 different from that produced by the failure of any previous insurrec- 
 tionary attempt. It was temporary and transient. The strength of the 
 country had not been put forth, and the failure was too plainly traceable 
 to mismanagement, imperfect armament, and the demoralization consequent 
 on bad leadership and divided counsels, to produce a permanently discour- 
 aging effect on the people. No striking event had occurred in connec- 
 tion with the attempt, and a portion only of the organized Nationalist 
 element had taken part in it. The bold rescue of two of the insurrec- 
 tionary leaders, in the streets of Manchester, and the disastrous explosion 
 at Clerkenwell, in the attempt to liberate a third, before the close of the 
 same year, gave ample proof that the revolutionary spirit was at work, and 
 that the English Government was still face to face with a disaffected 
 people. Four men gave their lives for Ireland on the scaffold; and the 
 indignation aroused by the incidents of their trial and execution gave a 
 fresh stimulus to the hatred of foreign rule. The Disestablishment of 
 the Irish Protestant Church, and the Land Act of 1870, were, on the 
 authority of Mr. Gladstone himself, the result of " the intensity of 
 Fenianism ; " and Isaac Butt's languid Home Rule movement was an 
 attempt to compromise the National question suggested by a similar 
 experience. Both failed to conciliate the majority of the Irish people, 
 and the influence of Fenianism remained. 
 
 Although most of the leaders were sent to convict prisons, and many 
 thousands of the most intelligent Nationalists were obliged to fly the 
 
36 
 
 THE RE-ORGANIZED NATIONALIST MOVEMENT. 
 
 country, the movement remained, to a certain extent, intact, and its local 
 centres of work were, in many cases, undisturbed. The less sanguine 
 spirits fell away, both in Ireland and America, but an organization 
 remained ; the broken links were repaired, and, in the course of a few 
 years disaffection, to British rule was in a more effective condition than 
 when its organized adherents were much more numerous, a few years 
 before. Those of the more active spirits, who had escaped imprison- 
 ment, found refuge in the United States, and their better and fresher 
 knowledge of the actual condition of Ireland enabled the American 
 branch of the Irish National movement to avoid many of the mistakes 
 which had brought Fenianism to shipwreck. Many of them, too, were 
 brought into direct contact with John Mitchel, and became more deeply 
 imbued with his ideas. The influence of these refugees — supported as it 
 was by continual accessions from home — has been felt in Irish politics 
 ever since, and the relations between the Irish at home and their coun- 
 trymen in America became closer than ever before. 
 
 Learning by dearly-bought experience, the Nationalists on both sides 
 of the Atlantic made a more careful estimate of the task they had 
 undertaken, and altered their plans accordingly. Their principles and 
 objects remained the same, but, instead of hatching projects of petty in- 
 surrections doomed to end in defeat, their policy became to organize 
 slowly and carefully, wait for England's difficulty, and strike with the 
 concentrated force and resources of the Irish race the world over. 
 
 From 1867 to the foundation of the Land League in 1879, tne only 
 organized bodies of Irishmen aiming at any important political change, 
 except the Home Rule League, which was only a few hundred strong, 
 were the Nationalists. Their organizations were the only centres of 
 National life, the only living political force in the country, and 
 the spasmodic ebullitions of vitality given by the Home Rule move- 
 ment were due entirely to a section of the Nationalists who, for a 
 time, threw their energies into it for the purpose of pushing it forward. 
 During these years the strength of the National sentiment, among the 
 masses of the people was demonstrated by many public events, but by 
 none more forcibly than by the election to Parliament of O'Donovan 
 Rossa and John Mitchel, on both of whom England had set the brand 
 of felony. The poetic death of the latter, in the very house in which 
 
RISE OF THE PAR NELL PARTY. 
 
 37 
 
 he was born, honored and lamented by the whole nation, while the 
 British Parliament was hurrying through a motion to disqualify him 
 from membership in an assembly whose authority he repudiated, was 
 one of the most striking events in later Irish history. 
 
 In 1878, the Home Rule movement, started by Isaac Butt, had 
 almost ceased to exist ; but a new, more vigorous, and more aggressive 
 form of it had begun to make itself felt. Young men had sprung up 
 who chafed under the restraints imposed by Butt, and who had no sym- 
 pathy with his conservative tendencies, or his halting and hesitating 
 policy. They had not as yet any definite plan, the object they aimed at 
 was the same as Butt's, and the only apparent difference was in the 
 desire for greater activity in the same work. They showed greater 
 hostility to everything English, and their tactics were harassing and 
 annoying to " the English enemy." This active section of the Home 
 Rulers soon became known as the Obstructionists, from their action in 
 Parliament, and their greater hostility to England won them popularity 
 with the people. They leaned towards the Nationalists for support, and 
 their main strength, inside the Home Rule party, was in that element. 
 Charles Stewart Parnell, the leader of this group, displayed such tact, 
 firmness and judgment in the Parliamentary contests, and such a grow- 
 ing tendency towards Nationalism in his public speeches, that he soon 
 became the most popular man in Ireland. 
 
 But the party was still without a policy, or a definite object, and it 
 was not quite in harmony with the traditions and the hopes of the 
 country. It drifted along in a sort of hap-hazard way, following the 
 movements of English politics, embarrassing the Ministry wherever it 
 could, exposing Irish grievances, and waiting for the inspiration and the 
 man to give it a policy and an object that would bring it into harmony 
 with the popular will. 
 
 Such was the state of Irish politics when, in 1878, Michael Davitt 
 appeared upon the scene. In a very short time the whole face of Irish 
 politics was x changed, and the people were aroused to a degree of polit- 
 ical activity and a perfection of organization that have never been 
 equalled in the whole course of Irish history. Yet he did not make the 
 change. The elements of the storm which burst over Ireland had been 
 gathering for ages ; but to him, more than to any other man, belongs the 
 
38 
 
 ADVENT OF MICHAEL DAVITT. 
 
 credit of guiding the people through the terrible ordeal, of inspiring 
 them with the confidence that commands success, and of giving them 
 the watch-words which kept their ranks unbroken until the dangers 
 which menaced their very existence were passed. 
 
 Michael Davitt had borne a very humble but a very active part in 
 the Fenian movement. The son of an evicted Mayo farmer, he expe- 
 rienced in his own person all the evils of the Anglo-Irish land system 
 The family were obliged to seek employment in England, and settled 
 down in the little town of Haslingden, in Lancashire, where, after getting 
 the barest rudiments of education, the future founder of the Land 
 League, while yet a mere child, was sent to work in a mill. An accident, 
 which deprived him of his right arm, incapacitated him for work when 
 only nine years of age, and he was sent back to school. But for this seem- 
 ing misfortune, the world would have never heard of him. He might 
 have been shot in an insurrection or hanged for " treason," but he cer- 
 tainly never would have figured as a leader in one of the most remarkable 
 movements of modern times. With another installment of rudimentary 
 knowledge, young Davitt was sent to work at the age of eleven years 
 in the local post-office, where a small business in printing and stationery 
 was also carried on. Books were thrown in his way and, without guid- 
 ance or instruction, he availed himself of every opportunity to improve 
 his mind; so that, as he grew to manhood, he was far ahead of many 
 who had gone through a careful course of training. He was the leader 
 of the young Irishmen of the district, and when a revolutionary agent 
 visited Haslingden, Davitt was naturally selected as chief propagandist. 
 He threw himself into the Fenian movement with his whole heart, and 
 when in February, 1867, when he was nineteen years of age, the attempt 
 was made to seize Chester Castle, he was on hand with his little con- 
 tingent. Unable to shoulder a rifle, with his single arm, he carried a 
 small store of cartridges in a bag made from a pocket handkerchief, and, 
 on the failure of the attempt, returned to Haslingden to resume his work 
 and re-organize the broken fragments of his " circle." On the re-organi- 
 zation of the movement he was selected as an organizer for the North 
 of England, where he did very important work, and was then detailed 
 for the more arduous duty of purchasing arms and forwarding them to 
 Ireland. Arrested and brought to trial for this work, he was sentenced 
 
i 
 
FROM THE CONVICT CELL TO THE PLATFORM. 
 
 in 1870 to fifteen years' penal servitude, seven and a half of which had 
 expired when he was released in 1878 on a " ticket of leave." 
 
 Almost from the moment of his release, Davitt became an important 
 man in Irish politics. He had studied much in an irregular way in 
 prison, and came out with his head full of plans and projects which he 
 was impatient to put in practice. Some of the prison libraries had a 
 few good books, although most of what reached the cells was literary 
 rubbish, and a little dexterity often enabled the convicts to exchange 
 books surreptitiously, and thus read two or three during the fortnight 
 which English "red tape" supposed necessary to the digestion of the 
 smallest volume. He had an overpowering desire to make up for 
 the deficiencies of his early training, and an extraordinary faculty of 
 acquiring in a short time what ordinary men learned by slow and 
 painful work. A weak man is ruined mentally and physically by impris- 
 onment, but a man of strong fibre sent to prison for standing by his 
 native land, although injured physically by the confinement, comes out 
 more resolute, more self-contained, and with a clearer view of things 
 than if he had spent his years in the heat and strife of the outside 
 world. It was so with Davitt. He acquired a habit of thinking out a 
 subject while sitting at his silent task or pacing his lonely cell during 
 seven long years, and he emerged from the prison with a truer concep- 
 tion of the needs of the movement, on the success of which his heart 
 was set, than he could have realized had he escaped imprisonment. 
 
 Received enthusiastically by their countrymen on their release, the 
 four " ticket of leave" men, Davitt, Chambers, McCarthy and O'Brien, 
 were the idols of the hour. Two days after their arrival in the Irish 
 capital, however, a sudden gloom was cast over them by the death from 
 heart disease of McCarthy, while breakfasting with Mr. Parnell, in com- 
 pany with John Dillon and others whose names have since become well 
 known. Invited to almost every town in Ireland, and to every place in 
 England and Scotland where there were Irishmen enough to welcome 
 them, the duty of replying to addresses devolved upon Davitt, and he 
 performed it with admirable tact, judgment and spirit. This was his 
 first experience in public speaking ; and, although not naturally a great 
 orator, he soon acquired a facility of expression that enabled him to face 
 any audience of his countrymen with confidence. These receptions 
 
40 
 
 DAVITT' S FIRST VISIT TO AMERICA. 
 
 brought him into personal contact with many thousands of his country- 
 men, and enabled him to ascertain for himself the exact condition of the 
 National movement and the tendencies of National thought. It also 
 gave him numerous opportunities of impressing men with his own ideas ; 
 but he found, to his great satisfaction, that the minds of most of his old 
 friends had been moving in the same direction as his own — although not, 
 perhaps, at such a rapid pace. Called before a Parliamentary Committee 
 to give evidence as to the cruel treatment of the political prisoners, he 
 conducted himself with such good sense, candor and judgment as to 
 extort compliments from hostile English Members, although he made a 
 strong case against the Government, and showed plainly that the 
 release had been dictated by a desire to save the discredit of allowing 
 McCarthy to die without proper medical treatment in prison. He was 
 also brought into contact with many " moderate " men, then strongly 
 prejudiced against the extreme National movement, and made an impres- 
 sion upon them which produced important results during the next two 
 or three years. 
 
 Having finished his tour through the " United Kingdom," Davitt 
 determined to visit America for the purpose of seeing his mother and 
 sisters who, during his imprisonment, had quitted England. He arrived 
 in New York early in August, 1878, having first been assured by some 
 old revolutionary friends that he could secure as many lecture engage- 
 ments as would enable him to pay the expenses of the trip, and carry out 
 his project of taking his mother home to Ireland. An extended course 
 was then far from his thoughts ; but the persuasion of his friends, after 
 much trouble, induced him to change his mind, and he delivered addresses 
 in numerous towns in the Eastern, Middle, and a few of the Western 
 States. 
 
 With the exception of the members of his own family, two or three 
 personal friends and a few dozen old associates from the North of Eng- 
 land, scattered through the country, Davitt at that time knew no one in 
 America. In New York City he knew but one man, Mr. James J. 
 O'Kelly, then on the staff of the Herald and afterwards member of Par- 
 liament for Roscommon. He landed on a Sunday evening, and after 
 depositing his baggage at a hotel proceeded at once to the Herald 
 office to see his friend. There the writer was introduced to him by 
 
THE NEW DEPARTURE. 
 
 43 
 
 Independence should be lost sight of, in the whirl of an agitation over 
 minor grievances where scheming politicians were liable to get the upper 
 hand. At private conferences, held everywhere he lectured, Davitt sol- 
 emnly pledged himself that every effort of his would be devoted to avert 
 this danger, and that Irish Independence should be always kept as the 
 beacon light ahead. On the faith of these pledges, repeated many times 
 afterwards, the support of the Nationalists of America was secured to the 
 new programme, and Davitt enabled to preach the gospel in Ireland. 
 
 Meanwhile a conference of Home Rulers was held in Dublin. The 
 "Home Rule Confederation of Great Britain," the English branch of the 
 organization, in which Mr. Parnell's strongest supporters were to be found, 
 held its annual gathering in the Irish capital, and the "active policy" in 
 Parliament was endorsed. The cable despatches, published by the Xew 
 York press, represented the result as a secession movement and a repu- 
 diation of the leadership of Isaac Butt. This misled the Xew York 
 Nationalists, and after a short consultation and telegraphic communication 
 with neighboring cities, it was decided to send the following cable des- 
 patch to Dublin, for presentation to Mr. Parnell, if approved by some 
 well-known Nationalists there : 
 
 "The Nationalists here will support you on the following conditions: 
 "' First, Abandonment of the federal demand, and substitution of a 
 general declaration in favor of Self-Government. 
 
 o 
 
 " ' Second, Vigorous agitation of the Land Question on the basis of a 
 peasant proprietary, while accepting concessions tending to abolish arbi- 
 trary eviction. 
 
 " ' Third, Exclusion of all sectarian issues from the platform. 
 
 u ' Fourth, Irish members to vote together on all Imperial and Home 
 questions, adopt an aggressive policy, and energetically resist coercive 
 legislation. 
 
 "'Fifth, Advocacy of all struggling nationalities in the British Em- 
 pire and elsewhere.' " 
 
 This despatch was signed by Dr. William Carroll, of Philadelphia ; 
 John J. Breslin, F. F. Millen and John Devoy, of New York ; and 
 Patrick Mahon, of Rochester, N. Y. It was published in the New 
 York Herald next day, and a series of "interviews" with prominent 
 Irish Nationalists on the day following giving their approval of the 
 
44 
 
 DAVITTS FIRST LECTURE TOUR. 
 
 programme and their reasons for favoring it. The article concluded with 
 the following words: "The feeling against Irish landlordism the repor- 
 ter found to be very intense, and a desire almost universally expressed 
 that the whole system should be swept away ; at the same time that 
 much was said in praise of certain individual members of the landlord 
 class. Fenianism, as people will persist in calling the extreme form of 
 Irish Nationality, seems really to be about to take ' a new departure,' 
 and to be destined to play a more active part in the public life of 
 Ireland than at any previous time. The reporter was assured that 
 lively times are ahead in both England and Ireland, which will act 
 as a strong stimulant on the Irish movement in America, and create no 
 small excitement. The belief in mere isolated insurrectionary movements 
 seems to have died out, and to be replaced by a determination to obtain 
 such a public standing in Ireland as will attract the attention of the 
 world, and secure alliances : \with England's enemies." 
 
 The "lively times" came/J indeed, and supplied the "strong stimulant 
 to the Irish movement in America," as predicted. 
 
 At this time Davitt was travelling through the States, and the des- 
 patch was sent to Parnell and the interviews published without consult- 
 ing him. When the papers reached him he became alarmed, and wrote 
 to New York deprecating the haste with which the programme had been 
 published. He feared it would frighten " moderate " people in Ireland 
 whom he hoped to gain over by slow degrees, and that the Nationalists 
 in Ireland would take it as an effort to revive a Whig agitation for 
 "redress of grievances." Both these things occurred, and to a great 
 extent the new movement was hampered by misunderstandings as to its 
 scope and its objects. A fierce controversy ensued — within a limited 
 circle, it is true, but including all those who were then actively work- 
 ing for Ireland, and on the decision arrived at depended whether the 
 " new departure " should become a question of practical politics or be 
 strangled at its birth. 
 
 Davitt, after his tour in the West, returned to New York, physi- 
 cally exhausted by incessant travelling, but filled with hope for the 
 future from what he had seen in his wanderings. Roughly speaking, he 
 had an idea of the work before him, but it was in a crude and indef- 
 inite shape, and he determined to return to Ireland, trusting a good 
 
WINNING OVER THE EDITORS. 
 
 45 
 
 deal to luck, and depending largely on his confidence in the patriotic 
 instinct of the Irish people. He had been introduced to Patrick Ford, 
 of the Irish World, a few days after his arrival, and found that gen- 
 tleman perfectly ready for an agitation of the most extreme kind on 
 the Land Question, but through ignorance of the actual state of Ire- 
 land, totally unprepared for any effort to obtain control of the local 
 public bodies, and out of harmony with the popular sentiment on the 
 National Question. He had several interviews with him and succeeded 
 in making a lasting impression, although Mr. Ford had been at first 
 inclined to denounce Davitt for advocating what he considered a halting 
 and half-hearted policy. The result was very satisfactory. For a consid- 
 erable time the Irish World dropped its vague and meaningless denuncia- 
 tions of "great blasphemies" and its advocacy of "eternal principles" 
 that were not stated, and went into plain, downright recommendations 
 for an agitation against the existing land system in Ireland. This, 
 together with Davitt's vigorous recommendations, increased its sale im- 
 mensely in Ireland, and for a long time it became the recognized organ 
 of the most advanced form of disaffection to British Rule in Ireland. 
 
 Wishing to win over to his views every important organ of Irish 
 opinion in America, Davitt next turned his attention to the Boston Pilot. 
 John Boyle O'Reilly, the editor of that paper, had been a Fenian, and, 
 while a soldier in a British cavalry regiment, had been court-martialled 
 and sent to penal servitude in Australia for participation in " treasonable 
 projects." " Accompanied by a New York friend, who was an old associ- 
 ate of O'Reilly, Davitt repaired to Boston, and in one interview succeeded 
 in winning over the editor of the Pilot and other influential Irishmen to 
 the " new departure." Shortly after this, he delivered a lecture in Boston 
 in which he gave a more complete sketch of his plans and objects than 
 he had hitherto given, and had conferences with O'Reilly, Dr. Joyce, P. 
 A. Collins and other leading Irishmen of that city. This was his last 
 lecture in America, and in December, 1878, he returned to Ireland. 
 
 Attacked by the Irishman, a Dublin paper which had at that time 
 some influence with a portion of the National party, and whose editor 
 traded on the National vote, he was engaged in a fierce controversy the 
 very week of his arrival in Dublin. The Irishman represented the 
 "new departure" as a cunning scheme to turn the attention of the 
 
4 6 
 
 NATIONALISTS AND HOME RULERS. 
 
 Nationalists from the work they were engaged in, to a purely Parliamen- 
 tary agitation, and its authors as deserters from the National ranks. 
 This, for a time, had considerable effect on many men who had been 
 at first disposed to look with favor on the project, and resulted in 
 Davitt being compelled to defend his character and his doctrines in a 
 newspaper controversy of peculiar bitterness. Meetings of Nationalists 
 were held, and the whole scheme proposed was discussed with great 
 earnestness for many weeks. Those who opposed him did so on the 
 ground that his scheme was a departure from the doctrine of physical 
 force, and an intermeddling in English Parliamentary politics that was 
 fraught with danger to the National cause. Very few had the smallest 
 sympathy with the landlords. Davitt bent all his energies to the task 
 of winning over the Nationalists to his views, knowing that, without their 
 aid, he could do nothing of the slightest importance, as Ireland was then 
 situated, and that, with their hostility, it would be impossible to do 
 anything at all. His efforts were vigorously seconded by his American 
 friends, and, during the Spring of 1879, large numbers of men were 
 won over. He failed, however, in his darling object of inducing the 
 party to go into the new policy in a body and direct its operations. 
 He was left free to act and was ably and efficiently aided by individ- 
 uals and the rest was left to himself. He next turned his attention 
 to the Parnellite section of the Home Rulers, and endeavored to effect 
 alterations in their programme and prepare the way for a union 
 between them and the Nationalists. In this he was only partially suc- 
 cessful. Conferences were held in Ireland, England and France, and his 
 life during this period was one of restless activity. Frequently he was 
 tempted to give up the attempt in disgust ; but he finally persevered and 
 continued to make converts to his ideas, or to discover men who already 
 held them. Among the first to come to his assistance were Patrick 
 Egan and Thomas Brennan ; and the close union and personal friend- 
 ship subsisting between these three men had a great influence on the 
 future course of the movement. 
 
 At this time, Mr. Parnell, although favorably impressed with portions 
 of the new policy, hesitated about throwing himself into it, fearing that 
 he might be pushed farther than he deemed it prudent to go, and fancy- 
 ing that some of its Nationalist advocates harbored insurrectionary projects 
 
PATRICK EG AN. 
 
THE ELEMENTS FAVORING THE MOVEMENT. 
 
 47 
 
 that might be sprung on the movement during some popular excitement. 
 Davitt had set his heart on winning him over, and neglected no oppor- 
 tunity of making an impression. Finally, what human arguments failed 
 to do was accomplished in a few short weeks by nature. The elements 
 were all on the side of the new movement, and almost everything that 
 occurred brought some new adherents. 
 
 The Summer of 1879 l° n & be remembered in Ireland. The 
 
 Spring had been excessively dry, and in the beginning of April there 
 was not a green leaf to be seen on the trees. The farmers were crying 
 out for rain, and when it came it was copious enough to satisfy their most 
 sanguine expectations. Soon everything looked blooming, and the lux- 
 uriance of the foliage gave promise of an abundant harvest. But the 
 rain continued, and during the whole summer there were scarcely ten dry 
 days. The sky was dark and leaden, the air was damp and chill, and 
 the earth was soaked with water. Every one became alarmed for the 
 harvest and longed for a few days of sunshine. Overcoats had to be 
 worn in July, and the most gloomy prognostications were indulged in. 
 It was plain to all that crops would be short, and many foresaw 
 famine. The farmers saw no prospect of getting the rent, and eviction, 
 as well as starvation, was staring them in the face. The ghastly memo- 
 ries of '47 were revived, and all Ireland was in a sullen and gloomy 
 mood. A new generation had grown up that would not tamely submit 
 to what their fathers had patiently borne during that terrible period, 
 and to a great extent they were organized. 
 
 Meetings began to be held to appeal to the landlords for abatement 
 of rent, and in nine cases out of ten these humble appeals were treated 
 with contemptuous indifference. Members of Parliament laid the facts 
 before the Government and were sneered at and lectured about Irish 
 improvidence and thriftlessness. Farmers' clubs, town councils, boards of 
 poor law guardians, meetings of priests, began to move and pointed out 
 to the Government the necessity of action and to the landlords the duty 
 of bearing their portion of the public calamity and of treating the 
 afflicted people with humanity. Xo effect was produced on the Govern- 
 ment and very little on the landlords, but the country was becoming angry 
 and exasperated. In Mayo and Sligo, meetings of another kind began 
 to be held. Groups of young men would assemble in the darkness of 
 
48 
 
 THE FIRST MEETINGS IN MAYO. 
 
 the night, and disguising themselves, make a violent demonstration either 
 against a neighboring landlord or some weak-kneed member of their 
 own class. This thing began to spread, and would have ended in a 
 more extensive system of Whiteboyism than had ever been seen in 
 Ireland before. The spirit of resistance was strong, and as sure as 
 eviction would come landlords would be shot, the police and the soldiers 1 
 would retaliate, and a hopeless agrarian Avar would be the result. 
 Davitt saw the danger and determined to make a desperate effort to 
 avert it. He hurried down to Mayo, pointed out the danger of the 
 situation, and induced the young men to give other methods a trial. 
 He succeeded, and after a few preliminary gatherings the first meeting 
 of the Land Agitation was held at Irishtown in Mayo. 
 
 The number of people present was not nearly so large as the news- 
 papers represented, but there were four or five thousand there and 
 the evidence of organization was not lost on the authorities. The men 
 marched in by parishes, each contingent having its leader, and took 
 up their places according to instructions received beforehand. There 
 was no confusion, no hurry, and the old excitement and demonstrative 
 enthusiasm common at Irish popular gatherings was nowhere visible. 
 The demeanor of the men was quiet, orderly and firm, with, perhaps, 
 a slight mixture of timidity on the part of the older men. The leaders 
 of contingents, and those who took the most active part in the 
 proceedings, were all young men and well known as staunch adherents 
 of the National cause. A large proportion of them had worked in Eng- 
 land for a time, and a few had been in America. But the great majority 
 of those present were small farmers and their sons, and their relatives 
 settled in the neighboring towns. The resolutions had been written 
 beforehand by Davitt, and discussed at informal meetings and social gath- 
 erings in Dublin by Patrick Egan, Thomas Brennan, and others. They 
 covered the question of Self-Government, the necessity of establishing a 
 peasant proprietary, and of an abatement of rent pending the settlement 
 of the Land Question. The proceedings consisted simply of the passage 
 of these resolutions and speeches in support of them, after which the 
 various contingents marched back to their homes. Some of the men who 
 spoke were politicians anxious to make capital, having no heart in the 
 movement and not intending to pursue it further than the passage of 
 
A HEEDLESS GOVERNMENT AND A SULLEN PEOPLE. 
 
 49 
 
 some paltry concession by Parliament. The people, however, were in 
 earnest, but still hardly conceiving the nature of the struggle on which 
 they were entering. 
 
 The proceedings were published in the Dublin papers, and a howl of 
 indignation came from the Irish Conservative and the English press. 
 The doctrines enunciated were declared to be rank communism, and the 
 Government was urged to suppress such meetings in future. The very 
 existence of distress was scouted, and the request for a reduction of 
 rents was pronounced to be robbery. Attention was called to it in Par- 
 liament, and when some of the Irish members pointed out the certainty 
 of great distress, if not of actual famine, they were answered by homilies 
 on the laziness and improvidence of the Irish people. Lord Beaconsfield 
 talked flippantly about the Irish never providing during "years of plenty" 
 for bad seasons, and their habit of continually appealing to the Govern- 
 ment to remedy the results of their own " neglect." The sacredness of 
 the "rights of property" was insisted upon, and the tremendous services 
 of the Irish landlords to the tenantry, their benevolence and good 
 nature were extolled to the skies. The people read these things — they 
 had become much more of a newspaper reading people than in 1848 — 
 and the natural result followed. A spirit of sullen determination not 
 to tamely submit to a repetition of the horrors of '47 took possession 
 of them, and they turned their thoughts to the means of procuring arms 
 with which to resist eviction and extermination. The rain kept constantly 
 pouring down, and as the summer advanced, all lingering hopes of a fair 
 harvest vanished. The people grew more sullen as the prospect darkened 
 and ominous mutterings of vengeance were distinctly heard. In several 
 districts of the West, plans for the shooting of from six to twenty land- 
 lords at one stroke on the commencement of evictions were hatched, and 
 many who afterwards took an active part in the agitation were indisposed 
 to waste any time in a purely peaceful and legal movement. 
 
 The danger of the situation was promptly reported to Davitt and his 
 friends, and he immediately set to work to find a remedy. He went down 
 to his native county, examined things for himself, and used all his influ- 
 ence with the Nationalists to restrain the people and to induce them to 
 continue the meetings and keep their condition before the public. He 
 had enormous difficulties to contend with ; but, after many discouragements 
 
 " G 
 
So 
 
 NATIONAL TENDENCIES OF THE AGITATION. 
 
 and disappointments, he succeeded and the agitation went on. Other 
 meetings were held at Milltown, Westport and Claremorris, and the 
 movement gathered force as it went along. At Milltown, Thomas 
 Brennan proposed the following resolution, which was substantially the 
 same as that proposed at all the early meetings, and first in order : 
 
 " That, as the people of Ireland have never ceased to demand their 
 right of Self-Go vernment, we hereby reiterate our resolution to labor for 
 the same until our country has secured its attainment." And in the 
 course of his speech in support of it, he used the following words : 
 " Their presence there, notwithstanding landlords' frowns and agents' 
 threats, proved that they knew their rights, and were determined to 
 insist upon them. They met that day to declare the rights of their 
 country to National Independence, and he believed that it was only 
 in an Irish Senate their right to the ownership in the land would be 
 recognized." 
 
 The strong National tendency of most of the speeches was, in fact, 
 the most remarkable feature of these meetings, and Davitt's scornful 
 repudiation of Butt's Home Rule scheme and all other attempts at com- 
 promise on the National Question, evoked severe criticism from the 
 adherents of the Home Rule League. But, without resolutions and 
 speeches expressing such sentiments, the Nationalists of Mayo would not 
 have attended the meetings, and it was they who gathered the timid 
 farmers and marshalled the crowds that gave these meetings importance. 
 Besides this, they were the expression of the deliberate conviction of the 
 speakers. 
 
 At Westport, Mr. Parnell gave expression to his famous advice to 
 the farmers to "keep a firm grip of their holdings," which afterwards 
 became one of the watchwords of the Land League. He declared that 
 " if the landlords could be purchased out, as in Prussia, it would be a 
 final settlement of the question." " But, in the meanwhile," he contin- 
 ued, " it is necessary to ensure that, as long as the tenant pays a fair 
 rent, he shall be left to enjoy the fruits of his industry. A fair rent is 
 a rent the tenant can reasonably pay according to the times, but in 
 bad times a tenant cannot be expected to pay as much as he did in 
 good times, three or four years ago. Now what must we do in order to 
 induce the landlords to see the position? You must show the landlords 
 
JOHN OF TUAM DENOUNCES THE AGITATORS. 
 
 5* 
 
 that you intend to hold a firm grip of your homesteads and lands. 
 You must not allow yourself to be dispossessed." At Claremorris, John 
 Dillon made his first speech in connection with the movement. He 
 expressed his gratification at the fact of it being in his native prov- 
 ince of Connaught, where Cromwell had driven so man)' of the Irish 
 people, and where landlordism had done its worst work, that the move- 
 ment to brine about its downfall had originated. At the meeting of the 
 committee of arrangements for this demonstration, the Rev. Ulick Burke, 
 who presided next day, endeavored to have a resolution in favor of 
 "denominational education" and another favoring "Home Rule" 
 adopted ; but although he gave proof that he was acting under instruc- 
 tions from Archbishop MacHale, of Tuam, one of the most popular 
 men who ever lived in Ireland, the proposition was rejected. Such reso- 
 lutions had been passed at every popular meeting in Ireland for several 
 years previous, and the refusal to accept them alarmed the Catholic 
 hierarchy. 
 
 The relations between the Catholic clergy and the originators of the 
 agitation were, at this time, rather strained. In relation to the West- 
 port meeting, the Archbishop of Tuam sent the following letter to the 
 Dublin Freeman s Journal: 
 
 Westport, June 5. 
 "Dear Sir: — In a telegraphic message exhibited towards the end of 
 last week in a public room of this town, an Irish member of Parliament 
 has unwittingly expressed his readiness to attend a meeting, convened in 
 a mysterious and disorderly manner, which is to be held, it seems, in 
 Westport, on Sunday next. Of the sympathy of the Catholic clergy for 
 the rack-rented tenantry of Ireland, and of their willingness to co-oper- 
 ate earnestly in redressing their grievances, abundant evidence exists in 
 historic Mayo as elsewhere. But night-patrolling, acts and words of 
 menace with arms in hand, the profanation of what is most sacred in 
 religion — all the result of lawless and occult association — eminently merit 
 the solemn condemnation of the ministers of religion, as directly tending 
 to impiety and disorder in Church and in society. Against such combi- 
 nations in this diocese, organized by a few designing men, who, instead 
 of the well-being of the community, seek only to promote their personal 
 interests, the faithful clergy will not fail to raise their warning voices, 
 
52 
 
 DA VI TT DEFENDS HIMSELF. 
 
 and to point out to the people that unhallowed combinations lead invari- 
 ably to disaster and to firmer riveting of the chains by which we are 
 unhappily bound as a subordinate people to a dominant race. 
 " I remain, dear sir, faithfully yours, 
 
 "John, Archbishop of Tuam." 
 
 And a little later he addressed a long letter to the same paper, in 
 which the following passage occurred: "In some parts of the country the 
 people, in calmer moments, will not fail to be astonished at the circum- 
 stance of finding themselves at the tail of a few unknown, strolling men, 
 who, with affected grief, deploring the condition of the tenantry, seek 
 only to mount to place and preferment on the shoulders of the people ; 
 and, should they succeed in their ambitious designs, they would not hes- 
 itate to shake aside at once the instrument of their advancement as an 
 unprofitable incumbrance." 
 
 The former letter referred to Mr. Parnell ; but the latter was clearly 
 aimed at Davitt, who promptly replied : " As one who has taken part in 
 the meetings to which his Grace refers," he said, " I beg respectfully to 
 say that I am neither a strolling nor an unknown man in the West, but 
 one who works for his daily bread, and who is known in Mayo, my 
 native county, where my relatives are now, in common with others, 
 experiencing the severity of the times, and a want of that assistance in 
 the struggle of life which a beneficial change in the land-laws ol Ireland 
 would afford them. Some twenty-five years ago, my father was ejected 
 from a small holding near the parish of Straed, in Mayo, because 
 unable to pay a rent which the crippled state of his resources, after 
 struggling through the famine years, rendered impossible. Trials and suf- 
 ferings in exile for a quarter of a century, in which I became physically 
 disabled for life, a father's grave dug beneath American soil, myself the 
 only member of my family ever destined to live or die in Ireland, and 
 this privilege existing only by virtue of ' ticket-of-leave,' are the conse- 
 quence which follow that eviction." All this, he added, entitled him 
 to something more than an imputation of affected grief at the condition 
 of his kindred, threatened with a fate similar to his own. 
 
 The people expressed their feelings with regard to this controversy 
 by holding a meeting, where about five thousand people attended, in front 
 of the Archbishop's house, and passing similar resolutions. A great 
 
ALARM OF THE LANDLORDS. 
 
 53 
 
 number of the priests were heartily in sympathy with the movement from 
 the beginning, and, after a while, the open opposition to the new move- 
 ment ceased. The agitation went on, but still without any definite- 
 organization, and the tone and spirit of it may be judged by the following 
 speech delivered by Davitt at Milltown, County Galway. 
 
 "I would advise the tenant-farmers," he said, "to feed themselves and 
 their children, to live comfortably and decently, to keep their cabins 
 neat, and send their children to school, and, if there was sufficient left, 
 to pay the landlords the rents they demand. Let the landlords turn 
 them out of their homes, if they would, at the point of the bayonet, and 
 a spirit would spring up in Ireland that would be the destruction of 
 landlords forever." He urged them to organize. "What had organiza- 
 tion done for Ireland?" he continued. "The organization to which he 
 had the honor to belong — the Fenian organization (loud and prolonged 
 cheers) — that organization disestablished the Irish Church. So said Mr. 
 Gladstone. Well, an organization of the tenant-farmers would disestab- 
 lish the landlords in half the time" (cheers). In conclusion, Mr. Davitt 
 counselled them to agitate, and said he did not look to the House of 
 Commons for a settlement of this question, but to the perseverance of 
 the Irish people on Irish soil. 
 
 The landlords in Ireland became alarmed ; but the Government seemed 
 to attach no importance to the agitation. Mr. James Lowther, the Chief 
 Secretary for- Ireland, in reply to a question in the House of Commons 
 regarding the meeting above mentioned, thus contemptuously described the 
 meeting: "The first resolution was moved by a clerk in a commercial 
 firm in Dublin, and seconded by a person described as a discharged 
 school-master. Another resolution was proposed by a convict at large on 
 a ticket-of-leave, and seconded by a representative of a local newspaper." 
 The " convict at large on a ticket-of-leave " was destined to play a much 
 more important part in the world than the flippant Yorkshire squire who 
 thus undertook to dispose of him. 
 
 The Land meetings continued, and the area of the agitation was 
 widened. From Connaught the movement spread into Munster and parts 
 of Leinster and Ulster; but, in most cases, the resolutions and speeches 
 were milder in the three latter provinces. Meetings of Tenants' Defense 
 Associations, Farmers' Clubs, and of the Catholic Clergy, passed resolu- 
 
54 
 
 DECLARATIONS OF THE CATHOLIC CLERGY. 
 
 tions calling on the Government to come to the relief of the distressed 
 districts ; but nowhere was the tone so vigorous or aggressive as in the 
 meetings organized by the Connaught Nationalists. A declaration of the 
 Catholic Clergy of the Deanery of Tralee, County Kerry, may be taken 
 as a sample. It said: "The prevailing distress, we believe, to be owing 
 principally to the following causes: In the first place, to the excessive 
 rents for the last twenty years. There has been very generally a steady 
 increase of rents, that were already high enough, until they have been 
 advanced to 50 or 100 per cent. ; in some cases, even much over the 
 poor-law valuation. These exorbitant rents the tenants have struggled to 
 pay, as long as prices kept up and harvests proved favorable. But now 
 that the prices of all kinds of agricultural produce have fallen 20 per 
 cent, they find it utterly impossible to meet the extravagant rents they 
 were heretofore obliged to pay — rents which we believe to be higher 
 than in any other part of Ireland." And the subject of American com- 
 petition was not forgotten. " But it may be said," the document con- 
 tinues, " that the present depression is only temporary, and that a good 
 harvest or two will restore matters to their former equilibrium. We fear 
 not ; because we apprehend that some, at least, of the causes are of a 
 permanent character. We may hope, through God's mercy, for favorable 
 seasons and good harvests; but we cannot hope that the competition of 
 foreign producers on the Continents of both Europe and America will 
 cease or become less active. On the contrary, we regard that competi- 
 tion as only in its commencement. * * * * Now, if this state of things 
 continues, the tenant-farmers of Ireland must of necessity go to the wall. 
 Bankruptcy and ruin will speedily overtake them, and the country will be 
 reduced to as bad a condition of things as that of the famine times. 
 The landlords have the salvation of the country in their hands." The 
 clergy of Clifden, County Galway, concluded a long statement of the 
 condition of that district as follows : " We shall continue to agitate, until 
 the order of death by starvation and the slow process of hunger shall 
 have vanished, and until death by eviction and extermination shall be 
 drawn from within the right which landlords enjoy ; that is, of perpetu- 
 ating the hideous crime of murder by rack-rent and extermination." 
 
 The Irish Members again and acain called the attention of the Gov- 
 ernment to the prevalence of wide-spread distress ; but the only action 
 
GROWJXG EXASPERATION OE THE PEOPLE. 
 
 55 
 
 taken was to quarter a large force of constabulary in the "disturbed" 
 districts, at an enormous cost to the people. A number of the landlords 
 granted reductions of rent ; but the vast majority treated all appeals for 
 abatement with contempt, and called on Parliament for measures of 
 repression. The Grand Jury of Mayo, a landlord body, called the atten- 
 tion of the Government to "the unsettled state of the county, and to 
 the serious agitation against the payment of rents without regard to 
 the rate or time at which the lands were let, or to the other circum- 
 stances connected therewith. This illegal design," they continued, " is 
 pursued by a system of wholesale intimidation by words and acts of men- 
 ace, and by violent speeches, exciting the people to outrages against both 
 landlords and tenants. We think these evils cannot be effectually 
 removed without additional powers being conferred on the executive by 
 Parliament." This was a specimen of the spirit shown by the landlord 
 class during the early stages of the agitation. They did not know the 
 enormous change that had taken place in the popular mind, and of what 
 little use to them the "additional powers" would prove. 
 
 The people became exasperated, and the tone of the meetings grew 
 bolder and more defiant. Davitt understood the spirit of the landlords 
 thoroughly ; and that he did not underestimate the difficulties to be 
 overcome, may be judged from the following extract from a speech 
 delivered at Shrule, County Mayo: ''Your fight," he said, "is against 
 a system which will be held to by the landlords like grim death. 
 Organize, unite, and sap its foundation by intelligent and persevering 
 operation. Expose its inhuman structure to the world. In the words 
 of the illustrious Mitchel : 'Act as if every tillage farm in Ireland 
 was a fortress to be held, not for the occupant and the landlord only, 
 but for the country.' Whether Ireland is to become a free nation or 
 not, or her land emancipated, depends upon the way in which the garri- 
 son of farmers acquit themselves, and stand upon their right to the soil 
 of the fatherland, and to the fruits of the labor by which they culti- 
 vated it." 
 
 The repeal of the Convention Act, secured mainly through the exer- 
 tions of Mr. P. J. Smyth, then Member for Westmeath, enabled the 
 agitators to give the new movement more definite shape, and on August 
 16th. 1879, a Convention of tenant-farmers was held in Castlebar. Here 
 
THE NATIONAL LAND LEAGUE OF MAYO. 
 
 the " National Land League of Mayo " was formed, and its object set 
 forth in a published document drawn up by Davitt. The following 
 extracts will be sufficient to show the aims and purposes of the organiza- 
 tion : " The objects for which this body is organized are, to watch over 
 the interests of the people it represents, and protect the same, as far as 
 may be in its power to do so, from an unjust or capricious exercise of 
 power or privilege on the part of landlords, or any other class in the 
 community. To resort to every means compatible with justice, morality 
 and right reason, which shall not clash defiantly with the Constitution 
 upheld by the powers of the British empire in this country, for the abo- 
 lition of the present Land laws of Ireland, and the substitution in their 
 place of such a system as shall be in accord with the social rights and 
 interests of our people, the traditions and moral sentiments of our race, 
 and which the contentment and prosperity of our country* imperiously 
 demand." All instances of eviction, rack-renting and other arbitrary acts 
 were to be exposed, the names of all who should take farms from which 
 others had been evicted published, and the members were pledged gen- 
 erally to stand by one another. The seventh article was peculiarly 
 significant: "Finally, to act as a vigilance committee in Mayo, noting 
 the conduct of its Grand Jury, poor-law guardians, town commissioners 
 and Members of Parliament, and pronounce on the manner in which 
 their respective functions are performed, whenever the interests, social or 
 political, of the people, represented by this club, render it expedient to 
 do so." 
 
 Mr. Parnell's position at this time may be judged from the following 
 words uttered at a meeting held in Limerick on August 31st: "It was 
 the duty of the Irish tenant-farmers to combine and ask for a reduction 
 of rent, and if they got no reduction where a reduction was necessary, 
 then, he said, that it was the duty of the tenant to pay no rent until he 
 got it ; and if they combined in that way, if they stood together, and if, 
 being refused a reasonable and just reduction, they kept a firm grip of 
 their homesteads, no power on earth could prevail against the hundreds 
 of thousands of tenant-farmers of this country." The advice was approved 
 of by the assembled farmers, and embodied in the following resolution : 
 " That the farmers of this county pledge themselves not to take any 
 farm from which a tenant has been evicted for refusing to pay a rent 
 
THE CENTRAL LAND LEAGUE FORMED. 
 
 57 
 
 which, in the opinion of honest and impartial valuators, is a rack-rent, 
 and which would make it impossible for the person paying it to maintain 
 his farm with decency and comfort." 
 
 By slow degrees the agitation spread in Ulster ; but the demands of 
 the farmers were very moderate. The inaction of the Government and 
 the selfishness of the landlords, however, soon produced the natural result ; 
 and speeches of a very aggressive character began to be applauded at 
 meetings, where there was a considerable mixture of Protestants in the 
 crowd. At Draperstbwn, County Londonderry, Mr. Biggar, Member of 
 Parliament for Cavan, said : " If the landlords refused the reasonable 
 and fair concession now asked for, they might have to suffer a great deal, 
 because, ultimately, a bloody revolution might take place in these king- 
 doms, and the land might be taken from the landlords entirely, as it was 
 in France." 
 
 Another feature of the agitation, subsequently called Boycotting, was 
 first mentioned by John Dillon at Maryborough, Queens County. He said : 
 " The fight will begin after the November days. What will the landlords 
 do when they refused them the rents of November ? Let those who have 
 the money, pay the rent; and those that have too high rents, ask the land- 
 lord to reduce them by 50 or 60 per cent., and if he refused, pay no 
 rent. He will then serve the tenant with notice, and they must have 
 the meetings .every Sunday, and if the last resource were adopted, they 
 must put a ban on his land. If any man then takes up that land, let 
 no man speak to him, or have any business transactions with him." 
 
 Finally, a central organization for the direction of the agitation was 
 formed at a meeting held in the Imperial Hotel, Dublin, on October 
 21st, 1879. The object was the same as that of the Mayo Land League, 
 and the methods to be used exactly those sketched out by Davitt. The 
 body which called the organization into existence was not very large, 
 and few of those present commanded, at that time, much influence in 
 the country. There were a few Members of Parliament, a few lawyers 
 of no particular distinction, some Dublin shopkeepers, priests, editors, 
 clerks, and the men who had up to then conducted the meetings in the 
 West. It is very doubtful if at that moment any of those present, 
 except perhaps, Davitt, fully realized the nature of the struggle on which 
 they were entering, or the tremendous influence the new organization 
 
 H 
 
58 PARNELL'S LEADERSHIP— THE CENTRAL ORGANIZATION. 
 
 was about to exercise in Ireland, and in the world. They had con- 
 ducted the agitation so far with considerable success, owing entirely to 
 the aid received from the Nationalists of the localities where meetings 
 were held ; a more manly and self-reliant spirit had been infused into 
 the farmers, who had been given habits of acting together — the materials, 
 in short, had been collected for a great movement ; but the future was 
 as much dependent on the action of the Government as on the conduct 
 of the people or their leaders. 
 
 Mr. Parnell had shown great hesitation about assuming the leadership 
 of the movement during the early meetings, and it was only after 
 repeated interviews with Davitt and a representative of the Irish-Ameri- 
 can Nationalists, and the strongest assurances that he would not be asked 
 to go beyond a certain limit, that he finally consented to throw himself 
 into it. He had the peculiar faculty of being able to act, on matters 
 where agreement prevailed, with people whose views were much more 
 advanced than his own ; and, while acting and speaking with great 
 audacity, his caution and self-restraint never forsook him. Without a man 
 of his social standing the humble men who had started the agitation 
 never could have brought it to the stage where it then was ; and with- 
 out the aid of their energy, experience and knowledge of the people, Mr. 
 Parnell would have been equally unsuccessful. And all combined could 
 not have got along without the active co-operation of a very large section 
 of the Nationalists in Ireland, backed by the vast majority in America. 
 
 The objects of the League were declared to be "first, to bring out a 
 reduction of rack-rents ; second, to facilitate the obtaining of the owner- 
 ship of the soil by the occupiers." It was then declared " that the objects 
 of the League can be best attained by promoting organization among the 
 tenant-farmers ; by defending those who may be threatened with eviction 
 for refusing to pay unjust rents; by facilitating the working of the Bright 
 clauses cf the Land Act (of 1870) during the winter; and by obtaining 
 such reform in the laws relating to land as will enable every tenant 
 to become the owner of his holding by paying a fair rent for a lim- 
 ited number of years." Mr. Parnell was elected President; A. J. Kettle, 
 a County Dublin farmer, Michael Daviit and Thomas Brennan, Secre- 
 taries; and Joseph G. Biggar, M.P., W. H. O'Sullivan, M.P., and Patrick 
 Egan, Treasurers. Resolutions to the following effect were then passed : 
 
FIRST CRISIS OF THE AGITATION. 
 
 59 
 
 " That the President of this League, Mr. Parnell, be requested to 
 proceed to America for the purpose of obtaining assistance from our exiled 
 countrymen, and other sympathizers, for the objects for which this appeal 
 is issued. That none of the funds of this League shall be used for the 
 purchase of any landlord's interest in the land, or for furthering the inter- 
 ests of any Parliamentary candidate." The meeting then adjonrued and 
 the Land League was launched on its perilous career. 
 
 Mr. Parnell did not start immediately for America, but remained in 
 Ireland to superintend the work of organization. Meetings were held as 
 before, and a large number of Farmers' Clubs, Tenants' Defense Associa- 
 tions, and other kindred organizations became affiliated with the central 
 organization as branch leagues. The distress was becoming greater and 
 boards of Poo 1 " Law Guardians, Town Councils, and other public bodies 
 were passing resolutions calling for prompt relief and amendment of 
 the Land Laws. Even the Local Government Board, a body appointed 
 by the Government, felt called upon to act, and issued a report giving 
 facts and figures taken from official sources, showing that the country 
 was rapidly hurrying towards famine. The remnant of the crops which 
 had been spared by the terrible rains of the summer, and had been 
 slightly stimulated by the feeble sunshine of July and August, were 
 almost totally destroyed by a series of the most awful thunder-storms 
 and floods that Ireland had ever seen. The people were in an angry 
 mood and beginning to lose faith in an agitation that appeared to have 
 no prospect of success, when the Government came to the aid of the 
 agitators by a bad blunder. 
 
 The first crisis of the agitation was at length reached at a meet- 
 ing held at Gurteen, County Sligo, on Nov. 2d. The Government had 
 watched this extraordinaty agitation with some alarm, but it is doubt- 
 ful whether its full significance was appreciated. Official stenographers 
 had been, for some time, attending the meetings for the purpose of 
 supplying verbatim reports of the speeches, and those delivered at Gur- 
 teen furnished what was considered a good opportunity to aim a blow at 
 the agitation that might keep it from assuming more dangerous propor- 
 tions. Davitt, alluding to a recent statement of Chief Secretary Lowther 
 that the Irish farmers had ^"30,000,000 in bank, and that the money 
 formed a good security for the landlords to obtain their rent during 
 
6o 
 
 THE SPEECHES AT GURTEEN. 
 
 the winter, said : " If it is true, I deny that you should draw upon that, 
 in this year of impending famine and dire misfortune before us, in order 
 to satisfy the greed and avarice of the landlords. If you have it there, 
 I say look first to the necessities of your children, of your wives, and of 
 your homes; look to the wants and necessities of the coming winter; 
 and, when you have satisfied those wants and necessities, if you have a 
 charitable disposition to meet the wants of the landlord, give him what 
 you can spare, and give him no more. I am one of those peculiarly 
 constituted Irishmen who believe that rent for land under any circum- 
 stances, in prosperous times or bad times, is nothing more nor less than 
 an unjust and immoral tax upon the industry of a people ; and I further 
 believe that landlordism, as an institution, is an open conspiracy against 
 the well-being, prosperity, and happiness of a people ; and I say that 
 anything that is immoral — whether it be a rent or an open conspiracy of 
 landlordism — has to be crushed by the people who suffer in consequence 
 of it. * * * Are we here to listen to any proposal of fixity of tenure 
 at fair rents, with periodical valuations ? I say no. That is fixity of 
 landlordism, fixity of poverty and squalor, and fixity of degradation, which 
 have made Ireland a reproach before civilization, a nation of beggars. I 
 say that, at last, in face of another impending famine, too plainly visible, 
 the time has come when the manhood of Ireland will spring to its feet 
 and say it will tolerate this system no longer." 
 
 Another speaker, James Daly, proprietor of the Connaught Telegraph, 
 wound up his address thus: "In conclusion, I give you this bit of advice 
 — hold your farms. Let them serve you with notice to quit, with eject- 
 ments ; let them, if they like, proceed to the courts. Defend yourselves, 
 but don't allow them to evict you. Then, supposing anyone is evicted, 
 let you assemble and put him in again that very night ; and if there is 
 a coward enough found among you to take another's land, then, I hope, 
 he will be served as he deserves." 
 
 James B. Killen, a Northern Presbyterian barrister, was still more 
 outspoken. " When I saw this large assemblage before me, I thought of 
 an old legend I heard in the North, that in a cavern there were a thou- 
 sand mailed warriors resting on their swords, who would, when their 
 enchantment was broken, at the sound of the angel of liberty's proclama- 
 tion of Ireland's liberty and freedom, burst forth. When I saw you in 
 
SYMPATHY AROUSED BY THE PROSECUTIONS. 
 
 61 
 
 your age, in your middle age, in the glory of your manhood, aye, and in 
 your womanhood too, I thought the hour had arrived when Ireland's lib- 
 - erty was about to be consummated. * * * There are some men who 
 will bring the law in operation on you, bring notices to quit and eject- 
 ments, and turn you out of your houses and farms. But if there be any 
 man who will go into that house or farm — well, may the Lord take care 
 of him. I leave it to yourselves. Self-preservation is the first law of 
 nature ; and I leave it to you to say whether we are to obtain our 
 rights, as in other countries, by the pen, the pencil, or the sword if 
 you wish it. Oh ! the time has gone by for any namby-pamby speak- 
 ing. We must now approach the matter with ungloved hand, speak tc 
 the men face to face, and tell them what we want and what we mean. 
 I say nothing here but what I am prepared to stand by." 
 
 The Government instituted a prosecution, the three orators were 
 brought before the magistrates in Sligo, they became the popular heroes 
 and a fresh stimulus was given to the agitation. 
 
 The Irish in America had not been much moved by the agitation up 
 to this period. Full of sympathy for their kindred and hating English 
 domination with a bitterness that neither time nor distance could lessen, 
 most of them had as yet failed to see any practical way of helping the 
 new movement. They did not believe the British Parliament would 
 grant any genuine measure of relief, nor did they believe that Ireland 
 was strong enough to wrest her rights by force. But they had been 
 keenly watching the course of events at home, and at every Nationalist 
 meeting the subject was earnestly discussed. Their attitude was one of 
 sympathetic inaction, but a force of opinion, afterwards to exert an enor- 
 mous influence, was slowly but surely developing. The arrests and sub- 
 sequent trials supplied a strong stimulus. Irishmen were prosecuted by 
 an English Government for endeavoring to benefit their own people, and 
 there could be no question as to the side on which the sympathies of 
 Irish- Americans would be ranged. 
 
 The same was the case among the working classes in the Irish cities, 
 and particularly among the more active adherents of the National cause. 
 These men did not, as a rule, love the farmers who, for a generation, 
 had done nothing for the country and were, perhaps, too severely blamed 
 for their inaction — which was, after all the direct result of the social 
 
62 
 
 PARNELL'S ROTUNDA SPEECH. 
 
 slavery in which they were sunk. The arrests at once appealed to the 
 sympathies of the townsmen, and gave the movement a political char- 
 acter which it had not heretofore possessed. In Dublin this change 
 of feeling found expression in a mass meeting in the Rotunda. An 
 immense crowd attended and the enthusiasm was unmistakable. Mr. 
 Parnell received a great ovation and spoke with unusual warmth. In 
 the course of his speech, he said : " Fellow-countrymen, I beg you to 
 remember there are to-night countrymen of yours suffering in prison 
 — (hisses) — because they attempted to show their fellow-countrymen the 
 road to freedom (cheers). Remember the voice of Michael Davitt is 
 speaking to you from his prison (cheers). Hold up your hands with 
 me and vow you will not cease— (great cheering, during which the 
 hands of thousands of people were held up) — that you will not cease 
 from this struggle until the teachings of Michael Davitt, for which he 
 has been persecuted to-day, shall have been carried out and fulfilled to 
 the very last letter." 
 
 This was cabled to America and produced strong leeling. Next day 
 another meeting was held at Balla, County Mayo, to protest against 
 the first eviction since the beginning of the agitation, and fears of a 
 collision with the soldiers and police were entertained. Thomas Brennan 
 in his speech repeated the words of Davitt at Gurteen, made a strong 
 appeal to the Irish feelings of the police, and was subsequently arrested. 
 Mr. Parnell also spoke and in his usual strain. The agitation grew 
 bolder and spread with much greater rapidity in the East and South, 
 Dozens of gatherings were held in various parts of Ireland every Sun 
 day ; but the character of the speeches and resolutions was the same 
 and the only new feature was the organization of regular local branches 
 of the Land League. After having been committed for trial the prison- 
 ers were released on bail and were enthusiastically received throughout 
 the country. They attended meetings everywhere, and some of them 
 made a tour of the manufacturing towns of England where the Irish 
 element was strong, addressing their countrymen and organizing branches 
 of the League. 
 
PARNELL AND DILLON IN NEW YORK 
 
 6 3 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE LAND WAR AND ITS RESULTS. 
 
 Parnell and Dillon in America — Hotv the American Land League was Founded — The Parlia- 
 mentary Elections of 1880 — Davitt's Second Visit to the Utiifed States — His Return and 
 Arrest — The Land Act and Coercion — Arrest of the Members and the No Rent Manifesto 
 — The "Treaty of Kilmainham" and the Phoenix Park Murders — General Outcome of the 
 League's Work — A New Ireland. 
 
 TOWARDS the end of December Messrs. Parnell and Dillon set sail 
 for America, and arrived in New York on January 2d, 1882. This 
 was the most important event in the agitation up to that time. A 
 Reception Committee, organized by the Nationalists, had been at work for 
 some weeks, and contained a larger number of representative Irishmen 
 and well-known Americans than had ever taken part in any previous 
 demonstration, although Richard O'Gorman, Judge Charles P. Daly, 
 Eugene Kelly, and other prominent Irishmen, refused to take part in it. 
 Reception Committees thus organized formed the nuclei of the future 
 Land League branches everywhere, the initiative coming in all cases from 
 the Nationalists. The influence of these early proceedings on the subse- 
 quent course of the agitation will easily be seen. A decidedly National 
 tendency was given to it, and the wealthy New York Irishmen who 
 declined to aid the reception committee lost their influence with the 
 people. 
 
 But, although these gentlemen refused to have any share in the pro- 
 ceedings, they were all present at the public reception, anxiously listening 
 to the speeches of the two envoys. Between four and five thousand of 
 the very best Irish people in New York City attended. A high price 
 was charged for admission, and Madison Square Garden, the largest hall 
 in the. city, was selected. The reception accorded the Land League dele- 
 gates by the audience was most enthusiastic, and they were now fairly 
 launched on their mission. Had the New York meeting failed, their 
 
64 ASSAILED BY THE AMERICAN PRESS. 
 
 whole tour would have been a failure, or only a partial success, and the 
 new organization in Ireland would have been dealt a blow from which 
 it could hardly have recovered. Owing to a resolution passed by the 
 League immediately before their departure from Ireland, Messrs. Parnell 
 and Dillon were requested to collect money for the famine-stricken people, 
 and in their first speeches they announced the two-fold purpose of their 
 mission — to relieve the distress and sustain the political, agitation. The 
 result of the meeting was the transmission by cable to the treasurers of 
 the League in Dublin before the week was out the sum of ^500 — the 
 first considerable amount received from any source. This was speedily 
 followed by ,£400 from San Francisco, and from that time the supply was 
 kept up briskly. 
 
 Delegates from Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago and other cities attended 
 the New York reception and made arrangements for a series of meetings, 
 and invitations poured in from all parts of the country. The envoys 
 were left no time for repose or for close examination of the condition 
 and opinions of the Irish people settled in the places they visited. This 
 was the cause of many subsequent mistakes and of considerable trouble 
 inside the movement. The most noisy people at meetings were only 
 too frequently taken for the best workers, and many unworthy men were 
 thus foisted into temporary positions of influence. 
 
 Almost from the moment they had landed, Mr. Parnell and his col- 
 league were assailed with astonishing virulence by a large section of the 
 American press, led by the New York Herald, and their life was one of 
 incessant combat. England has always wielded a powerful influence in 
 America; and in New York and other Atlantic cities, where the commer- 
 cial and financial affairs of the wealthy class are intimately connected 
 with those of England, this influence was at that time paramount. It 
 was exerted to the full against the new agitation, and the scurrility and 
 recklessness of statement, characteristic of American party warfare, were 
 indulged in by the hostile portion of the press, to a degree seldom wit- 
 nessed in the hottest political campaign. The coldness or covert hostility 
 of the wealthy Irish of New York encouraged these practices, and the 
 mettle and capacity of the envoys were severely tested. Their relief fund 
 had been the first in the field, and it was through their exertions, and 
 those of the other League leaders, that the very existence of famine was 
 
RIVAL RELIEF FUNDS. 
 
 65 
 
 established in the public mind. But those who had fought hardest to 
 prove that there was no distress at all, and to prevent Parliament from 
 relieving it, now came forward with the cry of charity on their lips to 
 appeal for help for the starving people. The Land League Relief Fund 
 was denounced as an unwarrantable misuse of charity for political pur- 
 poses ; but, admitting the political character of the committee, the other 
 funds were still worse instances of the same thing, inasmuch as they 
 forced the distressed people to humiliate themselves by seeking help from 
 their bitterest political enemies and oppressors. The Duchess of Marl- 
 borough, wife of the Lord Lieutenant, was placed nominally at the head 
 of one Relief Fund, which was really controlled by the Castle officials, 
 and the Mansion-House Fund, under the Presidency of E. D. Gray, 
 M.P., then Lord Mayor of Dublin, while much less hostile to the 
 people, owing to a mixture of elements on the committee, was yet almost 
 exclusively managed by enemies of the agitation. The New York 
 Herald Fund, although unquestionably intended to relieve the distress, 
 had also the unmistakable object of discrediting Parnell and Dillon by 
 lessening the receipts of the Land League Fund. Perhaps the general 
 result of all this rivalry was the distribution of much larger sums among 
 the distressed people and the simulation of distress by many not really 
 in need, with the demoralization which such practices never fail to bring. 
 In America the Land League Relief Fund exceeded all the others, 
 
 o 7 
 
 and this had much to do with the future success of the movement in 
 Ireland. The branch of the Dublin Mansion-House Fund established in 
 New York by Messrs. Daly and O'Gorman, with -the Trustees of the 
 Emigrant Savings Bank, organized with a similar object of diverting 
 money from the Land-League Fund, fell flat, and the committee soon 
 after dissolved. 
 
 After a hurried tour through a great portion of the United States 
 and a visit of a few days to Canada, the news of a dissolution of Parlia- 
 ment called Mr. Parnell back to Ireland. He had been honored by a 
 reception on the floor of Congress and by several State Legislatures ; had 
 succeeded in transmitting to Ireland a large sum of money for relief; 
 had beaten the enemies of the Land League everywhere he had gone, 
 and his reputation and influence had been enormously increased. A man 
 of peculiarly cold manner and English aspect and accent, he evoked no 
 
66 
 
 PARNELL AND THE AMERICAN IRISH. 
 
 warmth of feeling among the highly sympathetic and impressionable Irish- 
 men with whom he had come in contact ; but yet he had won their con- 
 fidence to a degree never attained by any of the numerous envoys sent 
 from Ireland during the previous twenty years. Contact with the essen- 
 tially practical Americans has given the Irish settled in the United States 
 a strong turn in the same direction, and the hard ordeal through which 
 so many of them have climbed to a position of prosperity has intensified 
 this quality. What they look for in an Irish leader is the quality of 
 mind that will fit him to cope with the hard-headed, stolid and persever- 
 ing Englishman, and they thought they saw in the calm, apparently 
 passionless, clear-headed and relentless leader of the Land League the 
 man for whose advent they had been long waiting. He had borne him- 
 self through a trying ordeal with admirable tact and judgment, and even 
 his few mistakes were due to his remorseless method of acting only from 
 his judgment of the facts he saw with his own eyes. Had he been able 
 to spend even six months in America, it is probable he would have 
 gauged the situation more accurately, but it was only ten weeks after 
 his arrival that he set sail for Ireland to take charge of the electoral 
 campaign. 
 
 Wishing to give permanent shape to the Land movement in America 
 before he sailed for home, he called a hurried meeting at the New York 
 Hotel, where his mother and sisters were stopping, and the American 
 branch of the organization was formally founded during the hurry of the 
 preparations on the day of his departure. Convened without much refer- 
 ence to the fitness of the individuals for the work in hand, it contained 
 elements of confusion, which a more careful examination would have 
 eliminated, and the half-suppressed strife there exhibited smouldered only 
 for a time, and finally prepared the way for disorganization and disunion. 
 The Nationalists were in a majority and dominated the meeting ; but 
 there were other elements there, by Mr. Parnell's special invitation, which, 
 though always in a minority, ever after kept up such a continual conflict 
 about measures and men, but especially the latter, as to paralyze the 
 League and prepare the way for a new factor in the movement, which 
 will be dealt with later on. 
 
 At this meeting Mr. T. M. Healy, then Mr. Parnell's private secretary, 
 afterwards Member of Parliament for Wexford, and one of the best known 
 
STIMULATING IRISH- A M ERICA X FACTIOXS. 
 
 67 
 
 leaders of the League, was first brought prominently forward. Although 
 a central office had been organized in New York before Mr. Parnell's 
 departure for the West, under the direct superintendence of Miss Anna 
 Parnell, afterwards President of the Ladies Land League of Ireland, 
 the work of attending to the Relief Fund and the political agita- 
 tion, with the correspondence between Mr. Parnell and the local com- 
 mittees, had become mixed up to such an extent that a change 
 was found necessary. Mr. Parnell cabled to London for Mr. Healy 
 to come out and accompany him in his tour as his private secretary, 
 keeping up correspondence with the local committees himself. At the 
 New York Hotel meeting, he submitted a draft of a plan of organ- 
 ization, approved of by Mr. Parnell, the principal feature of which was 
 that branch leagues should be grouped by States, each State being 
 independent and holding direct communication with the Dublin Execu- 
 tive. The significance of the proposition was at once recognized by a 
 few of those present ; but in the hurry of the moment the majority did 
 not see it. It was to be a great centralized movement, ruled and admin- 
 istered from Dublin, and the strings to be kept in a few hands there. 
 Not knowing what changes might occur in the programme or the leader- 
 ship at home, through possible coercion and consequent imprisonment, 
 the Nationalists present offered this part of the proposal a strenuous 
 opposition, insisting on an American organization with an American 
 Executive, and they finally carried their point. They saw in the propo- 
 sition a desire — with which they had become familiar during the Fenian 
 movement — to keep the American Irish divided, so as to use one faction 
 against the other, and enable the party for the moment dominant at 
 home to exercise absolute control. Tired of petty factions and their 
 quarrels, they had a broader conception of the movement, and wanted 
 the creation of an American body that would keep down faction on their 
 side of the Atlantic, and discourage its growth on the other. "While 
 looking to eventual Separation from England, they saw clearly the neces- 
 sity of building up local administrative bodies in Ireland, and organizing 
 the scattered political forces of the people before even a much more 
 moderate solution of the Irish question than they sought could be arrived 
 at. Although they carried their point, and ever after controlled the 
 greater portion of the movement in America, the encouragement given 
 
68 PARNELL ELECTED PARLIAMENTARY LEADER. 
 
 from Dublin to petty factious leaders soon resulted in an open rupture. 
 Factions were developed which, in their strife for the control of the 
 movement, appealed, with every remittance of funds, for the indorsement 
 of certain opinions and action, and thus sowed the seeds of future dis- 
 union in Ireland. 
 
 What led to this action on the part of the home leaders was a settled 
 belief that the Nationalists of America really sought to force the move- 
 ment into a premature physical struggle for Separation. They thought 
 that by balancing their influence with that of others, which to them 
 seemed conservative, they would be saving Ireland from bloodshed and 
 disaster. Yet, through the whole course of the agitation, the American 
 Nationalists formed the one strong, conservative and restraining force in 
 the movement, and, while unquestionably aiming at revolution, kept 
 the Land League from measures likely to end in conflicts that might 
 produce premature insurrection. And when Mr. Parnell had to deal with 
 extremists of another kind, who wanted to change the whole character of 
 the agitation, they were the men who first rallied to his support. 
 
 This conference over, Mr. Parnell departed for Ireland, leaving Mr. 
 Dillon to represent him. He was soon in the thick of the Parliamentary 
 campaign. Although the contest in Ireland was apparently between the 
 Government and the Land League, it was on the Home-Rule pledge, 
 with a promise, not always very clearly given, of advocating the rights 
 of the Irish farmers, that the Members outside of Ulster were elected. 
 The result was the sending of a number of men to Parliament of very 
 conflicting views, and many of them of very doubtful political character. 
 Out of some sixty nominal Home Rulers, a majority were found to vote 
 at a meeting of the party for the substitution of Parnell for Shaw, who 
 had temporarily filled the place vacated by the death of Isaac Butt, as 
 leader of the Home-Rule party in Parliament. Parnell thus became 
 the publicly acknowledged leader of the Irish people. 
 
 The Irish Members of Parliament were nominally divided into three 
 groups : The Home Rulers, the " Liberals," or old Whigs, and the 
 Tories ; but the so-called Home Rulers were really two distinct parties 
 connected by a very slender bond of union, and only prevented from 
 separating by strong pressure from their constituents. The " moder- 
 ate" wing of the party were simply Whigs who feared to face their 
 
REMARKABLE CHANGE OF FEELING IN ULSTER. 
 
 69 
 
 constituents with an honest avowal of their opinions, and from the very 
 start they secretly did their best to thwart the plans of the party. Mr. 
 Shaw was still their real leader, and later in the contest they openly 
 seceded. The avowed Whigs were an insignificant group who slipped in 
 here and there by narrow majorities, owing to the difficulty of finding 
 candidates acceptable to the people, and who could afford to live in 
 London. With the exception of Mr. Charles Russell, whose views on 
 the Land question were only a little less advanced than those of the 
 Land League, they were men of mediocre ability and doubtful political 
 character. The Tories were principally from Ulster ; but in that strong- 
 hold of Toryism the party lost many seats, and nearly all those elected 
 were obliged to pledge themselves to a strong measure of Tenant Right. 
 
 The mind of Ulster was moving, old party ties were being loosened, 
 and the old Orang-e war cries were fast losing their influence. Orange- 
 men had become accustomed to march side by side with their Catholic 
 neighbors to the land meetings, and listened approvingly to speeches in 
 which there was as much about Irish Nationality as Land Reform ; and 
 the barriers of sectarian prejudice were fast giving way. The Protestants 
 of the North saw with amazement three Catholic constituencies elect Mr. 
 Parnell, a Protestant, as their representative, and an Ulster Presbyterian 
 minister, the Rev. Isaac Nelson, chosen in his place for one of them 
 after he had made his selection. They saw the cases of Protestant 
 farmers attended to by the Land League, even when they were not 
 members of that organization, just as carefully as those of the Catholics, 
 and they began to realize, what was always the fact, that Irish Catholics 
 had no prejudice against a Protestant whose political sympathies were 
 with them. Striking proofs they had got of this before, from the days of 
 the United Irishmen down to their own; but they had disregarded them. 
 The Land League brought it home to their very doors. The influence 
 of this change of feeling was seen in a later stage of the movement. 
 
 The sweeping victory of the Liberals in the elections in England and 
 Scotland, largely due to the Irish vote in the large towns, brought Mr. 
 Gladstone to power, and the new Ministry contained a larger Radical 
 and advanced " Liberal " representation than had ever been known in 
 England before. Bright, Chamberlain, Forster and Fawcett had all 
 places in it, and as the Premier had, while in opposition during the 
 
7° 
 
 GLADSTONE'S HESITATING POLICY. 
 
 Beaconsfield administration, been carrying on a vigorous campaign of a 
 decidedly Radical tendency, it was natural that great expectations should 
 be formed as to their Irish policy. These expectations were doomed to 
 disappointment, and no Ministry, Whig or Tory, since the Union, ever 
 had such difficulties with Ireland, or did more to exasperate and embitter 
 the feelings of the people against English rule. 
 
 English politics had been gradually undergoing a great change, the 
 beginnings only of which were seen in the result of the elections of 1880. 
 Instead of two great parties, the English Parliament began to be divided 
 into several independent groups, and the Cabinet was no longer a 
 homogeneous body It contained serious elements of division on the 
 Irish question ; but, as the landlords were in a majority, the few doctrin- 
 aire Radicals, who had places in it, were unable to carry through even 
 the halting and hesitating measure of Land reform they favored. The 
 result was inaction, doubt, hesitation, while a volcano was smouldering 
 beneath their feet. 
 
 Ireland was growing worse from day to day. A great portion of her 
 people were starving, or living on the charity of the outside world, and 
 her appeals for the removal of the famine-producing system maintained 
 by foreign bayonets, produced no effect. The land meetings went on, 
 money came freely from America, and the relief of a considerable portion 
 of the distress gave the Land League a firm hold on popular sympathy. 
 The Executive drew up a Land Bill to be submitted to Parliament, not 
 with any hope of its being favorably received, but simply to force the 
 question on the attention of the House, and to place the responsibility 
 more directly upon it. It shared the fate of all such measures. The 
 obstructive scenes were renewed on a much larger scale, and the 
 attention of the world was fixed on Ireland. At last, stung into action 
 by the taunts of the Irish members and the threatening attitude of the 
 people, the Government, in July, 1880, brought in the "Compensation 
 for Disturbance Bill," with a view to lessening the horrors of eviction 
 and putting some restraint on the merciless landlords. After a succession 
 of stormy debates, it finally passed the House of Commons, shorn of 
 much of its original character, only to be rejected by the Lords. 
 
 There were muttered threats in England against the Upper House, 
 and some of the newspapers discussed its abolition. Mr. Gladstone, 
 
FROM RADICAL PROFESSIONS TO COERCION. 
 
 7i 
 
 during the debate, had predicted the eviction of 15,000 people if the bill 
 should not be passed ; and, in one of his oratorical flourishes, pronounced 
 eviction " equivalent to a sentence of starvation." Bright, Chamberlain 
 and Forster, both in the debate and in public speeches outside the 
 House, warned the country and the aristocracy of the consequences of 
 refusing such a small instalment of justice, and, in a threatening tone, 
 placed the responsibility on the House of Lords and the Irish landlords. 
 They resisted the clamor for coercion, and used the strongest arguments 
 to denounce it. " Force is no remedy," was their motto for the moment, 
 and the outside world imagined that Ireland and England were about to 
 begin a new era of peace and conciliation. No one would have thought 
 that these very men were about to bring in the most drastic and 
 stringent Coercion Bill passed by any British Parliament since the 
 Union, and that the most violent opponents of repression were to become 
 its sturdiest champions. John Bright, in the course of a few short weeks, 
 seemed to have abandoned the convictions of a life-time, and William E. 
 Forster, then Chief Secretary for Ireland, who had gone as the agent of 
 Quaker charity to relieve the victims of famine in 1847, seemed to have 
 developed a hatred of the Irish race that could only be appeased by 
 blood. 
 
 Mr. Forster had probably gone to Ireland actuated by the best 
 motives, and with a genuine desire to do as much for the Irish people 
 as was consistent with the British connection. But he had the failing 
 that all Englishmen who have ever filled the same position have had, 
 viz., ignorance of Ireland, coupled with a dogged belief that he knew 
 better what was for the good of the Irish than they did themselves. He 
 soon fell into the hands of the Castle clique — the men who had managed 
 and ruled every Chief-Secretary and Lord-Lieutenant for generations, no 
 matter what party happened to be in power in London. Anglo-Irishmen 
 who had been trained in the belief that it was necessary to keep the 
 Irish down, to repress the growth of national thought and to aid the 
 landlord garrison by every means in their power in rooting the people out, 
 or renegade Nationalists who had gone over to the Government for place 
 and pension, then held the reins of the Irish administration in their 
 hands, and used it solely for the benefit of their friends and political 
 partisans. Before the Lord-Lieutenant or the Chief-Secretary could do 
 
7- 1 
 
 THE NEW YORK CONVENTION. 
 
 I 
 
 anything, they had to be consulted; all official information was filtered 
 through their hands, and colored to suit the interests of the clique. 
 They carried out all orders as they thought proper, and, as they knew 
 the country and the people thoroughly, it was an utter impossibility for 
 the most intelligent Englishman, acting for the Government, to avoid, so 
 long as the system lasted, being completely in their hands. Forster only 
 shared the fate of his predecessors, and his utter failure was due chiefly 
 to the fact that he had a new Ireland to deal with. 
 
 Leaving the agitation in Ireland and the relief of the distressed, 
 which went on without any new feature during the summer, it is neces- 
 sary to return to America for a brief space to note the progress of 
 events there. Michael Davitt determined to again visit the United 
 States, where John Dillon had continued his tour, for the purpose of 
 continuing the work of organization and helping to increase the supply 
 of funds. He arrived in time to take part in the first convention of the 
 American Land League, held in Trenor Hall, New York, May 18, in 
 company with Dillon. It was not a large gathering, only about 
 fifty men being present ; but it contained many highly representative 
 men, and its work had a wide influence. Among those present were 
 John Boyle O'Reilly, of the Boston Pilot; P. A. Collins, afterwards Pres- 
 ident of one wing of the American Land League ; Rev. Lawrence Walsh, 
 afterwards Treasurer; Rev. T. Cronin, of Buffalo, N. Y., editor of the 
 Catholic Union; John C. McGuire, President of the Brooklyn Leagues; 
 Dr. William B. Wallace, President of the New York City Leagues, and 
 many lawyers, priests and other well known men from various parts of 
 the country. Among the resolutions passed were the following : 
 
 "Resolved, That we regard the present system of land tenure in Ire- 
 land as one of the chief causes of famine, and of the chronic poverty 
 and oppression which prevails in that country. 
 
 "Resolved, That the National Land League of Ireland, having ap- 
 pealed to the Irish of America to assist them in removing the cause of 
 poverty, we hereby pledge the earnest co-operation of this organization 
 to the Irish Land League, in the work of abolishing the present English 
 land system, and establishing a peasant proprietary in Ireland. 
 
 "Resolved, That, while prepared to aid the Irish Land League to the 
 utmost of our ability, we desire to place on record our conviction that 
 
DIFFICULTIES OF THE CENTRAL COUNCIL. 
 
 7.3 
 
 the kindred interests of manufacturing, mining, fisheries, and commerce are 
 also being protracted by deliberate and wickedly selfish restrictive legisla- 
 tion, and that poverty must remain the normal condition of the Irish peo- 
 ple until they regain the power to regulate and protect these interests." 
 
 The last one was passed on a recommendation contained in an able 
 letter from an Irish Presbyterian clergyman, Rev. Robert Ellis Thompson, 
 Professor in the University of Pennsylvania. In reference to it Mr. 
 Davitt in the course of his address said: "By your action to-day you 
 have widened the programme outlined by the Land League in Ireland ; 
 but, although we omitted the industrial question from the movement, it 
 was not because we were unaware of its importance, or of the evils 
 which Ireland's commerce suffers through unjust laws. I can assure you 
 now, that the addition which you have made to the platform to-day will 
 be accepted by the Irish people on the other side. As the movement for 
 the abolition of the Irish la?idlord system was first started here, I am 
 glad that this later addition to it is made here also." 
 
 The convention adjourned after electing a Council, with Davitt as 
 Secretary. He agreed to take the position for a time only, so as to put 
 the organization into proper shape, and then proposed to return to Ire- 
 land. A central office was opened, and he began the work of communi- 
 cating with the branches. The success at first achieved was far from 
 encouraging, as the organization was too new to accomplish more than 
 the occasional collection of a little money which was, in most cases, for- 
 warded direct to Dublin, as it flattered the vanity of local officers to be 
 in personal communication with the heads of the movement at home. It 
 required time to weld it together and to give it a working system ; but, 
 before that could be accomplished, elements of disunion and future disin- 
 tegration were at work, and resulted in splitting the organization into 
 two large factions and a number of local bodies unattached to any par- 
 ticular party. 
 
 On the Sunday after his arrival Davitt was tendered a reception in 
 Jones' Wood, New York, by the city Land Leagues. About fifteen 
 hundred people attended, and this was then nearly the full strength of 
 the organization. In his address he used the following words : 
 
 " The problem before us, when we organized, was simple, and our 
 platform contains this single plank — the destruction of landlordism and 
 
 K 
 
74 
 
 DA VI TT AND THE NATIONALISTS. 
 
 the winning of the land for the people, to whom it belongs. The Irish 
 League includes all parties — Nationalists, Moderates, Home Rulers, Re- 
 pealers, and all sects — Catholics and Protestants meeting in council to 
 work until Ireland's social rights are won and her enemy struck down 
 forever. We work by teaching peasants and all people that the land 
 was made for them, and not for ten thousand lazy Englishmen ; that, if 
 they allowed themselves to be trampled upon, they are worthy of 
 oppression, and that they are to rely on themselves alone and not 
 upon foreign or hostile legislators." 
 
 Chafing under the inaction to which he was reduced in the " central 
 office," Davitt at last determined to make a tour through the States to 
 stir up the sluggish branches and organize new ones. Above all the 
 Land League leaders, he never hesitated at assuming responsibility, or 
 acting; against the wishes of his colleagues, if he deemed the action 
 necessary for the good of the movement. He was very liable to act from 
 impulse, and at this time began to be very much under the influence 
 of Patrick Ford, of the Irish World. It was felt by his friends that he 
 disliked being under the necessity of consulting the Council, and that he 
 deemed it somewhat of a nuisance, He certainly encouraged the sending 
 of money direct to Ireland by the branches, or groups of branches, and 
 issued a circular, on his own responsibility, giving instructions to that 
 effect. This had much to do with the subsequent disunion. 
 
 During his stay in New York, Davitt had frequent conferences with 
 the leading Nationalists, a majority of whom stood by him against the 
 attacks of a number of his old associates at home. In the condition in 
 which the Land League then was, this support meant its salvation from 
 destruction, and very extreme measures were used by the American 
 Nationalists to curb the hostility manifested on the other side of the 
 Atlantic. They expected in return that Davitt would aid them in build- 
 ing up a movement in America, that, while not pushing the leaders in 
 Ireland beyond the programme they had adopted, might, on the fulfill- 
 ment of that programme, undertake the task of winning Self-Government 
 for Ireland. Davitt made solemn pledges to carry out this programme, 
 and on the strength of these pledges received the united support of the 
 Nationalist organizations in his tour through the States. They helped 
 him to organize branches, and in most cases were the officers and 
 
A TOUR OF ORGANIZATION. 
 
 7 5 
 
 principal workers. They were not alone the men most familiar with Irish 
 affairs, but in many cases the most prominent Irishmen in their local- 
 ities. They were frequently officers in other societies, and no other 
 organized body of Irishmen in America held so many positions of influ- 
 ence on the press, in the legal and medical professions, in commerce, in 
 State Legislatures and city councils, and a few had even found their way 
 into the United States Congress. He also got considerable help from 
 the Ancient Order of Hibernians, and the notices of his public meetings, 
 published in the Irish World, were of immense service. This helped to 
 make that journal, to a great extent, the organ of the movement and 
 largely increased its sale. 
 
 He made a much more extended tour than on his first visit ; but the 
 continued travelling and incessant speaking finally broke him down, and 
 he was laid up for over ten days with a severe attack of nervous fever 
 in Omaha, Neb. On his recovery, he continued his tour till he reached 
 San Francisco, where he received an enthusiastic ovation frpm the Irish 
 societies. He was very successful in organizing branches of the League, 
 and in infusing new life into the movement, and made, perhaps, a better 
 impression on men hitherto unconnected with Irish movements than any 
 man who had ever come from Ireland on such a mission. Among those 
 who were particularly struck with him was Mackay, the famous Irish 
 millionaire, whom he met in Virginia City, Nevada, and who showed 
 him the most marked attention. 
 
 Returning to New York, he devoted his attention to the local 
 branches of the League, and a series of enthusiastic meetings were held 
 to hear him speak. Things were growing hot in Ireland, and Irish 
 Americans were becoming stirred up as they had not been for many 
 years. Almost every one of the ward meetings he attended, supplied him 
 with as large an audience as greeted him in Jones' Wood on his arrival. 
 Dillon had in the meantime returned to Ireland, and the Government 
 had determined to prosecute the leaders. This was just the stimulus 
 that Irish-America wanted, and it bore good fruit in the meetings and in 
 the receipts. Davitt, in spite of the remonstrances of his friends, deter- 
 mined to return and take his share in the prosecutions, and on the eve 
 of his departure addressed a large meeting in the Cooper Institute, 
 organized by the Ladies' Land League, a new branch of the organization 
 
7 6 
 
 THE COERCION ACT. 
 
 started by Miss Fanny Parnell, and destined afterwards to perform a 
 very important part in the agitation. 
 
 Arriving in Queenstown on Nov. 20, he lost no time in raising his 
 voice against the outrages which had begun to assume alarming propor- 
 tions, although not a tithe of those reported by the police had actually 
 occurred, and he continued to vigorously push the agitation. The prose- 
 cution of his colleagues also engrossed his attention and he bore a con- 
 siderable part in preparing the defense. After twenty-eight days of tedious 
 speech-making and examination of witnesses, the trial ended on Jan. 21st, 
 1 88 1, by the jury disagreeing. A juror stated there were ten for acquittal 
 and two for conviction. This was the Government's excuse for introduc- 
 ing the Coercion Act. 
 
 The question of coercion had been discussed in the English press 
 and by every public speaker in England for many months, and it was 
 plain to any one who watched the drift of public opinion that it could 
 not much longer be delayed. With the exception of a few able Radi- 
 cals, like Joseph Cowen, Member for Newcastle-on-Tyne, and proprietor 
 of the Newcastle Chronicle, Henry Labouchere, editor of Truth, and 
 some men of lesser note, all England was crying out for it. The only 
 question with some Liberals was whether it ought to precede or to 
 follow a Land Bill. It was quite clear that Mr. Gladstone and his col- 
 leagues were as much solicitous to prevent the Tories outbidding them 
 for popular favor as for the settlement of the Irish difficulty, and in 
 introducing the Coercion Bill first in order, they silenced for the moment 
 the clamor of their opponents. The measure was introduced on January 
 24th, 1881, and was entitled "A Bill for the Protection of Life and Pro- 
 perty in Ireland." Every English Coercion Bill for Ireland has been 
 called by a false name, and introduced and defended by speeches full of 
 false pretences and misrepresentation of facts. In the present instance, 
 nearly all the worst features of all similar measures which preceded it 
 were combined, and the false pretences and perversion of the truth 
 which characterized the speeches of former Ministers, were all concen- 
 trated into one shameless and unblushing tissue of falsehood in the state- 
 ment of the reasons for resorting to coercion and the uses to which it 
 was to be applied. The information supplied by local police officers to 
 the landlord magistrates and carefully colored by the Castle clique, was 
 
DRIVIXG DISLOYALTY BEXEATH THE SURE ACE. 
 
 77 
 
 in all cases the only evidence supplied, and no testimony given against it 
 had the slightest effect. The various acts committed in one outrage 
 were often counted as distinct affairs, and in one instance, at least, the 
 number of holes made in a window by firing a gun loaded with shot, 
 were put down as so many separate '* outrages " committed in the 
 county. Both Gladstone and Forster pledged themselves that the Act 
 would onlv be used against those committing or inciting-- to outrages — 
 " village tvrants and dissolute ruffians," the Chief-Secretarv called them 
 — but that open, legitimate agitation should not be interfered with. Yet 
 during the long period of its duration it was only the Parliamentary 
 representatives and trusted leaders of the people, shopkeepers, farmers, 
 editors, and lawyers, all men of irreproachable character, who were 
 confined under its provisions ; and while the whole force of the Govern- 
 ment was used to put down the agitation by suppressing public meet- 
 ings, they were utterly powerless to prevent or punish outrages, which 
 multiplied in proportion as the safety valve of public agitation was re- 
 moved. "We must drive disloyalty beneath the surface," said Earl 
 Spencer, the Lord-Lieutenant, in a public speech, and this was precisely 
 the effect of the Coercion Act. 
 
 The Irish Members resisted its passage through Parliament with 
 great vigor and ability, and several scenes of a most exciting nature took 
 place; but in a few weeks the bill became law. In the course of the 
 resistance in Parliament, the Irish Members received the announcement 
 of Davitt's arrest and recommittal to a convict prison, and the result was 
 a scene which ended in the forcible removal of Parnell and his sup- 
 porters from the House. Despotic action by the speaker, and the 
 adoption of arbitral*}* rules of debate followed ; and although the tem- 
 porarily expelled Members returned to their places, the resistance was 
 practically at an end. In passing the worst Coercion Act imposed on 
 Ireland since the Union, the most radical Ministrv that England had 
 ever known were obliged to so curtail the liberty of debate as to destroy 
 the old prestige of Parliament and abolish the rights of minorities. 
 
 Davitt was arrested on the pretence that he had violated the con- 
 ditions of his " ticket-of-leave." He had, in fact, utterly disregarded it 
 from the beo-innino; ; but there was no more excuse for arrestine* him at 
 that moment than at any other time during the previous two years. 
 
78 
 
 DAVITT SENT BACK TO PRISON. 
 
 The passion and vindictiveness of spirit evidenced by this act gave the 
 lie direct to the professions made in introducing the Coercion Bill, and 
 had much to do with the reception given to the Land Bill subse- 
 quently. Davitt had displayed incessant activity since his return from 
 America, and his popularity was on the increase. A remarkable inci- 
 dent which occurred in Armagh, a short time before his arrest, had prob- 
 ably much to do with forcing the hand of the Government, as it 
 revealed an extraordinary change of feeling among the Ulster Protes- 
 tants. A meeting, composed mainly of Orangemen, was addressed by 
 Davitt, and at the conclusion of his speech the crowd took him on 
 their shoulders and carried him a considerable distance along the road. 
 When he told them in his speech that he was a convicted Fenian and 
 a " ticket-of-leave man," a voice shouted, " You are nothing the worse 
 for that," and the crowd cheered heartily. This, taken in connection 
 with similar incidents at other meetings, showed the direction in which 
 the Northern mind was moving, and that one of the chief supports of 
 British rule in Ireland was fast giving way. 
 
 In Tipperary, at a subsequent meeting, Davitt made the most eloquent 
 speech he had till then delivered ; but, although he strongly condemned 
 outrages, he talked rather wildly about his having restrained " the wolf 
 dog of Irish vengeance " in America, and to some extent flung down a 
 challenge to the Government. He had not, as a matter of fact, re- 
 strained any one in America having the means of wreaking vengeance 
 on England, and the allusion was taken as referring to the Nation- 
 alists, who had, in reality, often had occasion to restrain the hotter 
 spirits among Land Leaguers. He was sent back to Portland Prison 
 and cut off from all communication with the outside world. 
 
 The arrest evoked deep indignation throughout Ireland, and meetings 
 to protest against it were held everywhere. In America there were 
 angry speeches and resolutions, and the increased interest in the move- 
 ment swelled the numbers at the meetings and the amounts sent to sus- 
 tain the agitation at home. 
 
 Patrick Egan was instructed by the League Executive to take up his 
 residence in Paris, for the purpose of saving the treasury from seizure, 
 and keeping up uninterrupted communication with America and Australia. 
 Henceforth, he became a much more important figure in the movement 
 
THE LAND ACT OF 1881. 79 
 
 and exercised a considerable influence on subsequent events. A success- 
 ful business man of cautious, steady habits and keen intelligence, he was 
 better fitted for the peculiar position in which he was placed, than any 
 man in the League; and, although having a difficult task to steer his 
 way between bitterly contending factions inside the movement, he suc- 
 ceeded in preserving the good-will of all. For a long time the public 
 history of the League was the simple record of transactions between him 
 and the American branches, on the one hand, and the Irish Ladies' 
 Land League on the other. His strong National opinions ensured him 
 the earnest support of the Irish-American Nationalists, while his good 
 business standing convinced all other sections of his fitness for the 
 handling of funds. 
 
 The Land Bill was at last introduced with a tremendous flourish of 
 trumpets, and the world was led to believe that at last a final solution 
 of the Irish Land Question had been reached. Yet a few short months 
 showed it to be an utter failure, and the trouble was only aggravated by 
 the application of a partial remedy. It unquestionably went farther in 
 the direction of curbing the landlord's power than any previous act, and 
 it clearly recognized a certain right of the tenant to a property in the 
 soil. But, like everything emanating from the brain of Gladstone, it was 
 full of intricacies and complications. It borrowed a little from almost 
 every proposed reform of the Irish Land Laws, from Sharman Craw- 
 ford's to Isaac Butt's, and had no one guiding principle. Its main 
 feature was the creation of a Land Court to regulate rents, compensa- 
 tion for improvements, etc., with the consequent encouragement to end- 
 less litigation. Although it contained many germs of good, no man who 
 knew Ireland could regard it as a final settlement of the question, and 
 the Irish farmers refused to accept it as such. It was subjected to the 
 severest criticism from the Irish Members in the House, in the Irish 
 press, and on Land League platforms. Two years previously it would 
 have been accepted as a boon, and ten years before it would have been 
 regarded as revolutionary ; but Ireland had gone through a wonderful 
 change in a few short years. The people had set their hearts on 
 a peasant proprietary, to be obtained by the compulsory expropriation of 
 the landlords, and nothing less would satisfy them. 
 
 A convention was called by the Land League Executive, and on the 
 
So 
 
 THE ROTUNDA CONVENTION. 
 
 2istof April, 1881, the first assembly of that character since the days of 
 the Volunteers, and representing the Irish people, met in the Dublin 
 Rotunda. It was a remarkable gathering in many respects, and highly 
 representative. All the Land League leaders were there, the majority of 
 the "active section" of the Parliamentary Party, the officers of local 
 branches, farmers, lawyers, shopkeepers, priests, a few Protestant clergy- 
 men, some masters of Orange lodges, ex-Fenian centres — all sections of 
 the people were, in fact, represented, except the landlords and the 
 Wealthier merchants. The farmers, who were most affected by the bill, 
 were in a majority, and it was pronounced inadequate. The Members of 
 Parliament were instructed to let it go to a second reading and endeavor 
 to amend it, and after its final passage another convention was to be 
 called to decide on future action regarding it. 
 
 This Convention had a very important bearing on the Irish National 
 Question. An Irish representative body, better qualified to decide on the 
 merits of the Land Bill than any other set of men in the British 
 Empire, pronounced judgment against it; and that judgment was treated 
 with contempt by the English Parliament. There were many Northern 
 Protestants present who had hitherto been staunch supporters of the 
 Union; but after seeing Ireland's wishes overridden by a body ignorant of 
 the subject, it was natural for these men to reflect that if the convention 
 had been an Irish Parliament, the question would have been settled to 
 their satisfaction. The administration of the Coercion Act, during the 
 course of that and the following year, did much to strengthen that feel- 
 ing; and Northern Protestants began to seriously think over the means 
 of winning for Ireland the right to make her own laws. 
 
 In spite of the most strenuous efforts of the Irish Members to amend 
 the bill in the interest of the tenants, it passed the House of Commons 
 shorn of some of the good points the original draft contained, was 
 further "amended" in the Lords, and after some show of resistance these 
 "amendments" were accepted and the measure became law. The Execu- 
 tive of the Land League took immediate steps to have a certain number 
 of tet:t cases tried in the new Land Court, for the purpose of enabling 
 the tenants to make the most of the Act, to provide precedents and 
 facilitate further legislation. Their action was moderate and reasonable, 
 and entirely within the limits of law. In the Land Court, as in all 
 
THE LAND LEAGUE'S ANSWER TO COERCION. 
 
 8i 
 
 other courts where money is in question, the advantage was with the man 
 who could hold out longest and best afford the expense. Tenants could 
 not neglect their work and afford long-continued absence from home, 
 with the chance of having to pay the costs in case judgment should be 
 given against them. The Land League, therefore, proposed to act as 
 general agent for all the tenants, supplying counsel and defraying the 
 necessary expenses. This, in the eyes of the English Government, was 
 " obstructing the working of the Land Act ;" and it was determined to 
 put the members of the Executive in prison, and bring the whole force 
 of the Empire to bear in an endeavor to break up the Land League. 
 Parnell, Dillon and O'Kelly were arrested, other Members then in 
 England were marked out for imprisonment as soon as they should set 
 foot on Irish soil, and the Land League stru<ja-le entered on a new 
 phase. 
 
 The answer of the Land League to this declaration of war was the 
 No Rent Manifesto. After reciting the main facts of the situation, the 
 Manifesto said : " Fellow-countrymen, the hour to try your souls and to 
 redeem your pledges has arrived. The Executive of the National Land 
 League, forced to abandon the policy of testing the Land Act, feels 
 bound to advise the tenant-farmers of Ireland from this forth to pay No 
 Rents under any circumstances to their landlords until the Government 
 relinquishes the existing system of terrorism, and restores the constitu- 
 tional rights of the people. Do not be daunted by the removal of your 
 leaders. Your fathers abolished tithes by the same method without any 
 leaders at all, and with scarcely a shadow of the magnificent organization 
 that covers every portion of Ireland to-day. Do not suffer yourselves to 
 be intimidated by threats of military violence. It is as lawful to refuse 
 to pay rents as it is to receive them. Against the passive resistance of 
 an entire population, military power has no weapons. Do not be 
 wheedled into compromise of any sort by the dread of eviction. If you 
 only act together in the spirit to which, within the last two years, you 
 have countless times solemnly pledged your vows, they can no more 
 evict a whole nation than they can imprison them." 
 
 The document promised the aid of Irish-America in rather glowing 
 terms and continued: "One more crowning struggle for your land, your 
 homes, your lives — a struggle in which you have all the memories of 
 
 L 
 
8 2 
 
 EFFECTS OF THE NO RENT MANIFESTO. 
 
 your race, all the hopes of your children, all the sacrifices of your im- 
 prisoned brothers, all your cravings for rent-enfranchised land, for happy 
 homes and National Freedom to inspire you — one more heroic effort to 
 destroy landlordism at the very source and fount of its existence — and 
 the system which was, and is, the curse of your race and of your exist- 
 ence will have disappeared forever." It concluded with the following 
 words : " Stand together in the face of the brutal and cowardly enemies 
 of your race ; pay no rents under any pretext ; stand passively, firmly, 
 fearlessly by, while the armies of England may be engaged in their hope- 
 less struggle against a spirit which their weapons cannot touch ; act for 
 yourselves, if you are deprived of the counsels of those who have shown 
 you how to act ; no power of legalized violence can extort one penny 
 from your purses against your will ; if you are evicted, you shall not 
 suffer ; and the landlord who evicts will be a ruined pauper ; and the 
 Government which supports him with its bayonets will learn in a single 
 winter how powerless is armed force against the will of a united, deter- 
 mined and self-reliant Nation." 
 
 This was the Land League's first serious mistake. Hitherto the 
 leaders had kept their heads ; but the brutality of the action taken 
 against them by the Government produced its natural effect and they 
 struck back wildly. The policy was calculated to tax the powers of the 
 Government to the utmost, and to inflict enormous injury on the land- 
 lords ; but was nevertheless doomed to failure. Carried out as it had 
 been previously, without any general proclamation, and at the discretion 
 of the farmers, it had proved the strongest weapon against the land- 
 lords ; but the circumstances surrounding each individual case varied 
 very considerably, and the power of resistance of some of the landlords 
 was sufficient to overcome the pressure brought to bear upon them. 
 Then the spirit of the farmers generally was not equal to the strain, and 
 the nature of the sacrifices rendered necessary precluded the possibility 
 of keeping strictly within the limits of passive resistance. It was asking 
 too much of Irish human nature and giving too strong a temptation to 
 the Government and the landlords, to adopt measures calculated to exas- 
 perate the people and drive them into violent resistance. The result 
 was soon apparent. Eviction became the order of the day, the resistance 
 of the people was frequently pushed to the extent of physical conflicts 
 
WHEEDLING THE LEAGUE INTO SOCIALISM. 
 
 83 
 
 with the police — in a few cases verging on insurrection — intimidation of 
 timid farmers and outrages of all kinds were multiplied. The young 
 men of the farming class emigrated by tens of thousands, business was 
 paralyzed and the country suffered as if a state of war prevailed. The 
 Manifesto was ignored by the majority of the farmers, and where 
 obeyed was not literally carried out. Bargains and compromises were 
 made with the landlords, and the promised aid from Irish-America, 
 although there was a very large increase in the funds sent, did not 
 reach the figure necessary to thoroughly carry out the policy. 
 
 But the worst feature of the No Rent policy was the opportunity it 
 afforded to " social reformers " of various kinds in America to change 
 the whole character of the agitation and make it serve ends not contem- 
 plated by its founders and not approved of by any large section of the 
 Irish people. The Irish World was the principal organ, and the celebra- 
 ted Henry George, author of " Progress and Poverty," the real leader 
 of this section, which included many men who, like him, merely used 
 the Irish movement as a lever to work upon other countries. They 
 cared nothing for Irish Independence and scouted "peasant proprietary," 
 the corner-stone of the Land League, as vicious and unsound. Nothing 
 short of the " nationalization of the Land " would satisfy them. The No 
 Rent Manifesto was published in the Irish World without the qualifying 
 clause, " until the Government relinquishes the existing system of terror- 
 ism and restores the constitutional rights of the people," and the 
 numerous readers of that journal were led to take it as an absolute 
 strike against the payment of all rent for land. Mr. George went to 
 Ireland as correspondent of the paper, and unremittingly preached his 
 doctrines in speech and letter with great ability, force and plausibility. 
 All this time the vast majority of the Irish people did not see the real 
 drift of this propaganda, and those who did and who warned the people 
 against it were, for the moment, looked upon as dissensionists. 
 
 During this period a series of circumstances with which Michael 
 Davitt had some connection, threw the transmission of a very large 
 share of the funds from America into the hands of the Irish World, 
 and thus gave a great preponderance to the influence of the section it 
 represented. When Davitt started on his lecturing tour he resisted all 
 suggestions to have a new Secretary take his place, and directed that 
 
8 4 
 
 DAVITT'S ALLIANCE WITH FORD. 
 
 communications for the Council elected in Trenor Hall, should be sent 
 to Father Walsh, the Treasurer, who, of course, had not much time to 
 attend to correspondence. Through an accident, the President of the 
 Council suddenly disappeared and nothing more than an informal con- 
 ference of a portion of its members had ever taken place. While on his 
 tour, Davitt told all he met to send their money direct to Patrick 
 Egan, or through the Irish World. Possibly his motive was to 
 strengthen the hands of the home League by the rapid transmission of 
 money, but while it accomplished this purpose, it divided the organiza- 
 tion into two conflicting factions. A Convention called by Father 
 Walsh met in Buffalo, N. Y., Jan. 13th, 1881, and a large number of 
 men, not representing any branches, were present and carried the Con- 
 vention by a small majority. Its action was mainly directed against the 
 Nationalists who had founded the League, in consequence of the private 
 representations of a small faction from New York city, that dark and 
 sinister designs were harbored. The priests present were alarmed, and 
 voted in a spirit of hostility to the Nationalists; and although P. A. 
 Collins, an able lawyer from Boston, and an ex-Fenian organizer, was, 
 in his absence, elected President, a breach was made which rendered the 
 work of the Irish World comparatively easy. 
 
 A fierce attack was at once commenced by that paper, and a personal 
 controversy of peculiar bitterness was for some time carried on between 
 Messrs. Ford and Collins. The excitement in Ireland was in the mean- 
 time producing strong feeling among Irish-Americans, and subscriptions 
 poured in with increased rapidity. Had there been no public wrangling, 
 of course there would have been an infinitely larger sum collected ; and 
 had there been an able and efficient Council, recognized by the whole 
 body throughout the country, the result would have been out of all 
 proportion greater than anything so far achieved. As it was, the people 
 sent their money by the means nearest at hand, and entirely irrespective 
 of the quarrels or professions of the faction leaders. Mr. Ford, while 
 opposing the idea of a Council, made his office the centre of an organi- 
 zation, issued a "constitution" containing a provision that all moneys 
 were to be sent to the Treasurer of the Irish National Land League 
 throueh the Irish World, and was himself the undisputed head of it. 
 The prompt public acknowledgment of remittances, and the publication 
 
REV. FATHER SHEEHY. 
 
THE CHICAGO CONVENTION. 
 
 85 
 
 of the names of subscribers, was the strongest incentive to send money- 
 through that channel, as the Council only published statements from time 
 to time, and did not give subscribers' names. This swelled the Irish 
 World fund enormously, and, although deceptive, gave it the appearance 
 of representing the bulk of Irish-American opinion. 
 
 With regard to opinions on the Land Question, and on the National 
 Question, the vast majority of the rank and file in both sections were in 
 thorough accord ; but large numbers were drawn into reading the Irish 
 World, and many afterwards were influenced by its teachings. That the 
 majority of the Irish in America were opposed to it, however, was clearly 
 demonstrated by the Convention held in Chicago from November 30th 
 to December 2d. Convened in consequence of a resolution passed by 
 the Irish- American Club, a body of influential Irishmen in that city by 
 a call signed by P. A. Collins, Patrick Ford and John Boyle O'Reilly, 
 on behalf of the Irish in America, and by Father Sheehy, T. M. Healy, 
 M.P., and T. P. O'Connor, M.P., on the part of the Land League in 
 Ireland, it was by far the most representative gathering of Irishmen ever 
 held in America. Over eight hundred delegates from Land League 
 branches and other Irish societies met, and after three days' consideration 
 of the situation contented themselves with passing resolutions indorsing 
 all that had been done by the Home Land League, and affirming Ire- 
 land's right to Self-Government. Resolutions submitted to the committee 
 by Mr. Ford were rejected, and the delegates from Ireland were given to 
 understand that a sensible, practical policy, advancing steadily towards 
 Nationality, was what would commend itself to the Irish in America. 
 A few months later, the Washington Convention taught a similar lesson, 
 the differences between the Nationalists and a section of the priests were 
 bridged over, and there was a unification effected of all the elements 
 opposed to the Irish World's "humanitarian" programme. 
 
 In Ireland the movement took an entirely new shape during the 
 reign of Coercion. Nearly all the local leaders being in prison and the 
 organization having been declared illegal, the branches were obliged 
 either to break up or to assume more and more the character of ribbon 
 lodges. Disaffection was, indeed, " driven beneath the surface ;" but the 
 spirit of the people remained unbroken, and the habit of acting together, 
 acquired during two years of agitation, enabled them to carry on the 
 
86 
 
 IRELAND UNDER COERCION. 
 
 same work as before the organization was suppressed. The landlords 
 were resisted at every step, evicted tenants were reinstated in their 
 homes, or in huts erected near them, and the Ladies' Land League was 
 kept busy attending to cases of distress. Ladies were arrested on the 
 most flimsy pretexts and cast into the common jail, with the object of 
 frightening them into submission ; but this only tended to deepen the 
 hatred of the Government and their Irish officials, which was already 
 strong enough among the people. Frequent conflicts occurred between 
 the armed police and the people, and the weapons of the former were 
 often freely used without much regard to the sex or age of their victims. 
 There was plainly a deliberate intention on the part of the Castle clique 
 to force the spirit of resistance to such a point that the army could be 
 brought into play, and a premature rising of the people would enable them 
 to shatter the strength of the country. Had this succeeded there would 
 have been much more bloodshed than these gentlemen counted on, and 
 the vengeance that would have been wreaked on them and on England 
 would have had no parallel in Irish history. Troops were poured into 
 the country till every regiment available for foreign service was stationed 
 there, and Ireland bore the appearance of a country in a state of war. 
 The leaders of the Nationalists foreseeing the danger, had taken ample 
 precautions against a premature outbreak and, during the excitement of 
 the famous Boycott expedition had issued a proclamation, which was 
 posted up on every police barrack, church, and courthouse in Ireland, 
 under the very noses of the police, and in the principal towns in Eng- 
 land and Scotland, warning the people to allow no provocation to tempt 
 them into physical resistance. This alarmed the Government ; but it had 
 no small share in averting the threatened danger. 
 
 The strain on the people was very great. Business was paralyzed, 
 the credit of the smaller class of shopkeepers was very much impaired, 
 if not broken, and the best and most spirited of the people were emi- 
 grating by the thousand every day. The powers of the Government were 
 severely taxed, but so were those of the people. Public opinion through- 
 out the world, however, was running strongly with the people of Ireland, 
 notwithstanding the alarming increase of outrages, and the flow of money 
 from America to sustain the fight against landlordism kept up the spirits 
 of the Leaguers. 
 
WORK AND INFLUENCE OF JAMES RED PATH. 
 
 8? 
 
 About this period, and for some time previous, the influence exerted 
 by James Redpath on American opinion in favor of the Land League 
 began to tell in its favor. Born in Scotland, he came to America when 
 a very young man and became prominent in the Anti-Slavery movement 
 almost from its inception as correspondent of the New York Tribune. 
 Owing to the support given to the Southern slaveholding leaders of the 
 Democratic party by the majority of the Irish in America, he became 
 rather prejudiced against them and was not at all disposed to favor the 
 Land League when it was first launched. He was, however, a strong 
 Radical and the agitation early attracted his attention. He went to Ire- 
 land as correspondent of the Tribune, and a close investigation soon con- 
 vinced him of the justice of the demands put forth. He proceeded to the 
 famine-stricken districts of the West and made a rigid examination into 
 the condition of the people and their relations with the landlords. The 
 result was a series of letters containing the most scathing exposures of 
 the whole landlord system and of the criminal fostering of its injustice 
 by the English Government. Nothing like it had ever been published in 
 America and Mr. Redpath's previously known antipathy to the Irish lent 
 infinitely more weight to his words than would have otherwise attached 
 to them. He entered heartily into the spirit of the Land League, ad- 
 vised with its leaders, addressed popular meetings and largely contributed 
 to stir up the spirit of manly independence among the peasantry which 
 afterwards effected so much. He returned to America, lectured through 
 the country to crowded houses and thus reached thousands who were 
 attracted by his name, but who were rather hostile to the movement. 
 He went again to Ireland, continued his investigations and his letters 
 were almost universally copied by the American press. This helped 
 immensely to bring a fierce glare of American public opinion to bear on 
 Ireland and to stimulate the American Irish to renewed activity. The 
 Irish eventually began to regard him as one of themselves, and the 
 world looked upon him as one of the Land League leaders. Certainly 
 few among its leaders rendered it more effective service. 
 
 The Government were at last obliged to confess themselves beaten ; 
 and the doors of Kilmainham were opened on the imprisoned Members 
 of Parliament. Mr. Gladstone announced a change of policy with the 
 best grace he could in the House of Commons, and Mr. Forster, who 
 
 BOSTON COLLEGE LllUiAliY 
 
88 
 
 "THE TREATY OF KILMAINHAM." 
 
 stubbornly clung to repression, resigned. He had utterly failed in the 
 Chief-Secretaryship and ruined his character as a liberal statesman. The 
 most rabid Tory could not have acted with greater rigor or cruelty, and 
 he left a name behind him in Ireland which will endure with that of 
 Cromwell and Castlereagh. Mr. Gladstone's reputation also suffered con- 
 siderably ; but the sharp criticisms of the Tories were based on the 
 belief that they could have managed things better. No English politician 
 could recognize the enormous change that had taken place in Ireland, 
 making it absolutely certain that the old policy must fail, no matter by 
 whom applied. The Irish question had entered on a new phase ; but 
 they failed to recognize it. The " Treaty of Kilmainham," as the vague 
 and indirect agreement between the Government and the Land League 
 leader was called, was a dim recognition on Mr. Gladstone's part of the 
 fact that Ireland was a power to be dealt with differently from the Ire- 
 land of the past, but he was too old to see the full significance of the 
 change. 
 
 Mr. Davitt was released from Portland prison, and the installation of 
 Earl Spencer as Lord-Lieutenant, and Lord Frederick Cavendish as 
 Chief-Secretary, was hailed, with expectations, founded, perhaps, on very 
 slight reasons, of a new era of conciliation and good will between the 
 two countries. Mr. Gladstone had promised to release a large number 
 of the suspects, to bring in a bill based on suggestions made by the 
 Land League leaders, relieving the poorer class of tenants from arrears 
 of rent ; but his statements about the Coercion Act referred to amend- 
 ments that might make it more stringent, or less severe, as circumstances 
 might dictate. From subsequent events, it became apparent that, under 
 any circumstances, the amendments would have tended towards increased 
 severity. However, the brightest anticipations were entertained in Ire- 
 land, and the release of the leaders was enthusiastically celebrated. 
 
 In the midst of the rejoicings, and on the very day of the installa- 
 tion of the new representatives of British authority in Ireland, the world 
 was startled by the news of the assassination of Lord Frederick Caven- 
 dish and Under-Secretary Burke, in the Phoenix Park. Nothing like it 
 had ever occurred in Ireland before. Landlords, agents, bailiffs and 
 farmers had been killed through agrarian troubles, informers had fallen 
 victims to the vengeance of Nationalist conspirators, but the assassination 
 
THE PHCENIX PARK ASSASSINATION. 
 
 89 
 
 of political enemies, or officials of the British Government, had till then 
 been utterly unknown in Ireland. The effect was, therefore, all the more 
 profound in England, and the cool daring of the deed, and the ease with 
 which its perpetrators effected their escape, created a feeling of alarm the 
 like of which had never been seen in England before. Done in sight of 
 the Viceregal Lodge, in broad daylight, the utmost exertions of the 
 police failed to put them on the track of the murderers, and the offer 
 of enormous rewards did not tempt any of those concerned in it to give 
 any information. 
 
 The Irish leaders were dazed for a moment by the terrible stroke, 
 and issued manifestoes and declarations denouncing the murder and 
 exonerating the Land League from all responsibility for it. Indignation 
 meetings were held in Ireland and America, rewards were offered by 
 prominent Land Leaguers, and telegrams of sympathy and regret were 
 poured in on Mr. Gladstone by the hundred. It was a waste of energy, 
 and utterly useless. No reasonable man, knowing the situation, could for 
 a moment attribute the act to the Land League, or to any section of 
 the people in sympathy with it. It had just achieved a partial triumph 
 over the Government, and important concessions in the direction of its 
 demands were about to be granted. The whole situation was suddenly 
 changed for the worse, and the English people were exasperated to such 
 a degree that the most savage measures of repression would be consid_ 
 ered too mild. To those who knew the Nationalists, it was equally 
 unreasonable to place the act at their door, for increased coercion would 
 mean diminished facilities for their work of organization. The wildest 
 theories were indulged in, but the world remained in ignorance of the 
 real perpetrators. Coercion and police brutality, the active assistance 
 given by the Government to the work of the evicting landlords, had 
 aroused passions which neither the Government, the popular leaders, nor 
 the church could control, and, under such circumstances, a few exasper- 
 ated men could be easily found to execute whatever vengeance their pas- 
 sions would picture to them as a service to the country. 
 
 The cry for more repression went from end to end of England, and 
 a bill infinitely more tyrannical and far-reaching than any that had yet 
 preceded it was the result. It abolished trial by jury, even in capital 
 cases, empowered magistrates to imprison unwilling witnesses, utterly 
 
 M 
 
00 
 
 DAVITT'S "NATIONALIZATION" SCHEME. 
 
 destroyed all pretence of freedom of the press, or the right of public 
 meeting, and revived the Alien Act, extending its provisions to England. 
 It was a declaration of war, and the struggle assumed a new character. 
 Public agitation became impossible, and the discontented were driven 
 back on the secret societies. 
 
 But a new danger was in store for the Land League. Michael 
 Davitt and others had become imbued with the views of Henry George 
 about the " nationalization of the land," and in a few weeks after his 
 release, in carefully prepared speeches, delivered in Manchester and 
 Liverpool, the founder of the League announced his preference for that 
 mode of settlement over " peasant proprietary," to which the organization 
 had been committed mainly through his influence. He proposed that the 
 Government shouldbuy out the landlords and itself exercise their func- 
 tions, making a tax on land the means of supporting the expenses of the 
 State. He said he preferred to have this done through an Irish Parlia- 
 ment, but admitted that even under the existing Government he would 
 prefer it to all other settlements of the Land Question. He thus 
 explained his position in a speech delivered in Liverpool, June 6th, on 
 the eve of his departure for America : 
 
 "To propose that the English Government should become the owner, 
 steward, or guardian of the soil of Ireland will, at first sight, appear an 
 anti-national settlement of the Land Question, and one which involves a 
 principle of renunciation that cannot be sanctioned by Irishmen who be- 
 long to the extreme or Nationalist party. I am convinced, however, 
 that a calm consideration of the question will dissipate the idea that the 
 nationalization of the land of Ireland is any more of a recognition of 
 England's right to rule us than is involved in the payment of taxes or 
 in calling upon its government to advance the necessary funds for the 
 carrying out of a scheme of peasant proprietary. While I yield to no 
 Irishman alive in my allegiance to the principle of Ireland's right to 
 govern itself, I would infinitely prefer to deal directly with an English 
 Government than with its exacting and unscrupulous mercenaries, the 
 Irish landlords. Better to have the land of our country administered by 
 even Executive English authority than see it made the instrument of 
 social slavery and degradation, of tyranny and exaction by the merciless 
 and polluted hands of Irish landlordism." 
 
DISINTEGRA TING TENDENCIES. 
 
 9* 
 
 At first many of the " rank and file " of the Nationalists did not see 
 the full meaning of this; but the leaders took alarm at once, and saw in 
 it a complete surrender to England, and an abandonment of the National 
 strus:2fle. In America it met with fierce criticism from the beeinninsj, and 
 on Davitt's arrival in New York, on Sunday, June iSth, he found the 
 vast majority of the Land League bitterly hostile to it. He defended 
 himself vigorously and with much passion ; but his speeches, during his 
 short trip, were all on the defensive, and his influence began to go down. 
 The Irish World and a few men of the Land League sustained him ; 
 but his old friends and associates, the Nationalists, who had stood by 
 him so vigorously till then, gave his " nationalization " scheme the most 
 uncompromising opposition, and the great movement he had done so 
 much to build up began to break up into opposing camps. " Labor 
 Leagues " sprang up in Ireland, and the hostility manifested towards 
 the farmers was the most significant feature of the speeches and reso- 
 lutions. The laborers had, unquestionably, been badly treated in many 
 cases by the farmers ; but all the past successes of the Land League 
 had been won by the close union which prevailed between these two 
 classes, and their divisions now paralyzed its efforts. The discussion of 
 the " nationalization " scheme produced division in America, and men's 
 minds began to be concentrated more directly on the National Question, 
 as. the only means of enabling Ireland to settle all her burning social 
 and political problems at home. 
 
 The Land League had accomplished much for Ireland. It had 
 aroused the whole Irish race, the world over, to the necessity of stand- 
 ing by their native land, and it had organized them. It had concen- 
 trated their attention on Ireland and given a great impetus to their 
 resolve to aid their countrymen at home to shake off the English yoke. 
 It had raised the Irish question to the position of a European one, and 
 tied England's hands in her dealings with other powers to a degree that 
 had never been witnessed before. It was a revolt that was not an 
 armed insurrection, but which necessitated the continual presence of the 
 only military force which England had available for foreign war. It 
 helped materially to break down the prejudices of the Northern Protest- 
 ants, and prepared the way for their political amalgamation with the rest 
 of the people. It utterly broke down the political power and influence 
 
9 2 A NEW IRELAND CREATED. 
 
 of the landlords, which was always the chief support of English rule, 
 and entirely removed that slavish servility and timidity of the agri- 
 cultural classes, which had been till then a barrier to all independence of 
 political action. In short, under its influence, a democracy was organ- 
 ized which won the allegiance of the majority of the Irish people, and 
 commenced to sway the destinies of the country. It destroyed the 
 old political forces which had dominated the land for centuries and 
 brought new ones into active operation, which had hitherto lain dormant. 
 It began a revolution and prepared the way for a new Ireland, destined 
 to play an important part in the world, through its relations with the 
 British empire and the force of its example. 
 
THE LAND OF EIRE. 
 Part 1 1.— DESCRI PTI VE and HISTORICAL. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE CITY OF CORK TO BANTRY BAY. 
 
 General Character of the Counties of Cork and Kerry — Antiquities — Tower at Kinneath — Historical 
 Notice of the City of Cork — Modern Cork: Streets, Bridges, and Public Buildings — Birth- 
 place of Distinguished Persons — Character of the Inhabitants — Suburbs of Cork — Blarney 
 Village and Castle — Tradition of the Blarney Stone — Curious Cromlech and Druidic Relics — 
 Road from Cork to Bantry — Bantry Bay — Attempted Landings of the French there — Glen- 
 gariff — Its Scenery — Cromwell's Bridge — The Harbor. 
 
 IN no part of Ireland will the tourist in search of the picturesque receive 
 more ample gratification than in traveling through the south-western 
 portion of the island. Lakes, which, in romantic beauty, vie with the 
 boasted ones of Switzerland or Cumberland — mountains, that, for sublime 
 grandeur, might be proudly claimed by Scotland herself — rivers and 
 unregarded streams, whose sylvan charms are as deserving the homage 
 of the poet's pen and the painter's pencil as the more favored banks 
 of the pastoral Wye — continually surprise and enchant the wanderer 
 through the counties of Cork and Kerry. But in what other country 
 under heaven will he meet with such magnificent scenery as that which 
 presents itself along the extensive line of coast lying between Cork 
 harbor and the mouth of the Shannon ? There, nature has placed her 
 everlasting barriers of rock to oppose the rage of the Atlantic, whose 
 mountain billows vainly lash the huge and jutting headlands, that shelter 
 
2 
 
 THE CITY OF CORK TO BAN TRY BAY. 
 
 within their Titan arms noble bays and lovely creeks — or in the happier 
 words of Ireland's poet — 
 
 " Glens, where the ocean comes, 
 
 To 'scape the wild winds' rancour, 
 And harbors — worthiest homes, 
 
 For freedom's fleets to anchor." 
 
 The general character of this portion of Munster is hilly. In the 
 more western districts the lofty mountain ranges exhibit a wild and 
 beautiful aspect — delightful to the lovers of sublime and picturesque 
 scenery, but generally barren and unproductive, except in the deep valleys 
 that lie between the gigantic hills, where prolific nature revels in her 
 richest attire. The most equable and fertile tracts are found in the 
 eastern part of the county of Cork : nothing can exceed the richness and 
 abundance of the land in the neighborhood of Doneraile, Fermoy, and 
 along the banks of the Blackwater down to Youghal. From the great 
 diversity of the scenery, it need hardly be said that the western parts of 
 Ireland furnish the most favorable field that an artist could select for the 
 application of his talents, while, for the gratification of the antiquarian 
 investigator, the county of Cork alone will yield him a rich harvest of 
 subjects, particularly in the mounds, raths, cromlechs, pillars, excavations, 
 circles of upright stones, and other vestiges of the gloomy mysteries 
 of the Druidical worship, which thickly overspread this country. Of 
 churches and other ecclesiastical edifices, there are few to be found of 
 striking architectural importance, although many examples occur of small 
 churches, constructed of great stones piled together without the use of 
 cement, with inclined walls, and doors narrower at the top than at the 
 base, evidently of Pelasgic origin. There are to be found in this county 
 the remains of only one of the ancient Irish Round Towers ; it is 
 situated at Cloyne, a small town not far from Queenstown. 
 
 At Kinneath, or Kinnergh, near Dunmanway, is another pillar-tower, 
 which differs in several remarkable particulars from buildings of the 
 same class to be seen in other parts of Ireland. It consists of six stories, 
 each eleven feet nine inches in height, the lower or basement being a perfect 
 hexagon, while above the tower is quite round. A tradition is current 
 that this tower was built about the year 1015, by St. Mocholomog, soon 
 after the celebrated battle of Clontarf. Smith, the historian of Cork, 
 
ORIGIN OF THE CITY OF CORK. 
 
 3 
 
 cites a passage in support of this opinion from an ancient MS., to 
 which he does not assign any date. It is worthy of remark, however, 
 that this particular tower, which differs in an important architectural 
 feature from all the other pillar towers of Ireland, whose antiquity is 
 so great that even tradition is silent respecting their use and origin, 
 should be the only one to which such a story is attached. But we will 
 not go deeper into the perplexing subject of the Round Towers at 
 present, as we shall have occasion to notice some of these singular 
 buildings in their proper places in the course of our tour. The relics 
 of ancient castles in the county of Cork are numerous and interesting; 
 exhibiting every style of architecture employed between the time of the 
 Anglo-Norman invasion and the period of the Revolution, when fortified 
 dwellings began to fall into disuse amongst the nobility and gentry 
 throughout the kingdom. Their modern residences generally evince 
 considerable architectural taste, and the greater number of them are 
 placed in exceedingly beautiful situations. 
 
 The earliest historical notice of the city of Cork occurs at the 
 commencement of the seventh century, when St. Finn Barr or Barra, quitting 
 his solitude in the lonely island of Gougane Barra, founded his cathedral 
 on the site of a pagan place of worship, and afterwards added to it a 
 religious house and a school, which attained so much celebrity that 
 disciples and students, to the number of seven hundred, flocked to it 
 from all parts ; and, according to an ancient writer, " a desert, as it 
 were, by quick degrees became a city." Such was the influence of 
 learning and piety in Ireland at a period when, by the generality of 
 English readers, she is believed to have been sunk in the lowest 
 depths of barbarism ; and to this scholastic foundation of St. Finn 
 Barr's must be ascribed the origin of the city of Cork.* 
 
 It is not our purpose to go into an historical account of the rise and 
 progress of this city, although, if it were not apart from the object of 
 the present work, an interesting relation might be made of the trials 
 it has endured, from the time when Ireland's ancient enemies, the Danes, 
 
 * Corroch or Corcagh, the Irish name of Cork, is, like all Irish names of places, strikingly descriptive. It signifies 
 a swamp, to which the situation of the city on two marshy islands fully entitles it. The whole district on the south 
 and west of the Lee, was called Corcagh Luighe, i. e. Cork of the Lee. Cork at an early period had obtained the 
 title of Cahir, a city. 
 
4 
 
 THE CITY OF CORK TO BAN TRY BAY. 
 
 periodically wasted and burned the city, to the termination of the no 
 less barbarous warfare, which was maintained for upwards of six hundred 
 years, between the English settlers and the Irish chieftains who refused 
 to acknowledge allegiance to the king of England. Hollinshed thus 
 describes the wretched state of the city in 1570: — "On the land side 
 they are encumbered with evil neighbors — the Irish outlaws, that they 
 are fain to watch their gates hourlie, to keep them shut at service- 
 time, at meales, from sun to sun, nor suffer aine stranger to enter the citie 
 with his weapon, but the same to leave at a lodge appointed. They walke 
 out at seasons for recreation with power of men furnished. They trust 
 not the countrie adjoining, but match in wedlocke among themselves onlie, 
 so that the whole citie is well nigh linked one to the other in afFinite." 
 
 These " Irish outlaws," of whom Hollinshed speaks, were the McCarthys, 
 the Fitzgeralds, the O'Mahonys, and the Barretts, all ancient and 
 powerful Irish families, who, had they been but united in their efforts, 
 would have easily driven the English from the city ; but the dissensions 
 that prevailed amongst them always defeated their grand object. These 
 jealousies it was the avowed policy of the English rulers to foster. 
 Sir George Carew, Lord President of Munster, in 1600, fully understanding 
 the disposition of the people he had to contend with, says, " that if 
 the heads themselves might be set at variance, they would prove the 
 most fit instruments to ruine one another." In 1493, Perkin Warbeck, 
 the impostor king, was received in Cork with princely honors by the 
 mayor, for which offence the city was deprived of its charter, and the 
 mayor was hanged and beheaded. A new charter was, however, again 
 granted to the city in 1609. During the Protectorate, Cork held out 
 as a loyal city, until 1649 when it was surprised and taken, by the 
 Parliamentary forces, and the Roman Catholic inhabitants were cruelly 
 oppressed ; several of its leading families being despoiled of their estates 
 and possessions, and reduced to a condition of comparative indigence. 
 A new race was thus introduced into Cork, consisting of those Republican 
 soldiers, who, having received from Cromwell grants of forfeited property, | 
 settled in the city, where their descendants still continue amongst the 
 most influential and wealthy of its people. In 1688 the inhabitants, 
 having espoused the cause of James II., opened their gates and received 
 him into the city. Two years afterwards it was besieged by King 
 
THE STREETS OF CORK. 
 
 6 
 
 William's forces, under the command of the Duke of Marlborough, and, 
 after a vigorous defence of five days, during which time the garrison 
 was reduced to great extremities, it was forced to capitulate. This siege 
 is only remarkable for the death of the Duke of Grafton, an illegitimate 
 son of Charles II., who served as a volunteer in the garrison, and 
 was shot by a blacksmith from the opposite side of the river, on the 
 spot where the memory of his fate has been perpetuated in the name 
 of "Grafton Alley." 
 
 In the earlier days of Cork, while it was yet a fortified place, 
 the inhabitants were glad to compromise comfort for security ; and we 
 accordingly find that the ancient citv was an assemblage of houses 
 huddled together on the smallest possible area, with little regard to 
 regularity or convenience. The limits of the city were formed by the 
 Lee, separating into two principal channels, which afterwards rejoin, — 
 
 " The spreading Lee that, like an island fayre, 
 Encloseth Corke with his divided flood ; " — 
 
 and these channels with minor branches which then intersected the city, 
 gave it the appearance of a Dutch town. With the exception of the 
 main street, there was none in the ancient town in which two carts 
 could pass ; and some idea may be conveyed of the state of these wretched 
 thoroughfares from the fact that a miserable alley, not more than ten feet 
 in width, was at one time considered so spacious as to be entitled to 
 the name of " Broad Lane." "In the dark and narrow lanes off the 
 main streets, ere yet the city had outstept its walls, many of the public 
 establishments were held." In Old Bridewell Lane, a passage not more 
 than four feet in breadth, stood the corn-market. In similar narrow 
 lanes were to be found the fish-market, post-office and assembly-rooms. 
 In Dingle Lane stood the old theatre, upon whose boards Barry and 
 Mossop delighted their audiences about the middle of last century. The 
 advance of trade and civilization have, however, wrought important changes 
 in this city ; and on the sites of many of the old lanes and dirty passages 
 there have sprung up broad and regular streets filled with handsome modern 
 shops and private dwellings. Still, the streets of Cork are very dissimilar 
 in character ; some being broad and well built, while the greater part 
 remain irregular, narrow and unclean. 
 
6 
 
 THE CITY OF CORK TO BAN TRY BAY. 
 
 The principal modern streets are to be found in that portion of the 
 city known as the island, and comprised within the two branches of the 
 river already referred to. Those most deserving of notice are Patrick 
 Street, which is of great width and forms a sort of crescent, extending 
 in a westerly direction to the Grand Parade, itself a fine straight street, 
 on which was formerly conspicuously situated an equestrian statue of 
 George II. until one night, some years ago, when it disappeared and 
 was found in the river ! The South Mall runs at right angles with the 
 parade ; and though not the widest, it is yet the most respectable street 
 in Cork, being inhabited by professional men, and the chief merchants. 
 These streets appear to occupy the sites of the intercepting branches 
 of the river, as deep channels run under the first named, while the last 
 fills a position that a century ago was a river, its southern side having 
 been one shore of a triangular island, the other two shores of which 
 were Charlotte Quay, and Morrison Quay. The newest and most regular 
 street is Great George Street, which is continued as the Western Road. 
 Parallel to this latter is the celebrated Mardyke, once the promenade of 
 the fashionables of Cork, though now confined to the trading classes. It 
 extends about a mile along the bank of the Lee, and within the peninsula 
 formed by its diverging branches ; and, being well sheltered by lofty elms, 
 which form a natural arch, it presents a cool and pleasing resort to 
 which a foreign appearance is imparted at night by the glimmer of the 
 lamps, suspended overhead, which illuminate it. To the left of this 
 parade we have a view of Queen's College, a handsome quadrangular 
 structure in Tudor Gothic style, situated on a slight eminence over the 
 southern fork of the river, but of which we shall speak hereafter. Beyond the 
 Mardyke, the city is not well supplied with open air places of public resort, 
 but for this want the citizens find ample compensation in their beautiful 
 suburbs. There is nevertheless a Park of about two hundred and forty 
 acres, running parallel with the Lee, but it is flat and devoid of scenic 
 attraction except a pleasing view of the opposite bank of the river ; still, 
 it is well patronized in the early part of May, by the sporting fraternity of 
 the Emerald Isle, who assemble there and then, to witness the annual races. 
 
 The bridges connecting the island in the centre of the river with the 
 shores on both sides are six in number, four on the south branch and two 
 on the north. Parliament Bridge on the south, leading into the South 
 
LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC INSTITUTIONS. 
 
 7 
 
 Mall, and Si Patricks Bridge on the north, are both handsome structures, 
 particularly the latter, erected in i860. It is constructed of lime-stone, 
 consists of three elliptic arches, surmounted by a balustrade, and is sixty 
 feet in width between the parapets. It occupies the site of an old bridge 
 erected in 1798, which was partially destroyed by a flood in 185 1. This 
 accident resulted from a continuous rain of many weeks, in the mountainous 
 region wherein the river finds its source, which caused the swollen waters 
 not only to flood part of the city, but to impart such force to the surging 
 stream, that it roared through the arches of the bridge like a cataract, and 
 eventually carried away a portion of one of them. 
 
 The public buildings of Cork are numerous, and worthy of the 
 acknowledged taste and wealth of its citizens. Amongst the literary and 
 scientific establishments, the Royal Cork Institution occupies a conspicuous 
 position; it was founded in the year 1803, "for the diffusion of knowledge 
 and the improvement of the arts and sciences," and is a highly interesting 
 establishment. It possesses an excellent library, which contains, amongst 
 many valuable books, some rare volumes on Irish history. In the museum 
 attached to it are several curious works of art, and some ancient 
 monumental stones, inscribed with the Ogham character, peculiar to 
 Ireland, and used by the Druids previous to the introduction of 
 Christianity, when these simple letters were gradually discarded, and 
 the Roman substituted. 
 
 The city contains other pleasing evidences of the intellectual character 
 of its people, and of the rapid strides which knowledge has made 
 amongst them during the past century. This is evidenced by its 
 possession of a Public Library, Atheneum, and many other organizations 
 of a literary and aesthetic nature. But the most notable of its institutions 
 of learning is Queens College, founded under an act passed in 1845 
 which eave similar educational establishments to the sister cities of 
 Belfast and Galway. This college was opened in 1849 an< ^ ls beautifully 
 situated at the west of the city, on a rock rising fully forty feet above 
 the level of the southern branch of the Lee, and on the site formerly 
 occupied by Gill Abbey, founded in the seventh century by Gill Ada, 
 Bishop of Cork. The edifice was designed by Sir Thomas Deane, and 
 consists of three sides of a quadrangle, in the Tudor Gothic style of 
 architecture, with a tower commanding a fine view of the city and the 
 
8 
 
 THE CITY OF CORK TO BAN TRY BAY. 
 
 Lee, and has been characterized by Lord Macaulay " as worthy to 
 stand in the High street of Oxford." The college is open to all 
 religious sects and its faculty consists of a president, vice-president, 
 and about twenty professors giving instruction in ancient and modern 
 languages including the Celtic Tongue, mathematical and other sciences, 
 medicine, engineering, political economy and law. The students are 
 compelled to lodge in licensed boarding houses, which are under the 
 inspection of " Deans of Residences," of which Deans there are 
 three in number, respectively Episcopalian, Presbyterian, and Roman 
 Catholic. The college has power to grant the usual literary and medical 
 degrees, and diplomas of Engineering. Four years study is required for 
 the degree of Master of Arts, which costs in class and other fees ^32 ; 
 while the degree of Bachelor of Arts may be had in three years at a 
 cost of ^29. An educational institution of a less exalted character is 
 the A gricidtttral Model School, situated on the new Ballincollig Road, 
 about a mile to the west of the Queen's College ; it is a limestone 
 building of the Elizabethan character, and has attached improved offices 
 and a farm of about 120 acres. The pupils here receive a moderate 
 literary education and practical instruction in farming, with subsistence, 
 at the rate of £12 per annum. 
 
 If we turn from the graceful walks of literature to the path of 
 Christian charity, we find, in the various hospitals and charitable institutions 
 of which this city boasts, ample proofs of the active benevolence of the 
 inhabitants. 
 
 To a church Cork owes its origin, and by a sort of hereditary tendency, 
 she has ever since been remarkably prolific in ecclesiastical buildings. In 
 the reign of Edward IV. there were eleven churches and parishes in and 
 adjoining the city : some of these have long ceased to exist, but their 
 loss has been amply compensated by the number of churches, chapels, 
 and dissenting houses of worship which have grown up in modern times. 
 
 In the unattractive south-west portion of the city, situated on a slight 
 eminence near the margin of the south-west branch of the river is the 
 Cathedral of St. Finn Barr, the present edifice being the third that has 
 stood upon the same spot since the original foundation by that saint, 
 in the seventh century. No particulars are preserved of the character 
 of the first building ; but we learn that, having fallen into a state of 
 
THE CATHEDRAL OF ST. FINN BARR. 
 
 9 
 
 "decay and ruin," it was taken down in 1725.* Its successor, erected 
 ten years later, was a small inelegant structure, with a stumpy spire, 
 surmounting a plain tower, without buttress or ornament of any description ; 
 the tower having, it is believed, formed a part of the old church. The 
 manner in which the funds for its erection were raised is peculiar, 
 namely, by the levy of a tax on all the importations of coal for five years. 
 But the march of improvement swept away this humble cathedral in the 
 last decade, and its place is now supplied by a more commodious edifice 
 erected from designs by Mr. Burges of London. It is in the Transition- 
 Norman style of architecture, and its interior arrangements consist of 
 nave, aisle, and transept together with an apsidal choir and ambulatory. 
 Near the cathedral are the Episcopal palace and a church-yard or 
 cemetery. One of the ancient Touragans, or Round Towers, stood in 
 a corner of the latter until about the middle of the last century, when 
 it was taken down. M. de Boullaye le Gouz, in 1644, described it as 
 ten or twelve feet in circumference at the base, and upwards of one hundred 
 feet in height. It appears to have been built without cement ; and the 
 entrance to have been several feet from the ground. According to the 
 litany of St. yEngus Killedeus, written in the ninth century, this 
 burying-ground is the resting place of St. Finn Barr the founder, St. 
 Nessan, and seventeen bishops and seven hundred other pious and learned 
 men who flourished in the early days of the church ; but there remains 
 no tomb or memorial to confirm the statement. Hanmer repeats an 
 ancient legend respecting the extraordinary sanctity of the place, to the 
 effect that the ground was so privileged that no man dying penitent and 
 buried therein should feel the torments of hell. 
 
 The church of St. Anne Shandon stands on an eminence on the north 
 side of the city ; and, with its singularly constructed and disproportionately 
 lofty steeple,f one hundred and twenty feet in height, forms a conspicuous 
 
 * Upon the surrender of Cork to the Parliamentary army, during the war of the Protectorate, Oliver Cromwell 
 was a sojourner for a few days, when he directed the church bells to be taken down and converted into cannon ; 
 and is said to have answered a remonstrance on the subject with the facetious remark " that since gunpowder 
 was invented by a priest, he thought the best use for bells would be to promote them into Canons." 
 
 \ The many storied tower which supports the steeple has, curiously enough, two of its sides built with lime- 
 stone, and the two others with brown stone. 
 
 " Party-colored like the people, 
 Red and white stands Shandon steeple." 
 A previous edifice having been destroyed by fire, the building of the present church was commenced in 1722 
 
 2 
 
10 
 
 THE CITY OF CORK TO BAN TRY BAY. 
 
 object amongst the less aspiring buildings by which it is surrounded. It 
 contains a peal of very sweetly toned bells, which the pen of the inimit- 
 able Father Prout — Rev. Francis Mahoney, who died in 1865, and lies buried 
 in the church-yard — has celebrated in an exquisite ballad, wherein he pays 
 a natural tribute of fond recollection to his native city, and the "magic 
 spells" of his childhood: — 
 
 " On this I ponder 
 Where'er I wander, 
 And thus grow fonder, 
 
 Sweet Cork, of thee. 
 With thy bells of Shandon, 
 That sound so grand on 
 The pleasant waters 
 
 Of the river Lee." 
 
 Another ecclesiastical edifice worthy of special mention is St. Patrick's 
 Roman Catholic Church. Its style of architecture is of the Grecian 
 order, the principal external features of the building being a portico 
 supported by eight lofty columns, and above the roof a cupola borne 
 upon the same number of Corinthian columns, each bearing a figure 
 representing one of the apostles ; the whole being surmounted by a 
 cross. The Roman Catholic Church of the Holy Trinity, a Gothic 
 structure, is chiefly interesting from its having been founded by the late 
 Theobald Mathew, the apostle of temperance. It contains a stained 
 glass window purchased with the fund raised in Cork for the O'Connell 
 monument. St. Marys Church, belonging to the Dominicans, is a Grecian 
 structure, with an hexastyle portico of the Ionic order; while the Roman 
 Catholic Church of Sts. Peter and Paul, near to Patrick Street, is a 
 rich Gothic building, erected at a cost of ,£30,000, from designs by 
 the celebrated E. W. Pugin. 
 
 Numerous monastic establishments existed here previous to the reign 
 of Henry VIII., but the Reformation with ruthless hand swept away all 
 the conventual edifices, and scarcely a vestige of one of them remains at 
 the present day to direct the antiquarian in his curious researches, or to 
 form an object of interest to the sight-hunting tourist. 
 
 and the materials used in the construction of its steeple were hewn stone from the Franciscan Abbey, where James 
 II. heard mass, and from the ruins of Lord Barry's castle, once the official residence of the lords-president of 
 Munster, whence, says Crofton Croker, this part of the city derived its name— Shandon (Seandon) signifying in 
 Irish the old fort or castle. 
 
DISTINGUISHED NATIVES OF CORK. 
 
 11 
 
 Among the other public buildings of Cork deserving special mention 
 are, the Mansion Hoicse, near the Mardyke ; the Bank of Ireland ; the 
 Stamp Office; the County Club Hotcse ; the Commercial Buildings ; the 
 Protestant Hall, in the South Mall ; the C7csto?n House, occupying a tongue 
 of land, where the two streams meet at a somewhat acute anode on the 
 eastern side of the city, with the whole stretch of the river Lee on its 
 east, and with the termini of the railways to Dublin and Queenstown on 
 its north, and to Bandon and Passage on its south ; the Corn Exchange ; 
 the County and City Jails ; and the Lunatic Asylum. 
 
 The Theatre Royal provides for the wants of patrons of dramatic art, 
 but theatricals appear to have never been well supported in Cork. Still, it 
 was here that encouragement was first given to the comic talent of Mrs. 
 Jordan, who appeared in this city when only seventeen years of age; and 
 it claims to have been the birthplace of Miss Farren, the popular actress, 
 who afterwards became Countess of Derby. In fact Cork has been specially 
 favored in being the cradle of many persons who have risen to eminence 
 in literature and art, among whom may be mentioned Daniel Maclise 
 and James Barry the painters, Sheridan Knowles, Dr. Maginn, Haynes 
 Bayley, Crofton Croker, Francis Mahoney, Richard Milliken author of the 
 " Groves of Blarney," and Hogan the sculptor. Here also was created 
 one of the master pieces of English Literature, for it was in this city and 
 its vicinity that Edward Spenser wrote the "Faerie Oueene." It was here 
 too that William Penn may be said to have assumed a new life ; for it 
 was in Cork that the Father of Pennsylvania became a convert to Quakerism, 
 having changed his religion under the preaching of one Thomas Lowe, 
 while on a visit to the city to look after some of his father's (Sir William 
 Penn,) property, on which occasion he was thrown into prison, with eighteen 
 fellow convicts, but was speedily released. And it was from the shores of 
 the river Lee that he sailed for the western world to found the colony to 
 which he gave his name, and which has now become the "Keystone State" 
 of a Great Republic. His descendants still reside in Cork, and occupy the 
 paternal acres of which he died possessed. 
 
 As we have elsewhere observed, Cork, in a general point of view, has 
 considerably improved within the present century ; and it has now the 
 appearance of a thriving and healthful city. It had a population of 78,382, 
 at the time of the taking of the census in 187 1 ; and it lays claim to be 
 
12 THE CITY OF CORK TO BAN TRY BAY. 
 
 considered the capital of the south of Ireland. It returns two members 
 to parliament, and is a corporate city, governed by a mayor, sixteen aldermen, 
 and forty-eight counsellors, with a staff of paid officials. Its export trade 
 principally consists of grain, butter, and other provisions, which are shipped 
 to Liverpool, Bristol and the Welsh ports, in exchange for coal, and is of 
 sufficient magnitude to throng its docks with shipping ; while the activity 
 discernible on its quays and streets is a cheering evidence of the prosperity 
 it has attained by the industry and intelligence of its inhabitants. In 1850 
 Cork became connected by railway with Dublin; and now Queenstown, Bandon, 
 and other places in the south of Ireland are brought within easy reach by 
 the same method of transportation. And it is worthy of remark, that in 
 1852, but one year after the first world-renowned exhibition of London, 
 an industrial exhibition of no mean character was held in this city. 
 
 The proverbially humid state of the atmosphere, and the great quantity 
 of rain which falls in Cork, have very frequently had the effect of preju- 
 dicing strangers against a place which they have only seen under most 
 unfavorable circumstances : but no one who has resided there for any 
 time, with leisure and opportunity to view it thoroughly, has ever denied 
 its being a handsome city, though the natives, with excusable partiality, 
 have called it "the beautiful." Another instance of their pride of home is 
 the fact, that they never speak of Cork but as "the city." "Welcome to 
 the city;" "When did you leave the city?" is the manner in which a native 
 would be certain to address you, and a stranger could scarcely wound his 
 dignity more effectually than by speaking of the "beautiful city" as a town. 
 The manners of the Cork people are exceedingly urbane ; a natural kind- 
 ness and sauvity of disposition at once removes the chilling barriers to 
 social intercourse which require long and tedious formalities to surmount 
 in the sister island, and renders a sojourn in Cork peculiarly gratifying to 
 a stranger. The habit, however, of using the gentle oil of flattery in con- 
 versation — which amongst the lower classes is carried to an extent perfectly 
 oriental — has obtained for the Corkonians the epithet of " sweet-tongued," 
 and a character for insincerity, which they do not deserve. The poetical 
 licenses which these imaginative people allow themselves in their ardent 
 professions of attachment, are no more to be taken literally than the 
 unbounded liberality of the Spaniard, who, on your first introduction to 
 him, earnestly requests your acceptance of his house and all that it contains. 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE CITIZENS OF CORK. 
 
 13 
 
 Divesting their flowery eloquence of its "taste of the blarney," there will 
 be found beneath it a rich fund of noble and generous feeling, which a 
 little kindness never fails to ripen into warm and genuine friendship. 
 
 The lower order of the population of Cork are a lively and hard-working 
 race — improvident in their habits — strongly attached to old customs — intelli- 
 gent and ready withal — warm and sudden in friendship, but equally sudden 
 and violent in quarrel. They had formerly the character of being addicted 
 to that bane of Ireland's peace and prosperity — whiskey; but the moral 
 revolution wrought, more than a quarter of a century ago, by the Rev. 
 Father Mathew, whose truly pious exertions were the means of reclaiming 
 millions of his countrymen from the use of intoxicating liquors, is nowhere 
 more strikingly demonstrated than in this his native city,* where he com- 
 menced those benevolent labors which have since yielded so abundant a 
 harvest of good to Ireland ; and where, in Patrick Street, on October 8th, 
 1S64, a statue was inaugurated to his memory, and in commemoration of 
 his good deeds. 
 
 The talented author of " Vanity Fair " is very outspoken in his remarks 
 concerning the people of Cork, and his estimate of their character is, cer- 
 tainly, highly flattering. "The charming gayety and frankness of the Irish 
 ladies," says Mr. Thackeray, "have been noted and admired by every 
 foreigner who has had the good fortune to mingle in their society ; and I 
 hope' it is not detracting from the merit of the upper classes to say that 
 the lower are not a whit less pleasing. I never saw in any country 
 such a general grace of manner and ladyhood. In the midst of their gayety, 
 too, it must be remembered that they are the chastest of women, and that 
 no country in Europe can boast of such a general purity. In regard to 
 the Munster ladies, I had the pleasure to be present at two or three 
 evening parties at Cork, and must say that they seem to excel the English 
 ladies not only in wit and vivacity, but in the still more important article 
 of the toilet. They are as well dressed as Frenchwomen, and incomparably 
 
 * Father Mathew received the rudiments of his education at Kilkenny, thence proceeded to Ma)-nooth, took orders 
 
 in Dublin, and began his ministerial labors in Cork. On entering upon his career as an apostle of temperance, he 
 
 was, strange to relate, supDlied with funds by his brother-in-law, a distiller, who was eventually brought to bankruptcy. 
 
 In consideration of Father Mathew's exertions as a moral reformer, the British Government afterwards settled upon 
 
 him an annuity of three hundred pounds. Thackeray, meeting him in Cork at the height of his influence, tells us that no 
 
 man seemed more eager for the practical improvement of Ireland. " Leases and rents, fanning improvements, reading 
 
 societies, music societies — he was full of all these, and of his schemes of temperance above all." 
 •2—2 
 
14 
 
 THE CITY OF CORK TO BAN TRY BAY. 
 
 handsomer." And in speaking of the sterner sex, he writes, "in regard to 
 the gentlemen, a stranger too must remark the extraordinary degree of 
 literary taste and talent amongst them, and the wit and vivacity of their 
 conversation. . . . The Cork citizens are the most book-loving men 
 I ever met. The town has sent to England a number of literary men, of 
 reputation too, and is not a little proud of their fame. . . . The 
 young clerks and shopmen seemed as much au fait as their employers, 
 and many is the conversation I heard about the merits of this writer or 
 that. I think in walking the streets, and looking at the ragged urchins 
 crowding there, every Englishman must remark that the superiority of 
 intelligence is here, and not with us. I listened to two boys almost in 
 rags : they were lolling over the quay balustrade, and talking about one of 
 the Ptolemy s ! and talking very well too. One of them had been reading 
 in " Rollin," and was detailing his information with a great deal of eloquence 
 and fire." 
 
 The vernacular of Cork is perfectly distinct from that spoken in other 
 parts of Ireland, it is a patois peculiar to itself, and "may be regarded as 
 the ancient Cockneyism of the mixed race who held the old city, Danes, 
 English, and Irish." The intercourse with strangers, which has increased 
 with the rapidly extending commerce of the city, has however done much 
 to remove this peculiarity of dialect. 
 
 The suburbs of Cork, on the south side of the river, possess fewer 
 pictorial attractions than those on the northern shore. The Lough of Cork, 
 a considerable sheet of water south-west of the city, is the scene of one 
 of Crofton Croker's popular legends. He says, that it was once a small 
 fairy well, covered by a stone, concerning which a tradition had been 
 handed down from remote times, which predicted, that if the stone which 
 covered the well were not replaced every morning, after the dwellers in 
 the valley had taken from it their daily supply of water, a torrent would 
 rush forth, inundate the vale, and drown all the inhabitants. This calamity 
 was at length incurred by a certain princess, who, neglecting the injunction, 
 forgot to close the mouth of the well, and caused the destruction of her 
 father and his people. Legends like unto this are, however, told of many 
 other lakes in Ireland. Cambrensis and Hollinshed both relate a very 
 similar story, which they apply to Lough Neagh, in whose waters it is 
 said, a "whole territorie were drowned," and that "still the fishers, in a 
 
THE SUBURBS OF CORK. 15 
 
 clear sunnie daie, see the steeples and other piles plainlie and distinctlie 
 in the water." Moore has thus paraphrased this idea in one of his beau- 
 tiful melodies. — 
 
 " By Lough Neagh's bank, as the fisherman strays, 
 When the clear cold eve's declining, 
 He sees the round towers of other days 
 In the wave beneath him shining." 
 
 Other sheets of water of a more practical character are found in three 
 large reservoirs, situated about three hundred feet above the level of the 
 city, which are capable of supplying the inhabitants with two and a half 
 million gallons of fresh water drawn from the river Lee. The water-works 
 were constructed at an expense of ,£70,000, a very moderate sum, when 
 their extensive character is taken in consideration. 
 
 The Cemetery, near the village of Evergreen, occupies the ground 
 formerly taken up by the Botanic Garden, which on the failure of that 
 enterprise, was in 1830 transformed to its present use, by Father Mathew. 
 It is a handsome plot of land and has been laid out after the style of 
 the famous Pere la Chaise, in Paris, the walks being tastefully arranged, and 
 adorned with flowers and shrubs, intermingled with the weeping-willow 
 and the dark cypress, whose hearse-like plumes wave above the grave of 
 the forgotten dust — 
 
 " Sad tree that droops when oth^-s' griefs are fled, 
 The only constant mourner o'er the dead." 
 
 One of the finest monuments in the cemetery is the production of the sculptor 
 Hogan, and consists of the figure of an angel, in white Italian marble, 
 surmounting a sarcophagus of Portland stone. It was erected by a 
 clothier of the city, who taking a liking to the artist, his fellow-townsman, 
 ordered his own monument, and had the gratification to see it arrive from 
 Rome a few weeks before his death. 
 
 If a stranger pass from the south to the opposite side of the river, 
 and should seek out the celebrated "grove of Blackpool," he will be 
 disappointed to find the sylvan retreat that his imagination has pictured, 
 transformed into a poor suburb, without a single tree to lend its shade 
 to the once umbrageous haunt of the muses, and the 
 
 " Birth-place of sweet song," 
 
 where the lyrics of many a street-minstrel were first warbled to admiring 
 
16 
 
 THE CITY OF CORK TO BAN TRY BAY. 
 
 crowds. Sunday's Well is another suburb occupying the south side of 
 the hill, which overhangs the river, and is considered a remarkably 
 healthy locality. The prospect from it is delightful, and from one of its 
 elevated positions the view of the city and the winding river with its 
 picturesque shores is absolutely magnificent. These attractions made 
 Sunday's Well formerly a favorite retreat for the citizens, who had 
 their homes in many pretty cottages embosomed in gardens and pleasure- 
 grounds. The place takes its name from one of those ancient wells, 
 which, before the introduction of Christianity, were held sacred by 
 the Druids, and were afterwards converted by the Christian missionaries 
 to the promotion of the religion they came to teach. The water is 
 very clear and cold, but pleasant to the taste, and is supposed from 
 its sacred character to possess peculiarly sanative virtues in many diseases. 
 In this village the facetious and learned Father O'Leary once resided ; 
 and, according to Mr. Windele, the ill-fated Lord Edward Fitzgerald lay 
 concealed for some time in a cottage near the present basin — the place 
 was called Jemmapes. In speaking of the circumstance, he makes the 
 following remarks : — " It would appear from his (Lord Edward Fitzgerald's) 
 life, by Mr. Moore, that, after concealment had become necessary, he had 
 sought it either in the immediate neighborhood, or in the city of Dublin ; 
 but many persons are still living cognizant of his sojourn at Jemmapes, 
 and who also met him at some of those private meetings of United Irish- 
 men, at that time held almost nightly in the city." 
 
 From the barracks which crown the heights on the north side of the 
 river, another noble and extensive prospect may be obtained. Descending 
 on the eastern side of the hill, we approach the beautiful and justly cele- 
 brated suburb of Glanmire. It receives its name from the little river 
 Glanmire,* which, stealing like a coy virgin from its leafy covert, unites 
 with the broad Lee, about three miles from the quay of Cork. A delightful 
 walk opened to the public, adjoins the city on the Glanmire side. It runs 
 parallel to the river midst a wilderness of trees and flowering shrubs, 
 through whose interlacing branches, glimpses of the Lee, with numerous 
 white sails flitting over its bright waters, may be occasionally caught. 
 
 Although the road under the brow of the Glanmire hills, crowned as 
 
 * The probable derivation of the name Glanmire appears to be from two Irish words signifying the Vale of 
 Pleasantry, although Dr. O'Brien in his Irish Dictionary has drawn it from a less obvious source. 
 
THE BLARNEY STONE AND ITS VIRTUES. 
 
 1? 
 
 they are with superb country seats and overlooking the winding arm of 
 the bay, combines more points of the picturesque than is often to be met 
 with ; it is from the river that the finest views of its enchanting shores can 
 be had. Still we cannot dwell on their beauties here, but must request our 
 readers to accompany us in our pilgrimage to the far-famed Blarney Stone. 
 
 Blarney village lies within six miles of Cork along the railway leading 
 to Dublin. The principal object of curiosity that it possesses is its old 
 castle, a mile and a half from the station, which stands on a precipitous 
 limestone rock, at whose base flows the Murteen, a small river of consid- 
 erable beauty. A massive square pile, about one hundred and twenty feet 
 in height, which formed the donjon or great tower, is all that now 
 remains of the extensive outworks and defences which extended of old 
 around it in every direction, and covered, it is said, a space of ground, 
 whose interior area or court-yard measured eight acres. The walls are of 
 immense thickness, and must, before the introduction of artillery, have been 
 impregnable. The roof and all the floors have long since disappeared ; 
 but the curious visitor may, by a little worming through the narrow spiral 
 staircase, and occasionally putting his neck in jeopardy, succeed in explor- 
 ing all the chambers, particularly that called the "Earl's Chamber," which 
 is still pointed out as the favorite apartment of one of the earls of 
 Clancarty, the former possessors of the castle. * This room was cheerily 
 lighted by a large bay window, commanding a pleasing prospect of the 
 adjacent country ; and there remain even at this time, visible marks that it 
 was formerly fitted up with some regard to comfort as well as elegance. 
 Sir Walter Scott visited Blarney, in company with Mr. Lockhart and Miss 
 Edgeworth, and was present at the ceremonial of kissing the " Blarney 
 Stone." 
 
 To this stone the castle owes more of its celebrity than to its historic 
 recollections. A curious legend attributes to it the power of endowing 
 whoever kisses it with the sweet, persuasive, wheedling eloquence, so 
 perceptible in the language of the Cork people, which is generally termed 
 
 * Blarney Castle was built in the middle of the fifteenth century, by Cormac McCarthy, surnamed " the Strong," 
 and was long the residence of the princely race of the McCarthys, Lords of Muskerry, Barons of Blarney, and Earls 
 of Clancarty, who were descended from the Kings of Munster. During the Revolution it was held for James II. , 
 and besieged by the forces of the Prince of Orange, who compelled the garrison to surrender. It is now the property 
 of Sir George Colthurst, Bart, of Ardrum, who represented Cork in Parliament for several years ; and who married 
 the only daughter of St. John Jeffreys, Esq. whose ancestor, General Sir James Jeffreys, purchased the estate in 1703. 
 
 3 
 
18 
 
 THE CITY OF CORK TO BAN TRY BAY. 
 
 "Blarney" This is the true meaning of the word, and not, as some 
 writers have supposed, a faculty of deviating from veracity with an unblush- 
 ing countenance whenever it may be convenient. But the stone did not 
 reach the full zenith of its talismanic power until 1799, when Richard 
 Milliken, the Cork poet, or, as he has been styled, the "Blarney Laureate" 
 wrote his well known song "The Groves of Blarney," which gave to the 
 castle and the grounds, a notoriety they did not previously possess. The 
 lines describing the virtue of the stone are as follows : 
 
 " There is a stone there " A clever spouter 
 
 That whoever kisses, He'll sure turn out, or 
 
 O, he never misses An out and outer, 
 
 To grow eloquent ; ' To be let alone.' 
 
 'Tis he may clamber, Don't hope to hinder him 
 
 To a lady's chamber, Or to bewilder him, 
 
 Or become a member Sure he's a pilgrim 
 
 Of Parliament. From the Blarney Stone ! " 
 
 This song which has achieved so high a reputation, was intended as 
 a burlesque upon some of the wordy ditties with which ignorant pedantry 
 used to astonish the village circles. The words, however, were not written, 
 as some believe, to the air to which Moore adapted his " Last Rose of 
 Summer," but to another old Irish melody. A version of the lyric appears 
 in Crofton Croker's " Popular Songs of Ireland," and it is also printed 
 in the " Reliques of Father Prout," accompanied by Latin, Greek, French, 
 and Italian translations, the productions of the facetious Mahoney, and 
 wonders of classic ability. 
 
 Notwithstanding the celebrity of this stone, a perplexing doubt exists 
 as to its identity. Some of the guides point out as the " real " stone, 
 one placed on the highest part of the battlement at the northeast corner 
 of the tower, upon which the date 1 703 has been cut. We, however, 
 incline with those best acquainted with the antiquarian traditions of the 
 castle, to concede the tongue-sweetening virtues to a stone which forms 
 part of the face of the wall several feet below the parapet ; and which 
 bore a Latin inscription, now illegible, giving the date of erection (1446) 
 and the name of the founder. A ball from the cannon of Lord Broghill, 
 who in 1643 attacked and took the castle, struck and displaced this 
 celebrated stone, but it has been subsequently secured in its position 
 by means of a strong iron clamp. Persons desirous of kissing it must 
 
BLARNEY LAKE AND ITS TRADITIONS. 
 
 19 
 
 submit to the unpleasant operation of being suspended by the heels, 
 and lowered, head downwards, from the summit of the tower, at the 
 alarming height of one hundred and twenty feet from the ground, 
 before they can reach it ; and as this is the only way by which access 
 can be gained to the genuine stone, it is not strange that the majority 
 of those who visit Blarney should prefer performing the osculatory 
 ceremony on the more accessible stone, to risking their necks in the 
 highly perilous, and certainly not very graceful, mode of reaching the 
 other. The grounds attached to the castle are still remarkable for 
 their beauty. They were, however, formerly adorned with statues, grottoes, 
 alcoves, bridges, and every description of rustic ornament ; and before 
 man's avarice had obliterated many of its charms, the place must have 
 been a perfect little Eden. 
 
 Blarney Lake, a pretty sheet of water, lies about a quarter of a 
 mile from the castle ; it would, however, be scarcely worth noticing, 
 were it not connected with some old tradition of a herd of enchanted 
 white cows, that at certain seasons are said to come up out of the 
 lake to graze amongst the luxuriant pastures on its banks. There is 
 also a story generally current amongst the peasantry, that the Earl of 
 Clancarty who forfeited the castle at the Revolution, cast all his plate 
 and treasures into a certain part of the lake, and that " three of the 
 McCarthys inherit the secret of the place where they are deposited ; any 
 one of whom dying, communicates it to another of the family, and thus 
 perpetuates the secret which is never to be revealed until a McCarthy be 
 again Lord of Blarney." 
 
 A very remarkable cromlech or Druid's altar of immense size stands 
 on the banks of the river Coman, within the pleasure-grounds of the castle, 
 and numerous single pillar-stones, inscribed with ancient Ogham characters, 
 and other Druidic relics, abound in the neighborhood. These monolith 
 pillars, so commonly met with in Ireland, are now generally admitted to 
 be of Pagan origin, and as they are frequently to be found in the neigh- 
 borhood of those circles of stone which are supposed to have been 
 consecrated to the purposes of sun-worship, there is every reason to conclude 
 that they were in some way connected with the religious mysteries of the 
 primeval inhabitants of Ireland. The precise nature, however, of that religion 
 still remains buried in obscurity, in order, it might seem, to give to the 
 
20 
 
 THE CITY OF CORK TO BAN TRY BAY. 
 
 antiquarians a debateable ground on which to create many fanciful theories. 
 The resemblance of the single stone pillar to the Round Towers of 
 Ireland, appears to favor the hypothesis of their affinity, in being both 
 intended to represent visible images of the Deity ; and should a perfect 
 elucidation of the early system of religion in Ireland be ever obtained 
 there is little doubt that it will afford a key to the origin and intention 
 of the cromlechs, stone circles, pillars, temples, rocking-stones, and other 
 gigantic but apparently objectless works, usually termed Druidical, so 
 abundantly scattered over the country. Besides those massive stone 
 pillars, which it is imagined were devoted to the ceremonies of religion, 
 there are others which seem to have been merely sepulchral monuments ; 
 but these latter are distinguished by being wrought by man's art into a 
 conical summit, whereas the former are wholly unwrought. Urns, containing 
 human bones, ashes, and other funeral remains, are found at the base of 
 the monumental pillars, and sometimes within the circles of upright stones. 
 Dr. Ledwich quotes a law of Odin, which directed " great stones to be 
 erected on and round the sepulchre of the deceased ; and the rule was, 
 that a single circle round the base of the barrow indicated it to be the 
 tomb of some chieftain or general, and there sacrifices were performed in 
 memory of the deceased." But it is apparent that these sepulchral stones 
 were of a totally distinct character from those erected for the celebration 
 of religious rites, and also from those circles and stones which it is believed 
 were used for purposes of inauguration and judicature. 
 
 The route from the city of Cork to Bantry, which lies at the head of 
 the bay of the same name, is along the Cork and Bandon and West Cork 
 railways, thirty-seven miles to Dunmanway, and thence for twenty miles 
 further by post road. Thirteen miles from Cork, a branch of the railway 
 strikes off on the left to Kinsale, a small town situated on an arm of 
 the sea, forming a safe and commodious harbor, and one of the chief fishing 
 stations in the south of Ireland. It is a place of some antiquity and historical 
 importance, for Sir John de Courcy erected a castle on the Old Head of 
 Kinsale in the twelfth century; and in 1380 the English fleet defeated 
 the combined naval forces of France and Spain in the harbor. Later 
 on in 1 601, a Spanish force landed here, seized the town on behalf of the 
 Roman Catholics, and held it for two months, when it was recaptured by 
 the English. In the spring of 1689, Kinsale was garrisoned by the French 
 
BAN DON AND ITS FOUNDATION. 
 
 31 
 
 and Irish forces of James II., who held it until the end of the following 
 year, when it surrendered to General Churchill, afterwards the Duke of 
 Marlborough. It is a pleasant excursion from the town to the Old Head 
 of Kinsale, a promontory anxiously looked for by the voyager from America, 
 who sights it before any other British land. 
 
 The country between Cork and Bantry Bay is agreeably furnished by 
 the hand of nature, and adorned with several rich demesnes and handsome 
 villas, but the road presents no feature of remarkable interest for twenty 
 miles, at the end of which we reach Bandon. This is a large, well-built, 
 and thriving town, situated on a river of the same name, a gently winding 
 stream, which Spenser describes as 
 
 '* The pleasant Bandon, crowned with many a wood." 
 
 After passing the town the river increases in magnitude, and is navigable 
 within four miles for vessels of light draught. The place owes its origin 
 and prosperity to the enterprising spirit of that extraordinary man Richard 
 Boyle, afterwards the first Earl of Cork. The site upon which the town 
 stands formed part of the extensive fortified estates of O'Mahony, a chieftain 
 who had engraved in the rebellion of the Earl of Desmond. The greater 
 portion of the demesne was purchased in 1602 by the then Mr. Boyle, 
 whose foresight and sagacity enabled him to discover the natural advantages 
 of the spot, on which, in the year 1608, he commenced building the present 
 town of Bandon. It was originally surrounded by fortified walls; but in 
 consequence of the inhabitants rising upon and disarming a garrison which 
 was placed over them in the interest of James II., the town was heavily 
 fined, and the party then in power caused the walls to be levelled to the 
 ground, since which time they have not been rebuilt. Under the influence 
 of the enterprising and active spirit of the Earl of Cork, Bandon soon 
 became a place of some importance. He commenced reclaiming the large 
 tracts of bog and moorland which lay in the immediate vicinity, and suc- 
 ceeded in planting a race of industrious tenantry in a district that, before 
 it came into his possession, wore an aspect of rude and cheerless desolation. 
 Much, however, as one must admire the energy and perseverance of this 
 great man, the cruel rigor with which he persecuted all those opposed 
 to him in warfare or religion will always darken the page upon which his 
 history is written. 
 
22 
 
 THE CITY OF CORK TO BAN TRY BAY, 
 
 An anecdote is related of Swift, that when entering Bandon, the Dean, 
 being a little in advance of his servant, wrote on the gate of the town 
 the following lines : — 
 
 "Jew, Turk, or Atheist 
 
 May enter here, 
 But not a Papist." 
 
 The servant, on arriving at the spot, read the inscription, and concluding 
 it was his master's work, appended this rejoinder : — 
 
 " Whoever wrote this, wrote it well ; 
 The same is on the gates of hell." 
 
 Proceeding westward, the railway follows the course of the river Bandon. 
 The stream receives the Blackwater about a dozen miles from the town ; 
 and within the vicinity of the confluence, the scenery is enlivened by the 
 appearance of many pleasant country seats, among them being Kilcaskan, 
 Laurel Hill, Carrigmore, Manch House, and Fort Robert formerly the 
 residence of the late Feargus O'Connor of Chartist renown. Dunmanway, 
 a few miles further westward, is a small town of little note lying embosomed 
 amidst hills of rugged and sterile aspect ; offering few objects to attract 
 the traveler's attention. It is here that the railway terminates, and the 
 tourist who wishes to proceed further, must transport himself to the stage- 
 coach or the jaunting car. A short distance beyond the town, the road 
 enters a dark and lofty defile, which winds for nearly a mile through rugged 
 but picturesque mountains, that occasionally exhibit vestiges of the natural 
 woods with which they were formerly covered. There are two routes from 
 Dunmanway to Bantry, and it is hard to say which is the most hilly and 
 dreary. The longer makes a detour to the south, and sends a branch to 
 the town of Skibbereen, the name of which is sadly associated with distress, 
 owing to the locality having suffered severely in the famine year of 1847. 
 The shorter road is a little over a score of miles in length ; before it is half 
 traversed the scenery assumes a savage, stern, and moorland aspect and 
 that feature characterizes the remainder of the way. 
 
 Bantry Bay has so often formed the subject of the tourist's pen, 
 that little has been left to describe. The Scene from Sugar Loaf Mountain 
 presents to the eye an expanse of land and water, a panorama of 
 bold and magnificent scenery, not perhaps to be equalled in the world. 
 Overwhelmed by the novelty and immensity of the objects by which 
 
THE TOWN AND BAY OF BAN TRY. 
 
 23 
 
 the stranger finds himself surrounded, his eye wanders from point to 
 point of the vast picture with a painfully pleasurable distraction ; now 
 resting upon the placid surface of that island-studded bay, within whose 
 capacious bosom the navies of England might ride in safety ; now vainly 
 straining to reach the dimly defined horizon of the more distant 
 
 " World of waters wide and deep ;" 
 
 now wandering along the graceful and picturesque shores of the bay, or 
 following the bold outlines of the hills and mountain-ranges, that sweep 
 almost around this noble haven. 
 
 Among the mountain heights that fret the northern shore, Hungry 
 Hill * is the loftiest of his giant brethren, and towers in stupendous 
 grandeur over the bay. On its west, Berehaven erects its head, while 
 on its east, Sugar Loaf and the Glengariff Mountains stand sentry o'er the 
 little town ; and some miles to the north of these latter, Priest's Leap, 
 the Reeks, and Mangerton, present their huge proportions to the spectator. 
 The town of Bantry is little better than a fishing-village ; it possesses no 
 trade, and the remoteness of its situation affords little hope that it 
 ever will have any. In an historical point of view, it is remarkable 
 as being the place at which the French twice endeavored to invade 
 the country. The first attempt was made in 1689, when they were 
 prevented from executing their designs by Admiral Herbert, though they 
 would seem to have had the best of the naval engagement which ensued. 
 The second occurred in December, 1796, when one of the finest appointed 
 armies that ever sailed from the shores of France attempted a landing, 
 A fleet of seventeen sail, ten being ships of the line, anchored in Bantry 
 Bay. It, however, originally consisted of twenty-five ships of the line, but 
 had been reduced in number by violent storms, and when the remnant 
 of this proud armament reached the Irish coast, the dissension and 
 jealousy which existed amongst the leaders of the expedition prevented 
 them taking advantage of the opportunity that offered, of landing the 
 troops without opposition. Humanly speaking, had they landed, nothing 
 could have opposed them : the city of Cork would in three days have 
 been in their hands, and Ireland would have been lost to England, for 
 a time at least. But Providence decreed otherwise. On Christmas-eve 
 
 * Hungry Hillhzs. acquired some notoriety as being the place where Mr. Crofton Croker laid the scene of Daniel 
 O'Rourke's Adventures in his flight to the Moon. 
 
24 
 
 THE CITY OF CORK TO BAN TRY BAY. 
 
 1796, a tremendous hurricane came on, by which the French fleet was 
 driven out to sea, and the kingdom saved from the horrors of an 
 invading warfare. Adjoining the town is Bantry House the seat of the 
 Earl of Bantry ; and opposite is Whiddy Island defended by three 
 redoubts and containing the ruins of a fortress of the O'Sullivans. 
 
 Glengariff attracts almost as many pilgrims as the Giant's Causeway. 
 It can be reached by water from Bantry, a route which exhibits to great 
 advantage the peculiarly wild scenery of the bay ; but an approach that 
 affords bolder varieties of landscape, is along the coach road to Kenmare 
 and Killarney, the distance being about ten miles. Glengariff, as its name 
 signifies, is a rough and craggy glen about three miles in length, shut in 
 by magnificent mountains. Its breadth seldom exceeds a quarter of a 
 mile. The sides of the precipitous rocks which enclose it are clothed with 
 yew, holly, arbutus, and a variety of other trees and plants, that flourish 
 here in the luxuriant abundance of a southern climate. Through this 
 alpine valley a lonely mountain-stream, forcing its way over every impedi- 
 ment that presents itself, rolls seaward, murmuring, as it goes, its troubled 
 song to the woods and rocks, that answer in hoarse echoes the wild music 
 of the torrent. The beauties of Glengariff are not to be viewed in a day, 
 nor appreciated in a morning's walk : to be properly felt, they must be 
 examined leisurely, and in all their various lights and distances. An 
 eloquent writer on the scenery of this fairy vale, says : " It is by treading 
 its tangled pathways, and wandering amid its secret dells, that the charms 
 of Glengariff become revealed in all their power. There the most fanciful 
 and picturesque views spread on every side. A twilight grove, terminating 
 in a soft vale, whose vivid green appears as if it had never been violated 
 by mortal foot — a bower, rich in fragrant woodbine, intermingled with a 
 variety of clasping evergreens, drooping over a miniature lake of transparent 
 brightness — a lonely wild suddenly bursting on the sight, girded on all 
 sides by grim and naked mountains — a variety of natural avenues leading 
 through the embowering wood to retreats, in whose breathless solitude the 
 very genius of meditation would appear to reside, or to golden glades 
 sonorous with the songs of an hundred foaming rills." 
 
 There is a pretty legend that pertains to one of its craggy heights for 
 which we must find space upon our page. The Prince of Bantry being 
 conquered by the English soldiers, took to flight, leaving his Princess and 
 
GLENGARIFF AND ITS SCENERY. 
 
 35 
 
 children to the care of a faithful follower. But the country was so overrun 
 by the conquerors, who drove away the flocks, ransacked the houses, 
 and destroyed the crops, that he knew not where to find a meal or a 
 resting place for the unhappy family. He made, however, by the side of 
 the mountain a sort of shed, which he so artfully composed of sods and 
 stones, that no one could tell but that it was a part of the hill itself. 
 And, then, having speared a salmon, he fed his noble charge for the first 
 day, trusting to heaven for a meal when the salmon should be finished. 
 But the Princess O'Donovan and her children soon came to an end of 
 the fish and clamored for more. So the faithful servitor, taking with him 
 a rope and his little son Shamus, mounted up to the peak where the 
 eagles rested ; and, from the spot to which he climbed saw their nest with 
 the young eaglets in it, in a cleft below the precipice ; and then, giving some 
 thongs to his son, he told him that he would let him down by the rope 
 to the eyry, when he must tie the thongs round the necks of the eaglets, 
 so as not to choke them, but merely so as to prevent them from 
 swallowing much. Then Shamus did as his father bade him, and was 
 drawn up again. Presently the eagles came home, one bringing a rabbit 
 and the other a grouse, which they dropped into the nest for the young 
 ones ; and soon after flew away in search of other provisions. And now 
 Shamus was once more lowered to the eagle's nest, where he gutted the 
 grouse and rabbit, left the entrails to the eaglets, and brought away the 
 rest. And so the Princess and her little ones had game that night for 
 their supper. The fanciful historian does not chronicle how long they lived 
 in this way, nor does the legend tell us what became of the Princess and 
 her offspring. We are therefore compelled to draw upon our imagination 
 for the completion of the story, and we think we cannot terminate it in a 
 more satisfactory manner than by restoring the Prince of Bantry to his 
 Princess, his progeny, and his estates, and in the bestowal of the hand of 
 one of his fair daughters upon the fearless Shamus, the gallant young 
 eagle robber. 
 
 The wildness of the glen-scenery is happily and effectively contrasted 
 with the cultivation and art displayed in the beautiful grounds of Glen- 
 gariff Castle, which is the point generally chosen by artists from which to 
 make their sketches of the mountain valley. The most extensive view of 
 the glen is to be obtained from the steep, on the old Berehaven road, 
 
26 
 
 THE CITY OF CORK TO BAN TRY BAY. 
 
 near Cromwell's Bridge, a ruinous old structure built by the Protector, from 
 whence the spectator beholds the dark woods, hills, and rushing streams of 
 Glengariff, the lofty mountains of Berehaven, the bold shores of Bantry Bay, 
 and, afar off, the line of ocean, bounding all with its dark blue cincture. Says 
 Sir Aubrey de Vere : — 
 
 " Gazing from each low bulwark of this bridge, 
 
 How wonderful the contrast ! Dark as night, 
 
 Here, amid cliffs and woods, with headlong might, 
 
 The black stream whirls, through ferns and drooping sedge, 
 
 'Neath twisted roots moss-brown, and weedy ledge, 
 
 Gushing. Aloft, from yonder birch clad height, 
 
 Leaps into air a cataract, snow white ; 
 
 Falling to gulfs obscure. The mountain ridge, 
 
 Like a gray warder, guardian of the scene, 
 
 Above the cloven gorge gloomily towers. 
 
 O'er the dim woods a gathering tempest lours ; 
 
 Save where athwart the moist leaves' lucid green 
 
 A sun-beam, glancing through disparted showers, 
 
 Sparkles along the rill with diamond sheen !" 
 
 The rugged aspect of this remarkable region is depicted in vivid colors 
 by the Rev. Caesar Otway, who found that " every hill had its peculiar 
 interest ; and each, according to the time of the day or the state of 
 the atmosphere, presented a picture so suitable — or bright, or gloomy, or 
 near, or distant— valleys laughing in sunshine, or shrouded in dark and 
 undefined masses of shade ; and so deceptive, so variable were the distances 
 and capabilities of prospect, that in the morning you could see a hare 
 bounding along on the ranges of those hills, that at noon-day were lost in 
 the grey indistinctness of distant vision. Then the glen itself, unlike other 
 glens and valleys that interpose between ranges of mountains, was not flat 
 or soft, or smooth — no meadow, no morass, no bog — but the most appar- 
 ently tumultuous, yet actually regular congeries of rocks that ever was 
 seen. Suppose you the Bay of Biscay in a hurricane from the west ; 
 suppose you the tremendous swell, when the top-gallant mast of a ship 
 would be hid within the trough of its waves ; and now suppose that by 
 some Almighty fiat, all this vexed ocean was arrested in an instant, and 
 there fixed as a specimen of God's wonders in the deep. Such you may 
 suppose Glengariff. It appears as if the stratifications of the rock were 
 forced up by some uniform power from the central abyss, and there left to 
 stand at a certain and defined angle, a solidified storm. And now sup- 
 
GLENGARIFF INN AND HARBOR. 
 
 27 
 
 pose that in every indenture, hole, crevice, and inflexion of these rocks 
 grew a yew or holly ; there the yew, with its yellower tinge, and here 
 the arbutus with its red stem and leaf of brighter green, and its rough, 
 wild, uncontrolled growth, adorning, and at the same time disclosing the 
 romantic singularity of the scene. I know not that ever I read of such 
 a place, so wild and so beautiful." 
 
 The wayfarer, who on making the tour of the Emerald Isle, gives this 
 romantic spot a passing glance, has now two hostelries at which to take 
 his ease. Of these The Inn that bears the sign, "The Bantry Arms," pos- 
 sesses, among its other merits, that of a certain degree of antiquity. The 
 genial Thackeray made it his halting place in 1842, while collecting liter- 
 ary and artistic materials for his " Irish Sketch Book," a work which was 
 the precursor of "Vanity Fair," by some half-dozen years. He speaks of 
 it as a pretty house with some thorn trees standing before it, and, stretch- 
 ing out beyond, a beautiful bay with mountains rising on either side, and 
 in its midst an island, on which there stood a castle. "What," says he, 
 "sends picturesque tourists to the Rhine and Saxon Switzerland? Within 
 five miles round the pretty inn of Glengariff there is a country, of the 
 magnificence of which no pen can give an idea. I would like to be a 
 great prince, and bring a train of painters over to make, if they could, 
 and according to their several capabilities, a set of pictures of the place." 
 
 The harbor of Glengariff is an indenture, with a singularly jagged 
 coast-line, from the north-east head of Bantry Bay ; and presents to the 
 eye a charming picture, set in a framework of mountains, and having a 
 foreground of woods which encompass the eastern portion of the harbor, 
 and the course of the Glengariff. " Were such a bay lying upon English 
 shores," says the writer last quoted, "it would be a world's wonder. Per- 
 haps, if it were on the Mediterranean or the Baltic, English travelers 
 woul flock to it by hundreds. Why not come and see it in Ireland ? 
 The best view of this exquisite scene — the charm of a soft climate en- 
 hancing every other — is obtained from the height of the hilly road leading 
 to Killarney, and at the foot of which is a pretty cottage, preferred as a 
 residence for many years by Lord Bantry to the stately mansion at Ban- 
 try. This cottage is placed on an island formed by a mountain stream, 
 the approach to which is by a bridge made from the main-mast of a 
 French ship of the line, one of the invading fleet of 1796." 
 
28 
 
 THE LAKES OF KILLARNE Y. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY. 
 
 Road from Glengariff — Kenmare — Town of Killarney — Ross Island and Castle — 'Donoghue 's 
 Prison — Romantic Tradition respecting the Chief — Innisfallen, its Ruins, and its Annals — 
 Abbey of Muckross — Tore Cascade — Middle and Lower Lakes — Derrycunihy Cascade — Taking 
 a Stag — Panoramic view of the Lakes — Ronay tie's Island — Old Weir Bridge — Meeting of 
 the Waters — Glena Cottage — View from Innisfallen — O' Sullivan's Cascade — Muckross revisited 
 — Legend of the Yew Tree — General Remarks on the Scenery — The Upper Lake — Colman's 
 Leap — Eagle's Nest — Cave and Gap of Dunloe — Carran-Tuel — Mangerton — Devil's Punch 
 Boivl — The Beggar Nuisance. 
 
 TV'ILLARNEY, the Mecca of every pilgrim in search of the sublime and 
 
 J-V beautiful in nature, the mountain Paradise of Ireland, will form 
 the subject of the present chapter. 
 
 The road from Glengariff to Killarney lies through a mountain district, 
 which once belonged to the O'Sullivans and McCarthys, in whose deep 
 solitudes may be found scenes of romantic beauty — stupendous cliffs, lofty 
 mountains, thrown by the hand of nature into the most picturesque 
 disorder, the rushing torrent, the placid lake, the broad sea, and the rocky 
 shores, all combine to form a succession of glowing and magnificent 
 pictures, whose effect upon the spectator exceeds the power of description. 
 After journeying for a score of miles, or about half-way, we reached the 
 town of Kenmare, passing thither along a road-way, constructed many years 
 ago by the celebrated Scotch engineer, Nimmo, which ascends the slope 
 of Caha Mountains, affording fine views of the picturesque valleys beneath, 
 and piercing the summit of the ridge by a tunnel six hundred feet in 
 length, at the end of which we entered the county of Kerry, and obtained 
 a view of the Reeks, raising their lofty heads on the west of the Killarney 
 lakes. Kenmare is a small and neat town, situated at the head of a 
 
THE APPROACH TO KILLARNEY. 
 
 20 
 
 delightful bay, and is approached by a fine suspension bridge. It is of 
 comparatively modern origin, having been founded in 1670, by Sir Wil- 
 liam Petty, the ancestor of the Lansdowne family, the head of which is 
 its present possessor. " Scarcely any village built by an enterprising band 
 of New Englanders far from the dwellings of their countrymen," writes 
 Macaulay of its origin, "was more completely out of the pale of civiliza- 
 tion than Kenmare. Between Petty's settlement and the nearest English 
 habitation, the journey by land was of two days, through a wild and 
 dangerous country." The colony being Protestant suffered a reverse in 
 1688 when it was compelled to capitulate to a besieging Roman Catholic 
 force and embark for Bristol. The convent of St. Clare, here situated, 
 has in late years been brought into notice through the publications of the 
 "Nun of Kenmare." Miss M. F. Cusack, a convert from Protestantism, 
 who has adopted the name of Sister Mary Frances Clare. 
 
 Between Kenmare and Killarney the savage aspect of the country be- 
 gins to mellow into the softer traits of the lake scenery ; the hills are 
 partially wooded, and the crags, which overhang the road, are tufted with 
 rich verdure. Shortly after passing the Mulgrave Police Barracks we 
 reached a tunnel which forms a part of the road, close to which the traveler 
 obtains the first sight of the Upper Lake, spread before him in its calm 
 beauty like a broad mirror set in the bosom of the majestic mountains. 
 We did not, however, loiter to dwell upon the scenery, but hurried on to 
 the town of Killarney, to make it our headquarters, provide ourselves 
 with a guide, and undertake the popular tour of the lakes in the ortho- 
 dox manner. Still, as we passed along, the eyes filled with magnificent 
 views of the famous lakes and the vast blue mountains which encircle them. 
 Tore, Tomies, and Mangerton stood before us clothed in purple, with 
 great heavy clouds gathered round their heads, parting away every now 
 and then, and leaving their noble features bare. On our left, the lake lay 
 for some time beneath us, while on our right, we had a precipice covered 
 with a thousand trees, or a green rocky flat, with mountains rising beyond 
 as far as the eye could stretch. We skirted the foot of dark old Manger- 
 ton, presently passed Muckross, and then through avenues of trees and 
 by numerous lodges and gentlemen's seats, where we saw the mountains 
 again and the lower lake, and then came upon the mansion and grounds of 
 Lord Kenmare, which told us that we were at the threshold of the town. 
 
30 
 
 THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY. 
 
 Killarney — in the Irish language Kill-airne, or the church of the sloe- 
 trees — is a small, regularly-built town, more than a mile distant from the 
 shores of Lough Leane or the lower lake, which derives its principal sup- 
 port from the strangers who come to visit the lakes and the surrounding 
 scenery. Its only architectural feature of importance is the Roman Ca- 
 tholic Cathedral on the north, an elaborate Gothic building, but recently 
 completed, from designs by Pugin, celebrated for his imitations of 
 mediaeval art, and having some beautiful interior decorations by McCarthy 
 It is a fortunate thing for sojourners here, that they are now enabled to 
 choose between several excellent hotels for their place of temporary 
 abode. First among these stands the Railway, adjoining the station and 
 in pleasant ornamental grounds of its own, but a mile and a half from 
 the margin of the lake ; then there is the Royal Victoria Hotel, finely 
 situated in its own grounds sloping down to the north shore of the lower 
 lake ; and there are other good hotels on the eastern shore, and at 
 Muckross. 
 
 The first place to which strangers at Killarney generally resort is Ross 
 Island, which forms the southern part of the demesne of Lord Kenmare, 
 whose grounds extend northwardly to the outskirts of the town and af- 
 ford most enchanting views. Though popularly acknowledged as the 
 largest island in the lower lake, this plot of 158 acres is little more than 
 a peninsula, connected with the main-land by a causeway, which, being 
 flooded in winter, gives the place an insular character. On its southern 
 point is an abandoned copper mine, presumed to have been originally 
 worked by the Danes, and which was re-opened in 1804 by Colonel Hall, 
 father of S. C. Hall, of literary renown ; and operated profitably for four 
 years when, owing to the miners working too near the water, the mine 
 became flooded beyond reclamation. The main feature of the island, how- 
 ever, is Ross Castle, a fortress of about the fifteenth century and said to 
 have been formerly the residence of O'Donoghue the Prince of the Lakes. 
 It consists of an ivy-mantled keep, surrounded by outworks, and flanked 
 by small circular towers at the angles. Exquisite lake views are obtained 
 from the interior apartments, and in fact, it is to its situation as a point 
 of observance that it owes its principal celebrity. The sun was near set- 
 ting when we reached the ruin, and a soft and golden flood of light 
 covered the bosom of the lake, and the background of mountains and 
 
J?OSS ISLAND AND CASTLE. 
 
 31 
 
 islands, with a glory inexpressibly beautiful. The side of the castle towards 
 us lay in deep shade, and its one square and tall tower cut the glowing 
 sky with an effect which made us long for the possession of artistic 
 talents. The scene altogether, for softness of atmosphere, richness of 
 light, singular beauty of outline, and combination of island, mountain, and 
 water, seemed quite incomparable. We ascended the top of the ruin, and 
 sat watching the fading light on the lake till the color was dissolved in 
 twilight : it was a rare moment of natural beautv, sufficient of itself, with- 
 out legendary or other interest. 
 
 Next morning we returned to this spot, for it is the usual place of 
 embarkation for persons desirous of visiting the Lower Lake. The castle 
 is built on a limestone rock, and must at one time have been a place of 
 considerable strength. In the Great Rebellion, it «was garrisoned by the 
 Irish, and, in 1652, resisted for some time the attacks of Ludlow, one of 
 Cromwell's generals. But the Parliamentary commander, having launched 
 a number of boats on the lake, attacked the castle by land and water, 
 and forced the besieged to capitulate, the fortress being the last to sur- 
 render in Munster. Ware records the event in his Chronological Table 
 in the following words : " Ross, in the countv of Kern", a castle in an is- 
 land, is yielded up to Ludlow, after he had caused a small ship to be 
 carried over the mountains and set afloat on the lough, which terrified 
 the ejiemy." An old prophecy had declared Ross impregnable until ships 
 should surround it ; and the Irish soldiers, looking upon the prophecy as 
 accomplished, refused to strike a blow. 
 
 From Ross Island we took boat to Innisfallen Island, and on the way 
 were shown a small islet of rock, with one side nearly twenty feet per- 
 pendicular above the water, called O'Donoghue's Prison. Here the famous 
 old prince, immortalized in song and legend, is said to have confined a 
 disobedient son and some of his rebellious associates. In what age this 
 great dynast of the lakes flourished cannot be easily determined ; but that 
 a distinguished hero of the name once did reign over this favored region 
 it would be heresy to dispute. According to tradition, he was a powerful 
 and beneficent monarch ; his arm was strong in the fight, and the words 
 of wisdom were on his lips in the council. But the life of this good 
 prince was doomed to terminate, while still in the pride of his manhood 
 and the full lustre of his renown and glory. There are two traditions, in 
 
 BOSTON COfeLgOK UBUAKI 
 
3> THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY. 
 
 which the manner of his death is differently related ; one asserts, that, 
 while sitting surrounded by his subjects at a banquet, he bscame suddenly 
 spiritualized, and descending, "as some light vision," to the neighboring 
 lake, plunged into its crystal waters and vanished from their sight. It is 
 believed that every May morning at sunrise, he quits the regions of immortal 
 bliss, and appears in person among the descendants of his people. His ap- 
 pearance is regarded as an omen of prosperity to whoever heholds him ; he 
 is generally seen mounted on a gallant white steed, bounding over the 
 lake ; but he is sometimes beheld on the green shores, contending in the 
 mimic fight, or treading the stately measure of the ancient Irish dance. 
 Moore's beautiful ballad called " O'Donohue's Mistress," is, as he informs 
 us, founded upon one of the stories connected with this legend of the 
 lakes. It portrays a young and beautiful girl, whose imagination was so 
 impressed with the idea of this visionary chief, that she fancied herself 
 enamoured of him : 
 
 "Of all the proud steeds that ever bore 
 Young plumed chiefs on sea or shore, 
 
 White steed, most joy to thee ; 
 Who still, with the first young glance of spring, 
 From under that glorious lake dost bring 
 
 My love, my chief, to me." 
 
 And the ballad closes with the vow of the fascinated fair one that : 
 
 " Of all the sweet deaths that maidens die, 
 Whose lovers beneath the cold wave lie, 
 
 Most sweet that death will be 
 Which, under the next May evening's light, 
 When thou and thy steed are lost to sight, 
 
 Dear love, I'll die for thee." 
 
 As we approached Innisfallen, the woods, which at a distance seemed 
 impenetrably dense, opened in glades and alleys. The trees here are ot 
 larger growth than common, the ash and holly apparently thriving to 
 the best advantage ; the arbutus also flourishes in abundance, and not 
 only contributes to the beauty of the lakes, but to the wealth of the 
 people, who manufacture a variety of pretty toys of its wood, and en- 
 deavour to convince the traveler that salmon broiled over an arbutus fire 
 possesses a delicious flavor, which cannot be imparted to the fish by any other 
 mode of cooking, — the consent to the experiment involving employment 
 
INN I SF ALLEN AND ITS RUINED ABBEY. 
 
 33 
 
 for half a day, with other et ceteras, to the well-practiced boatmen of 
 the lake. The island is twenty-one acres in extent, and is situated 
 nearly midway between the east and west shores of the lake. It is con- 
 sidered the gem of Killarney, and it is not only interesting from its his- 
 torical associations, but from the charm thrown around it by the poetry 
 of Moore. 
 
 " Sweet Innisfallen, long shall dwell 
 
 In memory's dream that sunny smile, 
 Which o'er thee on that evening fell, 
 
 When first I saw thy fairy isle." 
 
 Innisfallen, Inis-faithlen, though a mere ruin at present, was once the 
 seat of an order of monks distinguished in the ecclesiastical history of 
 Ireland. It was founded by St. Finihan Lothar, the Leper, about the 
 commencement of the seventh century. The abbey church consisted of a 
 single aisle, seventy feet long and twenty wide ; and from the narrowness 
 of the few windows which can now be traced, it must, like most of the 
 very ancient churches in Ireland, have been extremely dark. The archi- 
 tecture of the cloister is exceedingly rude, but though much dilapidated, 
 the limits of its covered walk, and the apertures opening into the interior 
 area, may be still distinctly traced. At a short distance from the principal 
 ruins there are three other buildings, which, it is said, belonged to the 
 abbey ; but the most interesting of all the remains of antiquity at this 
 place is a small chapel or oratory, covered with ivy, which stands on a 
 mass of rocks close to the water. In this abbey were composed the 
 celebrated Annals of Innisfallen, supposed to have been commenced some- 
 where about the eleventh or twelfth centuries. These annals, written in 
 the Irish character, and in the Irish language, intermixed with Latin, 
 contain a short account of the history of the world in general to the time 
 of St. Patrick, with very little of Ireland till the year 430, but thence- 
 forward a short history of the country to 13 18. A copy, written five or 
 six hundred years ago, is preserved in the Bodleian Library, at Oxford. 
 The publication of this work has been attempted at various times, but 
 no complete translation has yet been given to the world. 
 
 From Innisfallen we pulled over to Muckross, the charming demesne 
 of Captain Herbert, the member for Kerry, and one of the largest propri- 
 etors in the south of Ireland, which stretches from the foot of the Tore 
 
34 
 
 THE LAKES OE KILL A RNE Y. 
 
 Mountain along the eastern borders of the Middle and Lower Lakes, and 
 on which in late years a beautiful Elizabethan mansion has been erected. 
 The old abbey of Irrelagh or Muckross stands on a slight eminence, on 
 the right of the road leading to the mansion-house, and, as seen partially 
 through the trees, is an object of the highest picturesque beauty. A 
 well-kept, good road, lying through very highly cultivated park scenery, 
 conducts to the abbey, but we deferred to the next day the pleasure of a 
 leisurely survey of these beautiful ruins. Having ordered our boat to 
 meet us at the head of the Upper Lake, we took a car and proceeded 
 by the road along the shore to Torc Cascade, a very picturesque fall 
 formed by the Devil's Stream in its descent from Mangerton. The 
 waters are precipitated in a sheet of white foam over a projection of the 
 mountain, from a height of sixty or seventy feet. After breaking on the 
 rocks in mist and spray, the torrent resumes its impetuous course through 
 a deep, narrow ravine, amidst plantations of fir and pine trees, and taste- 
 fully-arranged pleasure-grounds, and soon mingles with the waters of the 
 lake. Precipitous rocks, covered with luxurious trees and ferns, rise on 
 either side. To the left, a circuitous foot-path leads to a spot above the 
 cascade, from whence we obtained a very fine view of the Middle and 
 Lower Lakes, which our artist has enabled us to present to the reader. 
 On the left the Torc Mountain rises close at hand, and the faint line of 
 the Dingle Hills form the distance to the right, while below us in the 
 centre of the picture is presented the peculiar peninsula of wooded rock 
 which separates the lakes. The walk conducts still higher to a spot 
 where the cascade is far under the observer's feet, and where the view is 
 even finer than from the lower station. The tourist should not fail to 
 survey the prospect from this lofty eminence, for it is one of the grandest 
 in Ireland. 
 
 After pondering for a while upon this view, we resumed our route 
 along the smooth road by the side of the lake, admiring the splendid 
 purple tints on the mountain sides, and the wonderful variety in the 
 shapes and groupings of the noble mountains around. As the altitude 
 increases, the views over the upper lake in particular almost defy descrip- 
 tion. At the base of Cromaglan Mountain an additional effect is obtained 
 by the tunnel through which the road is carried, and through which we 
 had already passed on our way hither from Kenmare. A mile beyond 
 
STAG-HUNT NEAR DERRYCUNIHY CASCADE. 
 
 35 
 
 this, and a little above Galway's bridge, the Galway and the Ullauns 
 streams unite, and in their steep course downwards to the lake form a 
 broken and majestic fall known as the Derrycunihy Cascade, some thirty 
 feet high. The whole of the short river may, in fact, be considered a contin- 
 uous cascade, and the effect is wonderfully increased by the foliage that 
 so thickly borders it. The name of the fall is derived from a remarkable 
 personage who leapt over the stream, and is said to have left his foot- 
 marks printed in a stone. It is here worthy of mention that these marked 
 stones are to be found in all parts of Ireland, and have had various 
 origins ascribed to them. Spencer concluded that they were a sort of 
 sign manual for the chiefs, who, standing on a stone, " received an oath 
 to preserve all the ancient customs of the country inviolable." 
 
 The red deer still holds covert in the woods and forests of Killarney ; 
 and the artist whose beautiful drawings embellish this work was fortunate 
 enough to witness the Taking of a Stag, just below the Derrycunihy 
 Cascade. Of the sport, for which Killarney has been famed in past days, 
 but sees now only rarely, Mr. Weld presents us with a graphic account. 
 
 " On the day preceding the hunt, those preparations are made which 
 are thought best calculated to ensure it a happy issue. An experienced 
 person is sent up the mountain to search for the herd, and watch its 
 motions in patient silence till night comes on. The deer which remains 
 the most aloof from its companions is carefully observed, and marked as 
 the object of pursuit, and it is generally found at the dawn of the ensuing 
 morning in the vicinity of the evening haunt. Before the break of day 
 the dogs are conducted up the mountain as silently and secretly as possi- 
 ble, and are kept coupled until some signal, commonly the firing of a 
 small cannon, announces that the party commanding the hunt has arrived 
 in boats at the foot of the mountain ; then the dogs are loosed, and 
 brought upon the track of the deer. If the business previous to the 
 signal has been silently and orderly conducted, the report of the cannon, 
 the sudden shouts of the hunters on the mountain which instantly succeed 
 it, the opening of the dogs, and the loud and continued echoes along an 
 extensive region of woods and mountains, produce an effect singularly grand. 
 
 " Tremble the forest round ; the joyous cries 
 
 Float through the vales ; and rocks and woods, and hills 
 Return the varied sounds." 
 
36 
 
 THE LAKES OE KILLARNEY. 
 
 " The deer, upon being roused, generally endeavors to gain the sum- 
 mit of the mountain, that he may the more readily make his escape 
 across the open heath to some distant retreat. To prevent this, numbers 
 of people are stationed at intervals along the heights, who by loud shout- 
 ing terrify the animal, and drive him towards the lake. At the last hunt 
 which I attended, a company of soldiers were placed along the mountain- 
 top, who, keeping up a running fire, effectually deterred him from once 
 ascending. The hunt, however, begins to lose its interest after the first 
 burst, and the ear becomes wearied with the incessant shouts which 
 drown the opening of the hounds, and the echoes of their mellow tones. 
 The ruggedness of the ground embarrasses the pursuers ; the scent is 
 followed with difficulty, and often lost altogether, or only resumed at the 
 end of a long interval : much confusion also arises from the emulous 
 efforts of the people on the water to follow the course of the hunt, 
 especially if it should take a direction towards the Upper Lake, when the 
 contending boats are frequently entangled among the rocks and shoals of 
 the river which leads to it. Those who attempt to follow the deer 
 through the woods are rarely gratified with a view, and are often excluded 
 from the grand spectacle of his taking the sail, or, in other words, plung- 
 ing into the lake. It is therefore generally recommended to remain in a 
 boat ; and those who have the patience to wait as long as five or six 
 hours are seldom disappointed. I was once gratified by seeing the deer 
 run for nearly a mile along the shore, with the hounds pursuing him in 
 full cry. On finding himself closely pressed, he leaped boldly from a rock 
 into the lake, and swam towards one of the islands ; but terrified by the 
 approach of the boats he returned, and once more sought for safety on 
 the main shore. Soon afterwards, in a desperate effort to leap across a 
 chasm between the two rocks, his strength failed him, and he fell 
 exhausted to the bottom. It was most interesting to behold the numerous 
 spectators who hastened to the spot, — ladies, gentlemen, peasants, hunters, 
 combined in various groups around the noble victim as he lay extended 
 in the depth of the forest. The stag, as is usual on these occasions, was 
 preserved from death." 
 
 Walking some distance up the hill from which the Derrycunihy Cascade 
 descends, we had a magnificent Panoramic View of the Lakes. From 
 this elevation the three bodies of water appear spread out below the eye, 
 
THE OLD WEIR BRIDGE. 
 
 37 
 
 with their islands and mountain shores, in a landscape of which no 
 description can convey an adequate idea. Fortunately, in this case, the 
 pencil "takes up the burthen," and in the wonderful perfection of the 
 arts, description can be conveyed through the eye almost with the reality 
 and enjoyment of nature. 
 
 Retracing our steps through the tunnel, we found our boat waiting for 
 us on the margin of the Upper Lake ; we therefore discharged our land 
 conveyance, and trusted ourselves on the bosom of the waters. The first 
 place to which our boatman pulled was Ronayne's Island, one of the 
 largest in this lake. It obtains its name from a recluse who occupied it 
 for some years ; and who, building himself a cottage on the rocks near the 
 water, the ruins of which are still visible, and, avoiding all society, employed 
 himself wholly in reading, hunting and fishing. He became exposed, of 
 course, to the visits of curious people, and was on such occasions exceed- 
 ingly savage and morose ; but his name, says Weld, is still mentioned 
 with respect, and even admiration, at Killarney. 
 
 From Ronayne's Island, the prow was pointed homeward, and with the 
 warm sun creating an atmosphere of midsummer on the tranquil bosom of 
 the lake, we laid in the stern-sheets, and watched the magnificent changes 
 in the mountain-groups as we sped onward, and wanted nothing but some 
 absent friend to share our happiness. We soon entered on the narrow 
 river two miles in length and called the Long Range, which connects the 
 lakes, and after winding through a channel, where the current ran very 
 strongly, came in sight of a picturesque old bridge, when the boatman 
 requested us to steer directly for the centre of the arch, with a caution 
 to be careful and steady. The oars were then shipped, and the current 
 increasing to great rapidity, the boat shot under the bridge with a velocity 
 that rather surprised us. This Old Weir Bridge is a dangerous spot, and 
 many accidents have occurred in shooting it. "The rapidity of the current," 
 says Weld, "forms an impediment to the ascent of boats not to be coun- 
 teracted without considerable efforts, and never fails to occasion much 
 delay in proceeding to the Upper Lake." To render the boats more 
 manageable, the passengers are always required to land, and walk through 
 the woods till they get above the bridge ; and, even after being thus 
 lightened, it demands the united strength of nine or ten men to drag a 
 large boat against the stream. The bridge consists of two arches, of which 
 
THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY. 
 
 one alone affords a passage for boats, and obtains its name from its form- 
 ing part of a contemplated fishing weir. 
 
 But, after our passage through, we soon gained still water, and found 
 ourselves in a lovely spot. It was the Meeting of the Waters. The route 
 by which we had come was the connecting stream with the Upper Lake ; 
 that which now diverged to the right connected with the Middle, Tore or 
 Muckross Lake, while the course of water to our left led to the Lower 
 Lake or Lough Leane. We proceeded along the latter stream, entered the 
 Lower Lake at its narrowest portion, and, turning round a point to the 
 left, landed in a small and lovely crescent of the shore. In the centre of 
 it stood a picturesque little cottage known as Lady Kenmare's, a perfect gem 
 as regards situation, and the close-shorn lawn of which descended every- 
 where to the edge of the water — rocks behind it, trees around, the 
 forest extending up the mountain in the rear, and the solitude of lake 
 and mountain burying it in silence and beauty. Glena Cottage is a place 
 to remember with a heart-ache when one is weary of the world. With a 
 kind thoughtfulness Lord Kenmare has here also erected another cottage 
 for the accommodation of summer tourists, in which all necessaries are 
 provided for cooking a dinner ; and if lovely scenery can aid in the 
 enjoyment of creature comforts, there is not a more beautiful place in the 
 world than this in which to celebrate the union ; and here is certainly the 
 place to test the virtue of salmon broiled on arbutus skewers, if the 
 traveler has any desire to enjoy the flavor so highly eulogized by his 
 eloquent boatman. 
 
 Unwillingly leaving this enchanting scene, we re-embarked and steered 
 across the Lower Lake towards Ross Island, the approach to which by 
 water is remarkably picturesque. The gray towers and ivied walls of the 
 castle appeared as if emerging from the waters of the lake — and glittering 
 as they were, at the moment we beheld them, with the rich rays of the 
 evening sun, nothing could be imagined more strikingly beautiful. It was 
 long after our return to the hotel, before we could think of anything but 
 the delightful scenery we had been viewing ; and even after slumber had 
 steeped our senses in forgetfulness, we were in fancy wandering through 
 the fairy scenes of this enchanting region. 
 
 On the following morning we determined to take another view of ln- 
 nisfallen and Muckross Abbey, whose beauties we had not sufficient time 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE LAKE. 
 
 39 
 
 to examine on our first visit. Accordingly we took boat at an early hour 
 in the day, in order to have full leisure to admire those interesting places. 
 The character of the scenery of the Lower Lake is totally distinct from 
 that of the Middle or Upper Lakes ; it is distinguished for its elegance 
 and beauty, being studded with rocks aud wooded islands, covered with a 
 variety of evergreens. The Upper Lake on the contrary, is remarkable 
 for its wild sublimity and grandeur, while the Middle Lake combines in 
 a great degree the characteristics of the other two. There are lakes in 
 Switzerland which, for single views, perhaps excel either of the Lakes of 
 Killarney ; but, taking the peculiar atmosphere, the variety and grouping 
 of the mountains, the interest of the ruins on the shores, and (above all 
 to our thinking) the exquisite mingling of art with nature, and Killarney 
 has no rival. And still her lakes are comparatively small, for the Lower 
 or larger one covers but an area of a little over twelve square miles, 
 while the Middle has only a surface of two square miles, and the Upper 
 one has less than a mile and a half. In the case of the two first named, the 
 length is double the breadth, while the Upper Lake is a long sheet of 
 water only about half a mile in width. Of the numerous islets with which 
 the bosom of the Lower Lake is studded, and which have all received 
 names, there are only four or five worthy of any consideration, except as 
 accessories to the splendid picture which nature here spreads before us. 
 Though Ross Island claims superiority from its extent, for beauty it 
 cannot compare with 
 
 " Innisfallen, of the islands queen." 
 
 It is in truth an isle of beauty and repose, where a man, weary of the 
 storms of the world, might spend in calm tranquility the evening of his life. 
 
 Viewed from the water, Innisfallen appeared to be covered with an 
 impervious wood, but after penetrating the leafy screen which fringes the 
 shore, we found the interior of the island spread out into beautiful glades 
 and lawns, embellished by thickets of flowering shrubs and clumps of 
 magnificent trees, amongst which the boasted arbutus, with its dark, shin- 
 ing leaves, stood conspicuously distinct. From these delightful openings 
 the lofty peaks of the distant Tomies and Glena, with the misty summits 
 of the Purple Mountains which form the southern boundary of the lake, 
 are distinctly seen ; while between the dark stems of the trees glimpses 
 
40 
 
 THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY. 
 
 are caught of the sparkling waters below, and the more distant sunny 
 shores. 
 
 Innisfallen, like every spot in this region of romance, has its legends. 
 One of these informs us that, in ancient times, a friar of the Abbey of 
 Innisfallen had wandered, on a fine summer's day, to an adjacent grove, 
 where the silent tranquility of the scene and its perfect seclusion disposed 
 his mind to religious meditation and prayer. Devoutly kneeling, with his 
 thoughts abstracted from the contemplation of earthly things, and his soul 
 exalted with visions of a better world, he heeded not the flight of time. 
 Eventually fatigue overcame him, and he fell into a profound slumber 
 which lasted, on the authority of the legend, seven hundred years. At 
 the close of an afternoon nap, far more protracted than that of the 
 renowned " Rip Van Winkle," it is not to be wondered that the holy 
 man found, not less than did the bibulous Dutchman, many a change to 
 have taken place in a world where everything is perishable and transitory. 
 On opening his eyes, and looking around him, his senses were over- 
 whelmed with the deepest amazement. The whole face of nature was 
 changed. A beautiful lake burst on his astonished sight, where no lake 
 had been before ; rubbing his eye-lids, to assure himself that he was 
 really awake, he began to imagine that all he saw was the effect of a 
 miracle, which heaven had worked while he slept. With this conviction, 
 he arose, repeated an Ave, and entrusted himself to the waters of the 
 lake, which bore him in safety to Innisfallen. Directing his steps to the 
 abbey, he entered, with the hope of having all these wonders explained ; 
 but, alas ! a fresh cause of astonishment awaited him. The monks were 
 all strangers to him, and ridiculed his improbable story ; and so, terribly 
 confounded, the poor friar turned sadly from the place where he was 
 regarded as an impudent impostor, and betook himself to one of the 
 rocky islands of the lake, where, for many years after, he lived a holy 
 life, and died in the odor of sanctity. The spot where the friar is sup- 
 posed to have slept is called Ross View, and is about a mile from the 
 town of Killarney. It is esteemed a hallowed spot by the country folk, 
 who, with implicit faith, point out three small indentations in the rock, 
 as being impressions of his chin and elbows, caused by his protracted 
 repose. 
 
 Leaving Innisfallen, we directed our boatmen to pull across to O'Sulli- 
 
O'SULLIVAN'S CASCADE. 
 
 11 
 
 van's Cascade, which lies at the south side of the lake, and which is 
 shown to strangers as one of the greatest beauties of Killarney. The 
 shore here exhibits a sweep of wood so great in extent and so rich in 
 foliage, that it is impossible not to be struck with its beauty. High 
 overhead rise the magnificent Tomies ; but while we were admiring the 
 sublimity of the scene, the boat glided into a small bay, having in its 
 centre an opening in the wood formed by the bed of a considerable stream, 
 which is the source of O'Sullivan's Cascade. Landing to the right, we 
 walked under the thick shade of the wood, over a rugged declivity close 
 to the torrent-stream, which breaks impetuously from rock to rock, with 
 a roar that kindles expectation in the mind of a person visiting this scene 
 for the first time. The picture we had formed in our fancy did not 
 exceed the reality : on a sudden, we beheld rolling headlong from the 
 mountain — 
 
 " Th' ungovernable torrent, loud and strong, 
 In thunder roaring as it dashed along ; 
 Leaping with speed infuriate, wildly down, 
 « Where rocks grotesque in massive grandeur frown. 
 
 With ocean strength it rushes on its way, 
 'Mid hoary clouds of everlasting spray ; 
 To its rock-basin, with tremendous roar, 
 The brown hills trembling round the wizard shore." 
 
 The stream, which bursts from the deep bosom of a woody glen, 
 throws itself over the face of a high perpendicular rock into a basin 
 concealed from the spectator's view ; from this basin it forces itself 
 impetuously between two rocks into another reservoir : this second fall 
 is of considerable height, but the third and lower one is the most 
 striking in its appearance. Each of these basins being large, there appears 
 a space of several yards between the three falls ; and the whole being 
 as it were embowered within a woody arch, the effect is exceedingly 
 picturesque and beautiful. 
 
 We next directed our course to the ruin of Muckross Abbey, which, 
 though not comparable in extent or architectural grandeur to many similar 
 edifices in Ireland, is, from the beautiful seclusion of its situation, one 
 of the most interesting monastic remains in the country. The Abbey, 
 at which we have already glanced, overhangs the lake in one of the 
 finest parts of Muckross demesne. Embosomed in the shade of lofty and 
 o 
 
42 
 
 THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY. 
 
 venerable ash, oak, yew, elm, and sycamore trees, — festooned with trailing 
 plants, and garlanded with ivy of the darkest and most luxuriant foliage, — 
 it is more beautiful in its loneliness and decay than it could have been in 
 its pristine state of neatness and perfection. 
 
 The exact period of the foundation of Muckross Abbey has not been 
 well ascertained, but that a church was situated here from a very remote 
 time, appears from a record in a manuscript collection of Annals in the 
 library of Trinity College, Dublin, which states that the church of Irrelagh 
 (Muckross) was burned in the year 1192. The present ruins are, however, 
 altogether of a later date, and are the remains of a monastery of Conven- 
 tual Franciscans, erected by the McCarthys, Princes of Desmond, and 
 dedicated to the Blessed Trinity. It owes its present state of preservation 
 to the repairs which it received in 1602, and subsequently in 1662, as 
 appears from a black letter inscription placed on the north side of the 
 choir. The church consists of a nave and choir, separated by a small 
 belfry, which is pierced by a narrow Gothic door, connecting the nave and 
 choir. On the south side of the nave there is a small chapel ; on the 
 north side lies the cloister, which is the most perfect and interesting por- 
 tion of the building. Within the walls of Muckross Abbey some of the 
 Irish kings are supposed to be interred : the vault of the McCarthy Mores 
 is placed in the centre of the choir, and is marked by a modern tomb ; 
 while a second monument designates the resting-place of O'Donoghue of 
 the Glens, who is buried in the same vault. 
 
 The portion of ground on the south of the church has for ages 
 past been the favorite cemetery of the peasantry of the surrounding 
 district; and it is not uncommon for persons who die at great distances 
 from the place, to lay their injunctions on their friends and relatives to have 
 their remains conveyed thither for sepulture, — firmly convinced that their 
 spirits would not enjoy rest if their mortal part be consigned to any earth 
 but that of the blessed Muckross. 
 
 The cloisters consist of an arcade of Gothic arches, the pillars and 
 mouldings of which are of gray marble ; and the solemn and imposing effect 
 they produce is greatly heightened by a venerable and majestic yew-tree, 
 which rises like a stately column from the centre of the enclosure, and, 
 spreading its dark and lofty branches overhead, induced Mr. Smith, 
 who wrote the History of Kerry, to compare it, with more truth than 
 
CONFERENCES WITH THE EXILED NATIONALISTS. 
 
 4' 
 
 Mr. O' Kelly. In company with a friend he started that very night for 
 Philadelphia to attend a conference of leading- Nationalists from various 
 parts of the country. Davitt made a very favorable impression upon all 
 present, and it was there he was induced to prolong his visit and to 
 undertake a more extended lecture tour than he had originally intended. 
 The men he met represented the only organized Irish National element 
 in the United States. Other bodies there were, large and influential, 
 whose members were full of good will to Ireland, but they did not meet 
 for purely Irish purposes, and Irish affairs were not discussed at their 
 meetings. There was a still larger class of Irishmen outside of all dis- 
 tinctively Irish organizations, full of sympathy for their native land, but 
 encaged in no work for her benefit and havincr no common oround of 
 action. All of these were then out of Davitt's reach, and he was unknown 
 to them. The only men who knew of him, who worked for the same 
 object as he had at heart, were the Nationalists, and they alone got up 
 his first course of lectures in America, and gave him a platform from 
 which to address his countrymen. Without their aid he could not have 
 secured an audience at all, and without the proceeds of these lectures in 
 his pocket — small as the amount was — he could not have devoted his 
 time during the rest of the year to the work which he undertook. These 
 facts- have an important bearing on the whole course of events for the 
 next few years and should not be lost sight of. 
 
 After spending a few days with his mother in Manayunk, he returned 
 to New York, and on the Sunday after his arrival delivered his first pub- 
 lic address in America at an excursion of Irish Nationalists, organized by 
 a military body called the Irish Volunteers, in a grove on the banks of 
 the Hudson. His first lecture was delivered in Philadelphia, on Sept. 
 1 6th, and his second in New York, in each case to limited audiences. 
 With the exception of the organized Nationalists and a few of the 
 Ancient Order of Hibernians, there was then no one who took an active 
 interest in Irish affairs, and the general public was very poorly repre- 
 sented at his lectures. Numerous conferences were held before and after 
 these lectures, and at all these Davitt was astonished to find among men 
 who firmly believed in physical force and looked resolutely to separation 
 as the only solution of the Irish National Question, the most tolerant 
 views with regard to agitations seeking minor objects and the greatest 
 
44 
 
 THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY. 
 
 tell your honors how they sparkled with the life and joy that was dancing 
 in her young veins. Any how, she put poor Frank Fineen's heart into a 
 terrible frustration ; and more besides him, I can tell you ; for there was 
 hardly a boy in the parish, ould or young, that wasn't ready to break his 
 neck after her. If Honor had a fault, it was that she delighted in 
 bewildherin' the poor souls with her deludin' ways ; for it can't be denied 
 that her smile wor like the priest's blessing — everybody got a share of it, 
 and each one thought he himself had the biggest ind of it. In troth, it 
 was a shame for her ; but sure it's the way with all the cailleens, they like 
 to make fools of the men ; and by what I undherstand, sirs, it's much the 
 same amongst the quality ladies. Hows'ever, there was only two of all 
 her sweethearts for whom Honor really cared a trawneen,* and these were 
 Frank Fineen, and a wild young chap called Neal Connor, who had been 
 out sogering in the horse-dragoons, and fighting agin ould Boney and the 
 black king of Morawco in furrin parts, and who had lately come home to 
 see his ould mother, and get cured of a wound in his arm that happened 
 to him by axcidence in the wars. 
 
 " Neal was a smart, good-looking fellow enough, with an uncommon 
 gift of the gab, and a free-and-asy way that made him, like a tinker's dog, 
 at home wherever he went. His dress, too, was enough to take the sight 
 out of one's eyes ; and he wore a little cap like a skimmin'-dish, with a bit 
 of goold band round it, stuck on one side of his head, as if he thought 
 everybody should admire him. Of course, he had nothing to do but 
 stravaige up and down the village, showing his fine clothes, and divarting 
 himself with making love to all the purty girls that came in his way, and, 
 amongst the rest, to Honor Hennesey, whose head was fairly turned with 
 all the murdherin' stories he told her of ; his fights and battles, where the 
 colors wor flying, and the drums bating, and the trumpets blowing, and 
 the cannons tundhering, and the generals shouting out, ' Feigh a baillagh ! 'f 
 Fair play for ould Ireland!' while the Connaught Rangers, the darlins, 
 wor making lanes through the French corps with their swoords and 
 bag'nets. Any how these fine discoorses made Honor begin to fancy she 
 liked the young soger better than Frank Fineen, who had been coorting 
 
 * Trawnecn, the stem of the grass. 
 
 f Feigh a bailldgh ! " Clear the way," or, more literally, " Clear the pass," was often the watchword to victory 
 in the Peninsular campaign amongst the Connaught Rangers, who formed a portion of the brave Picton's 
 " fighting division." 
 
LEGEND OF THE YEW TREE. 45 
 
 her for nigh hand a twelve-month, and who she knew doted down upon 
 the very ground she walked upon ; so that between Frank's honest love 
 and Neal's fine speeches, poor Honor didn't know which of them to 
 choose, and, like many a girl in her situation, would fain have kept them 
 both. Hows'ever that could not be, at laste in these parts ; and so as the 
 time was fast drawing on that Neal should return to his regiment, Honoi 
 found that she must decide one way or the other. I believe it was only 
 two or three evenings before the day that Neal was to leave the village, 
 that a meeting was held at the public-house above the cross-roads, where 
 all the boys and girls of the neighborhood were gathered to have a fling 
 of a dance together. It was understood that on this night Honor was to 
 make her choice between her lovers, so becoorse they both came prepared 
 to do all they could to win the hand of the purty cailleen. Neal, it was 
 remarked, never talked so fast, laughed so loud, and whispered such 
 slewthering* speeches into Honor's ear as on that evening. Frank, who 
 was no match for the soger at the blarney, sat by without opening his 
 lips, but every now and then he threw such mournful and reproachin' 
 looks over towards Honor, as caused her cheek to turn pale, and made 
 her wish in her heart that Frank could spake to her like Neal. Well, as 
 the night grew late, some of the ould people began to talk of ghosts and 
 specrits, and holy places, and laygends, and the like ; and, amongst the 
 rest, of the yew-tree of Muckross, which was planted by the blessed hands 
 of St. Colu mbkill himself, who left a strict order and command to all 
 thrue believers not to touch so much as a leaf from it. I don't know 
 what put it into Honor's head, but says she, quite suddenly, ' I wish I had 
 some of the leaves of that tree : I hear they are good for the tooth-ache ; 
 and last night I had it so bad I could not get a wink of sleep.' 
 
 " Then, giving a side-glance at her sweethearts, she added, in a careless 
 way, 
 
 " ' I wondher is there anybody here fond enough of me to go to the 
 abbey to-night, and fetch me a handful of the leaves.' 
 
 " ' I'll go,' cried Neal and Frank, jumping up together. 
 
 "Honor looked from one to the other in a laughing wa). 
 
 " ' I won't make little of either by preferring one to the other,' says she, 
 'but if you're both so eager to oblige me, I'll give him who first brings 
 
 * Slewthering, flattering. 
 
/ 
 
 46 THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY. 
 
 me a branch from the yew-tree that grows in the church ' — here she 
 smiled one of her deludin' smiles, and purtended to look for a pin she 
 had dropped on the flure — 'I'll give him,' says she, 'whatever he asks that 
 'tis in my power to bestow.' 
 
 "The words had hardly passed her lips when the two young men, 
 without the laste warning, started off, like a brace of greyhounds, down the 
 hill towards the abbey. 
 
 " 'Holy mother!' cried Honor, turning as pale as a shroud, 'they don t 
 mean to touch the blessed tree ! Sure they might know I was only 
 ioking to try their sperrit. Shawn McGarry, achree, run after them, and 
 don't let them attempt such a thing ! Run, Shawn, asthore ! ' 
 
 " But Shawn should have had the foot of one of the mountain-deer to 
 be able to overtake the rivals, who were already half-way down the hill. 
 The night was as black as pitch, but both the lovers knew every inch of 
 the path, and you may be sure neither of them let much grass grow 
 under their feet on the way. On they kept, running for the bare life, till 
 Neal, who was the lightest of the two, got a good piece ahead of Frank, 
 and was crossing the last ditch between him and the abbey, when he 
 heard a voice calling to him in the pitifullest manner you can consave. 
 
 " ' Neal Connor, Neal Connor ! ' says the voice, ' stop and help a poor 
 ould woman that's fallen into the ditch.' 
 
 "'I haven't time,' says Neal, 'at the present.' 
 
 " ' For the love of heaven ! for the blessed Vargin's sweet sake, don't 
 lave me to perish here ! ' says the ould woman. 
 
 " ' Don't bother me,' says Neal, ' I wouldn't stop now for a univarse of 
 ould women,' and away he run. 
 
 "Just then up comes Frank. 
 
 " ' Help a poor ould crather out of this, Frank Fineen, and my bless- 
 ing will attend you,' cries the same voice. 
 
 "'That I will and welcome, poor woman,' says Frank, 'though every 
 minnit is worth goold to me now. — -Where are you at all ? ' 
 
 "'Here I am, in the ditch: give us your hand, avourneen.' 
 
 " Frank reached out his hand to her, which she caught hoult of; but when 
 he tried to pull her up she was so mortial heavy he could hardly stir her, 
 
 "' Pull away, Frank, abouchal — pull away, asthore!' says the ould woman 
 from the bottom of the ditch. 
 
DREADFUL END OF A MARVELLOUS STORY. 
 
 47 
 
 " ' I'm pullin' my best,' says Frank, making a great heave, and raising 
 her about half-way up the bank, when his foot slipped and down he went, 
 head over heels, along with her into the mud and sludge of the ditch. 
 After struggling and sliddhering about for a long while, he at last got 
 himself and the ould woman upon dry land. 
 
 "'You've done one of the blessed works of mercy, Frank,' says she: 
 ' a poor ould woman like me has little to give ; but here's something at 
 laste for you to remember me by,' and tearing a bit off the corner of her cloak, 
 she gave it to Frank, who put it in his pocket, and walked off towards the 
 abbey quite melancholy, for he knew he had lost so much time that his 
 chance of being first back with the yew-branch was gone. Surprised at 
 not meeting Neal on his return, he entered the cloisters, and there what 
 did he behold, but the soger stretched upon one of the tombstones, with 
 a large branch of the blessed tree in his hand. Frank at first thought he 
 was dead, but after a while he began to recover, and at last, with Frank's 
 help, he tottered to a neighbor's cabin, where he was put to bed, and the 
 priest sent for ; but before Father James could arrive poor Neal Connor 
 was a corpse. Before he died, however, he tould Frank that the 
 instant he cut off the branch of the tree, he heard a dreadful screech — 
 heaven presarve the hearers ! — and at the same time felt a sudden 
 blow w from something he couldn't see, which struck him sinseless to the 
 ground. 
 
 " Indeed ! " we exclaimed. 
 
 " Aye, your honors ; but the most particular part of the story ain't tould 
 yet ; for the next day, when the people went to look at the yew-tree, they 
 found the ground around it steeped in blood from the wound that Neal 
 Connor had made cutting off the branch ; and since then, the ghost of the 
 soldier is said to haunt this ould place, followed by a big dark man who 
 every night whips him three times round the abbey walls." 
 
 We suppose our ancient chronicler believed us to be somewhat incred- 
 ulous, for she hastily added : 
 
 "In troth, sirs, it is a mighty remarkable laygend, and has some hard 
 parts in it ; but still an' all, it's as thrue as that your honors are sitting 
 there upon that flagstone." 
 
 We assured her that we placed as implicit belief in her narration as 
 we did in any similar marvellous tradition. 
 
48 THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY. 
 
 "But," we asked, "who was the old woman that Frank helped out of 
 the ditch?" 
 
 " I knew you would be curious about her. Well, then, that ould 
 woman was no other than the blessed Saint Bridget herself; and if Neal 
 Connor had shown a pitiful heart towards the cries of the distressed, she 
 would have pursarved him from the misfortune that happened to him. 
 As for Frank, he had his reward for the ducking he got that night ; for 
 in less than a month he was married to Honor Hennesey — and, by all 
 accounts, there was lashins of whiskey at their weddin' ; but that was 
 before Father Mathew and the Teetotallers was hard of in these parts." 
 
 Having acknowledged the gratification we had received by a small 
 present to the old dame we quitted the abbey, overwhelmed by a shower 
 of blessings. 
 
 We had already passed over the waters of the Upper Lake, but 
 resolved to devote another day in exploring its numerous beauties more 
 closely, and in visiting the wonderful mountain-pass, called the Gap of 
 Dunloe. Our artist sketched the Upper Lake from the summit of the 
 cliff, through which the tunnel of the Kenmare road passes, the view from 
 that point being specially enjoyable from the nearness of the objects which 
 compose it. The wild grandeur strikes the observer, on first beholding it, 
 with feelings of awe and admiration. Perfectly distinct in the character 
 of its romantic scenery from that of the Middle and Lower Lakes, the 
 Upper combines many of the softer beauties of wood and water, with all 
 the stern sublimity of mountain scenery ; possessing in a surpassing degree 
 every variety of landscape that can delight the eye or gratify the imagina- 
 tion. Embosomed amidst majestic mountains, whose fantastical summits 
 seem to pierce the sky, the lake appears to be completely land-locked. On 
 the south lie the Derricunihy mountains and on the left the lofty Reeks 
 
 " Lift to the clouds their craggy heads on high, 
 Crown'd with tiaras fashioned in the sky ; 
 In vesture clad of soft etherial hue, 
 The Purple Mountains * rise in distant view, 
 With Dunloe's Gap ." 
 
 This mountain cincture imparts to the Upper Lake an air of solitary 
 beauty and intensity of interest not to be found to the same extent in either 
 
 * Purple Mountains. — This lofty range of hills has acquired its name from a beautiful heath of a bright purple 
 color, which clothes them nearly to the summits, and gives them, when viewed at a distance, a peculiar rich tint. 
 
SCENERY OF THE UPPER LAKE. 
 
 ■19 
 
 of the other lakes. Nature here sits in lonely and silent grandeur amidst 
 her primeval mountains. Solitude — stillness, the most profound, rests upon 
 the woody shores and the tranquil lake, filling and overpowering the mind 
 with a deep sense of the perfect seclusion of the scene. 
 
 At various points bright mountain-streams may be seen pouring down 
 the glens and deep ravines — now leaping from rock to rock, and flashing, 
 like living silver, in the broad sunlight — now glittering in the shade of 
 the dark foliage, till they are lost in the shining waters of the broad lake. 
 A number of islets of the most picturesque forms are also scattered over 
 its surface ; some of them are mere masses of naked rocks ; others, on the 
 contrary, are redundant in vegetation, producing trees, shrubs, and plants 
 in the wildest profusion, amongst which the arbutus, with its tempting 
 berries, and the mountain-ash, with its scarlet clusters glowing through the 
 dark shining foliage of the holly-tree, are prominently conspicuous in the 
 autumn season. In several instances the action of the water has worn 
 away the lower parts of the rocks composing these islands, giving to the 
 overhanging portions the resemblance of masses of giant architecture, 
 thrown confusedly together by some convulsion of nature. In other places 
 the rocks are completely perforated, forming natural arches, sufficiently 
 large for boats to pass through ; and, we must confess, that while our boat- 
 men rested on their oars for a few moments in one of these singular 
 chasms, to enable us to examine it at our leisure, the threatening 
 appearance of the huge impending rocks, supported upon disproportion- 
 ately slender columns and crumbling foundations, considerably abated the 
 pleasure that we should have enjoyed in the contemplation of these 
 strange freaks of nature at a more respectful distance. 
 
 There are three principal islands in the lake, known as Ronayne's, 
 McCarthy's, and the Eagle's ; besides several lesser islets, to which the 
 lake-boatmen have given names. The first of these, and the derivation of 
 whose name we have already mentioned, is the centre of a cluster of five 
 lying near the western shore. It has precipitous banks, is finely wooded, 
 and is covered with the richest verdure. From the summit of a rock in 
 its centre, a new and magnificent view may be obtained of the whole 
 scenery of the Upper Lake, with all its splendid accessories of mountains, 
 rocks, and woods. The spectator there beholds the cloud-crowned peaks 
 of the surrounding mountains, piled up like the eternal barriers of a vast 
 
 7 
 
\ 
 
 50 THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY. 
 
 amphitheatre, of which the sparkling waters of the lake form the smooth 
 arena ; producing a coup-d 1 ceil which for beauty and grandeur cannot be 
 surpassed by the most favored spots on earth. 
 
 Lord Brandon's Cottage is the principal object of interest on the 
 western shore of the lake. Its situation is highly romantic, and the noble 
 possessor has enhanced the natural beauties of this pictuersque retreat by 
 tasteful improvements. A modern antique tower, erected by a former 
 peer, stands in the gorge of the rugged glen of Coomduv, or the Dark 
 Valley, which, when viewed from the lake, with its majestic mountain back- 
 ground, forms a bold and prominent feature in the picture. 
 
 Towards the eastern end, the Upper Lake becomes attenuated into a 
 narrow strip of water, rather more than half a mile long, to which has, 
 strangely enough, been given the name of Newfoundland Bay. It 
 is a lovely inlet, entered between two lofty crags, and hemmed in by 
 rugged precipitous rocks, and thick overhanging trees. Behind this is a 
 deep, wooded ravine, through which a rapid stream rushes with consider- 
 able force from a cataract concealed in a sequestered glen at a short 
 distance from the shore. We had now completed our tour of the Upper 
 Lake, having reached Colman's Eye, a promontory at the entrance of the 
 Long Range, and were once more at the point where its waters begin 
 to descend to the Lower Lake. We immediately pass Colman's Leap — 
 so-called, we were told, because the person whose name it bears performed 
 an extraordinary act of agility at this very spot. This Colman was once 
 upon a time lord of the Upper Lake ; and, instead of following the 
 example of his namesake, who, as a saint and peacemaker, assisted St. 
 Patrick in converting Ireland to Christianity, spent most of his time in 
 quarrelling with the O'Donoghue and provoking him to single combat. 
 Being worsted at one of these diversions, it appeared to him a prudential 
 course to fly ; and, closely pursued by his adversary, he took this celebrated 
 jump over the river, where the guides show you his foot-prints on the rock. 
 
 One of the most remarkable objects to be visited in passing down the 
 river from Colman's Eye to the Old Weir Bridge is the " Eagle's Nest," 
 which every visitor makes a point of seeing before leaving Killarney. It 
 is a rugged cone-shaped mountain, nearly twelve hundred feet in height 
 above the sea level, and seven hundred above the river, thickly wooded at 
 its base, but presenting to the spectator's eye as it travels upwards a 
 
THE EAGLE'S NEST AND ITS ECHOES. 
 
 51 
 
 succession of broken crags, thinly covered with trailing plants and flowering 
 mosses. Amongst these inaccessible precipices the golden eagle (Falco 
 chryscetos) makes its eyry, and from this circumstance the mountain derives 
 its name. This noble bird, though formerly common in the western parts 
 of Ireland, is now rarely to be found, and only in remote and mountainous 
 districts, where it breeds amongst the loftiest cliffs. But it is not from its 
 being the lofty station of the king of birds that this cliff has obtained all 
 its celebrity ; it is also remarkable for its fine echoes, which may be heard 
 to the best advantage at a station selected on the opposite shore. The 
 grandest effect is produced by the discharge of a small cannon, the practice 
 of firing which was for a time forbidden in consequence of a frightful 
 accident having occurred at one of the fusilades. The tumultuous and 
 oft-repeated clangor of the report is appalling and truly wonderful ; 
 each explosion awakens a succession of echoes, like peals of thunder, 
 breaking on the startled ear with a deafening crash that seems to shake 
 the mountain to its granite foundations, followed by another and another 
 till the reverberations are lost in the hoarse and indistinct murmurs 
 of the distant hills. A bugle sounded under the Eagle's Nest pro- 
 duces, on the contrary, a series of wild and solemn melodies. The 
 plaintive and lonely voices of the rocks and glens fill the soul with " sweet 
 sadness," and, as Inglis says, "makes our imagination endue the mountains 
 with life ; and to their attributes of magnitude, and silence, and solitude, 
 we for a moment add the power of listening and a voice." 
 
 There are many other objects of minor interest to which the stranger's 
 attention is always directed in his voyage down the channel ; each 
 possessing some strange tradition or amusing anecdote, and many of these, 
 we suspect, owe their existence to the creative fancy of the guides, who 
 endeavor to gratify the appetite for the marvellous of the lion-hunters 
 who visit the lakes, by inventing the wonderful stories they relate. 
 
 Our attention was next turned to the Gap of Dunloe, on the west of 
 the lakes ; and two miles distant from its entrance we came upon the 
 cave of the same name, discovered in 1838 by some laborers who were 
 making a ditch, when they broke into a hollow under the earth. " The 
 Cave of Dunloe," says Hall in his Hibemiia Illustrata, "must be regarded 
 as an ancient Irish library, lately disinterred, and restored to light. The 
 books are the large impost stones which form the roof. Their angles 
 
52 
 
 THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY. 
 
 contain the writing. A library of such literature was never heard of in 
 England before, and scarcely in Ireland ; and yet it is of the highest 
 antiquity." The writing consists of Ogham characters, the age and reading 
 of which have long been disputed points amongst antiquaries. 
 
 At the entrance to the gap we found a cottage, which we were told 
 had been the residence of the celebrated beauty, Kate Kearney. It is 
 now inhabited by the reputed grand-daughter of the heroine, who, though 
 she bears the same name, was to our eyes unpossessed of the charms 
 poetically attributed to her prototype. The traveler who passes this way 
 is not unlikely to be offered by her some goat's milk seasoned with a 
 little potheen ; but, if he is a disciple of Father Mathew, he will be 
 inclined to think a taste of it as destructive as that presented by the 
 seductive features of the ancient beauty, and of which we are told in 
 the melody : 
 
 " Beware ere you sip the balm from her lip, 
 For fatal's the breath of Kate Kearney." 
 
 The Gap of Dunloe is a wild mountain defile or pass, lying between 
 the Reeks and the Purple Mountain, a shoulder of the Tomies range. 
 The romantic conception of the peasantry attribute its formation to a 
 sword-cut from a warrior giant of old. The glen, which is about four 
 miles in length, presents a most extraordinary appearance. On either 
 hand, the craggy cliffs, composed of huge masses of projecting rocks, 
 impend fearfully over the narrow pathway, and at every step threaten with 
 destruction the adventurous explorer of this desolate scene. In the inter- 
 stices of these immense fragments, a few shrubs and trees shoot out in 
 fantastic shapes, which, with the dark ivy and luxuriant heather, contribute 
 to the picturesque effect of the landscape. A small, but rapid stream, 
 called the Loe (from whence the name of the ravine), traverses the whole 
 length of the glen, expanding itself at different points into five small 
 lakes, each having its own proper name, but which are known in the 
 aggregate as the Cummeen Thomeen Lakes. The road, which is a mere 
 rugged footpath, frequently constructed on the brink of precipices, follows 
 the course of the stream, and in two instances crosses it by means of 
 bridges. One of these stands at the head of a beautiful rapid, where the 
 water rushes in whitening foam over the rocky bed of the torrent. The 
 
ASCENT OF McGILLICUDDY'S REEKS. 
 
 53 
 
 part of the glen which attracts most admiration is that where the valley 
 becomes so contracted as scarcely to leave room between the precipitous 
 sides for the scanty pathway and its accompanying strand. The peasantry 
 have given to this romantic pass the name of " the Pike." 
 
 Keeping onward, the visitor begins to ascend the Purple Mountain 
 until he reaches an elevated point, from whence he obtains a sudden view 
 of the Upper Lake, and the rich scenery in its neighborhood. Beautiful, 
 surpassingly beautiful, is the prospect before us ! " On our right," says 
 Mr. Windele, in describing it, " lies the deep, broad, desolate glen of 
 Coomdtiv ; an amphitheatre buried at the base, and hemmed in by vast 
 masses of the mountain, whose rugged sides are marked by the courses 
 of the descending streams. At the western extremity of the valley, 
 gloomily reposes amidst silence and shadows one of those lakes, or rather 
 circular basins, of dark, still waters, Loch an brie dearg, ' the lake of the 
 charr or red trout.' Other lesser lakes dot the surface of the moor, and, 
 uniting, form at the side opposite the termination of the gap, a fine water- 
 fall of considerable height, enjoying the advantage not common to other 
 falls in Ireland, of being plentifully supplied with water at every season of 
 the year." 
 
 We did not ascend the Reeks, or, more properly, McGillycuddy's Reeks ; 
 so named from an ancient sept or branch of the O'Sullivans. They are 
 reputed the highest of the Irish mountains : the altitude of Carran-ticel 
 (the culminating point of the range), according to the surveys of Nimmo 
 and Griffith, being three thousand four hundred and fourteen feet, making 
 it six hundred and fifty-eight feet above the height of Mangerton, which 
 had previously been considered the loftiest mountain in Ireland. 
 
 The ascent of Carran-tuel, "the inverted sickle," is both difficult and 
 dangerous, requiring an active and experienced guide to conduct the 
 courageous traveler by the fearful precipices which lie between him and 
 the dizzy summit of this monarch of the hills, and is only to be encoun- 
 tered by strong lungs, cool heads, and feet accustomed to those perilous 
 mountain-paths. But the peak of the ridge once attained, the prospect 
 from thence will, we have been assured, richly repay the toil of the way. 
 The scene is magnificent beyond conception. Beneath the spectator's 
 feet lies " a sea of terrene billows, each with its own blue lake, amongst 
 which Lough Carra is distinguished as the broadest and fairest. At every 
 
54 
 
 THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY. 
 
 turn they are seen in the sunlight or shadowed by overhanging precipices. 
 Of the Killarney Lakes, a small portion only of the Lower Lake is 
 visible, owing to the interposition of the Tomies Mountains." A vast and 
 uninterrupted view is also obtained from this elevated point, extending 
 beyond the Shannon on the north, and embracing in a westerly and 
 southerly direction the bays of Tralee, Dingle, Castlemaine, Kenmare, 
 Bantry, Dunmanus, with Cape Clear, and far beyond all, the waters of the 
 Atlantic Ocean, forming a dark line of horizon to the immense picture. 
 
 Mangerton Mountain to the east of the Upper Lake only remained to 
 be visited now ; and the following morning, accompanied by a guide, we 
 commenced its ascent. Its height is calculated at two thousand seven 
 hundred and fifty-six feet ; and it is not by any means so difficult of 
 ascent as Carrau-tuel, being easily accessible on horseback. Though not 
 so wildly picturesque in its appearance as the monarch of the Reeks, 
 Mangerton possesses sufficient interest to repay the traveler for a day's 
 visit to it. As he ascends, a vast and commanding prospect is gradually 
 revealed : mountains, plains, and lakes seem spread like a map beneath 
 him in pleasing distinctness of outline and position. The great object of 
 attraction to the visitors of this mountain is the Devil's Punch-bowl, which 
 lies near its summit, and usually forms the limit of their examination. 
 This " Bowl," which is a small lake about a quarter of a mile in diameter, 
 is contained in a deep chasm of the mountain. Its waters, which appear 
 of an inky blackness from the dark nature of the surrounding peat-soil 
 and the overhanging shadow of the perpendicular rocks, are intensely cold, 
 yet they have never been known to freeze. The supply is principally from 
 springs, and the overflow of the water discharges itself, under the name 
 of the Devil's Stream, down the side of the mountain, and after forming 
 the Tore Waterfall, flows into the Middle Lake. The Bowl has been 
 conjectured by many persons to be the crater of an extinct volcano. This 
 opinion seems, however, to have been formed on very slight grounds, for 
 there are not the most remote traces of volcanic action anywhere in its 
 vicinity; and if the hypothesis were founded merely on the shape of the 
 Bowl, the same supposition might with equal correctness be extended to 
 every other lake or tarn to be found in such numbers amongst the entire 
 chain of these mountains. The Punch-bowl, independent of the natural 
 interest it possesses, has gained an additional celebrity from the circumstance 
 
ARCH^.OLOGICAL REMAINS AT AGHADOE. 
 
 55 
 
 of the great statesman, Charles James Fox, when on a visit to Lord 
 Kenmare, in 1772, having swam round the basin — a feat, like that of Lord 
 Byron's swimming across the Hellespont, which subsequent travelers feel 
 more disposed to admire than to imitate. 
 
 Before leaving Killarney we visited the venerable ruins of Aghadoe, 
 situated between two and three miles to the north-west of the town, 
 and upon rising ground that commands a view of the Lower Lake with 
 its numerous islands and the lovely valley in which it lies embosomed. 
 The place, the ancient name of which was Achadh-da-eo, was once 
 the seat of a bishopric, and it is stated in the Annals of Innisfallen to 
 have been the burial-place of a son of O'Donaghue. The only mural 
 remains extant are those of its Cathedral, Castle, and Round Tower. 
 The former of these is a low building, consisting of a nave and choir 
 of unequal antiquity ; the nave in the Romanesque style, on the west, 
 being considered by many antiquarians to be of the eighth century ; 
 while the choir, on the east, is in the pointed style and presumably 
 an addition of the thirteenth century. They are separated by a solid 
 wall in which there appears to have originally been an opening. The 
 entire length of the cathedral is about eighty feet, and its breadth 
 twenty feet. The choir contains some tombs, and was lighted by a 
 double lancet window over the altar, and another in the side wall. 
 The nave was lit by two small round-headed windows, and still possesses 
 in its western wall a Romanesque doorway of elaborate fashion and 
 exquisite finish, consisting of a semicircular arch springing from pillars, 
 and embellished with chisellings in fretwork, and carvings in relievo. So 
 rich and graceful is the effect that it is puzzling to understand how so 
 elegant a portal should adorn so plain a building. The walls are densely 
 covered with ivy, and there are so many sad memorials of humanity 
 strewn upon the ground that a recent visitor remarks "we might well 
 wish that man had taken a lesson from that simple plant, and covered 
 them up, even as the ivy covers the mouldering walls." 
 
 The Round Tower stands a short distance from the northwest anode 
 
 o 
 
 of the cathedral. All that remains of it is a portion of the basement 
 story, about twelve feet high, having an outer circumference of fifty-two 
 feet, but enough to show that it has been much better built than 
 either the adjacent castle or church. Many of the stones have been 
 
56 
 
 THE LAKES OE KILLARNEY. 
 
 removed to mark tombs in the graveyard ; and within and without the 
 spoliators have been at work, among them the "gold-seekers," infatuated 
 dreamers of hidden treasures who have injured the antiquities of Ireland 
 more than all the devastations of her wars and rebellions. Of the 
 Castle, some little distance off, and called the " Bishop's Chair," as the 
 Round Tower is called the " Pulpit," all that remains is the fragment 
 of a tower about thirty feet in height, with walls seven feet in thickness 
 and containing a flight of stairs within. Its circular form, with traces 
 of earth-work surrounding, lead to the belief that it was built in the ninth 
 century, and indicate its similitude to the Saxon Castles. 
 
 It is impossible to depart from this enchanting region without regret ; 
 and it is equally impossible for the thoughts ever to revert to it without 
 the mind's eye being filled with the magnificent pictures it presents. Of 
 the uniform beauty of the scenery, we can conceive of no more apt 
 illustration than that which we find given by the critical author of the 
 " Irish Sketch Book " in his reply to a self-put query, as to what can be 
 said about the Middle Lake. " When there, we agreed that it was more 
 beautiful than the large lake, of which it is not one fourth the size ; then, 
 when we came back, we said, ' No, the large lake is the most beautiful ' ; 
 and so, at every point we stopped at, we determined that that particular 
 spot was the prettiest in the whole lake. The fact is, and I don't care to 
 own it, they are too handsome." 
 
 There is, however, one drawback to the full enjoyment of all this 
 beauty ; and that is in the visitor being dogged at every step by a miserable 
 retinue of beggars, "mountain dew" girls, buglers, and touters, who torment 
 the ear with their persistent entreaties, and who cannot but with difficulty 
 be got rid of until they have worried their victim to an acquiescence in 
 their demands. We know of no other country, except perhaps Italy, 
 where such a nuisance would be tolerated, and we are satisfied it might 
 be at least considerably abated, if not entirely suppressed, at Killarney by 
 a determination on the part of the local authorities that it shall no longer 
 exist. The picturesque places of Switzerland, Scotland, and other European 
 lands are free from this mendicant plague, and it is certain that the charm 
 of a summer sojourn in the White Mountains, the Adirondacks, or the 
 Alleghanies would be greatly diminished if the American tourist were 
 required to submit to the pest. 
 
GLENFLESK AND KILL A HA CASTLE. 
 
 57 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 VALLEYS OF THE FLESK AND THE LEE. 
 
 Killaha Castle — Labbig-Owen — Mac room — Inchageela — Lough Allua — Gougane Ban a — 
 Remarks on "Patrons" — Pass of Keimaneigh — Abbey and Castle of Kilcrea — Plundering 
 Bands of Kernes — Ballincollig — Inniscarra — "The Ovens" — Carrigrohan Castle — Love of 
 Dancing amongst the Irish — Approach to Cork. 
 
 IN these days of rapid locomotion, the tourist almost invariably 
 arrives at and departs from Killarney by the branch of the Great 
 Southern and Western Railway, which connects Tralee, a score of miles 
 further west, with the main line at Mallow, forty miles to the east, from 
 whence the latter proceeds in a northwardly direction to Dublin and a 
 southwardly to Cork. It being, however, our province to view the beauties 
 of the land, rather than to travel upon beaten tracks, we selected as the 
 route for our return to Cork the now little frequented common road 
 running through the valley of the Flesk to Macroom, whence we passed down 
 that of the Lee, taking by the way the romantic scenery that environs its source. 
 
 The Flesk River, which is formed by the junction of two mountain 
 streams, after a rapid and tortuous course through the valley to which it 
 gives its name, enters the open country about seven miles from Killarney 
 at Killaha Castle, and after a brief but interesting career through woods 
 and plains, savage rocks, and flower-enamelled banks, mingles with the 
 waters of the Lower Lake at Castlelough. Killaha Castle, now in ruins, 
 was formerly a stronghold of the O'Donoghues, erected about the close 
 of the fifteenth century for the protection of the important pass of Glen- 
 flesk, at the southern extremity of which it is situated. Running parallel 
 to the high-road, the river, which is here narrow, but deep and winding, 
 traverses the valley. The sides of the glen are composed of sterile 
 mountains, exhibiting continuous ranges of weather-beaten crags rising 
 
 8 
 
58 
 
 VALLEYS OF THE FLESK AND THE LEE. 
 
 in terraces one above the other, interspersed with patches of coarse 
 heather, and scanty pasturage for a few goats and poor-looking cattle. 
 In the lower parts of the glen and along the banks of the river the 
 soil is rich and abundant ; and the traveler's eye is relieved by the 
 sight of cultivated plains, verdant meadows, and waving fields of yellow 
 grain, checkered by the vivid green of the frequent potato-garden, that 
 invariable appendage to the Irish peasant's cottage. 
 
 At the southern extremity of the valley, opposite to the entrance from 
 Killarney, a series of precipitous rocks which form the face of the 
 Crochawn mountain at the opening of the glen have received the name 
 of Phil-a-dhaun, or the Cliff of the Demon. About midway up, a fissure in 
 the rock, called Labbig-Owen, or Owen's Bed, is pointed out as the place 
 of refuge of a notorious outlaw, who formerly had his head-quarters in 
 this district. The passage to this mountain retreat is intricate and toilsome ; 
 but after some difficult scrambling over loose stones and broken crags, 
 the visitor reaches the foot of the Outlaw's Rock, and by means of a 
 ladder gains access to what is called his bed. This is only a rough platform, 
 overhung by a portion of the cliff which effectually shelters it from the 
 rain and the crumbling of the rock above. Here, armed and provisioned, and 
 accompanied by only one faithful follower, Owen, secure in his impregnable 
 lair, defied for a time all attempts of his enemies to seize him. His 
 fireplace, table, stool, etc., hewn from the rock, are still pointed out by 
 the guides, who delight in recounting numerous anecdotes of the prowess, 
 courage, and generosity of the Irish Rob Roy. 
 
 The history of this outlaw is variously related. It would appear from 
 the most authentic accounts, that he was of the McCarthy race, and, as in 
 duty bound, a follower of O'Donoghue of the Glens. Mr. Croker is of the 
 opinion that he was a mere cattle-thief, and that his marauding propensities 
 rendered him amenable to the law and obliged him to take refuge at 
 Labbig, where he for a long time baffled his pursuers, until, becoming 
 weary of his situation, or for some other and unknown reason, he quitted 
 his favorite haunt and retired to Iveleary, amongst whose mountain-crags 
 he imagined himself in perfect security. But there, if we are to believe 
 Mr. Windele, in an evil hour he sought the shelter and protection, as he 
 imagined, of an old friend, but in reality his bitterest enemy. His host, 
 who was named Reardon, rejoiced in the possession of one whom he had 
 
THE TOWN AND CASTLE OF MACROOM. 
 
 59 
 
 long wished to have within his grasp ; and, regardless of the universal law 
 of hospitality, treacherously devised his destruction. Owen's well known 
 strength and valor induced him to avoid the hazard of an open attack, 
 and led him to resort to the cowardly device of stratagem. Placing the 
 bed of his intended victim over a trap near the fire, it was lowered during 
 the night, and its sleeping occupant brutally murdered with graffaiiJts 
 (three-pronged pitchforks), and decapitated by Reardon and his accomplices 
 — an act of treachery which brought lasting odium upon the neighboring 
 bearers of the name, who obtained therefrom the reproachful cognomen of 
 Reardane na ceean, or Reardon of the Head. Owen's attached follower 
 was so overcome with grief on learning of the fate of his leader, that he 
 threw himself over the face of the cliff, and was dashed to pieces on the 
 rocks beneath. 
 
 Macroom is a considerable market-town, lving nearlv midwav on this 
 route between Cork and Killarney. It is placed on a neck of land formed 
 by the river Lee with the Sullane, which latter rises some ten miles to 
 the west in the Derrvnasa^art mountains, a ran^e that intervenes between 
 this district and the Paps of Killarney ; and, though a fine river and even - 
 way equal to the Lee except in the length of its course, bride-like resigns 
 its name as soon as they become united. The ancient name of Macroom 
 was- Maigh cruim, signifying the plain of Crom, who was the Jicpiter 
 Tonans of the Irish ; and here the second order of Druids, the Bards, 
 held their meetings, even after the introduction of Christianity. There is 
 little to interest the antiquarian or tourist in the town. It is the terminus 
 of a railway which runs down the valley of the Lee, and connects it with 
 the city of Cork twenty-four miles distant. The surrounding country is 
 diversified in its character. Large tracts of bog lie in close proximity to 
 it ; but the bold mountain range which stretches to the north makes an 
 agreeable variety in the features of what would otherwise be a very 
 monotonous landscape. 
 
 The castle, adjoining the town, is an ivy-mantled ruin. Tradition assigns 
 its foundation to King John, but of this there are some strong doubts. 
 The probability is, that it was built by the family of the O'Flynns, from 
 whom it derives the Irish name Caslean-i-Fhlionn, or O'Flynn's Castle. 
 This ancient family once held extensive possessions in the baronies ol 
 Carberry and Muskerry, to the latter of which they gave the name of 
 
/ 
 
 60 VALLEYS OF THE FLESK AND THE LEE. 
 
 "O'Flynn's pleasant country." This castle was the scene of several sieges 
 in the seventeenth century, when it was burnt down no less than four 
 times ; and during one of these struggles it was garrisoned by the Roman 
 Catholic Bishop of Ross, who was afterwards hanged by Lord Broghill 
 before the walls of Carrigadrohid. It is also asserted that Admiral Sir 
 William Penn, the father of the renowned Pennsylvania quaker, was born 
 within its walls. Contiguous to the ruins is the modern Macroom Castle, 
 an elegant mansion, and one of the seats of the Earl of Bantry. 
 
 From Macroom we turned for a score of miles to the westward, out of 
 our direct route to Cork, for the purpose of visiting Loughs Allua and 
 Gougane Barra, near to which the river Lee takes its rise. Here the 
 country is of such peculiarly romantic beauty, as well entitles it to a visit 
 from every traveler possessing the least taste for nature in the rude 
 grandeur of her solitary retreats. The road, which at first is not very 
 interesting and rather circuitous, runs through the valley of Garra and the 
 rugged tract called " O'Leary's Country ; " but as we approached the village 
 of Inchageela it assumed a wilder and more striking aspect, being everywhere 
 broken up into craggy hills, clothed with heath, furze, and numerous other 
 shrubs and plants that flourish in these rocky regions. Emerging from a 
 deep glen, we came in view of the village, an irregular assemblage of poor 
 habitations, and of the ancient Castle of Carrignacurra. Formerly a place 
 of some strength, belonging to the O'Learys, this castle is now reduced to 
 a single lofty tower, whose moss-covered walls, surrounded by thriving 
 plantations, afford an agreeable relief to the eye amidst the wild and 
 cheerless scenery in which it stands. 
 
 Leaving Inchageela we found ourselves entering into the deep solitude 
 of the mountain district, where the Lee expands itself into a beautiful 
 sheet of water, called Lough Allua (from Lough-a-Laoi, the Lake of the 
 Lee), about three miles in length, and in some places nearly a mile in 
 breadth. The rocky outlet of the water of the lough in some places, is 
 not more than three or four feet wide — 
 
 " Amid heaps 
 Of mountain wreck, on either side thrown high, 
 The wide-spread traces of its wintry might, 
 The tortuous channel winds o'er beds of sand : 
 Here silently it flows — there from the rock 
 Rebutted, curls and eddies — plunges here 
 Precipitate — there, roaring among crags, 
 It leaps and foams and whirls and hurries on." 
 
LOUGHS ALLUA AND GOUGANE BARRA 
 
 61 
 
 The lough is picturesquely dotted with clusters of islands ; but the 
 natural beauty of the scene has been considerably impaired by the 
 destruction of the woods which clothed the islets, and skirted the sur- 
 rounding banks. The road lies on the northern side of the lough, following 
 the indentations of its winding shores, through scenery of the most 
 diversified yet solitary character, which will gratify the warmest expectations 
 of the tourist who has leisure to investigate all its various beauties. At 
 the west end of Lough Allua is a mountain bearing the sad though poetic 
 name of Coolnegreenane, or the Mountain Unknown to the Sunbeam; 
 while to the south lie the Sheehy Hills, which intervene between the 
 valleys of the Lee and the Bandon at Dunmanway. 
 
 After passing Lough Allua, the river contracts itself into a narrow stream, 
 and the traveler approaches, through narrow defiles and deep glens, the 
 sequestered lough of Gouqane Barra, or The Gurgling Head, — the first 
 pausing place of the infant Lee, which bursts from the deep recess of a 
 rocky mountain a short distance from this spot. The Lough, which is 
 situated in a deep mountain recess, is enclosed on every side, except the 
 east, with steep and rocky hills, down whose precipitous sides several 
 mountain-streams pour their bright tributes into the placid waters beneath. 
 
 The small island in this lough, connected with the shore by a rude 
 artificial causeway, is traditionally known as the wild home of St. Fionn 
 Barr, the saintly founder of Cork ; and is, indeed, an admirably chosen 
 place for the enjoyment of undisturbed solitude, and the indulgence of 
 devout meditation. The origin of his retreat here is stated to be as 
 follows: "St. Patrick, after banishing the reptiles out of the country, 
 overlooked one hideous monster, a winged dragon, which desolated the 
 adjacent country, and power was conferred on a holy man, named Fineen 
 Bar, to drown the monster in Gougane Lake, on condition of erecting a 
 church where its waters met the tide ; and the saint, having exterminated 
 the monster, fulfilled the agreement by founding the present cathedral of 
 Cork." Several aged trees, of the most picturesque forms, grow upon the 
 shores of this island, and overshadow the ruins of the chapel built by the 
 saint. The court or cloister, and other buildings appertaining, cover nearly 
 half the area of the island. In the centre of the court we found the 
 shattered remains of a wooden cross, on which were nailed innumerable 
 shreds and patches, the grateful memorials of cures performed on devotees 
 
62 
 
 VALLEYS OF THE FLESK AND THE LEE. 
 
 who had made pilgrimages to this holy retreat, and by whom this sacred 
 relic is held in extraordinary veneration. The Scene at Gougane Barra, 
 which our artist has given us, represents a gathering of pilgrims at this 
 holy shrine. 
 
 Around the court are eight small circular cells, in which the penitents 
 are accustomed to spend the night in watching and prayer. The chapel 
 that adjoins it stands east and west, the entrance being through a low 
 doorway at the eastern end. The length of the interior is about thirty-six 
 feet, and its width fourteen. The side walls, however, are not more than 
 four feet in height, so that when roofed it must have been extremely 
 low, not probably exceeding twelve feet. The walls of the convent 
 adjoining are similar in height to those of the chapel. Mr. Windele 
 says, its entire extent "is fifty-six feet in length by thirty-six in breadth; 
 it consists of four small chambers, and one or two extremely small 
 cells ; so that when we consider their height, extent, and the light 
 they enjoyed, we may easily calculate that the life of the successive 
 anchorites who inhabited them was not one of much comfort or convenience, 
 but much the reverse — of silence, gloom, and mortification. Man elsewhere 
 loves to contend with and emulate nature and the greatness and majesty 
 of her works ; but here, as if awed by the sublimity of surrounding 
 objects, and ashamed of his own real littleness, the founder of this desecrated 
 shrine constructed it on a scale peculiarly pigmy and diminutive." Indeed, 
 while contemplating this and many other unworldly recesses in different 
 parts of Ireland, it is impossible to avoid a conviction that the wild scen- 
 ery of those solitary islands and untrodden glens must have had con- 
 siderable effect in nurturing an ascetic tendency in the minds of religious 
 enthusiasts. 
 
 A charming description of Gougane Barra has been left us by a young 
 poet named James Joseph Callanan, a native of Cork, who, had he lived 
 to realize the promise that his early writings held out, would have proved 
 himself one of Ireland's most distinguished lyrists. The simple beauty of 
 the style and freshness of the language induce us to transcribe the com- 
 mencement of his poem: — 
 
 " There is a green island in low Gougane Barra, 
 Where Allua of songs rushes forth as an arrow, 
 In deep-valleyed Desmond, a thousand wild fountains 
 Come down to that lake from their home in the mountains. 
 
HOLY WELLS AND "PATRONS: 
 
 63 
 
 There grows the wild ash, and a time-stricken willow 
 
 Looks chidingly down on the mirth of the billow ; 
 
 As, like some gay child, that sad monitor scorning, 
 
 It lightly laughs back to the laugh of the morning. 
 
 And its zone of dark hills, — Oh ! to see them all bright'ning, 
 
 When the tempest flings out its red banner of lightning. 
 
 And the waters rush down, 'mid the thunder's deep rattle, 
 
 Like the clans from the hills at the voice of the battle ; 
 
 And brightly the fire-crested billows are gleaming, 
 
 And wildly from Mullagh the eagles are screaming ! 
 
 Oh ! where is the dwelling, in valley or highland, 
 
 So meet for a bard as this lone little island? " 
 
 It would be impossible to convey by language a more vivid and truthful 
 picture of the "lone island" than that contained in these vigorous lines. 
 
 Upon the island is a well which is supposed to possess peculiar virtues, 
 and is consequently much resorted to by pilgrims. Here, and on the 
 shores of the lake, a very large and celebrated Patron was formerly held 
 on St. John's day, when numerous tents were pitched, and a kind of 
 carnival held, in which dancing and singing, interspersed with love-making, 
 praying, and fighting, formed the principal business ; but the grossness of 
 the proceedings and the frequent choice of the occasion for the contests of 
 hostile factions, eventually led to the Roman Catholic clergy discountenan- 
 cing the meeting. As many of our readers may have never heard of the 
 Irish Patron — or, as it is more generally pronounced, Pattern — it may be 
 as well to explain that it is an assemblage of persons of both sexes at a 
 particular place, for the performance of certain religious ceremonies and 
 penances. The locality usually chosen is a " Holy Well," in all probability 
 one of those which, in the early Christian ages, had been used by the 
 priests for the purposes of baptism. Many of these have in their vicinity 
 a hermitage, chapel, or tomb of the pious man whose sanctity attaches 
 itself to the well, and whose waters in consequence are said to possess 
 miraculous virtues in healing the sick and maimed. The time at which 
 the believers in those wonderful cures resort to the health giving- font, is 
 on the anniversary of the Patron saint of the well. On such occasions it 
 is not unusual to see several thousand persons collected at a celebrated 
 fountain, many with pious, but mistaken zeal, performing their painful 
 penances on their bare knees around the holy well for themselves or on 
 behalf of their friends ; for it is not unusual, when the penance is too 
 
64 
 
 VALLEYS OF THE FLESK AND THE LEE. 
 
 severe for the strength or inclination of the principal, to have " the stations," 
 as they call the routine of the performance, executed by proxy. The 
 original intention of the Patron was evidently of a religious character ; 
 but, we repeat, in process of time it degenerated into a scene of such 
 riot and debauchery, as to cause the suppression of these meetings by the 
 clergy. To the east of the island the waters issue from the lough, and 
 form the head of the River Lee, which at this point is so shallow that it 
 may be crossed by a few stepping-stones ; and thence it pours its 
 irregular course over huge ledges and masses of rock — now sweeping 
 onward headlong, and now pausing in dark eddying pools through the 
 rugged valley, until it reaches Lough Allua. 
 
 Before quitting this neighborhood we journeyed still further to the 
 west, for the purpose of visiting the Pass of Keimaneigh, or the Path of 
 the Deer, a rugged ravine, one mile in length, which, for picturesque 
 though gloomy grandeur, we have never seen surpassed, even in this region 
 of romantic glens and mountain defiles. Through this pass runs the high 
 road from Macroom to Bantry, having the appearance of being excavated 
 between the precipitous crags, which, rising on either hand, assume the 
 resemblance of fantastic piles and antique ruins, clothed with mosses and 
 lichens, with here and there the green holly and ivy, contributing by the 
 richness of their tints to the beauty of the scene. Even the arbutus, 
 which by many is supposed to be peculiar to Killarney, is found here 
 clinging to the overhanging rocks. "We behold with wonder," says 
 an agreeable writer, " this and the ash, and other hardy plants and 
 shrubs, growing at immense heights overhead — tufting crags, inaccessible 
 to the human foot, while we are astonished to think how they got there. 
 The London-pride grows here, and on the surrounding mountains, as 
 well as amongst the ruins of Gougane Barra, in the most astonishing 
 profusion. On the mountains of Tore and Mangerton, near Killarney, 
 it is met with in great abundance ; but its profusion in the neighborhood 
 of the Lee far exceeds all comparison." Having completed our examination 
 of Keimaneigh, we began to retrace our route to Macroom, highly 
 gratified with our visit to these romantic scenes, which, were they 
 found in almost any other part of Europe, would be a favorite pilgrimage 
 for those lovers of the picturesque, who haunt the Rhine and traverse 
 the Alps in search of nature in her wild and beautiful solitudes. 
 
RUINED FRIARY AT KIICREA 
 
 65 
 
 From Macroom we proceeded to Cork down the valley of the 
 Lee — here a sweet and sylvan stream ; and about midway came to the 
 ruins of the Abbey and Castle of Kilcrea. The abbey occupies a retired 
 and picturesque situation on the margin of the Bride, a small river which 
 takes its rise in the neighborhood of Kilmurry, and for several miles winds 
 through a long valley, in the midst of which was formerly the Bog of 
 Kilcrea — a dreary morass rendered almost impervious to the traveler by 
 the matted underwood, and other rank vegetable productions, with which 
 it was overgrown. The numerous remains of large oaks still found in the 
 neighborhood show that the greater part of this vale, and the lofty uplands 
 by which it is surrounded, were in more ancient times covered by a vast 
 wood. 
 
 The friary, as well as the church which adjoins it, are worthy the 
 attention of the antiquarian and the artist. An avenue of venerable ash 
 and elm trees conducts the visitor to the church, and prepares the mind 
 for the solemn impressions which the gloomy appearance of the ruins is 
 calculated to inspire. It is said that a nunnery existed on this spot at a 
 very early date, of which the abbess was St. Cyra or Cera, whose 
 anniversary is celebrated on the 16th of October; but all traces of such 
 an institution have long since disappeared. The friary is stated to have 
 been founded in 1478. Its church was dedicated to St. Bridget or Bride. 
 The ruins are both picturesque and interesting, and consist of nave, choir, 
 and transepts, with a tower eighty feet in height, rising from the 
 junction of the two former. Separated from the nave by three 
 pointed arches is a side aisle, which was divided in the same manner 
 from the transept. Tradition reports that Cromwell and his soldiers 
 destroyed the mullions of the windows, and stabled a troop of 
 horse in the adjoining refectory. The principal interest in these 
 mural remains arises from the melancholy contemplation of the 
 gloomy and neglected aisles, where the dust of prince and peasant 
 lie mingled in undistinguishable confusion, beneath the ruinous tomb- 
 stones which are scattered over every portion of the church and 
 friary. Most of these stones bear the names of the old families 
 and septs of the district — McCarthy, McSwiney, and Barrett, being 
 the most numerous. In the south transept is the tomb of Herlihy, 
 Bishop of Ross, one of the three Irish bishops who attended the 
 9 
 
GG 
 
 VALLEYS OF THE FLESK AND THE LEE. 
 
 council of Trent.* The passage from the church to the friary is on the 
 north side of the nave, through an enclosure called the " Earl's Chamber." 
 From thence the visitor proceeds to the different chambers of the friary, 
 the names and uses of each being furnished by the guide, who points out, 
 with confident volubility, the kitchen, refectory, dormitory, penitentiary, 
 etc., all of which were pleasantly lighted by numerous oblong side lights. 
 The cloister which adjoins the north wall of the choir is a large square 
 court, around which ran a covered ambulatory, where the brotherhood 
 were wont to walk in wet weather. The other portions communicated 
 with the cloister by five doors, which opened into it. The monks who 
 resided here belonged to the Franciscan Order, commonly called " Gray 
 Friars ; " and if we are to believe an old ballad, their house was ever open 
 for the hospitable reception of the benighted wayfarer, for it informs us 
 
 " Three monks sat by a bogvvood fire ; 
 
 Bare were their crowns, and their garments gray. 
 Close sat they to that bogwood fire, 
 Watching the wicket till break of day ; 
 Such was ever the rule at Kilcrea. 
 For whoever passed, be he Baron or Squire, 
 Was free to call at that abbey, and stay, 
 Nor guerdon or hire for his lodging pay, 
 Though he tarried a week with its holy choir ! " 
 
 *In the nave of the church lie the mortal remains of "Arthur O'Leary the outlaw," who died May 4th, 1773, at 
 the age of twenty-six. This unfortunate gentleman fell a victim, in the prime of early manhood, to the barbarous 
 penal enactments against Catholics, which in his day disgraced the British Statute Books. He was possessed of 
 considerable property, which could only be personal, as the laws prohibited the holding of real estate by Roman 
 Catholics, to which religious faith he belonged. He had been an officer in the Hungarian service, and on his return 
 to Ireland his influence over the tenantry of his old patrimonial estate excited the jealousy of Mr. Morris, one of its 
 landed proprietors, which was further inflamed by a horse of his having been defeated in a race by one of O'Leary's. 
 This latter event impelled Morris to avail himself of the then existing law, prohibiting a Roman Catholic from 
 possessing a horse exceeding five pounds in value, and to attempt a legalized robbery by publicly tendering O'Leary that 
 amount and demanding the very animal that had won the race. This offer was indignantly refused by the young 
 Irishman, who declared he would surrender the horse only with his life ; and a scuffle ensued out of which he was 
 glad to escape alive. By a summary process he was proclaimed on the spot an " outlaw," and soldiers were stationed 
 to intercept him on his return to his residence, two of whom ineffectually fired at him from an ambush as he approached 
 his home. This fire was returned by O'Leary from a gun which he carried, when another shot from the soldiers laid 
 him dead on the road. The brutal penal laws followed him even in death, and prohibited his interment in consecrated 
 ground ; his body was accordingly buried in a field outside the abbey, where it lay for several years. On being tried 
 in Cork for O'Leary's death, Morris was acquitted ; but the event was avenged by a brother of the murdered man, 
 who, watching his opportunity, fired three shots at him through the windows of his lodgings in a public street in Cork, 
 one of which inflicted a wound in his side, of which he soon after died. O'Leary's brother escaped to America, 
 where he is reported to have lived to a good old age. Such was the state of Ireland little over a century ago! 
 
 1 
 
CASTLE OF BALLINCOLLIG. 
 
 87 
 
 At a short' distance from the friary stands the Castle of Kilcrea, said to 
 have been built in the fifteenth century by the same Cormac McCarthy, 
 Lord of Muskerry, who founded the church and friary. The ruins betoken 
 it to have been a place of considerable extent and rude magnificence. A 
 staircase, composed of dark marble — of which there are extensive quarries 
 in the neighborhood — leads, by a flight of seventy-seven steps, from the 
 ground-floor to the summit of the building, becoming spiral as it approaches 
 the higher chambers. The upper apartment, which was spacious and well 
 lit, formed the state-room ; its floor, which is now unsheltered by a roof, 
 is overgrown with grass, from which circumstance it is called the parkeen- 
 glas, or "little green field." Traces of outworks are still visible around 
 the castle ; and on the east side is the bawn, a small fortified area, defended 
 by curtain walls and two square towers. This enclosure, in former times, 
 served by day as a place of recreation to the inhabitants of the castle, 
 and bv ni^ht as a secure retreat for the cattle of the estate. The latter were 
 in no less danger from their natural enemies, the wolves, than from the 
 plundering bands of kernes or gallowglasses of the various hostile septs, 
 who, as opportunity or hope of prey allured them, swept the country with 
 whoop and shout, rifling and burning the dwellings of the unprotected 
 peasants, and carrying away their cattle to their impregnable mountain 
 fastnesses. There they enjoyed their triumph until the chief whose lands 
 had been robbed, watching his time, rushed out with his enraged followers, 
 and in the darkness of night retaliated upon the aggressors, by committing 
 infinitely more mischief than he had sustained, and driving off, if possible, 
 double the number of cattle which his clan had lost. 
 
 From Kilcrea the railway took us to Ballincollig, a neat little town, 
 five miles from Cork. The castle of Ballincollig, near the town, was once 
 a stronghold of the Barretts, an Anglo-Irish family, who possessed large 
 estates in this county, and gave their name to the adjoining barony. It 
 is a plain, quadrangular tower, about forty feet in height, in the centre of 
 a walled enclosure, defended by towers. A natural cave, which runs some 
 distance into the rock beneath the keep, is still shown as the place where 
 the former possessors of the castle confined their prisoners. The edifice 
 cannot boast any great extent or architectural beauty, nor is there much 
 to interest the antiquarian in its ruins, although it is said to have been 
 built as far back as the time of Edward III. 
 
68 
 
 VALLEYS OF THE FLESK AND THE LEE. 
 
 Within a mile of the village of Ballincollig the beautiful river Bride 
 unites with the Lee. The rich lowland adjoining the junction of the 
 rivers is called Inniscarra, or the Beloved Island, where the pious St. Senan 
 founded a monastery in the sixth century. It is a sweet secluded spot, 
 admirably adapted for meditation and the alienation of the heart from 
 worldly concerns. Not a vestige of this establishment, however, is now to 
 be discovered. 
 
 A succession of several natural caves are to be seen near The Ovens, 
 a small hamlet in this neighborhood, that derives its name from those 
 subterranean chambers, some of which are said in shape to resemble 
 ovens. Two or three of them are accessible to the curious ; but there is 
 little to render them worthy a particular description here. Like all caves 
 found in limestone countries, they are merely a succession of irregularly- 
 sized chambers, hung with spars and stalactites, and connected by narrow 
 and intricate passages. Travelers who have visited the caves of Mitchels- 
 town, or that of Dunmore, in the county Kilkenny, will find these at 
 Ovens much inferior to the former in romantic beauty, and in size and 
 extent ; although the country people say that they extend underground as 
 far as the Castle of Carrigrohan, a distance of four miles. The great 
 number of these singular caverns found in Ireland is owing, in almost 
 every instance, to the calcareous or limestone strata, of which the island 
 is composed. To the same cause may be attributed much of the pictur- 
 esque charms of its scenery — ■ its numerous waterfalls, deep glens, 
 subterranean rivers, natural bridges, and precipitous cliffs, which are not 
 to be met with to the same extent, variety, and beauty, in any other 
 country. 
 
 On the summit of a steep rock overhanging the river Lee, near the 
 affluent of the Blarney, about four miles from Cork, stand the picturesque 
 ruins of the Castle of Carrigrohan. They consist of two distinct piles ; 
 one, the more ancient — built in the early feudal times, when the security 
 of the chieftain depended on the number of his followers and the strength 
 of his castle walls — is now a mere heap of ruins, whose massive architecture, 
 narrow, gloomy chambers and vaulted dungeons, show that it must formerly 
 have been a place of some importance. The other building, which is in 
 better preservation, belongs to that era when the ancient castle began to 
 assume the more peaceful characteristics of the modern manor-house. 
 
CARRIG ROHAN AND THE McCARTHYS 
 
 69 
 
 The McCarthys are said to have been the founders of the ancient portion 
 of this castle; from one of whom, surnamed Rohuin or "the Nobleman," the 
 name of the fortress, Carrigrohan, or, the Rock of Rohan, is derived. 
 It is mournful, while wandering through this part of southern Ireland, to 
 meet everywhere the crumbling relics of the greatness of this once 
 powerful family, whose very memory is now nearly forgotten, or remem- 
 bered only by those to whom they are endeared by the traditions of the 
 country, or who find a sad pleasure in turning over the pages of ancient 
 Ireland's eventful history. While viewing those mouldering ruins, we could 
 not forbear picturing to ourselves, that, perhaps within these very walls 
 the ancient kings of Munster — the proud McCarthys Mor — sat surrounded 
 by warriors and statesmen, bards and chieftains, receiving embassies from 
 foreign princes ; though it may be said of the last of this noble race, that— 
 
 " In the fields of their country they found not a grave." * 
 
 Carrigrohan was destroyed in the Great Rebellion, though the ruins were 
 afterwards occupied by a Captain Cope, the notorious leader of a band of 
 robbers who infested this part of the country, and were the terror of the 
 neighborhood for a Ions: time. 
 
 We remember it was after a day spent many years ago, in wandering 
 through the beautiful scenery which embellishes the banks of the Lee, 
 that we were attracted by the sounds of music. Guided by them we 
 proceeded along a by-road until we came to a sheebeen, or small public-house, 
 in front of which a number of persons of both sexes were assembled. 
 The younger portion of the company was seated, some on the grass and 
 others upon deal forms arranged around a small reserved space. In the 
 centre of this space an active, clean-limbed young fellow was dancing with 
 an indefatigable energy that put every muscle and fibre of his frame in 
 motion. Opposite to him, a pretty modest-looking girl, with her eyes 
 fixed upon her shoe-strings, footed it, less vigorously perhaps, but with no 
 
 * Robert, the fourth Earl of Clancarty, the lineal descendant of the Kings of Munster, was the son of 
 Donogh, whose estates were confiscated for his adherence to James II. After vainly seeking a restitution from 
 George II., he retired to France, where he was allowed by Louis XV., apartments in the palace, rank in the 
 army, and the privileges of the higher nobility. Notwithstanding all this, he was haunted by an ever-yearning 
 love for his native land; and in order, as he often declared, to die in the sight of British soil, he repaired to 
 Boulogne-sur-Mer, where, on a handsome pension from the French king, he lived in the hospitable style which 
 accorded with his disposition, and in the society of the English and Irish refugees who made that sea-port their 
 place of residence. He died in 1770, at the age of eighty four, leaving two sons, who had no legitimate issue. 
 
70 
 
 VALLEYS OF THE FLESK AND THE LEE. 
 
 less determination, to the popular jig tune, " The Rakes of Mallow," 
 perpetrated by a blind piper, who had been planted by the "boys" on a 
 bundle of fresh straw, laid by way of a cushion on an upturned cleave* 
 A churn-dash stuck into the earth supported on its flat end a cake, which 
 was to become the prize of the best dancer. The contention was carried 
 on for a long time with extraordinary spirit. At length, the competitors 
 yielded their claims to a young man, the son of a rich farmer in the 
 neighborhood, who, taking the cake, placed it gallantly in the lap of a 
 pretty girl, to whom we heard he was about to be married. The victor, 
 to show his generosity, ordered a large supply of whiskey to be distributed 
 to those present ; and as this acknowledgment is always expected from 
 the dancer who gains the cake, it is, as a matter of policy, generally 
 conceded to him who is considered to be best able to pay for the honor. 
 
 The mirthful dances of Ireland are the jig, reel, hornpipe, country- 
 dance, and cotillon. Of these the jig is the dance peculiar to the land; 
 and its music as well as the steps used in dancing thereto, being totally 
 different from every other known movement, entitle it to be distinguished 
 as the national Irish dance. 
 
 The approach to Cork, along the old coach road from Ballincollig, is 
 through a fertile and highly improved country, and the entrance to the 
 city, by the western outlet, is exceedingly beautiful. About a mile from 
 the city the view is very imposing — the spacious, well-formed road, the 
 venerable trees of the Mardyke Walk, the handsome county jail, the 
 mansions of the gentry exhibiting taste and comfort united in a remarkable 
 degree, and the richly cultivated fields which stretch along the banks of 
 the river, giving to this side of the city a character, of wealth and grandeur, 
 which prepossesses one in favor of the place before he enters it. 
 
 * Cleave — A large kind of basket, carried by the peasantry on the back. 
 
ROUTES FROM CORK TO QUEENSTOWN. 
 
 71 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 QUEENSTOWN AND ITS HARBOR. 
 
 The River Lee below Cork — Glanmire and Dunkettle — Blackrock Castle and its associations — 
 Ursuline Convent — Dundanion Castle — Little Island — Subterranean Chambers at Carrig- 
 tohill — Lough Mahon — Foaty — Passage — Giant's Stairs — Motikstown and its Castle — 
 Queenstown — Ancient and Modern Yachting — Barrymore Island — Queenstown Harbor — 
 Drake's escape from the Spaniards — Beauties of the Harbor and River Scenery — Rostellan 
 Castle — Sword of Brian Boroihme — Castle Mary and its Ancient Cromlechs — Cloyne 
 and its Cathedral — Bishop Berkeley — Turaghan, or Round Tower — - Remarks on the 
 Round Towers of Ireland. 
 
 HAVING made a very complete survey of the "beautiful city" upon 
 our previous visit, we now merely took it " on the wing " in our 
 passage to the mouth of the Lee and the harbor of Queenstown. The 
 public -means of conveyance from Cork to the latter place are three in 
 number — the Queenstown division of the Great Southern and Western 
 Railway, a dozen miles in length, which passes along or near to the left 
 bank of the river, and half-way sends off a branch to Youghal ; the Cork, 
 Blackrock and Passage line, which runs along the right shore for about 
 six miles to Passage, whence the rest of the journey is performed by 
 water ; and the middle, and far more picturesque, course by steam-boat 
 over " the pleasant waters of the River Lee," calling on the way at 
 Blackrock, Passage and Monkstown. It did not require a minute's 
 consideration for us to select the latter route, and the hour that the boat 
 consumed in conveying us to our destination was crowded with many 
 charming pictures of passing scenery. From our starting point at St. 
 Patrick's Bridge the river runs eastwardly for about a couple of miles to 
 the promontory of Blackrock, having, after we have cleared the busy 
 quays, its left bank delightfully wooded and ornamented with pleasant 
 villas, while on the right, the Victoria Park, which has been won by the 
 
72 
 
 QUEEN STOWN AND ITS HARBOR. 
 
 hand of man from a marshy tract, intervenes between the river and its 
 bank, which is less elevated than that on the opposite shore. Close to 
 the river's edge on the former, run the Glanmire road and the Queenstown 
 railway, and on the latter, the stream is skirted by the New Wall, built 
 for the purpose of narrowing the navigation of the river, and now forming 
 a fashionable promenade with accommodations for out-door music ; while 
 the Cork and Passage Railway forms a prominent feature on this side of 
 the picture. 
 
 The hills on each side of the Lee afford so many inviting situations, 
 that it is no wonder they have become literally studded with villas 
 encompassed by extensive pleasure grounds ; and these so increase the 
 picturesque effect of what has been poetically termed " the noble sea 
 avenue to Cork" that an eastern traveler has been led to assert, "a few 
 minarets placed in its hanging gardens would realize the Bosphorus." 
 The high bank on the left or northern shore rises immediately below 
 Cork, and, with its panoramic display of combined wood and villa, continues 
 for three miles, when it is interrupted by a romantic valley, at the head 
 of which is situated the village of Glanmire, on a small river bearing the 
 same name, as well as that of, the Glashaboy. But as we have already 
 referred to the beauties of this suburb of Cork in our first chapter, we 
 must not dwell here, but pass to the opposite bank of the river, remarking 
 however, en passant, that the most important of the suburban residences 
 which deck the wooded slope between Cork and Glanmire, are Tivoli, 
 Fort William, Lota Park and Lota House, and that the mansion and 
 demesne of Dunkettle are charmingly situated near the spot where the 
 Glanmire river unites its waters with those of the Lee. It has been 
 stated by Mr. Townsend, who many years ago wrote a description of 
 Cork and its vicinity, that "all the situations of the Lee are fine, but 
 none of them enjoy so extensive a combination of beauties as Dunkettle." 
 
 The peninsula and castle of Blackrock lie on the shore opposite 
 Dunkettle, and form a prominent feature in the picture of the River 
 Lee below Cork, which our artist sketched from the Glanmire Hill. 
 The little peninsula is one of the most beautiful outlets of Cork, and 
 is, like the opposite bank, thickly studded with country houses and neat 
 cottages. The castle was built in the early part of the reign of James 
 I., by the Lord Deputy Mountjoy, for the defence of the river which 
 
BLACKROCK AND CA RRIG TO HILL. 
 
 73 
 
 washes its base, and had additions made to it in 1722. Here an 
 Admiralty Court was held by the mayors who were appointed by several 
 charters Admirals of the Harbor, a right which has been annually 
 asserted on the first of August, by the mayor and corporation sailing 
 to its entrance and performing the ceremony of throwing a dart into 
 the sea, as a testimony of their jurisdiction. On the authority of the 
 city council book, Dr. Smith mentions that, in 1627, the question ot 
 the Mayor of Cork being Admiral of the Harbor was contested with 
 the corporation by Edward Champion, for the Lord Barry. The present 
 edifice, erected nearly half a century ago, on the foundation of the old 
 one, is in the castellated Gothic style, having a circular battlemented 
 tower with a smaller turret, in which a light is burnt for the guidance 
 of the shipping. Not far distant stands the Convent of the Ursulines, 
 one of the most celebrated institutions of its kind in Ireland, if not in 
 Europe, but more remarkable for its extent than for its architectural 
 beauty. A little to the west of Blackrock, on the side looking towards 
 the city, lie the castle and grounds of Dundanion, through the latter 
 of which the railroad to Passage runs in a deep cutting. The modern 
 mansion, surrounded by venerable trees, takes its name from that of the 
 old one, the ruins of which still exist. 
 
 Turning our attention once more to the left bank of the Lee, after 
 passing Dunkettle, the eye is attracted by Little Island, or Lisle, 
 so called in opposition to Great Island, or Barrymore, situated further 
 down the river. Little Island is a considerable tract on which is 
 situated Inchera House, and is separated from the mainland by a 
 shallow and narrow tidal stream. This island and the grounds of 
 Dunkettle are both overlooked by the Mathew Tower, a circular 
 structure erected by Mr. Connor to the memory of the great temperance 
 advocate. 
 
 Two or three miles back of Little Island, and close to the Youghal 
 railway, lies the small village of Carrigtohill, with little to recommend 
 it to the notice of the tourist, except its subterranean chambers and 
 circular intrenchments, of which peculiar conformations no less than fifteen 
 or sixteen have been discovered at different times in this neighborhood. 
 Though we visited these caverns upon an occasion different to that 
 which carried us along the current of the river Lee, we shall diverge from 
 10 
 
74 
 
 Q UEENSTO WN AND ITS HARBOR. 
 
 our direct course for a few moments to describe them here, as they prop- 
 erly belong to the district about which we are now writing. 
 
 Earthen mounds, raised by human labor, are very numerous throughout 
 Ireland, and amongst the peasantry are called indiscriminately Raths in 
 the Irish language, and Danish Forts in the English ; the construction of 
 them being popularly attributed to the Danes. This indiscriminate nom- 
 enclature is, however, an error into which even writers upon Irish antiq- 
 uities have fallen. The word rath, strictly speaking, should be applied 
 only to those earthen works intended for purposes of military defence, 
 and never to the mounds which are evidently sepulchral tumuli. 
 
 The subterranean chambers at Carrigtohill, which were discovered in 
 1835, are situated within one of these circular forts or raths. The descent 
 to them is by a narrow sloping passage, which leads into a small excav- 
 ated chamber, of about seven feet in diameter, formed without any 
 masonry. Similar underground works have been discovered within the 
 boundaries of several of the ancient forts, some being regular sets of cham- 
 bers, as is the case at Carrigtohill, others are simply long galleries, with 
 an entrance in the centre of the intrenchment ; while in many instances, 
 no trace can be found of any passage to the inside. Various conjectures 
 have been advanced as to the uses of these raths and chambers. By the 
 best informed they are supposed to have been the sites of the dwellings 
 of the ancient inhabitants, before they exchanged their rude habitations 
 for castles of stone and walled towns. The vestiges of buildings still 
 found on some of the more extensive raths, and the decayed bones (chiefly 
 those of the ox) and charcoal, which are often discovered in large quantities 
 on turning up the ground, are strong corroborative evidences that these places 
 once formed the defensible places of abode or retreat for the old Irish 
 chieftains and their dependents. The proximity to each other in which 
 these mounds are usually found, as if for the purpose of ready communi- 
 cation in time of need, shows that though divided into chieftainries, each 
 under the command of its particular head, the septs united upon great 
 occasions to repel a common enemy or resent a common insult. This 
 form of government, by which every petty chief, although ruling his own 
 vassals with arbitrary power, was obliged to render certain service to the 
 great head of the state, being analogous to the principal of the feudal 
 system, makes it unnecessary for us to explain it further here. If, as it 
 
CAVES AT CARRIG TO HILL. 
 
 75 
 
 has been conjectured, these intrenchments were the rude defences of the 
 habitations of the native Irish, it is extremely probable that the subter- 
 ranean chambers might have been used as storehouses for the provisions 
 of the little community ; and the fact that the entrances to these under- 
 ground chambers have, in most instances, been discovered by accident, is 
 only a further proof that they were intended as places adapted for con- 
 cealment in time of danger. The popular tradition amongst the peasantry 
 is, that after the Danes had been conquered at the battle of Clontarf, 
 they constructed these forts and secret chambers to escape the pursuit of 
 the Irish ; but such a supposition is too absurd to obtain a moment's 
 belief, as it is evident such works could not have been effected by a 
 scattered force, flying before an active and victorious enemy. If the Danes 
 did take refuge within these intrenchments, it must be concluded that they 
 were in existence for ages before their time. 
 
 These raths have, time out of mind, been an object of superstitious 
 veneration to the Irish peasantry, who believe that the mysterious incis- 
 ures are the abodes of the fairies, or " good people ; " hence it is that few 
 of the country folk will approach one of them after nightfall, without trem- 
 bling, lest they should incur the anger of the irascible pigmy gentry hy 
 intruding on their revels, or disturbing their moonlight festivities. And 
 to thq. same feeling of superstitious awe may be attributed their reluctance 
 to disturb, by the operation of the spade or axe, these interesting relics 
 of antiquity, which may be frequently seen overgrown with aged trees 
 and underwood in nature's wild simplicity. Numerous are the tales related 
 by the peasantry, of daring individuals who have watched the midnight 
 revels of the fairies in these places, which for long ages have been the 
 favorite haunts of the tiny race. Children of mortals, who have been 
 stolen by the "good people," are, it is believed, conveyed by them into 
 these raths, on which, it has been remarked, the verdure is always greener 
 and brighter than on any of the neighboring fields. 
 
 We have however neither space nor time to allow us to wander within 
 the realms of fancy, so will return to our place, on the bosom of the Lee 
 between Dunkettle and Blackrock. As that river winds round the point of 
 the peninsula, the shores recede on either side, and the stream expands 
 into a beautiful sheet of water, called Lough Mahon, from the ancient family 
 of the Mahonys having formerly held large possessions in its vicinity, as well 
 
76 
 
 QUEENSTOWN AND ITS HARBOR. 
 
 as from the resemblance it bears to a broad lake when sailing across it. 
 "The whole," says Mr. Windele, "seems land-locked, enclosed on several 
 sides by high hills, and on others, by wooded slopes stretching far inland to 
 the foot of other chains of hills. Turn which side you will, the scenery is of 
 the most charming description. Looking up towards the city, Blackrock 
 Castle stands finely out, backed by woods and distant hills. The wood- 
 crowned eminences of Lota and Dunkettle appear beside it, with the finest 
 effect." 
 
 As we passed down Lough Mahon, we noticed on our left, at the south 
 end of Little Island, a branch of the river flowing through a beautiful 
 gorge and dividing it from Foaty Island ; on the latter is situated Foaty 
 House and grounds, the laying out of which shows how art, guided by 
 excellent taste, can transform an uninteresting plot of land into a charming 
 demesne. Continuing our course we were brought to the town of Passage, 
 on the right bank of the river, and the terminus of the railway traversing 
 that shore of the Lee, which steamers connect with Queenstown by a sail 
 of half an hour. Passage is also the unloading place for vessels plying to 
 British ports, the river being so shallow as to prevent craft drawing much 
 water from proceeding to the quays of Cork. The town, too, lays some 
 claim to being a watering-place. It is situated at the base of a steep 
 hill, and embosomed in woods which give it a very pleasing effect when 
 viewed from the river, though an internal inspection reveals streets and 
 lanes that can neither boast of breadth nor cleanliness. Father Prout has 
 written of it, that 
 
 " The town of Passage is both large and spacious, 
 And situate upon the say ; 
 'Tis nate and dacent, and quite adjacent 
 To come from Cork on a summer's day. 
 
 " There you may slip in to take a dipping, 
 
 Forenent the shipping, that at anchor ride ; 
 Or in a wherry cross o'er the ferry 
 To ' Carrigaloe, on the other side.' 
 
 This " Carrigaloe on the other side " is a bleak hill at the western 
 extremity of Great Island ; at its foot, and in close proximity to the river, 
 runs the direct line of railway from Cork to Queenstown. 
 
 An extensive view of the river and the surrounding country may be 
 obtained from the summit of the steep hill that overhangs Passage. The 
 
THE GIANTS STAIRS AND MONKSTOWN. 
 
 77 
 
 ascent is somewhat difficult, but the toil of the walk is amply compensated 
 by the delightful prospect thereby obtained. Hill and dale, wood and 
 water, noble mansions and lowly cottages, green fields and rugged rocks ; 
 the deep blue sea, stretching far away to the southward in immeasurable 
 expanse ; the silvery Lee beneath the feet, winding placidly between its 
 picturesque banks ; beautiful islands, bays, and headlands, momentarily 
 arresting the attention, and appearing to compete for the tribute of 
 admiration ; form the component parts of the varied and imposing picture. 
 
 Glenbrook, half a mile further down the river, is a pretty bathing- 
 village, and the shore from thence to Monkstown, a mile further on, is 
 extremely beautiful. The most remarkable features of this spot are 
 immense masses of rock which nature has piled up with such apparent 
 regularity as to present, when viewed in profile, a striking resemblance to 
 a succession of huge steps, from whence they have received the name of 
 "The Giant's Stairs." Here, as is customary, tradition has been busy; 
 and the tales of the peasantry assign to a powerful giant, called Mahoon, 
 the construction of these stupendous steps. They implicitly believe that he 
 resides in a cave beneath the cliff, and gravely relate the adventures of 
 persons who have had the hardihood to enter his subterranean abode. These 
 steps were originally seven in number, but were reduced a few years ago 
 to five, upon the construction of a new road. 
 
 Monkstown is a pleasant little village, delightfully situated in the 
 opening of a lovely glen. Its ancient ruined castle 
 
 "Bosom'd deep in tufted trees," 
 
 stands in a commanding situation on the overhanging hill. It is a 
 quadrangular structure flanked by square towers, and was erected in 1636 
 under peculiar circumstances, which led to its cost being only one groat. 
 During the absence of the owner of the demesne, while serving in the 
 army of Philip of Spain, his wife Anastasia resolved to surprise him by 
 building a stately castle, without diminishing his funds. To accomplish 
 this, she compelled her tenants and workmen to purchase from her the 
 necessaries of life, at an advance upon the prices at which she was enabled 
 to buy the same wholesale ; and when the edifice was completed, and 
 she had added up the amounts of her receipts and expenditures, she found 
 the latter to exceed the former by only four pence. 
 
78 
 
 Q UEENSTO WN AND ITS HARBOR. 
 
 Leaving Monkstown the steamer rounded a point of land and placed 
 before our vision the magnificent harbor of Oueenstown, with the town of 
 that name on our left, and the western and southern shore on our right 
 extending from Monkstown to the mouth of the harbor, and presenting a scene 
 of great beauty — elegant mansions, cultivated lawns, woods, and green 
 pastures, stretching down to the water side, arrested and charmed the eye, 
 while the broad expanse of the harbor before us, encircled by undulating 
 hills, and dotted with islands, assumed all the features of a lake, and 
 completed a noble picture. 
 
 Ouefnstown was formerly known as the Cove of Cork, and received 
 its present name from Queen Victoria, August 3d, 1849, upon the occasion 
 of her landing there, on her first visit to that part of her dominions. It 
 is the principal naval station in Ireland, and is delightfully situated on the 
 south side of Great Island, which skirts the north of the harbor and is 
 connected with the main land by bridges. The town is built on the side 
 of a hill sloping down to the water's edge, and has an attractive appearance 
 when approached by steamboat, presenting, as it does, its whole extent to 
 the view. It can boast but few objects of antiquarian interest, having 
 been merely an insignificant village at the beginning of the present century. 
 It rose, however, into importance during the Napoleonic war, when the 
 harbor was made a rendezvous station for the British navy ; and its 
 popularity has increased in later years from its having become a prominent 
 halting place for ocean steamers. 
 
 But the town owes a great portion of its success to the mildness oi 
 its climate and to its excellent situation, being partially open to the sea 
 on the south, and encompassed on every other side by high hills, which 
 effectually shelter it from cold winds. This happy position, and the 
 picturesque beauty of its environs, have for a long period made it a 
 favorite resort for numbers of invalids, who, remarks Dr. Scott, the author 
 of a " Medical Topography " of the place, " would otherwise have sought 
 the far off scenes of Montpelier or Madeira, with their vehement suns 
 and less temperate vicissitudes of climate. The many recoveries here, have 
 justified the selection, and proved the restorative and invigorating principle 
 of its atmosphere. An admirable equability of climate, and an absence of 
 sudden and violent interruptions, are the great characteristics which have 
 so beneficially marked out this town to the ailing and debilitated, and 
 
ANCIENT AND MODERN YACHTING. 
 
 79 
 
 established its reputation." From the steepness of the site on which the 
 town is built, the invalid is afforded a variety of climate, tempered to 
 his wishes, and attainable according to the elevation of the different 
 ascending terraces ; and for all purposes of exercise, the neighborhood 
 abounds with exhilarating walks and drives. 
 
 But it is not to the valetudinarian alone that this spot offers attractions ; 
 its proximity to Cork, the beauty of its scenery, and its favorable situation 
 for sea-bathing and for boating and sailing, draw a great influx of gay and 
 fashionable visitors here during the summer months. The " Royal Cork 
 Yacht Club " whose station is here, is the oldest of its kind in the 
 United Kingdom, though the " Royal Yacht Squadron " takes precedence. 
 It owes its origin to the " Water Club of the Harbor of Cork," established 
 in the year 1 720, which annually proceeded a few leagues out to sea, with 
 a ceremony which was, says an ancient writer, " somewhat like that of the 
 Doge of Venice wedding the sea." Its rules and orders were very quaint, 
 such as not allowing any admiral to " presume to bring more than two 
 dozen of wine to his treat," it being deemed a "breach of the ancient rules 
 and constitutions of the Club, except when my Lords the Judges are 
 invited ; " or to " bring more than two dishes of meat for the entertain- 
 ment of the Club ; " or that the members should wear " long-tail wigs, 
 large sleeves, or ruffles ; " or that, unless the company exceeded fifteen, 
 any man " be allowed more than one bottle to his share, and a perempt- 
 ory." The " Royal Cork Yacht Club " received the Admiralty warrant in 
 1831, to fly the old flag of 1720, with a "harp and crown in the centre.." 
 and some of the ancient customs of the " Water Club " are still retained. 
 Its club-house is adjoining the great quay at Queenstown ; and the annual 
 regatta held under its auspices, is one of the most attractive in Ireland. 
 The "Royal Western Yacht Club of Ireland," established in 1827, and 
 obtaining its Admiralty warrant in 1832, has also a club-house here, and 
 holds regattas. 
 
 From the improvements that have taken place in Queenstown in late 
 years, it bids fair to increase in popularity and rank high as a place of 
 summer resort. The quay erected to the west of the town by Lord 
 Middleton, in 1848, affords a splendid promenade. The town is built partly 
 on the margin of the shore, and partly, as we have observed, on the 
 terraces of the steep hill that overhangs the harbor. It is from these 
 
80 
 
 Q UEENSTO WN AND ITS HARBOR. 
 
 terraces that the most extensive prospects over the latter may be obtained, 
 and, undoubtedly, it is a noble sight to look down upon the broad expanse 
 of that land-locked haven, specked with yachts and pleasure boats and 
 fortified isles, and encompassed by lofty hills crowned with numerous villas 
 and mansions ; and should, as is frequently the case, some ocean steamers 
 or emigrant ships be landing or embarking their living freight, or a fleet 
 be lying at anchor under the shelter of the land, nothing can be conceived 
 more lovely and magnificent than the effect of the coup cPceil. 
 
 The island on which Queenstown is situated, extends five miles from 
 east to west, and two from north to south ; it is not only one of the first 
 places mentioned in Irish history, but it is recorded to have been steadfast 
 in its loyalty, as it maintained its independence even after the English had 
 possession of Cork and the surrounding country. In 1329, it was the 
 property of Lord Philip Hodnet, who resided at Clonmel, where he was 
 besieged by the united forces of the Barrys and Roches, who captured 
 his castle and put all his adherents to the sword. The Barrys having 
 thus obtained possession of the property, gave it the name of Barrymore 
 Island. In 1666, the Earl of Orrery described it as being very fertile, 
 and looked upon it as a place of such importance that, he said, if he 
 were an enemy about to invade Ireland, it would be the first place he 
 would endeavor to secure. The antiquities now found upon the island 
 are the remains of Belvelly Castle, built by the Hodnets, and the ruins 
 of Temple-robin and Clonmel churches. A large proportion of those 
 interred in the burying-ground belonging to the latter are strangers. Many 
 a storm-tossed mariner lies here, who has struggled with death upon the 
 ocean, that he might breathe his last upon the land, and instead of the 
 dark billows rolling over his cold remains, have the bright green grass 
 and the young flowers springing from his grave. Many a youthful 
 victim whom fell consumption had marked for its prey, but who, with 
 self-deluding hope, sought too late to arrest its progress in this mild and 
 genial climate, has here found his last resting-place. Here, too, reposes 
 the mortal part of the Rev. Charles Wolfe, an elegant though almost 
 unknown writer, who, in 1823, at the early age of thirty-two, died in Cove, 
 whither he had removed for the benefit of its air. He was the author 01 
 the ode on the " Burial of Sir John Moore," commencing " Not a drum 
 was heard," which, had he never written anything else, was sufficient to stamp 
 
I SLA XV S AXD DEFEXSIVE WORKS. 
 
 -I 
 
 him as a poet of the highest order. Here also, in an undistinguished 
 grave, is buried Tobin. the author of several dramatic pieces, the best known 
 of which is "The Honeymoon." who died in the harbor on his passage to 
 the West Indies. 
 
 Oueexstown Harbor, prominent for its capacity and safety, is three 
 miles long and two broad ; and is completely landlocked, and capable of 
 sheltering- the entire British navv. Its entrance is bv a channel two miles 
 in length and one in breadth, defended by forts on each side, and by 
 others on the islands in the interior. Of the latter, which stand between 
 Queenstown and the mouth of the harbor. Spike Island is the largest and 
 most conspicuous. It faces the entrance, and acts as a breakwater to 
 shelter the harbor from the violence of the southerly winds and the 
 strong flood tides. It is also happily situated for its defence, and has 
 been strongly fortified for that purpose ; the building of its fortifications 
 having been commenced in i 791, under the superintendence of Colonel, after- 
 terwards General Vallancev, who. though an Englishman, devoted himself 
 assiduously to the investigation of the early literature and antiquities 
 of Ireland. The island likewise contains a large convict prison, the 
 inmates of which are employed in the government works for the improve- 
 ment and protection of the harbor. Haulbowline. a small rocky islet to 
 the west of Spike, contains the naval storehouses, and affords the same 
 protection to the vessels in the harbor, from the strong ebb tides, that 
 Spike Island does from the flood. Opposite to Haulbowline lies Rocky 
 Island, containing a powder magazine occupying six chambers hewn in 
 the rock, where 10.000 barrels of powder are usually stored. At the 
 entrance to the harbor on the east is Roche's Point — a name familiar to 
 the readers of telegrams announcing the safe arrival of ocean steamers — 
 with its loftv lighthouse for the guidance of benighted mariners. 
 
 n O O O 
 
 In the southwest corner of the harbor is the little fishing village 
 of Cross Haven, situated at the mouth of the Owenboy or Avenbuoy, 
 in English signifying the Yellow River, from the color of its waters, 
 to which the floods caused by heavy rains give a muddy yellow tinge. 
 Although of a considerable breadth, this stream is not navigable for 
 any great distance except by small boats ; within its mouth, however, 
 which more resembles, and is sometimes called, a creek, there is good 
 anchorage for vessels of considerable burthen. It is related that five 
 
 H 
 
82 
 
 QUEENSTOWN AND ITS HARBOR. 
 
 ships of war under the command of Sir Francis Drake, being hotly pur- 
 sued by the Spanish fleet, ran up this river a short way to a part named 
 Tubberavoid, (the well of safe anchorage), since styled Drake's Pool, 
 where the little squadron lay land-locked and completely concealed from 
 their pursuers, who sailed into Cork harbor, but, not discovering their prey, 
 gave up the chase. About four miles from the river's mouth, lies the 
 village of Carrigaline, which, tradition states, the first Earl of Cork intended 
 should rival Cork in commerce, and had actually proceeded so far, in 
 his gigantic undertaking, as to mark out the ground plan of an extensive 
 town ; but the scheme, which originated in the comparative advantage in 
 distance of the proposed town from the sea, ended with the life of its 
 projector. The ancient castle of Carrigaline is seated on an immense mass 
 of limestone rock, and the fortress was one of great importance during the 
 time of Elizabeth, when it was considered impregnable. 
 
 The charming scenery which surrounds Queenstown Harbor, and lines 
 the sides of the watery way from Cork to Roche's Point, has called forth 
 the praise of many a passing traveler. Arthur Young, the celebrated 
 agriculturist, who visited Cork about a century ago, when the shores of the 
 river had received little improvement from the hand of art, considered 
 the country surrounding the harbor to be in many respects preferable to 
 anything he had seen in Ireland. Inglis bestows on the scenery the full 
 tribute of his admiration ; and Milner says that " neither the Severn at 
 Chepstow, nor the sea at Southampton, is to be compared to it." Another 
 writer adds, that " no part of the scenery is barren or uninteresting ; a 
 perpetual variety is presented along the whole course. The eye, whilst 
 lingering over some happy picture, is continually attracted by some new 
 succession, possessing all the charms of the most romantic landscape." 
 While Sir John Forbes remarks, " It would be difficult to overpraise the 
 beauty of the river from Cork to Queenstown, or the magnificent harbor 
 or inland bay in which it terminates, more especially when these are seen 
 under the influence of a bright .sun and a brilliant sky. Indeed, every 
 element of beauty that can mingle in such a scene seems to be here com- 
 prised ; we had a stream ever varying in its course and outline, of ample 
 breadth, yet not too broad to prevent distinct recognition of the objects 
 on its banks ; water of a color and purity like the sea, lofty barriers on 
 either side, covered with rich woods and intermingled with green park-like 
 
ROSTELLAN CASTLE AND CASTLE MARY. 83 
 
 fields and shining villas; here and there white villages on level patches 
 of shore ; and the whole animated and, as it were, humanized, by the 
 peopled steamers sweeping up and down, the boats and yachts sailing or 
 pulling about, and a ship or two at anchor, decked out in their national 
 flags, in every bay that opened out upon us as we pursued our course." 
 
 Desirous of visiting the ancient cathedral city of Cloyne, we took a 
 boat from Oueenstown to Aghada, on the eastern shore of the harbor and 
 about half a dozen miles distant from our place of destination. Adjacent 
 to Aghada is Rostellan Castle, delightfully situated on a wooded promon- 
 tory, commanding an exceedingly fine view of the grand and animated 
 harbor with its beautiful shores. The demesne is rich in luxuriant 
 beauty, and the judicious manner in which the grounds are laid out 
 speaks highly for the elegant taste of the owner. The property con- 
 tains an ancient cromlech on the shore of Saleen Creek. The present 
 mansion is a modern erection, built on the site of an old castle of the 
 Fitzgeralds, Seneschals of Imokilly. An ancient sword, said to have been 
 once wielded by Brian Boroihme, the great ancestor of the O'Briens, and 
 the monarch who defeated the Danes at the memorable battle of Clontarf, 
 is preserved in a small armory of the castle, and shown to strangers as a 
 genuine relic ; for Rostellan Castle was until lately the seat of the O'Briens, 
 Marquesses of Thomond. On the decease of the last marquis in 1855, all 
 the family titles became extinct, with the exception of the Irish Barony of 
 Inchiquin, which descended to his kinsman, Sir Lucius O'Brien, Bart., who 
 became Lord Inchiquin. 
 
 Our road to Cloyne took us through the sweetly secluded little hamlet 
 of Saleen, half hidden amidst clustering hawthorns, and presenting such a 
 picture of quiet pastoral beauty, that one might easily imagine Goldsmith 
 had it in his mind when describing the beauties of the " Deserted 
 Village " — 
 
 " Where smiling Spring her earliest visits paid, 
 And parting Summer's ling'ring bloom delayed." 
 
 The house and demesne of Castle Mary,* contiguous to the village, 
 form a prominent feature in the landscape ; but the chief interest which 
 attaches to this spot is the existence of a huge cromlech or Druidical 
 
 * Castle Mary was formerly called Carrig Cotta, supposed to be a corruption of Carrig Croith, or the Rock 
 of the Sun, from the adjoining cromlech or Druidical altar. 
 
84 
 
 Q UEENSTO WN AND ITS HARBOR. 
 
 altar, standing in a field at a short distance from the house. It is an 
 immense mass of limestone of an oblong shape, one end resting on the 
 ground, and the other extremity supported by two large upright stones. 
 The length of the incumbent stone is about fifteen feet, its breadth 
 between seven and eight feet, and its thickness three and a half feet. 
 Adjoining this great altar is a smaller one of a triangular shape, and, like 
 the other, it is supported by two uprights in an inclined position. It 
 is supposed that this lesser stone was used for the purposes of common 
 sacrifice, while the greater altar was probably reserved for occasions of 
 extraordinary solemnity. The incumbent stone or slab of the cromlechs is 
 sustained in some cases by rows of upright pillars ; in other instances the 
 table is supported by two or more large cone-shaped rocks, but on none 
 of the stones used in the construction of these altars can the mark of any 
 tool be discovered.* Numerous other cromlechs are known to exist in the 
 county of Cork (Mr. Windele states that there are as many as twenty- 
 four), but the description of this one may suffice to give an idea of all 
 the others. There is a tradition that nothing will grow under these altars ; 
 an opinion that originates from the total absence of vendure, incident to 
 a want of sufficient light and air. 
 
 Cloyne, distant about a mile from Castle Mary, is pleasantly situated 
 on a gentle eminence that rises from the southern vale of Imokilly. It was 
 formerly the seat of the bishop of the diocese of that name ; but now, 
 shorn of the honors of an episcopal residence, it has little besides its 
 antiquarian interest to invite the attention of the traveler.f The ancient 
 name of the place was Cluaine-uamhach, or " the retreat of the caves," — 
 the propriety of the designation being evident from the numerous caves 
 of great extent which exist in the neighborhood. One very considerable 
 
 * Like the gobhlans or pillar-stones, so frequently found in Ireland, the cromlech owes its origin to the 
 idolatrous system of worship which, there is every reason to suppose, pervaded a great portion of the world before 
 the existence of profane history ; in its appearance, however, the cromlech is totally different from the pillar-stone. 
 The Irish and British word, crom-kach, which signifies a crooked or bent stone, it is supposed, was applied to those 
 rude altars from their inclining position ; although it is equally probable that they derived their name from being 
 the stones on which sacrifices to the god Crom were offered. An ingenious conjecture has been advanced, that they 
 were placed in an inclined position to allow the blood of the victims slain upon them to run off freely. 
 
 f Cloyne was once the residence of the Fitzgeralds, Seneschals of Imokilly, and it is recorded that a skirmish 
 took place near the town between the Seneschal and Sir Walter Raleigh, in which the latter acquitted himself 
 with extraordinary gallantry. In the north transept is an altar-tomb belonging to those Fitzgeralds, in which are 
 some fragments of a mailed figure, that probably was once attached to it. 
 
CAVES AND CATHEDRAL OE CLOYNE. 
 
 85 
 
 and interesting cavern may be seen in a part of the episcopal demesne, 
 called the Rock Meadow.* 
 
 The bishopric of Cloyne was founded in the sixth century by St. 
 Coleman, a disciple of St. Finn Barr, the Bishop of Cork.f The ancient 
 Cathedral is a small, low building, of an exceedingly plain and simple 
 style of architecture, that refers its erection to a very early period ; never- 
 theless, modern innovations have disfigured the character of some parts 
 of the building, and the repairs bestowed upon it have been executed with 
 as little regard to taste or propriety as the patches upon a beggar's 
 cloak. The reconstruction of the choir, in 1776, under the direction of 
 Bishop Agar, offers a striking evidence of this fact, in the absurd way in 
 which light Italian ornaments have been blended with the more austere 
 lineaments of the edifice. The building is cruciform, consisting of a nave, 
 choir, and north and south transepts ; but the tower, if it ever possessed 
 one, has entirely disappeared. Within the adjoining churchyard, which is 
 surrounded by numerous venerable trees, that give to it a solemn and 
 secluded aspect, are the remains of a small building, called by some " The 
 Firehouse," by others, St. Coleman's Chapel. It is evidently of great 
 antiquity, and tradition asserts that the bones of that holy man were 
 preserved there until the beginning of the last century, when a bishop of 
 
 * Mr. Crofton Croker has given us an account of a visit he made to one of these caves, at Carrigacrump. 
 Shortly after entering, he found himself in a chamber of considerable size, the roof of which seemed supported 
 by a ponderous stalactical pillar, on a base proportionately massive, ornamented with clustering knobs of small 
 stalactites that hung over each other like hands with the fingers spread out. Above, appeared gloomy galleries 
 with entrances resembling rich Gothic archways ; but, being without the means of ascent, he was unable to 
 explore any of them. His guide having, for the sake of effect, placed his light on the opposite side of the 
 central pillar, so as to leave the spectator in darkness while illuminating half the chamber, it caused a projecting 
 point of rock to assume without much effort of fancy the appearance of a colossal figure in repose, leaning on a 
 club, that, he poetically remarks, might seem to the vivid imagination the genius of the cave slumbering -in his 
 favorite grotto of spar. A story is related, but with slight claims to belief, of a trumpeter, belonging to a 
 dragoon regiment quartered in Cloyne, being left behind by a party of his comrades, with whom he had entered 
 one of the passages in the Bishop's Meadow, and the next morning surprising the laborers in Carrigacrump 
 quarry, (whence the stone principally used in building the custom house and quays at Cork was obtained), by 
 the sound of his bugle issuing from the crevices of the rock, to which sound he was indebted for his 
 preservation, as they immediately extricated him, he having traveled in his subterranean journey about a 
 miie in a direct line. 
 
 f The see of Cloyne was united to that of Cork in 1490. In the Protestant Hierarchy the see of Ross was 
 added to these in 1586 ; and that of Cloyne was afterwards separated in 1638, but by an act of Parliament 
 of 1833 was permanently re-united to the diocese of Cork and Ross, on the death of its bishop which took 
 place in 1835. In the Roman Catholic Church, Cloyne and Ross are suffragan sees, the Bishop of the formei 
 residing at Queenstown, and that of the latter at Skibbereen. 
 
86 
 
 Q UEENSTO WN AND ITS HARBOR. 
 
 Cloyne caused them to be removed, and the building to be nearly levelled 
 to the ground. 
 
 The episcopal residence, at the east end of the village, is a spacious but 
 irregular building, having been improved and altered according to the 
 different tastes of the prelates who occupied it. In this house the 
 celebrated Doctor Berkeley, a man illustrious for his learning, but more 
 illustrious for his virtues, passed many years of his life, dividing his time 
 between his pastoral duties, his garden, and his books ; and endearing 
 himself to his flock by his gentle manners, and his earnest endeavors to 
 promote the prosperity of the little city.* 
 
 A monastery was founded at Cloyne in the year 707, around which 
 the town gradually grew up ; the reputation of the monks for learning and 
 piety attracting crowds of scholars and devotees to the place ; but of the 
 monastery or of an hospital, erected in 1320, not a vestige now remains. 
 
 At a short distance from the cathedral towards the west, stands one of 
 the most remarkable specimens of the ancient Turaghans or Round Towers 
 of Ireland. The original height of the tower was ninety-two feet, but the 
 conical roof having been demolished by lightning, f an embattlement was 
 placed round the top, which has increased the height to one hundred and 
 two feet. It is divided into six stories, the first of which is eleven and a 
 half feet from the ground, at which height the door of the tower is 
 placed. The distance of each floor from the other is also eleven and a 
 
 * Bishop Berkeley, the ideal philosopher, held the see in the time of George II. He was born at Kilcrin, in 
 the county of Kilkenny, in 1684, and was a school-mate of Swift. He afterwards obtained a fellowship in Trinity 
 College, Dublin, became chaplain to the Earl of Peterborough on his embassy to Italy, and was appointed, in 1724, 
 to the deanery of Derry. In anticipation of the happy results of a scheme for establishing a college in the 
 Bermudas, for the purpose of training pastors for the colonial churches and missionaries to the American Indians, 
 he wrote his well-known stanzas, in which occurs the oft-quoted line : 
 
 "Westward the course of empire takes its way." 
 
 In 1729 he settled in Rhode Island, where he purchased land and built a house ; but, his collegiate scheme failing, 
 after a residence there of two and a half years, he presented his library and estate to Yale College, and returned to 
 Ireland. In 1734 he received, as a special mark of favor from Queen Caroline, the bishopric of Cloyne, which he 
 held for twenty years, and died at Oxford in 1753. Towards the close of his life he became subject to hypochon- 
 dria, which led him not only to imbibe tar-water in considerable quantities, but to strongly recommend it to his 
 friends, and write a treatise commending its virtues. 
 
 \ Dr. Smith, in his " History of Cork," relates that on the night of the 10th of January, 1794, a flash 
 of lightning struck the tower, rent the conical top, tumbled down the bell and three lofts, forced its way through 
 one side of the building, and drove the stones which were admirably well joined and locked into each other, 
 through the roof of an adjoining stable. 
 
REMARKS ON ROUND TOWERS. 
 
 87 
 
 half feet. The tower is built on a limestone rock ; but, with a strange 
 disregard for that material, of which there is abundance on the spot, the 
 stones which compose the tower have been brought from some distant 
 quarry — a singularity which is observable in many of the Druidic remains 
 in both England and Ireland. The tower is now used as a belfry, and 
 the name by which it is known among the peasantry is Clogach-Cliiina, 
 or, the House of the bell of Cloy ne. 
 
 The existence of these Pillar-towers is one of the most extraordinary 
 circumstances connected with the history of Ireland; and notwithstanding 
 all that has been written about them, and the innumerable conjectures 
 which have been advanced on their origin and use, the question still 
 remains unsolved. The writers who have discussed the subject have been, 
 no doubt, fully satished each in his own mind of the soundness of his 
 own conclusions on the point — each is convinced that he has solved the 
 riddle ; but those who read and think, without the bias occasioned by 
 a predisposition to a favorite hypothesis, must still remain in doubt. It 
 might have been expected that our extended geographical knowledge and 
 antiquarian research would have detected, in some region or other, 
 buildings of a similar description ; but nothing has been discovered that 
 could justify the inquirer in connecting the state of society in any other 
 part of. the world, with that which existed in Ireland at the time these 
 singular edifices were constructed ; nor has much light been thrown upon 
 the subject since it first became one of philosophical investigation. Never- 
 theless, as objects peculiar to Ireland, we may be permitted to offer here 
 a few comprehensive remarks with reference to the opinions of various 
 writers, concerning the date of the erection and intended use of these 
 remarkable structures. 
 
 The main facts connected with them are as follows : — They are of a 
 date beyond all traces of history or tradition ; no record in existence 
 notices the foundation of any one of them.* They were built at a time 
 when the art of architecture must have been in a very improved state. 
 "A striking perfection observable in their construction, is the inimitable 
 perpendicular invariably maintained. No architect of the present day 
 could observe such regularity. Nelson's Pillar, Dublin, has been proved 
 to vary somewhat from the perpendicular line ; but the keenest eye cannot 
 
 * When Cambrensis wrote in the twelfth century, there was no tradition extant respecting their origin. 
 
88 
 
 QUEENS TOWN AND ITS HARBOR. 
 
 trace a deviation, in a single instance, amongst the whole of the Sabaean 
 monuments. Even the tower of Kilmacduagh, one of the largest in the 
 kingdom, having from some accident been forced to lean considerably on 
 one side, yet retains its stability as firm as before, such was the accuracy 
 of its original elevation ; while the cement employed in giving it solidity, 
 and which is the direct counterpart of the Indian chtmam, bids defiance 
 to the efforts of man to dissever, except by the exertion of extraordinary 
 power."* These facts prove a highly advanced state of architectural 
 knowledge. The number of the buildings is not less remarkable. Upwards 
 of ninety have been ascertained either as now existing, or known at a 
 period within historical memory. Their situation is also another marked 
 peculiarity. They are generally found in low and sheltered spots, seldom 
 upon places of great elevation ; and are, with few exceptions, in the imme- 
 diate vicinity of some ecclesiastical building. 
 
 The existing towers have frequently suffered injury ; but their altitude, 
 in their present condition, varies from twenty-five to one hundred and 
 thirty-three feet. Their usual circumference, near the base, is from forty to 
 fifty feet. They frequently, but not uniformly, spring from a projecting 
 plinth, and diminish gradually as they ascend. In some remaining towers 
 the roof is of a conical shape, and there is every reason to conclude that 
 this was originally the shape of all. Battlements now crown the summit 
 of several of them, but appear to have been added long after the erection 
 of other parts of the structure. The doorway is raised to the height of 
 several feet, generally from ten to twenty, above the level of the ground. 
 There are seldom any apertures for admitting light, except near the 
 summit, where four small windows, pointing to the cardinal points, are to 
 be seen in some. Both doors and windows are in general oblong open- 
 ings, of less breadth at the top than at the bottom — a feature character- 
 istic of the old Pelasgic and Egyptian styles of architecture. Arched 
 windows, with carved mouldings and sculptured decorations, are sometimes 
 to be met with ; but these deviations from the general mode of building 
 may, with great probability, be ascribed to the early Christian priests, who 
 converted them to the purposes of Christianity — for, as we may here 
 observe, it was the policy of the Christian missionaries not so much to 
 impair the reverence which the people entertained for their ancient places 
 
 * O'Brien's "Round Towers of Ireland," p. 515. 
 
SIGNIFICANCE OF ROUND TOWERS. 
 
 89 
 
 of worship, as to change the object of their adoration from a false to a 
 true God. There are no traces of stairs in any of these towers, yet the 
 interiors have in many instances projections at different heights, suggesting 
 rests for flooring-joists. These Pillar-towers are almost exclusively con- 
 fined to Ireland. Two have been met with in Scotland,* but it is easy to 
 imagine that the prevalent taste for such buildings in Ireland, would lead 
 to their imitation in one or two instances in a country so near, and 
 inhabited by descendants of the same race. A few buildings somewhat 
 resembling them — that is, long, narrow towers — have been seen in the 
 eastern countries, but none of them are of the construction which an 
 observer acquainted with those in Ireland would pronounce at once, and 
 without hesitation, to be a Tnraghan\ or Pillar-tower. 
 
 Such are the leading facts connected with them : the conjectures on 
 their use are equally numerous and vague. Some have pronounced them 
 to have been the residences of hermits, like the Stylites % of the eastern 
 countries, who spent their lives on the tops of elevated pillars ; but history 
 affords no grounds on which to rest the opinion. If such had been their 
 use, the names of several of the inmates of the buildings, in whose 
 construction so much expense and ingenuity had been employed, could 
 not have passed away unnoticed. Others have supposed them to have 
 been Danish watch or signal-towers ; but the situation of some of them, 
 in low and sheltered places, contradicts the supposition. They are also 
 asserted to have been belfries ; but it is apparent that their application 
 to such a purpose must have been long subsequent to their erection, and 
 only in a few instances, as the greater number of perfect towers now 
 remaining exhibit no traces of the insertion of beams in the masonry for 
 the suspension of a bell. In addition, the silence of history, as to the 
 period of their erection, furnishes undeniable negative evidence to the 
 opinion that they were originally built in the early ages of Christianity, 
 
 * One is situated at Brechin, the other at Abernethy. 
 
 f The name Tur-agkan, literally the " tower of fire," warrants the supposition that these pillars were connected 
 with the ancient worship of fire. The word agh, signifying " fire " in the Irish language, is frequently compounded 
 in the names of places in whose vicinity traces of Druidic structures may be discovered — as Aghadoe, " the field of 
 fire," where there stands one of these towers. 
 
 \ Mr. Harris assumes that the Round Towers were erected for the reception of the anchorite monks termed 
 Stylites, from the practice of living in a pillar. Simeon, an enthusiast of the fourth century, was the first who 
 adopted this singular mode of penance. 
 
90 
 
 Q UEENSTO WN AND ITS HARBOR. 
 
 for any ecclesiastical purpose ; while, on the contrary, the founding of 
 cathedrals, churches, abbeys, hospitals, and even belfries, is carefully noted. 
 They may, it is true, have been applied to ecclesiastical uses by those 
 who introduced Christianity into Ireland, or by some of their successors, 
 yet there are no data for assuming such to have been the object of their 
 foundation. 
 
 The want of a satisfactory solution to this question, involving so much 
 of the ancient history of Ireland, has not arisen from neglect. It has, in 
 fact, been often and laboriously mooted, and much learning and research 
 have been brought to bear upon it ; indeed, no writer would presume to 
 treat of the ancient monuments of Ireland without taking cognizance of 
 these great indexes to the antiquity of its national civilization. Every 
 writer, therefore, from Cambrensis downwards, has noted them more or 
 less largely, and most have hazarded a theory upon them. Some years ago, 
 the Royal Irish Academy offered a gold medal as a prize for the best essay 
 upon the subject. This drew forth two candidates, Mr. O'Brien, a learned 
 and enthusiastic young writer, and Mr. George Petrie, a gentleman 
 distinguished as an artist and as a cautious inquirer into the antiquities 
 of his native country, and to whose essay the Academy awarded the prize. 
 Mr. Petrie, in his paper, contends for the Christian origin of the Round 
 Towers, to which he does not assign an earlier date than the sixth 
 century, founding his opinion upon the similarity of their architectural 
 style with some authentic monuments of ecclesiastical construction, and 
 also upon the sculptures found on several of them, which he insists were 
 executed at the time of their being built. He also makes the period of 
 their erection subsequent to the introduction of Christianity into Ireland. 
 Mr. O'Brien, on the contrary, supports the opinion that they were erected 
 in the remote ages of Paganism. His theory supposes that all the various 
 theological systems, which have divided the world up to the present time, 
 are founded upon an allegory ; and that the Pillar-towers are an emblem 
 of that allegory — multiplied personifications of the great object of worship, 
 which has led away the bulk of mankind from the spiritual worship of the 
 invisible God. It is not very easy, and still less desirable, to convey a 
 palpable idea of the theory of this very learned, very ingenious, and very 
 visionary writer ; but it will suffice to say that he believes he has discov- 
 ered an identity in the form of the towers to the Hindoo Lingam, and 
 
IDOLATROUS USES OF ROUXD TOWERS. 
 
 91 
 
 that their use " was that of a cupboard," to hold those figures sacred to 
 the Indo-Irish Budha. Mr. Windele, who has devoted much attention to 
 the subject, rather coincides with Mr. O'Brien's opinion. He says the 
 Irish names of these towers "are of themselves conclusive, and announce 
 at once a fane devoted to that form of religion, compounded of Sabaeism 
 or star-worship, and Budhism, — of which the sun, represented by fire, was 
 the principal deity in all the kindred mythologies of Persia, India, Phoeni- 
 cia, Phrygia, Samothrace, and Ireland. This idolatry in many respects 
 differed from that of Gaul and Britain. Zoroaster was its great reformer 
 in Persia, and the reformation seems to have been accepted in Ireland." 
 
 It is worthy of remark that there are a few Round Towers in England, 
 chiefly in Norfolk and Suffolk, where they are attached to old churches ; 
 and a faint similarity of these to the Pillar-towers of Ireland has caused 
 Ledwick, and other antiquarians, to believe that they were all identical in 
 character, and of ecclesiastical origin. A very slight inspection will, however, 
 convince any person that these English towers, which are uniformly con- 
 structed in a rude manner, and composed of flints, rough stones, chalk, and 
 other coarse ingredients imbedded in mortar, are extremely unlike the well- 
 executed Pillar-towers of Ireland. An opinion, which bears with it some 
 show of probability, has been advanced, that these pillars were monuments 
 erected over the graves of celebrated kings, priests, or heroes. Such a 
 belief would certainly not be at variance with the character of the Irish 
 towers, for human bones have been found interred beneath one at Ram 
 Island, in Antrim; and similar relics, which had undergone the process of 
 burning, have also been discovered under the tower at Timahoe. When 
 we behold the stupendous pyramids of Egypt, which were doubtless 
 intended only as sepulchres for the dead, we need not feel any great 
 surprise if these aspiring pillars of Ireland should have been devoted to 
 the same monumental purpose. But we must here dismiss this interesting 
 and perplexing inquiry, with but faint hopes that future researches will 
 ever lead to a solution of the enigma that has puzzled so many anti- 
 quarians. 
 
 BOSTON COLLEGE LIBIUK* 
 CHESTNUT HILL, A1.AS3. 
 
92 
 
 ALONG THE SOUTH-EASTERN SHORE. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 ALONG THE SOUTH-EASTERN SHORE. 
 
 Youghal and its Collegiate Church — Residence of Sir Walter Raleigh — Introduction of Potatoes 
 into Ireland — Valley of the Blackwater — Dromana and the Desmonds — Listnore and its 
 Castle — Dungarvan — Tramore Bay — Dunbrody Abbey — Harbor and City of Waterford — 
 Cathedral and Reginald's Tower — Villages on the Coast — Saltee Islands — Discovery of 
 Refugees — Harbor and Town of Wexford — Baronies of Forth and Bargy and their 
 Peculiarities. 
 
 DECIDEDLY the best and most delightful manner of viewing the 
 bays, inlets, headlands, and the coast-scenery of a country, is from 
 the deck of one of the numerous pleasure yachts in which men of 
 combined wealth and culture now so greatly delight to while away the 
 live-long summer-day. This asseveration is, however, merely pertinent to 
 those persons who are strangers to the peculiar qualms that compel 
 some amateur voyagers to cast their bread upon the waters, but cer- 
 tainly without any desire that it should return to them after many 
 days. The harbor of Oueenstown, we have stated, is the great rendez- 
 vous for yachts in the south of Ireland. Our inward man being, we 
 are happy to say, unaffected by the caperings of such frisky craft and 
 their coquettings with the foam-capped waves, we found a cruise from 
 this port a favorable opportunity wherein to take a glance at several 
 of those noble havens which indent the coast of Ireland ; and, as a 
 portion of the beauties of the country lie on the sea-board, and in 
 the numerous and picturesque islands with which it is studded, we 
 trust that none of our readers will feel indisposed to accompany us in 
 our sailings and saunterings along-shore. 
 
 Proceeding eastward from Queenstown harbor the first opening that 
 presented itself to our notice was Ballycottin Bay, bleak, low, unshel- 
 
TOWN AND HARBOR OF YOUGHAL. 
 
 93 
 
 tered, and almost devoid of scenic beauty, but abounding with fish of 
 excellent quality. The next was that of Youghal harbor, with the bold 
 outline of its beetling cliffs, jutting out in dark defiance of the ocean 
 swell. 
 
 The town of Youghal is situated on the western shore of the 
 beautiful Blackwater, which, at its mouth, has an average breadth of 
 half a mile, but, inland, expands into a spacious harbor, capable of 
 accommodating ships of considerable tonnage. It had, in 1871, a 
 population of 5,574, and sends one member to the British House of 
 Commons. Its importance dates as far back as 1209, when it is said 
 to have been incorporated by King John. In 1579, the Earl of 
 Desmond, being proclaimed a traitor, plundered the town ; and about 
 the same time, the mayor, on his refusal to receive an English gar- 
 rison, and neglecting to protect the place without it, was hanged 
 before the door of his own house. In 1582, the forces of the 
 Seneschal of Imokilly, whose castle lay ten miles to the west, surprised 
 the town and scaled the walls, but were repulsed by the garrison ; 
 which again in 1645, though weak, gallantly withstood an assault from 
 Lord Castlehaven. In the years of trouble that occurred about the 
 latter date, the native Irish were expelled and their property seized ; 
 and the inhabitants having declared for the Parliament, Cromwell made 
 his headquarters at Youghal, whence he embarked for England in 1650, 
 after the siege of Clonmel. In 1690, after the reduction of Waterford, 
 the town surrendered to the forces of William III. Remains of the 
 walls, which do not appear to have been either lofty or strong, line 
 the south of the town, and are in summer rendered attractive from 
 the profusion of wild flowers with which they are clothed. 
 
 Youghal is built on a slope at the base of a steep hill, from the 
 summit of which is obtained a birds-eye survey of the quaint old place 
 with its crumbling walls, ladder-like lanes, and ancient structures, as 
 well as extensive views of the harbor, opening widely to the sea 
 between bluff headlands, and landward, of cultivated fields, wooded 
 spots, and distant mountain ranges, and the river stretching away far 
 inland, and crossed at some little distance by a long wooden bridge 
 that connects the counties of Cork and Waterford. Around the estuary 
 are ruins of several ancient edifices, many of which stand as memorials 
 
04 
 
 ALONG THE SOUTH-EASTERN SHORE. 
 
 of the introduction of Christianity into Ireland. Two religious houses, 
 one on the north and the other on the south side of the town, were 
 established here by the Geraldines, about the middle of the thirteenth 
 century. The former, of which a small fragment only exists, was a 
 Dominican friary, founded by Thomas Fitzgerald, called the Ape, from 
 a baboon or ape having snatched him when an infant, from his cradle, 
 and to the terror of the family carried him to the battlements of his 
 father's castle at Tralee, though afterwards restoring him carefully to 
 his cradle. The latter, according to Ware, the first Franciscan friary 
 in Ireland, was founded by Maurice Fitzgerald, who, it is related, 
 originally commenced the erection of a castle, but was led, through the 
 ill-behavior of his son, to turn his half-built fortress into a monastery, 
 evidence of which still remains in the incongruous juxtaposition of a 
 square tower with the sacred structure. In 1464, the Earl of Desmond 
 established here the Collegiate Church of St. Mary, with warden, 
 fellows, and choristers. Though the building is described as having been 
 in use in 1681, it was then much out of repair, and subsequently became 
 one of those numerous ruined religious edifices which dot the surface of 
 the land. It has, however, recently been snatched from the grinding jaws 
 of time and restored to some part of its former magnificence. A six-light 
 east window of stained glass is one of the most elaborate and best pro- 
 portioned specimens in Ireland. The edifice, at one time said to have 
 been " the fairest parish-church in the province," was even beautiful as a 
 ruin, situated as it was, with stalwart trees standing as sentinels by its 
 side ; and it is in this picturesque attitude that it is presented to the eye 
 of the reader in the accompanying plate. Many specimens of decorative 
 architecture, and several ancient monuments are here found to interest 
 the archaeologist. A Round Tower once stood at the west end, and at one 
 side of the church yard is the site of the college founded by the Earl of 
 Desmond, but now occupied by a modern mansion. 
 
 Near to the church stands the warden's house, now called Myrtle 
 Grove from its juxtaposition to a luxuriant growth of myrtles, some of 
 which are nearly thirty feet high. It is famous as having once been the 
 residence of Sir Walter Raleigh, who, in 1588-89, was Mayor of Youghal. 
 He came hither as a soldier of fortune in command of a few troops, to 
 assist the Lord Deputy during the Desmond rebellion. For his skill 
 
INTRODUCTION OF THE POTATO. 
 
 95 
 
 and bravery in that campaign he was rewarded from the forfeited estates* 
 with the site of the town, and a tract of land extending as far as 
 Lismore, which he disposed of in 1602, to Richard Boyle, first Earl of 
 Cork, who had befriended him upon his return from Virginia ; and by the 
 marriage of Lady Mary Boyle in 1 748, the property eventually became 
 vested in the dukedom of Devonshire. Raleigh's house is a plain 
 Elizabethan structure, having probably been transformed to that style in 
 the sixteenth century. Here he was wont to entertain the poet Spenser, 
 and, while lying under the yew tree in his garden, to pore over the 
 " Faerie Queene," and indulge in the fumes of the " fragrant weed " he 
 had brought with him from Virginia. Tradition relates that once while 
 thus occupied, a domestic, passing with a bucket of water from the well, 
 believed her master to be on fire, and dashed the contents of the pail in 
 his face, screaming to her fellow-servants to come and aid in extinguishing 
 him. In this same garden, it is said, that the potato, which he also 
 brought from America, was first propagated in Ireland ; and it is asserted 
 that the person to whom he entrusted the care of the plant, imagining 
 that the apples growing on the stalk were to be eaten, gathered them, 
 but not liking the taste, neglected the plant until he dug up the ground 
 to receive other crops, when, to his surprise, he found a multitude of 
 tubers as the product of the original root, and from these sprang the 
 countless wealth of potatoes with which the soil of Ireland now teems. 
 In like manner when tea was first introduced into England from China, 
 the boiled leaves were eaten, while the liquid, which, it was afterwards 
 found, contained the essence of the plant, was thrown away. Notwith- 
 standing the nutritive properties of potatoes, a popular writer asserts, that 
 Pat considers it quite as natural for him to smoke tobacco as to eat them, 
 because they were equally made known to him by Raleigh. 
 
 Considerable improvement has been effected in the general aspect of 
 Youghal since the year i860; many of the dilapidated buildings have been 
 either removed or restored, and successful efforts for infusing commercial 
 activity into the town and making it an attractive watering place, have 
 
 * The Earl of Desmond was, perhaps, in his time, the most wealthy "subject" in Europe. He had, it is 
 said, besides his numerous vassals, five hundred followers of his name and kindred. His estates, confiscated at 
 his attainder, amounted to 574,628 English acres, which were parcelled out among Queen Elizabeth's soldiers, 
 as rewards for crushing his rebellion. 
 
96 
 
 ALONG THE SOUTH-EASTERN SHORE. 
 
 been much aided by the opening of railroad communication with the City 
 of Cork, twenty-seven miles distant. The strand affords excellent bathing, 
 and the walks along the shore to Cable Island and on towards Ballycottin 
 Bay present many delighful views ; while an attraction is found in the 
 love of the inhabitants for flowers, which the salubrity of the climate 
 enables them to cultivate with marked success. 
 
 The excursion we took through the ancient demesne of the once 
 favored Raleigh, up the Valley of the Blackwater to Lismore, was an inci- 
 dent to be remembered for a lifetime. There are some half-dozen rivers 
 of the same name running their respective courses in different parts of 
 the land, but this eclipses them all. Spenser speaks of it as 
 
 "Swift Awniduff, which of the English man 
 Is cal'de Blacke-water."— 
 
 and it has been a theme of praise for many travelers, who have described 
 it as combining beauties unsurpassed either on the Rhine, the Rhone, or 
 the Danube. It takes its rise not far from the Lakes of Killarney, and 
 has a course of a hundred miles, only the last sixteen of which can be 
 navigated by steamers. The Blackwater, even in this country of lovely 
 rivers, is, without doubt, eminently lovely. Its banks are bold, verdant, 
 graceful, and gemmed with beautiful structures, offering in its whole 
 length, perhaps as great a variety of enjoyable scenery, as any river in 
 the world. Thomas Davis, in comparing it with a northern namesake, 
 terms it "The Beauty of Munster," and in his rhapsody remarks: — 
 
 " I would rove by that stream, ere my flag I unrolled ; 
 I would fly to these banks my betrothed to enfold, — 
 The pride of our sire-land, 
 The Eden of Ireland, 
 
 More precious than gold." 
 
 Shortly after leaving Youghal our steamer passed under the wooden 
 bridge, the largest of its kind in Ireland — 1,787 feet long, joined to a 
 causeway 1,500 feet in length, making the total nearly three-fifths of a 
 mile — and immediately entered the river proper, as distinguished from the 
 harbor. Ruined structures and modern residences line the river's banks 
 in quick succession. Among the former are Rincrew (Rinn-cru — Point of 
 Blood) situated on a precipitous hill, and once a preceptory of the 
 
THE VALLEY OF THE BLACK WATER. 
 
 97 
 
 Knights Templars, said to have been founded in the twelfth century by 
 Raymond le Gros, one of the companions of Strongbow ; Temple Michael 
 Church and Castle, erected in the fourteenth century and reduced to the 
 present condition by the cannonade of Cromwell ; and the Abbey of 
 Molana, said to have been founded by St. Molanfide early in the sixth 
 century, and to contain the grave of Raymond le Gros. After passing 
 these, the river expands into a small lake, called the Broad of Clashmore, 
 presenting a delightful prospect of mountain, mansion, meadow, and water, 
 beautifully blended. 
 
 Higher up we come upon the ivied ruins of the old castle of Strancally, 
 perched on a moss-clad cliff rising almost perpendicularly from the water. 
 This castle, formerly denominated "Strath-na-Caillighc" (The Hag's Holm) 
 was a seat of the Desmonds, and had, in the rock beneath, a cave or 
 chamber popularly known as the " Murdering Hole," in which tradition 
 states, that an Earl was wont to despatch rich neighbors, after he had 
 feasted them with wine, and then to cast their bodies through an opening 
 like a portcullis into the river, which is here at its deepest, in order that 
 he might possess himself of their estates ; for which act of treachery 
 Queen Elizabeth's government ordered the castle to be blown up. Near 
 by, where the Bride falls into the Blackwater, is new Strancally Castle, 
 a modern Gothic mansion whose battlements surmount the foliage of the 
 woods in which it lies buried. At the junction of the two rivers a bend 
 in the main stream brings us in view of the Knock-me-le-down {Cnoc-maol- 
 diui — bare, brown hill) Mountains, whose rugged peaks contrast boldly 
 with the fertile valley beneath. A mile or two higher up the stream, on our 
 right, the castle of Dromana, built on a wooded eminence, presents itself ; 
 and it is from this point that our artist has given us the picture of the 
 Valley of the Blackwater. Overlooking the river from an eminence of 
 sixty or seventy feet, the eye stretches for miles over the fertile lands 
 below, along the course of the river as it travels towards us from its 
 mountain birth-place in the distant west ; while, towards the north, the line 
 of vision is closed by the mountain range between Lismore and Clonmel, 
 with a particularly well-shaped outline, the loftiest peak being the Knock- 
 me-le-down, over two thousand feet above the sea-level, on whose top 
 Major Eeles, an eccentric gentleman, who resided at Youghal, and wrote 
 some tracts on electricity, was buried, with his horse and gun beside him. 
 
 13 
 
98 
 
 ALONG THE SOUTH-EASTERN SHORE. 
 
 Dromana presented the most lovely of the many beautiful views our 
 excursion afforded. All about, rocks and trees hung picturesquely over 
 the water, forming numerous delightful combinations. As a spot it is not 
 only a bright one in a pictorial point of view ; but it is a notable one, 
 historically, having been one of the residences of the powerful Desmonds, 
 in whose lives is embodied no small portion of the poetry of Irish history. 
 " With possessions of nearly four counties," says Croker, " the Earls of 
 Desmond, when actuated by private motives, were enabled to take the 
 field with an armed force so considerable as to excite just apprehensions 
 in those who had the government of an imperfectly subdued country." 
 Near to the present mansion are the remains of a fine old castle reputed 
 to have been the birth-place of Catherine, the long-lived Countess of 
 Desmond, who, at the age of 140, journeyed from her residence at Inchi- 
 quin to the English court, to petition James I. for her jointure, of which 
 the attainder of the last Earl had deprived her ; and whose life is said to 
 have been finally cut short by a fall from a favorite cherry-tree into which 
 she had climbed — the cherry, be it known, having been brought, not 
 many years before, by Sir Walter Raleigh from the Canary Islands, and 
 introduced into Ireland at Affane, a mile higher up the river. 
 
 The views from the steamboat as it glides up the river from Dromana 
 to Cappoquin, a distance of three miles, are exceedingly charming, and 
 even surpassed those presented to us lower down ; but the only places we 
 passed that we can find room for special note are, on the left bank, the 
 ancient castle of Tourin and the modern structure of the same name, and 
 on the right, the village of Affane just mentioned. At the latter a battle 
 was fought in 1564, between the clans of the Butlers and the Fitzgeralds. 
 The latter were defeated, and the Earl of Desmond was wounded and carried 
 from the field by four of his conquerors, whereupon he was taunted by 
 one of the Earl of Ormond's leaders with " Where is now the great Earl of 
 Desmond?" To which he indignantly replied, "where, but in his proper place, 
 on the necks of the Butlers ! " When about a couple of miles from Cappo- 
 quin, one of those sudden turns in the river, which had been continually 
 revealing to us new beauties, opened to our view rising ground intersec- 
 ted by wooded glens, and rich with variegated foliage. Above all, appeared 
 Mount Melleray, with upon it the convent of La Trappe, established by 
 some French Cistercian monks, driven from their native country by the 
 
THE LITTLE CITY OE LISMORE. 
 
 99 
 
 Revolution of 1830. The community, however, is now chiefly composed of 
 natives of Ireland; and the severity of its rules is almost unequalled in 
 the Roman Catholic Church. At Cappoquin, after traversing the river 
 for seventeen miles, we were compelled to leave the steam-packet, upon 
 whose deck we had been for two hours under a spell of enchantment, as 
 a massive stone bridge, which has replaced a wooden one built by the 
 Earl of Cork, formed a pretty stout barrier to our progress ; though we 
 were told, that, if it had contained a draw, there was a sufficient depth of 
 water in the river to have enabled the steamer to ascend as far as Lismore. 
 From the former to the latter place is a distance of four miles, and two 
 charming roads, one on each side of the river, connect them. At Cappo- 
 quin, a bend in the river completely changes its course, which thus far 
 from its source runs from west to east, while from this place to its outlet 
 to the sea at Youghal it is generally from north to south. 
 
 The view of the small town of Lismore from the highly picturesque 
 bridge, which was built by the Duke of Devonshire, if not the most 
 striking, is the most beautiful in this district of countrv. The Blackwater, 
 both above and below the bridge, flows through one of the most verdant 
 of valleys, just wide enough to show its greenness and fertility, and 
 diversified by noble single trees and fine groups. The banks bounding 
 this valley are in some places thickly covered, in other places thinly 
 shaded, with wood. Then there is the bridge itself, and the castle, 
 gray and massive, with its ivy-grown towers ; and the beautiful spire of 
 the church, and the deep-wooded lateral dells that carry to the Blackwater 
 its tributary streams. Nothing, we are certain, can surpass in richness and 
 beauty the view from this bridge, when, at evening, the deep woods, and 
 the gray castle, and the still river are left in shade ; while the sun stream- 
 ing up the valley gilds all the softer slopes that lie opposite. 
 
 The early annalists report Lismore to have been one of the most 
 distinguished seats of learning in Ireland, and that on the site of the 
 present castle there once stood a famous university. It is said that, four 
 thousand students thronged its halls, among whom was counted the name 
 of Alfred the Great. Lismore is described as having been in the seventh 
 century a remarkable and holy city, possessing numerous monasteries, 
 resorts of pious men from Britain, and half of it an asylum into which 
 no woman was permitted to enter ; but its history presents a catalogue of 
 
100 
 
 ALONG THE SOUTH-EASTERN SHORE. 
 
 destructive conflagrations at the hands of the Danes and Ossorians, which' 
 in a measure account for its now being almost destitute of ancient edifices. 
 Its original name was Dunsginne, which eventually gave way to its present, 
 Lis-Mor (Great Fort) from a rath in its immediate vicinity. A bishopric 
 was founded here in the middle of the seventh century by St. Carthagh ; 
 but, after fruitless attempts, in 1225 and 1326, the see was ultimately united 
 to that of Waterford by Edward III. in 1363. Thus, small as the place 
 now is, it is like Cloyne, designated a "city" according to the English 
 definition of the term. The most notable events in its history are its 
 seizure by the Danes in the ninth century ; and the holding there of a 
 council by Henry II. in 11 72. The old cathedral church, St. Carthagh, 
 we are told, was held in such veneration by the Irish, that, in 11 73, 
 Raymond le Gros found a threat of burning it down to be the easiest 
 mode of extracting heavy black-mail from the inhabitants. It is approached 
 through a fine avenue of trees, possesses a graceful white limestone spire, 
 and has been restored in many parts by the Earl of Cork, in 1663, and 
 at later periods. 
 
 But the principal feature of the place is Lismore Castle, a stately 
 pile crowning the rugged rocks that overhang the river, and are so veiled 
 with trees that the foliage seems to spring from the water's edge. 
 The origin of this magnificent edifice is due to the visit of Henry II., 
 who rested at Lismore for two days in his progress through the south of 
 Ireland, when he was so impressed with its importance as a military 
 position, that he determined a fortress should be erected there — a design 
 which was carried out by his son, King John, when Earl of Moreton, in 
 1 185, on the site formerly occupied, as we have said, by the ancient 
 university. This fortress was, however, surprised and destroyed four years 
 later by the Irish, who slew the garrison. It was afterwards rebuilt, 
 and became an Episcopal residence ; and at length, in 1589, it passed 
 with the rest of the manor to Sir Walter Raleigh, by whom it was 
 eventually sold, along with his possessions at Youghal, as already stated, 
 to the first Earl of Cork, and with them ultimately became, by marriage, 
 a part of the estates of the dukedom of Devonshire. In 1627, the 
 celebrated philosopher, Robert Boyle, was born within the walls of the 
 castle, which was much enlarged by his elder brother, the second Earl of 
 Cork. In the rebellion of 1641, it was successfully defended by the young 
 
LISMORE CASTLE. 
 
 101 
 
 Lord Broghill against the attack of five thousand Irish, under Sir Richard 
 Beling ; and two years later, it was again unsuccessfully besieged by a still 
 greater force. In 1645, however, it was compelled to surrender to the 
 attack of Lord Castlehaven. 
 
 The approach to the castle is through fine court-yards, and the interior 
 is fitted up with much elegance and exquisite taste ; while the external 
 views presented at some of the windows are extremely fine. James II. 
 was entertained in the tapestried chamber in 1690, when, on being con- 
 ducted to a lattice, which still bears his name, to take a view of the 
 surrounding scene, he shrank back with terror, and accused his host of a 
 design to hurl him into the abyss below — the river appearing far beneath, 
 in consequence of the great difference of level between the north and 
 south fronts, while the elevated position affords a magnificent view of the 
 valley, and the mountain chains that form its boundaries. The feudal towers 
 of this ducal pile are seen to the best advantage from the handsome bridge, 
 that spans the river at its foot. At the eastern angle of the water face, 
 rises the tower of King James, and to the rear towards the town that 
 known as King John's — the former deriving its name from its having been 
 the resting place of James II., during the war of the Revolution, and the 
 latter from its being: the scene of the first British Parliament held in 
 Ireland under the presidency of King John. In addition to these, there 
 has been erected, since the sketch which illustrates this work was taken, 
 a huge modern tower, flanking- the western angle of the river front, and 
 already overtopping the whole building. It is called the Carlyle tower, 
 after the late Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, who laid the foundation stone, 
 and forms a part of the large additions made under the superintendence 
 of the late Sir Joseph Paxton of Crystal Palace fame. It is, however, 
 incomplete, the work having been stopped upon the death of the Duke of 
 Devonshire, the entire of whose contemplated additions, if ever executed, will 
 make Lismore Castle one of the first residences in the United Kingdom. 
 
 The disciple of old Izaak Walton will perhaps consider all the charms 
 we have presented of the Blackwater, as only second to the information 
 that it abounds in salmon, trout, pike, and perch ; and that the part of 
 the river best adapted for angling lies between Lismore and Mallow, where 
 the scenery continues to be exceedingly fine. Part of the stream is, 
 however, strictly preserved; but it seems a natural trait of Irish hospitality 
 
102 
 
 ALONG THE SOUTH-EASTERN SHORE. 
 
 never to refuse the appeal of a brother angler for permission to cast his line. 
 A branch of the Great Southern and Western Railway follows the course of 
 the river, through Fermoy to Mallow, where it joins the main line at the 
 point where the branch to Killarney and Tralee also connects. However, 
 we were compelled to close our excursion at Lismore, as our yacht was 
 waiting for us at Youghal ; but it ill behooves us to pass from the place 
 without paying a tribute to the general air of comfort that pervades the 
 little city, unmistakably due to the generous character of the late Duke 
 of Devonshire. 
 
 Resuming our cruise, we, at little over a dozen miles from Youghal 
 Harbor, rounded Helvick Head, a bluff promontory, and entered 
 Dungarvan Bay, which, though open and safe, is shallow, and therefore 
 useless to vessels of large burthen. Dungarvan was a place of some note 
 during the civil wars, and the remains of the ancient walls may yet be 
 traced. It is said to have been spared the fate of a bombardment by 
 Cromwell, in consequence of his being flattered by a woman's drinking his 
 health at the entrance of the town. Of the castle, founded by King John, 
 only a portion of the keep at present exists. The town had a population 
 of 8,645 m 1871, and returns one member to parliament. 
 
 Continuing our course along this rock-bound coast, we came upon a 
 succession of magnificent scenes, formed by a number of deep bays, 
 separated from each other by headlands projecting boldly into the ocean. 
 Some of these havens, however beautiful, are carefully avoided by experi- 
 enced mariners. Of this description is Tramore Bay, lying twenty miles 
 east of Dungarvan, for it is extremely shallow, the sand being left bare 
 at low water, and terribly exposed to the southerly gales, which have made 
 it notorious as the scene of numerous shipwrecks.* The village of Tramore, 
 on a hill at the northwest corner of the bay, is a pleasantly situated little 
 watering place, much patronized by the people of Waterford, with which 
 city it is connected by a railway seven miles in length. 
 
 Half a dozen miles further on we entered the noble harbor of Watei- 
 ford, formed by the junction, nearly a dozen miles from the sea, of the 
 
 * A melancholy instance occurred in 1816, when the Sea-horse, transport, having on board the second battalion 
 of the Fifty-ninth Foot, was driven on shore, and 292 men and 71 women and children perished in the open day, 
 under the eyes of thousands of spectators, who were unable to offer them the slightest assistance — sad fate for brave 
 fellows after escaping death in many a well-fought battle in foreign climes, to thus meet it on the shores of their 
 native land. 
 
THE HARBOR OF WATERFORD. 
 
 103 
 
 Suir and the Barrow. These rivers, with the Nore which unites with the 
 Barrow half a score miles still further inland, derive their sources from the 
 same range of mountains in the centre of Ireland, diverge from each 
 other, and after watering various parts of the rich counties of Tipperary 
 and Kilkenny, converge as they approach the termination of their mean- 
 dering courses, and ultimately mingle their waters and discharge them 
 through this broad estuary into the Atlantic. In his " Rivers of Ireland," 
 the poet Spenser has a quaint myth regarding the nativity and union of 
 these streams : — 
 
 " And there the three renowned Brethren were, 
 
 Which that great gyant Blomius begot 
 
 Of the faire nimph Rheiisa wand'ring there : 
 
 One day, as she to shunne the season whot 
 
 Under Slewboome in shady grove was got, 
 
 This gyant found her, and by force deflower'd ; 
 
 Whereof conceiving, she in time forth brought 
 
 These three fair sons, which being thenceforth powr'd 
 In three great rivers ran, and many countreis scowr'd. 
 
 " The first the gentle Shure that, making way 
 
 By sweet Clonmell, adornes rich Waterford ; 
 
 The next, the stubborn Newre whose waters gray 
 
 By fair Kilkenny and Rosseponte boord ; 
 
 The third, the goodly Barrow which doth hoord 
 
 Great heaps of salmons in his deep bosome : 
 
 All which, long sundred, doe at last accord 
 
 To joyne in one, ere to the sea they come ; 
 So, flowing all from one, all one at last become." 
 
 The coasts of this noble bay are studded with the remains of ancient 
 civilization, both religious and military. Not far from its head, and near to 
 the embouchures of the Suir and Barrow, are the remains of Duxbrody 
 Abbey, in the county of Wexford. The monastery is recorded to have 
 been founded, about the year 1182, by Hervey de Montmorency, marshal 
 to Henry II., one of the first of the English adventurers that obtained a 
 footing in Ireland. He was related to Strongbow by marriage, being uncle 
 to the lady Aliva de Montmaurisco, the Earl's first wife. When Strongbow, 
 who had obtained extensive grants of land from Dermot MacMurrou^h, the 
 traitorous King of Leinster, found it necessary to repair to England, to 
 appease the political jealousy of Henry, by formally surrendering to him 
 his Irish acquisitions, he appointed Hervey de Montmorency, Seneschal 
 
104 
 
 ALONG THE SOUTH-EASTERN SHORE. 
 
 of Leinster, and committed to him the command of the English forces. 
 Hervey thereby obtained such influence that it created the envy of 
 Strongbow, who, upon his return to Ireland, found a pretext for quarreling 
 with him, which led the insulted chieftain to quit the army, and to 
 abandon all his lands, except this small portion in the barony of Shel- 
 burne, where he erected this noble abbey, settled it with monks of the 
 Cistercian order, and, retiring from the stormy scenes in which he had 
 been long engaged, assumed the cowl and became its first abbot. Dun- 
 brody Abbey was originally dependent on that of Buildwas in Shropshire, 
 but eventually became independent, and its abbot sat in Parliament as a 
 spiritual lord, until the dissolution of monasteries by Henry VIII., when 
 this was granted to Sir Osborne Itchingham. The edifice, though dilapi- 
 dated by time, and considerably injured by the hands of barbarous 
 despoilers, is one of the most perfect and interesting specimens of the 
 ecclesiastical architecture of its age to be met with in the Kingdom. An 
 arched doorway at the western end and an unique window above it have 
 been pronounced of magnificent workmanship. At the eastern end is an 
 elegant three-light window of the early English style, deeply splayed 
 inwardly and surmounted by smaller ones. The interior viewed from the 
 entrance is singularly striking, having in front the great aisle divided from 
 the cloisters by a double row of arches, supported by massive square 
 pillars, and adorned inside with a moulding springing from beautiful 
 consoles. In the centre of the edifice, sustained by noble arches, fifty feet 
 in height, rises a massive tower, whose gray battlements afford shelter 
 to a community of daws, whose sable plumage and mournful cawings 
 might suggest to the mind of a Brahmin the idea that the souls of the 
 old monks who once paced these dim cloisters inhabited the bodies of 
 these birds, and still lingered around the haunts they loved so well. Some 
 curious tombs of the early benefactors of the abbey existed formerly within 
 its walls, but they have long since been overturned and destroyed by the 
 country people in digging for hidden treasures, which popular tradition 
 says are concealed amongst the ruins. 
 
 Proceeding up the Suir, which for the first score miles separates the 
 provinces of Munster and Leinster, at four miles from its outlet into the 
 harbor, we reached the City of Waterford, the centre of commercial 
 industry for this part of the Kingdom, and the fifth city in point of rank 
 
THE CITY OF WATERFORD. 
 
 105 
 
 in Ireland, having in 1871 a population of 23,337, an< ^ returning two mem- 
 bers to Parliament. It lies upon the southern bank of the river, over 
 which a long wooden bridge of thirty-nine arches connects it with the 
 popular suburb of Ferry Bank on the opposite shore, in the county of 
 Kilkenny, ■ where the railway station for the lines to Kilkenny and Limer- 
 ick is situated. This bridge was constructed at the close of the last 
 century by Mr. Lemuel Cox, of Boston, Mass., in not only a substantial 
 manner, but for a less sum than the original estimate, an antiquated 
 habit which American contractors of the present day are not generally 
 guilty of imitating. Tablets affixed to its central piers record its history, 
 and state it to be 832 feet long, 40 feet broad, and to consist of stone 
 abutments and 40 sets of piers of oak. 
 
 The ancient name of Waterford is stated to have originally been 
 Cuan-na-Grioth, or, Haven of the Sun, and afterwards Gleami-na-Gleodh, 
 or, Valley of Lamentation, so named from the tremendous conflicts between 
 the Irish and the Danes ; while old Irish authors frequently spoke of it 
 as the " Port of the Thigh " from the peculiarity of its shape. Its 
 present name may be said to have been given to it by the Danes, as it is 
 attributed to be a corruption of Vader Fiord, the Ford of the Father. 
 Though historically recorded to have been founded as early as A. D. 
 155, its early importance may be said to date from the year 853, when 
 the Danes founded a colony under their leader Sitric, after which they 
 sallied forth from its fortifications to devastate different parts of the 
 country; and it was still inhabited by them at the time of the English 
 invasion in 1 1 70, when it was captured by the forces of Strongbow 
 under Hervey de Montmorency and Raymond le Gros. In the following 
 year Dermot McMurrough, King of Leinster, gave his daughter Eva 
 here in marriage to Strongbow, when Henry II. landed to take possession 
 of his new kingdom. The city's first charter was granted to it by King 
 John, who in 12 10, resided in it some months. The history of Waterford 
 is so crowded with accounts of sieges and reverses, in great measure caused 
 by its proximity to England, that it would be impossible for us to 
 detail them. We may, however, mention as amongst its most important 
 events, that it was visited by Richard I., who remained here nine months 
 to assuage his grief for the death of Queen Anne ; that for eleven days 
 it withstood the siege of Perkin Warbeck, for which it received its 
 
 14 
 
106 
 
 ALONG THE SOUTH-EASTERN SHORE. 
 
 motto — "Urbs intacta manet ;" that it surrendered to the Parliamentary 
 forces under Cromwell;* and that it espoused the cause of James I., (who 
 embarked here for France, in 1690, after the battle of the Boyne), 
 but three weeks later it was compelled to surrender to the Protestant 
 army under General Kirk. 
 
 The Cathedral is reported to have been originally built by the Danes at 
 the time they embraced Christianity towards the close of the eleventh cen- 
 tury, when the Bishopric was also established, f and Malchus, a Benedictine 
 monk, became its first bishop. It is said to have been a venerable and 
 stately edifice, but, in 1773, the old materials were transformed into the 
 present structure, consisting of a large plain building with a lofty spire. 
 The Roman Catholic Cathedral, erected in 1793, is an imposing structure 
 of the Ionic order, and is reported to have cost ,£20,000, which sum 
 was chiefly obtained from pence taken at the door. It is scarcely to 
 be expected that a city which has been the theatre of so many conflicts 
 can be very rich in archaeological remains. There were a Franciscan 
 Monastery, on whose site was established the hospital of the Holy 
 Ghost ; and a Dominican Priory, the tower and belfry of which are 
 still in existence. A peculiar feature in the defence of the city was its 
 
 * The manner in which Waterford fell into the hands of the Ironsides is peculiarly interesting. The 
 citizens, aided by Lord Ormond, had for some time kept the besiegers at bay, when two brothers named Croker, 
 belonging to Cromwell's army, were detailed with thirty musketeers to fire a small suburb, which act created 
 such a smoke that it alarmed the Irish in the city, many of whom fled, leaving their ladders on the ramparts. 
 This suggested to one of the brothers the possibility of capturing the place with their small force, and so they 
 mounted the wall, rushed in hallooing and firing as they advanced, and the noise and smoke concealing their 
 numbers, the inhabitants fled in dismay under the impression that the entire English army had effected an 
 entrance. One of the brothers, however, was killed in the operation, but the other opened the gate to Cromwell, 
 who, it is related, rewarded him on the spot for his reckless bravery by writing him an order, resting the paper 
 on the pommel of his saddle, for the confiscated possessions of Sir Walter Coppinger, an Irish gentleman 
 residing at Lisnabrin near Tallow. It is added, that upon Croker, shortly afterwards, proceeding thither to claim 
 his newly acquired estates, he was met by the fair daughter of the deposed Knight, who besought permission 
 to tarry awhile with her aged father within their ancestral walls, until provided with another dwelling, and 
 one suited to their ruined fortunes. The request was granted, but the lady never quitted the Castle of 
 Lisnabrin, and still found happiness there notwithstanding that Cromwell's officer became its lord. Though 
 the Crokers have since branched off into many families in Ireland, Walter, the christian name of the old 
 Knight, remains peculiar to the direct line. 
 
 f As mentioned on a previous page, the see of Waterford had that of Lismore united to it in 1363. In 
 the Roman Catholic Church the diocese is now under the charge of a bishop-coadjutor ; but the Protestant 
 bishopric was, in accordance with the act of 1833, annexed to that of Cashel and Emly on the death of the 
 then existing prelate. 
 
THE QUAY AT WATERFORD. 
 
 107 
 
 possession, in addition to its regular fortifications, of several private 
 fortresses called by the names of their respective proprietors, and sup- 
 posed to have been not less than twenty in number. Its great feature 
 to antiquarians, however, is Reginald's Tower, a fine old remnant of 
 Danish architecture, standing near the lower end of the quay. It is 
 named after its founder, Son of Imar, and its history is told in the 
 inscription on a tablet inserted over the entrance, which reads : — " In 
 the year 1003 this tower was erected by Reginald, the Dane; in 1171 
 was held a fortress by Strongbow, Earl of Pembroke;* in 1463, by 
 Statute 3, Edw. IV., a mint was established here; in 1819 it was re-edified 
 in its original form, and appropriated to the Police establishment by 
 the corporate body of the City of Waterford." 
 
 The Quay at Waterford, which extends for more than a mile along 
 the Suir, and The Mall, which branches at right angles from its southern 
 end, are the only streets worth mentioning in the city. The quay 
 has been described by the Tidal Harbor Commissioners as the finest 
 in the United Kingdom, and always presents a lively appearance from 
 the large exporting trade continually carried on, consisting almost en- 
 tirely of agricultural produce, especially live-stock. Steamers for Irish, 
 English, and Scotch ports, daily leave the wharves, which can be ap- 
 proached by vessels of 2,000 tons burden. Many of the principal 
 mercantile houses line the quay and command a view of the opposite 
 side of the river, where several villas have been erected, beyond and 
 above which towers a lofty range of hills, whence an excellent view is 
 obtained of the city and its surroundings. We must not omit to state 
 that Mrs. Jordan, the celebrated actress, was born in the City of 
 Waterford in 1767; and that on the 18th of January, 181 1, Charles 
 Kean first saw the light here. 
 
 Returning to the mouth of the harbor, we passed Dunmore lying 
 in a sheltered nook inside the great western headland. Although now 
 merely a bathing village, in past years it was a place of some 
 
 * After the successful storming of the town by the English forces of Strongbow, in 1171, when the city 
 was plundered, and all the inhabitants found in arms were put to the sword, Reginald, Prince of the Danes, 
 and Malachy O'Faelan, Prince of the Decies, with several other chiefs who had confederated to resist the 
 invaders, were imprisoned here after they were condemned to death. They were saved, however, by the 
 intercession of Dermot MacMurrough, who, with many Welsh and English gentlemen, came to Waterford to 
 be present at the marriage of his daughter Eva to Earl Strongbow. 
 
108 
 
 ALONG THE SOUTH-EASTERN SHORE 
 
 importance, being the Irish station for the mail-packets then plying to 
 Milford Haven, for which service a pier, now deserted, was erected 
 at a cost of ^100,000. The shores in the vicinity are extremely 
 picturesque, and the natural caves formed by the action of the waves 
 in the stupendous cliffs, are numerous and extensive. Their present 
 tenants are marine birds ; but in former days they are said to have 
 afforded asylums and secure storehouses to the bands of smugglers 
 that formerly infested this coast. On the opposite point of the bay, 
 which is here two and a half miles wide, stands Hook Lighthouse, 
 one hundred and ten feet high, situated at the extremity of a narrow 
 peninsula which projects about four miles from the main-land, and 
 forms part of the eastern shore of the harbor. It has evidently 
 been erected upon the remains of an antique building, conjectured, 
 by some, to have been one of the Round Towers. It is more probable, 
 however, that it owes its origin to the Danes, who formed a settlement 
 at Waterford under their leader Yvorus, and would naturally be led 
 to erect a beacon or lighthouse at the entrance of the principal 
 sea-port which had come under their sway. 
 
 About five miles from Hook Tower is Bag-in-bun Head, a small 
 promontory, celebrated as the spot where Robert Fitzstephen landed, — 
 "the first of all Englishmen, after the Conquest, that entered Ireland," 
 as Hollingshead quaintly observes. In the summer of 1169, he em- 
 barked at Milford Haven, with thirty knights, sixty men-at-arms, and 
 three hundred archers, in three ships ; and, after a speedy and pros- 
 perous voyage, landed at this point, giving rise to the well-known 
 proverb : — 
 
 "At the Head of Bag-in-bun 
 Ireland was lost and won." 
 
 Bag-in-bun Head forms the western extremity of Bannow Bay. A 
 little distance from Fethard, an insignificant fishing village on the 
 west shore of this inlet, are the remains of Tintern Abbey, founded 
 in 1200, by the Earl of Pembroke, son-in-law of Strongbow, in com- 
 memoration of his safe deliverance from shipwreck ; and who not only 
 named it after, but peopled it from the more celebrated monastery upon 
 the banks of the Wye, in Monmouthshire. As a modern mansion is 
 formed out of the chancel, little but the tower now remains to identify 
 
COAST BETWEEN WATERFORD AND WEXFORD. 
 
 109 
 
 the ancient monastic edifice. On the opposite side of the bay stood 
 the town of Bannow, which, two hundred years ago, consisted of no 
 less than nine principal streets of well built houses, and four centuries 
 earlier was one of the principal seaports of the country ; but the 
 place has been extinguished either by the depression of the ground, 
 or the ravages of sand, and nothing but a ruined church now re- 
 mains to mark its site. At the head of the bay is an interesting 
 group of ruins, known as the " Seven Churches of Clonmines," but 
 really consisting of four castles and an abbey. A town is said to 
 have existed here in the time of the Danes, of sufficient importance 
 to have possessed a mint, but no traces of it now remain. The 
 Saltee Islands, lying about three miles from the shore, and comprising 
 about one hundred acres of rich pasturage, were a source of danger to 
 mariners until a warning light was placed among them to mark their 
 position.* 
 
 From Bannow Bay the coast is low, flat, and uninteresting for 
 twenty-five miles eastward to Tuskar Lighthouse, an object of interest 
 to voyagers beating up St. George's Channel, built on a small island- 
 rock, lying off Carnsore Point, which forms the south-eastern angle of 
 Ireland. Rounding this point we found the shore to bend suddenly 
 northward, and our bark soon entered the picturesque Harbor of 
 Wexford, through a narrow inlet. "It is formed," says Mr. Hay, "by 
 two narrow necks of land bending towards each other, like two arms 
 closing after an extension from the body, which appearance the river's 
 mouth assumes by its banks, not very unlike the old Piraeus of Athens. 
 The extremities of these peninsulas, denominated the Raven on the 
 
 * The larger of these islands derives a melancholy interest from the fact of its having been the place o: 
 concealment, during the Rebellion of 1798, and the arrest, on June 26th in that year, of Beauchamp Bagenal 
 Harvey and John Colclough, gentlemen of wealth and station in Wexford, and leaders of the Irish forces in 
 that county. After the massacre at Scullabogue, accompanied by Mrs. Colclough, and carrying a large store of 
 provisions, they fled hither, with the view to an ultimate escape to France. Information of their retreat having 
 reached the authorities, a detachment of the 2nd Royals was despatched in a cutter to apprehend them ; and 
 after minute but fruitless search was about to leave the island, when a soldier perceived smoke issuing from a 
 crevice in the rock. It was found to proceed from a cave, the approach to which was difficult and dangerous ; 
 the officer in command, therefore, called upon the inmates to surrender, threatening that, if there were no 
 answer, he would direct his party to fire into the cave. Upon this, Mr. Colclough, fearing danger for his wife, 
 at once appeared, waving a white handkerchief fastened to the end of a stick ; and the two gentlemen having 
 given themselves up were conveyed to Wexford, where they were tried on the following day, and executed the 
 day after. 
 
110 
 
 ALONG THE SOUTH-EASTERN SHORE. 
 
 north, and Roslare on the south, form the entrance into the harbor, 
 which is about a mile and a half broad, and is defended by a fort at the 
 point of Roslare." The bay, into which the river Slaney discharges 
 itself, is about eight miles in length by three in breadth, and is well de- 
 fended from the sea ; but the obstruction of a bar near the entrance, 
 and the shallowness of the water in the harbor, which will not allow 
 vessels of more than two hundred tons burden to enter it, has con- 
 siderably lessened the commercial advantages which its proximity to 
 England would otherwise have commanded.* 
 
 The town of Wexford is pleasantly situated on the side of a hill, 
 the wooded summit of which overlooks the haven ; but its streets 
 are remarkably narrow and inconvenient. It is a place of great anti- 
 quity, having been an important settlement of the Danes, and one of 
 the earliest landing places of the Anglo-Norman invaders ; while in 
 later years it played an important part in the Rebellion of 1798. 
 It was granted a charter by Adomar de Valence in 13 18, and the 
 town was at one time enclosed within walls, traces of which still 
 remain. Near to where the west gate stood are the ruins of the Abbey 
 of St. Selsker.f founded in the twelfth century. It is the most inter- 
 esting archaeological relic in the town, erected on the spot where the 
 first treaty was signed with the English, in 1169, when the town 
 surrendered to Fitz-Stephen. Cromwell is said to have transferred the 
 peal of bells which belonged to this church to one in Liverpool, in return 
 
 * According to Mr. Beaufort, Wexford derives it name from the shallowness of its harbor. "It was 
 founded," he asserts, "in the ninth century, by a colony of Ostmen, Danes, or Frisians, on a bay denominated 
 Garman, but by them Waesfiord or Washford ; which imports a bay formed by the tide, but left nearly dry at 
 low-water, and in this sense the same as the English washes of Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire." During the 
 early days of its maritime importance, when ships of large burden were unknown, Wexford was a mart for the 
 disposal of the serfs or slaves, which the slave merchants purchased in England. " Here might be seen," says 
 an old monkish writer, "whole ranks of fine young men and beautiful women, exposed to sale in the slave- 
 market on the hill. They were sold in part to the Irish noblesse and herdsmen, while others fell to the share 
 of foreign merchants, and were exhibited in the slave marts of Rome and Italy." 
 
 f This abbey was founded and endowed by Sir Alexander Roche, of Atramont, under peculiar circum- 
 stances. When a young man, he was induced by his parents to join the Crusaders, in order that he might be 
 separated from the beautiful daughter of a poor burg«ss who had won his heart, and union with whom was 
 distasteful to them. On his return, finding his parents dead, and himself a free agent, he repaired to the young 
 woman's dwelling, but only to ascertain that, believing him dead, she had entered a convent. His despair at 
 this discovery led to his founding this monastery, dedicating it to the Holy Sepulchre, and becoming its first 
 prior ; and its original name of St. Sepulchre eventually became corrupted into St. Selsker. 
 
BAROXIES OF FORTH AXD BARGY. 
 
 Ill 
 
 for which the merchants of Wexford were granted freedom of the town 
 and exemption from port dues. Of the modern edifices the most 
 noteworthy is the Roman Catholic Church of St. Peter, with its lofty 
 spire and elegant rose windows ; it is attached to a college of the 
 same name, which, with its square central tower, forms a conspicuous 
 object on Summer Hill. A bridge, consisting of two causeways pro- 
 jecting from opposite banks, with a roadway of 722 feet between, was 
 constructed, like that of Waterford, bv Lemuel Cox, the bridge-buildei 
 of Boston, Mass. In the census of 1S71 Wexford had a population 
 of 11,673, an d is a Parliamentary borough returning one member. 
 
 The baronies of Forth and Bargy, which extend along the coast 
 between the harbor of Wexford and Bannow Bay, are quite interesting, 
 partly from the number of fortified houses and towers they contain, 
 of which there are said to be nearly sixty, and partly from the fact 
 that the baronies are inhabited by the descendants of Welsh colonists, 
 who followed Fitz-Stephen and Strongbow thither ; these colonies being, 
 it is presumed, not of primitive Welsh stock, but rather the offspring of 
 Xorman, English, and Welsh families, who had gained possessions in 
 South Wales, and were the adventurers who pushed their fortunes 
 across the channel. The inhabitants of these baronies are peculiar 
 in their folk-lore, habits, and dialect, and General Yallancey published 
 a vocabulary of their language, which shows its close affinity to the 
 Anglo-Saxon. Time, however, is rapidly assimilating the characteristics 
 of the people to those of their neighbors. 
 
 As it was necessary for us to visit Kilkenny, Cashel, and other 
 inland points, we returned overland to Oueenstown, at which place we 
 promised to rejoin our yacht, for an extended cruise along the southern 
 and western coasts. 
 
112 
 
 FROM KILKENNY TO Q UEENSTO WN. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 FROM KILKENNY TO QUEENSTOWN. 
 
 New Ross and its Historic Incidents — Kilkenny, its Castle .and Cathedral — Round Tower and 
 other Antiquities — Its eminent Collegians — Amateur theatricals — Curious case of Witchcraft — 
 Cave of Dunmore — J er point Abbey — Valley of the Suir — Slieve-na-man — Racing for a 
 husband — Clonmel, the " Vale of Honey " — Bianconi and his cars — Donoghmore and Fethard 
 — Cahir — Caves of Mitchelstown — Moat of Knockgraffon — Tipperary — The "Golden Vale" 
 — Rock of Cashel — Cashel Cathedral — Round Tower — Cormac's Chapel — Hore Abbey — Holy 
 Cross Abbey — Thurles — Kilcolman Castle. 
 
 THOUGH the railway would have conveyed us in less than three hours 
 from the town of Wexford to the city of Kilkenny, we preferred 
 stopping on the way at Ballywilliam, for the purpose of visiting New 
 Ross, five miles distant from the line, and a thriving borough, with a 
 population, according to the last census, of 7,132, returning one 
 member to Parliament. It is pleasantly situated on the border line 
 between the counties of Kilkenny and Wexford, and upon the banks of 
 the Barrow, a little distance below its point of junction with the Nore, 
 and here a majestic stream crossed by a long wooden bridge, another 
 example of the workmanship of the American bridge-builder referred 
 to in the last chapter. Tradition ascribes the foundation of the town 
 to Rose, daughter of Crume, King of Denmark ; and its walls to 
 another Rose, who was the sister of Strongbow; while it is otherwise 
 stated to have been founded, shortly after the English invasion, by 
 Isabella, daughter of the latter, and encircled by more than a mile of 
 defences. An ancient poem describing the building of the walls in 
 1265, (necessitated by the dread felt by the inhabitants, lest they might 
 suffer from the feud then raging between the chief of the Geraldines 
 and the Earl of Ulster,) relates that different trades worked on them 
 
KILKENNY AND ITS HISTORY. 
 
 113 
 
 upon different week days, and that on Sundays the ladies performed 
 their share of the labor. New Ross was certainly a place of im- 
 portance in the thirteenth century, and enjoyed considerable trade in 
 the early part of the fifteenth, when it is said to have obtained its 
 charter from Henry IV. It surrendered to Cromwell in 1649, and it was 
 the scene of severe conflicts in which Bagenal Harvey played an impor- 
 tant part in the Rebellion of '98. The scenery of the surrounding country 
 is very beautiful, while the river being an abiding place of salmon is nat- 
 urally rendered attractive to the angler. The town does a considerable 
 export trade, and a steamboat plies daily down the Barrow to Waterford. 
 
 The first impression of Kilkenny from a cursory glance is extremely 
 fine, the Cathedral of St. Canice, the noble castle, and other very imposing 
 structures, coming into almost every view, from the unevenness of the 
 ground, and the happily chosen sites of the edifices. The city is divided 
 into two unequal parts, called respectively Irish-town (the neighborhood of 
 the cathedral) and English-town (that of the castle) — the former lying on 
 the eastern, and the latter on the western bank of the Nore, which is here 
 spanned by two fine bridges, from one of which, St. John's bridge, a romantic 
 view is obtained of the castle of the Ormondes. Kilkenny (ancient Cill- 
 chainnigJi) was founded by Strongbow in 11 72, and was for a long time 
 the capital of the " Pale," or the limit of English authority ; and during the 
 succeeding three centuries, dissensions were so frequent between the resi- 
 dents of the English and Irish towns that the law had often either to 
 interpose on behalf of the oppressed Irish, or to guard the rights of the 
 English.* Parliaments have frequently been held in the city, memorable 
 among which are those of 1309 and 1367, by which stringent penalties 
 were imposed upon the English who "affected the fashion of the Irish;" 
 and that of the confederated Catholics in 1642, which led to the re- 
 establishment of Roman Catholicism in Ireland. In 1400, Kilkenny 
 was surrounded by walls, traces of which are still extant. In 1690, 
 William III. entered it after the battle of the Boyne. The population of 
 the city at the time of taking the last census, in 1871, was 12,667, an d it 
 is represented by one member in the British Parliament. 
 
 * The famous legend of "The Kilkenny Cats," which fought so furiously that nothing was left of them but 
 their tails, is an allegory of a feud between the municipalities of Kilkenny and Irish-town, about their respective 
 boundaries and rights, which was continued to the end of the seventeenth century, and resulted in their mutual 
 impoverishment and in its only legacy being the tales of their dissensions. 
 15 
 
114 
 
 FROM KILKENNY TO Q UEENSTO WN. 
 
 Kilkenny Castle, the residence of "the chief butler of Ireland," 
 appears to have been originally commenced by Richard de Clare 
 (Strongbow) upon the immediate foundation of the city ; but, in the 
 following year, 1 1 73, while still in course of construction, it was destroyed 
 by Donald O'Brien, King of Limerick. It was, however, rebuilt in 1195 
 by William, Lord Marshall, Earl of Pembroke, in the possession of whose 
 descendants it remained until the year 1391, when it was purchased by 
 James Butler, the third Earl of Ormonde, and from that time to the 
 present it has been the principal residence of his illustrious descendants. 
 The founder of this family was Theobald Walter, one of the followers 
 of Henry II., who bestowed upon him some of his newly acquired 
 possessions in Ireland, and the office of chief butler of Ireland, which 
 station, with the estates, was made hereditary ; and from this office the 
 name of Le Botiller, or Butler, is derived, the ancient family surname being 
 < now a matter of dispute. In 1399, the earl had here the honor of receiv- 
 ing King Richard II., and of entertaining that sovereign for fourteen 
 days. In March, 1650, when the city was invested by Oliver Cromwell, 
 and its defence intrusted to Sir Walter Butler, the guns of the former 
 were opened on the castle, and a breach was effected on the 25th ; but 
 the besiegers were twice gallantly repulsed, and the breach was quickly 
 repaired. On this occasion it was said that Cromwell, apprehending a 
 longer resistance than suited the expedition necessary in his military 
 operations at the time, was on the point of quitting the place, when he 
 received overtures from the mayor and townsmen, offering to admit him 
 into the city. He accordingly took possession of Irish-town, and being 
 soon after joined by Ireton with fifteen hundred fresh men, Sir Walter 
 Butler, considering the weakness of the garrison, determined to execute 
 Lord Castlehaven's orders, which were, that if not relieved by seven o'clock 
 the day before, he should not expose the townsmen to be massacred, 
 but make as good conditions as he could by a timely surrender. The articles 
 of capitulation were highly creditable to the garrison ; and it is recorded 
 that Sir Walter Butler and his officers, when they marched out, were 
 complimented by Cromwell, who told them they were gallant fellows; and 
 that he had lost more men in storming that place than he had in taking 
 Drogheda, and that he should have gone without it, had it not been for 
 the treachery of the townsmen. 
 
KILKENNY CASTLE. 
 
 115 
 
 Of the original castle, as rebuilt by the Earl of Pembroke, but little 
 now remains. It was an oblong square of magnificent proportions, with 
 four lofty round towers at its angles. Towards the close of the seven- 
 teenth century, this castle was remodelled by the first Duke of Ormonde 
 in the bad style of architecture then prevailing on the Continent — a taste 
 for which the duke had probably acquired in his repeated visits to France. 
 It retained, however, three of the ancient towers, but changed in character, 
 and disfigured by fantastic decorations, to make them harmonize in style 
 with the newer portions of the building. These modifications were, 
 fortunately, removed by the grandfather of the present marquis, and an 
 edifice of better taste, the subject of our present engraving, erected on 
 the site, preserving the ancient towers, and restoring them to something 
 like their original character ; and this building, from the designs of Mr. 
 Robertson, of Kilkenny, has been recently subjected to restoration. The 
 interior decorations are also modern in style, but the castle continues to 
 be adorned with its original collection of ancient tapestries and pictures, 
 valuable as works of art, but still more as memorials of some of the most 
 distinguished historical, personages of the two last centuries. 
 
 Nothing can be finer than the situation of this castle, placed as it 
 is on a lofty eminence immediately overhanging a charming river, 
 along the banks of which, and directly beneath the castle, there is a 
 very pleasant walk. From the turret a magnificent view is presented 
 of the city and of the winding Nore and its fertile valley. A singular 
 effect, said to be undiscernible anywhere else in the world, is here 
 exhibited of a large city, the numerous chimneys of whose houses 
 emit no smoke — a marvel thus recorded in an old rhyme : — 
 
 " Fire without smoke, earth without bog, 
 Water without mud, air without fog, 
 And streets paved with marble." 
 
 The first of these advantages is attributed to the use of anthracite 
 coal, obtained from the mines of Castle-comer and those of South 
 Wales. The second and fifth result from there being little bog land in 
 the vicinity, and the streets being literally paved with a black marble 
 quarried in the immediate neighborhood. But however silvery the Nore may 
 have been in the time of the rhymer, its waters in the immediate vicinity of the 
 
116 
 
 FROM KILKENNY TO Q UEENSTO WN. 
 
 city are now scarcely translucent, although it is unmistakeable that a vast 
 number of small streams running into it are as clear as crystal. 
 
 From the military we crossed the Nore to the ecclesiastical emi- 
 nence of the town, the hill opposite the castle, crowned with the noble 
 Cathedral of St. Canice. This is one of the most beautiful masses 
 of architecture in Ireland. The hill on which it stands is crowned 
 with noble trees, hiding and disclosing the old towers very pictur- 
 esquely, the tall shaft of the famous Round Tower soaring above all. 
 The graceful proportions of the cathedral give it a lightness and ele- 
 gance not common to buildings of its capacity — St. Canice being 
 (among Irish churches) only inferior in size to Christ Church and 
 St. Patrick's, in Dublin. It was commenced about the year 1180,* by 
 Bishop O'Dullany, who translated the old see of Ossory, from Aghaboe to 
 Kilkenny.f From the vastness of the design its authors could hardly 
 expect to see it completed, consequently they finished the choir and 
 had it consecrated, and it was not until two centuries had elapsed that 
 the noble plan was consummated. The sacred pile is cruciform in 
 shape, extending two hundred and twenty-six feet from east to west, 
 and the length of the transepts measuring one hundred and twenty- 
 three feet. The nave is distributed into a centre and two lateral 
 aisles, communicating by pointed arches, springing from plain pillars of 
 black marble. Four pointed windows illuminate each aisle, and the 
 upper part of the nave is lighted by five quatrefoil windows. The 
 tower, much too low in proportion to the length of the choir and 
 transept, is supported upon groined arches, springing from massive 
 
 * It is presumed by some antiquarians that the present cathedral was erected upon the site of a building 
 coeval with the introduction of Christianity into Ireland ; and they seem to have no doubt that a holy man, 
 named Canice or Canicus, built somewhere near the present cathedral a cell from which, joined with the name 
 of the saint, the town aftenvards took its name. This latter opinion is supported by reference to various 
 authorities by Peter Shee, the historian of the cathedral. But to their opinions Dr. Ledwick entirely dissents, 
 considering the saint "an imaginary personage." 
 
 f The bishopric of Ossory, regarded as the most ancient in Ireland, was founded by St. Kieran in 402, at 
 Saighir, Kings County, and was transferred to Aghaboe or Aghavoe, Queens County, in 1052, and again to 
 Kilkenny in 1 180, as stated above. The ancient province of Ossory was divided into Kings and Queens 
 counties in the sixteenth century. According to act of Parliament passed in 1833, the Protestant sees of Ferns 
 and Leighlin became united to Ossory, on the death of the bishop of the former in 1835. In the Roman 
 Catholic church, however, Ossory and Ferns remain distinct dioceses, while the see of Leighlin is now united 
 to that of Kildar*. 
 
CATHEDRAL OF ST. CAN ICE. 
 
 11? 
 
 columns of marble. The western window is triplicated, and a cross 
 and two Gothic finials crown the centre and angles of the great 
 gable. The choir extends seventy-seven feet in length, and is unin- 
 terrupted in its simple grandeur by any of the trifling, though not 
 unusual, decorations of cathedral churches. St. Mary's Chapel, now 
 used as a parish church, is situated to the north of the choir, and com- 
 municates with the north transept ; and the chapter-house and bishop's 
 court occupy corresponding positions on the south. 
 
 The present condition of the cathedral reflects much credit upon the 
 later incumbents of the see of Ossory. The venerable structure suf- 
 fered greatly during the wars of the seventeenth century ; and the 
 whole of the interior remained in a state of dilapidation, and was 
 rapidly sinking into decay, until 1756, when Bishop Pococke, on being 
 advanced to the see of Ossory, raised and set up the inverted monu- 
 ments, restored the shattered walls, and re-edified the whole structure, 
 being aided thereto by generous subscriptions. A more recent restor- 
 ation of the cathedral was commenced in 1865, and completed under 
 the superintendence of Mr. T. N. Deane, architect. It is recorded 
 that about 13 18, the eastern window was embellished with stained glass 
 of so much beauty that Rimini, a nuncio of the pope, offered £100 
 for it to Bishop Roth and the chapter, which they, valuing their 
 honor above gold, very properly refused. During Cromwell's usurpation, 
 his fanatic followers demolished this window, allowing but few fragments 
 to elude their sacrilegious hands ; these Dr. Pococke gathered, and 
 caused to be inserted in the window above the western door. Bishop 
 Pococke died in the see of Meath, to which he was translated from 
 that of Ossory ; but his public services, his eminent virtues, and great 
 learning, are rewarded with an honorable gratitude by the erection here 
 of a cenotaph, bearing a feelingly-written inscription to his memory. 
 He not only caused those permanent repairs which a continuation of 
 existence demanded, but exercised a vigilance in the detection of every 
 fragment of antiquity in the cathedral that had escaped the ravages of 
 time or barbarity. 
 
 The chair or throne of St. Kieran, a stone seat with arms ot 
 upright stone having a graceful curve, stands in the north transept. 
 This patriarch is believed to have preceded St. Patrick in his holy mission 
 
118 
 
 FROM KILKENNY TO Q UEENSTO WN. 
 
 by thirty years, and to have been the first to preach Christianity 
 in Ireland. Under the second window from the vestibule is a monu- 
 ment to the memory of Bishop Walshe, the unhappy manner of whose 
 death has been unnoticed in the inscription. In the year 1585, he 
 cited one James Dullard, a profligate wretch, to appear in his court, 
 and reply to a charge of adultery ; but the monster answered the 
 citation by breaking into the palace of the bishop, and stabbing him 
 to the heart with a skean. He then fled into Troy's Wood, and 
 uniting himself to the banditti that infested the vicinity, stated the 
 mode in which he had qualified himself for his new vocation ; but the 
 brigands were so shocked at his crimes, and so disgusted with his 
 confidence, that they formally tried him, found him guilty on his own 
 confession, twisted a gad around his neck, and hung him from a tree 
 in the forest. 
 
 There are in the cathedral many sepulchral honors to the memory 
 of the ancient and illustrious house of Butler, notable among which 
 we may mention that of Peter Butler, eighth Earl of Ormonde, who 
 died in 1539, and his haughty countess, Lady Margaret Fitzgerald, 
 whose memory is perpetuated by the Irish, under the name of 
 Moryhyhead Ghearhodh. This extraordinary lady, inheriting the martial 
 spirit of her ancestors, was always attended by numerous vassals, well 
 clothed and accoutred, and composing a formidable army. She had 
 several strong castles within the limits of her territory, of which that 
 at Ballyragget was her favorite citadel. Near to the cathedral are 
 the bishop's palace and the chapter-house, as well as the Well of 
 St. Canice, which is still held in great repute, its water, on the hottest 
 day, being said to possess an icy coldness. 
 
 Close to the south transept of the cathedral stands the Round Tower, 
 in good preservation, one hundred and eight feet high and forty-seven 
 in circumference at the base and with its entrance, facing the south, eight feet 
 from the ground. This tower has some features differing from those of 
 similar structures, one being the width of the windows, of which there are 
 six at the summit, two beyond the usual number, and between which 
 and the door five square openings are placed. Not far distant are 
 the ruins of the Franciscan Monastery, which have been degraded in 
 turn to the uses of a tennis-court and a brewery. The Dominican or 
 
PUBLIC EDIFICES OF KILKENNY. 
 
 119 
 
 Black Abbey, also situated in Irish-town and founded in 1225, has been 
 rescued from the grasp of the despoiler, and restored to the services 
 of the Roman Catholic Church. The parish Church of St. John in 
 the same district, was formerly the hospital of St. John, founded by 
 William, Earl of Pembroke, in 1220, but used as barracks prior to its 
 restoration. Its peculiarity is the number and extreme beauty of its 
 windows, which have obtained for it the name of the " Lantern of 
 Ireland." The choir still remains unrenovated. It would be impossible, 
 however, to notice all the remnants of antiquity still to be found 
 in Kilkenny. "There is, perhaps, no city in Ireland," say Mr. and 
 Mrs. Hall, " so full of striking, interesting, and — notwithstanding the 
 unseemly localities in which they are, for the most part, situated — 
 picturesque ruins as Kilkenny. Our way was guided through numerous 
 alleys and by-lanes, to examine relics of the olden time : we found 
 wretched hovels propped up by carved pillars ; and in several instances 
 discovered Gothic door-ways converted into entrances to pig-sties. 
 Ruins of abbeys, churches, castles, and castellated houses, are to be 
 encountered in every quarter." 
 
 In all views of the city, one of the most conspicuous features is 
 the noble gray limestone tower of the new Roman Catholic Cathedral, which 
 is, like the more ancient cathedral, cruciform in shape, having a lofty apse, 
 and is considered to be by far . the handsomest building of the kind in 
 Ireland. Another Roman Catholic structure worthy of special notice is 
 the College dedicated to St. Kieran — a modern Gothic building situated on 
 the Clonmel road. 
 
 Kilkenny has long borne an enviable reputation in the annals ot 
 education. The Bittlers Grammar School, founded in the sixteenth 
 century, was endowed by the Duke of Ormonde in 1684, and made a 
 royal college by King James. It takes high rank among like institutions; 
 and well it may, when it is considered that it enrols among its alumni 
 such names as Congreve, Farquhar, Dean Swift, Bishop Berkeley, and 
 Harris, the antiquary. While within the demesne of literature we may add 
 that it is no light honor to Kilkenny that it was the birthplace of Banim, 
 who stands in the head rank of his country's novelists, and has been, not 
 inaptly, termed the " Irish Walter Scott." During nearly the entire first 
 score years of the present century, the city was noted as being the scene 
 
120 
 
 FROM KILKENNY TO Q UEENSTO WN. 
 
 of private theatricals in which several men of mark and several profes- 
 sional ladies of celebrity took part, the former including Thomas Moore 
 in its number, and the latter Miss O'Neil, who retired from the stage, 
 in 1819, upon her marriage with Sir Wrixon Becher, one of the amateur 
 performers at these entertainments. The theatrical season invariably drew 
 to the city a vast assemblage of rank and talent, which led the streets to 
 be " thronged with chariots and horses, and parties of ladies riding single 
 gave a most agreeable effect to the aspect of the town." 
 
 Kilkenny is also famous as being the scene of some persecutions for 
 witchcraft, which find a parallel in the horrors enacted at Salem, in 
 Massachusetts. The most remarkable case is that of one Dame Alice 
 Kettyl, who, it is authoritatively stated, was early in the fourteenth century 
 summoned before the Bishop's Court to answer the charge of practising 
 magic, sorcery, and witchcraft ; and, with her maids Petronilla and Basilia, 
 was accused of holding nightly conferences with an imp, or evil spirit, 
 called Robin Artysson, to whom, in order to obtain his aid, they sacrificed 
 on the highway nine red cocks, and the eyes of nine peacocks. Dame 
 Alice, it is further said, caused this imp and his associates, to sweep the 
 streets of Kilkenny every night between " the hours of complin-prayer 
 and daybreak;" not, however, for the purpose of sweetening the 
 town and making it agreeable, but for the good of her greedy son, one 
 William Utlan — a land-pirate who monopolized the town-parks, and 
 grasped at great possessions — to whose door the cunning mother had the 
 filth of the city raked, so that he might manure his meadows with it. Such 
 of the inhabitants as ventured abroad at late hours heard unearthly 
 brooms plying over the causeway, and saw fearful-looking scavengers at 
 their dirty work, scouring away to the slow chorus : — 
 
 " To the house of William, my son, 
 Hie all the wealth of Kilkenny town." 
 
 Beyond this, the chroniclers assert that Dame Alice surpassed even Cap- 
 tain Freney, the robber, and his Kellymount gang, in riding amid the 
 darkness of night ; for immediately upon the nine peacocks' eyes being 
 cast into the fire, up rose Robin the imp, and presented her with a pot 
 of ointment, with which she oiled her broomstick, and then briskly 
 mounting it, and accompanied by her maids, Petronilla and Basilia, per- 
 formed a night's journey in a minute, in order to hold a Sabbat with 
 
ANCIENT TRIALS FOR WITCHCRAFT. 
 
 121 
 
 other enchanters on the Devil's Bit, in the county of Tipperary. The 
 accused were all convicted ; but the Dame having powerful friends was 
 merely sentenced to pay a fine and abjure sorcery. Returning, how- 
 ever, to her old pranks, she found it prudent to escape to the Continent 
 in company with her maid Basilia. But Petronilla, less fortunate, was 
 burnt at the stake near the cross of Kilkenny, declaring, previously, that 
 William Utlan was a confederate, and had worn the devil's girdle round 
 his body for a twelve-month and a day; yet Utlan's life was spared 
 on condition of his covering the roof of St. Mary's church with lead. 
 On searching the Dame's closet after her flight, says Hollinshed, they 
 found a sacramental wafer having Satan's name stamped thereon, and a 
 pot of ointment with which she greased her staff, and was thus enabled 
 to amble and gallop through thick and thin and in fair weather and foul. 
 
 Mr. Crofton Croker, in a letter on this subject published in the 
 " Dublin Penny Journal," considers this trial, perhaps one of the earliest 
 on record, to have been an act of ecclesiastical persecution, having for 
 its object the extortion of money for the roofing of the church with 
 lead ; and adds that the connection with the fairy creed is obvious 
 from the name of the evil spirit, as every Irish scholar will perceive 
 that Artysson when translated means chicken-flesh, while Robin is a 
 familiar name in fairy-lore. Mr. Croker, in conclusion, justly remarks : — 
 " Ireland has been, in my opinion, unjustly stigmatized as a barbarous 
 and superstitious country. It is certain that the cruel persecution 
 carried on against poor and ignorant old women was as nothing in 
 Ireland when compared with other countries. In addition to the three 
 executions at Kilkenny, a town the inhabitants of which were - almost 
 entirely either English settlers, or of English descent, I only remember 
 to have met with an account of one other execution for the crime of 
 witchcraft. This latter took place at Antrim, in 1699, and it is, I 
 believe, the last on record. The particulars of this silly tragedy were 
 printed in a pamphlet entitled 'The Bewitching of a Child in Ireland,' 
 and from thence copied by Professor Sinclair in his work entitled 
 'Satan's Invisible World Discovered,' which is frequently referred to by 
 Sir Walter Scott in his ' Letters on Demonology.' " 
 
 Three or four miles to the north of Kilkenny is the Cave of 
 Dunmore, introduced by Banim into his novel " Crohore of the Bill- 
 
 16 
 
FROM KILKENNY TO Q UEENSTO WN. 
 
 hook." The visitor after descending a large oval pit, evidently the 
 result of the depression of the surface, enters an irregularly shaped 
 cavern of considerable circumference, with the roof fifty feet high and 
 the floor sloping downwards. A narrow passage then leads by a 
 slippery path to an inner chamber where the eye is attracted by a 
 .variety of stalactitic forms, which the imagination compares to those of 
 different objects. After this the cave narrows and again widens into 
 a third large apartment, with beyond cavities and winding passages 
 which it is reported run out even as far as the castle at Kilkenny. 
 There passes through the cave, at some distance from its mouth, a 
 stream of water near which, and in other parts far within the cavity, 
 there have been found a number of skulls and bones, some of them 
 enveloped in calcareous spar. 
 
 On the line of railway to Waterford, and about a dozen miles 
 from Kilkenny, is Thomastown, named after its founder, Thomas 
 Fitzanthony, one of the earliest of the English settlers. It is pleas- 
 antly situated upon the Nore, and was once a walled town and a 
 place of importance, owing to the river being, until a late date, so far 
 navigable. It contains some ruins, but these have little import com- 
 pared with Jerpoint Abbey, which is situated in the immediate 
 neighborhood, and decorates the banks of the same "stubborn Nore." 
 This abbey was founded in 1180, for Cistercian monks, by Donogh 
 McGilla-Patrick, Prince of Ossory. The abbot is recorded to have 
 been a peer of Parliament, and the abbey in wealth and architectural 
 grandeur to have stood the fourth in rank among the mitred abbeys 
 of Ireland. The demesne lands extended over 6500 acres of fertile 
 ground, and the buildings included the abbey-church and tower, a 
 refectory, dormitory, and offices, occupying an area of three acres. 
 The whole of this property, bequeathed for objects purely sacred, was 
 granted at the dissolution, in 1540, to Thomas Butler, tenth Earl of 
 Ormonde, at an annual rent of ^49 $s. gd. 
 
 The style of architecture of the abbey combines the Anglo-Norman 
 and Early English, and those parts that survive, display a beauty and 
 perfection not inferior to anything of coeval structure in the kingdom ; 
 but, from neglect and barbarity, this most splendid ruin has been 
 so injured and polluted, that at one time the proportions of its vast 
 
ELV.YS OF JERPOIXT ABBEY. 
 
 123 
 
 choir and wide-spread arches, the shattered frames of the richly traced 
 windows, with the mouldering fragments of sepulchral monuments, were, 
 we are informed, imbedded in such a surface of mire and filth, as to 
 prohibit ingress or inspection. But, fortunately, before it was too late, the 
 Kilkenny Archaeological Society, one of those local institutions that are 
 doing so much to preserve the relics of antiquity which adorn the British 
 Isles, has taken these venerable ruins under its protection, and rescued 
 them from the degraded position into which they had fallen. Mr. and 
 Mrs. Hall remark of these relics, that " they stand alone in their mag- 
 nificence ; there is no object within ken to distract the attention — nothing 
 to disturb the imagination in recalling them to their condition of wealth 
 and splendor, to contrast it, after a while, with their fallen state, as we 
 pace through dilapidated aisles, among broken sculptured sepulchres of the 
 ancient lords, or ' close-packed ' graves of the poor peasants of yesterday." 
 To which we may add the impressions of a poetical visitor : — 
 
 I gaze where Jerpoint's venerable pile, 
 
 Majestic in its ruins, o'er me lowers : 
 The worm now crawls through each untrodden aisle, 
 
 And the bat bides, within its time-worn towers." 
 
 And not the least charm in the picturesque aspect of these ruins is 
 their position on a beautiful stream, which, to use the language of the 
 poet just quoted, " makes lonely music in its flow " as it journeys onward 
 to its junction with the Barrow : — 
 
 " Thy stream, thou lovely river ! thine, sweet Nore ! 
 Flowing, though all around thee feel decay : 
 Thy banks still verdant as in days of yore, 
 
 Through the same plains dry crystal waters stray." 
 
 A journey by rail of a score miles southward took us to the station on 
 the Suir, opposite Waterford ; but, as we had already visited that city, we 
 at once proceeded in a westerly direction upon the railway which passes 
 up the valley, and skirts the northern shore of that river to Clonmel, a 
 distance of twenty-eight miles from Waterford. The Suir, whose banks 
 are here beautifully wooded and have upon them many a crumbling and 
 moss-grown ruin, separates the counties of Waterford and Kilkenny to 
 within a short distance of Carrick-on-Suir, about midway between Waterford 
 and Clonmel, and then the county of Tipper^ry lines its northern, while 
 
124 
 
 FROM KILKENNY TO QUEENSTOWN. 
 
 that of Waterford continues to extend along its southern bank. - Soon 
 after re-entering Munster we passed Carrick, prettily situated on the river, and 
 had a glimpse of the old castle of the Ormondes, built in 1309, and the ivy- 
 covered antique bridge. The line continues to run parallel to the beautiful 
 flowing stream, and as it approaches Clonmel the valley becomes exceedingly 
 picturesque, its southern slope being composed of the wooded spurs of 
 the Commeragh mountains, which closely approach the stream, while on 
 its north rises Slieve-na-man, a solitary conical mountain, 2362 feet high, 
 which, like many other of the Irish peaks, has a story of its own to tell. 
 The proper Irish name of the latter is Sliabh-na-mJian-Fionn-na-Heirm, 
 "the mountain of the fair women of Ireland," attributed to this hymeneal 
 incident : Fin Mac Cual (the reputed father of Ossian, and the Fingal of 
 Macpherson's poem), puzzled as to which of the fair daughters of Erin he 
 should select for a wife, caused all the beauties of the land to assemble 
 at the foot of this mountain, and take part in a race for his hand. Tak- 
 ing his seat on the Druid's altar that crowns its summit, he gave a 
 signal for the test of speed and wind, and off started the fair ones — 
 " away, away, they went, through wood, and heath, and furze, over crag 
 and mountain stream ; all obstacles appeared nought with such a prize in 
 view " — and Graine, the daughter of Cormac, monarch of Ireland, having 
 proved herself the fleetest, secured the hand of the Fenian chief. This 
 mountain is also celebrated by Ossian as the scene of the most renowned 
 hunting-match of the Fenians. 
 
 Clonmel is situated on both sides of the Suir, here crossed by a bridge 
 of twenty arches, and on Moire and Long Islands, connected with the 
 mainland by three bridges. The origin of the name is fancifully attributed 
 to the Tuatha-de-dannans, a primitive Irish race, who were guided in the 
 selection of a settlement by a swarm of bees which they let off for the 
 purpose, and these resting here, a baile or circular fort was erected, and 
 the spot received the significant name of Cluain-mealla, or, the " Plain of 
 Honey." The fort afterwards gave way to a castle and fortifications, before 
 which Cromwell sustained the severest repulse he met with in Ireland. 
 Its defenders, failing in ammunition, were compelled to fire away their 
 buttons, and it is said that the Protector, after deciding to raise the siege, 
 renewed the attack on finding a silver bullet, which impressed him with 
 the belief that the garrison was driven to straits that would soon compel 
 
CLONMEL, THE " VALE OF HONEY: 
 
 125 
 
 it to surrender. Clonmel had a population of 11,104 in 1871, returns 
 one member to Parliament, and is principally situated in Tipperary, of 
 which county it is the largest town, and the place for holding the assizes 
 of the South Riding. The town received its charter in 1608, although in- 
 corporated much earlier. The manufacture of woolen goods was introduced 
 in 1667, by the Duke of Ormonde, then Lord-Lieutenant, who brought five 
 hundred Walloons over from Canterburv, but the manufacture declined at 
 the Revolution. The old church is an interesting edifice, and is pictur- 
 esquely overshadowed by trees, while the churchyard is surrounded by 
 remains of the old walls, with square towers at intervals. The west gate, 
 the only one left out of four, has been preserved and stands at the 
 entrance of the main street. The town lays claim to being the birth- 
 place of Lawrence Sterne, the humorous divine, and the Countess of 
 Blessington, the popular authoress. It was here, also, that the trial of 
 Smith O'Brien for high treason took place in 1848. In Clonmel, too, 
 was started the system of cheap and expeditious car traveling which 
 conferred such a benefit upon the country. The originator, Mr. Bianconi, 
 a native of Milan, in Italy, settled in this place early in the century 
 as a framer of, and dealer in pictures ; and having by industry and 
 frugality amassed a little money, he, in 181 5, conceived the idea of 
 running a car to Cahir. to accomodate those who could not afford to 
 travel bv mail-coach. From this little beg-inningr branched forth the 
 system so popular with travelers in the south and west of Ireland, 
 carrying, as it has been truly observed, " civilization and letters into 
 some of the wildest haunts of the rudest races in Erin's Isle;" and 
 gaining for the introducer the respect and esteem of his fellow-towns- 
 men, by whom he was repeatedly elected mayor. 
 
 The situation of Clonmel is extremely picturesque, the Suir is here 
 a broad and rapid stream, and the surrounding country is a blending 
 of Alpine and pastoral scenery. The Commeragh mountains, which 
 shelter it on the south and seem to terminate the streets, extend far 
 into the county of YVaterford, and " are inhabited by a people identical 
 with the Cumraeg of Wales and Cumberland, and the Cimri of antiquity, 
 so formidable to the Romans." There are many delightful sylvan 
 walks by the side of the town and near the river's brim that well 
 merit the poetical names by which they are designated, the principal 
 
126 
 
 FROM KILKENNY TO QUEENS TOWN. 
 
 being the Wilderness, the Round of Heywood, the Green, and Fairy- 
 hill Road. 
 
 The ruined church of Donoghmore, a few miles to the north-east of 
 Clonmel, is one of the oldest edifices in Ireland, presenting a com- 
 bination of Pagan and Saxon architecture; its situation, "in keeping 
 with its aspect, being lonely and wild but not melancholy." Six miles 
 to the north of Clonmel, and near to Slieve-na-man, is the small and 
 ancient town of Fethard, built in the time of King John, and mainly 
 remarkable for the preservation of its fortifications, castles, and gate- 
 ways. Before the Union, the town was represented in the Irish Parliament, 
 the patronage being in the O'Callaghan family, and its ambition is 
 exhibited in its being governed "by a sovereign, twelve chief burgesses, 
 portreeve, and an indefinite number of freemen, assisted by a recorder, 
 town-clerk, sergeant-at-mace, and other officers." 
 
 A few miles west of Clonmel, the railway leaves the vicinity of the 
 Suir, which here makes a detour to the south, but eleven miles from 
 Clonmel it comes upon it again, flowing from north to south, and 
 crosses it at Cahir, a small but thriving town in the midst of a 
 grain-growing district. The produce of the land affords here employ- 
 ment to several flour-mills mainly belonging to members of the Society 
 of Friends, who long ago settled in this part of the country. The 
 ivy-clad castle was originally built in 1142 by Connor, King of 
 Thomond, and was taken by the Earl of Essex in 1599, by Murroch 
 O'Brien Lord Inchiquin in 1647, and again by Cromwell in 1650. 
 It is picturesquely situated on a rock, is of irregular outline con- 
 sequent upon its adaptation to the form of its insular site, and con- 
 sists of a great square keep and extensive outworks, flanked by seven 
 towers, which during the present century have been very judiciously 
 put into thorough repair. This castle, however, is said to occupy the 
 site of a structure of very remote antiquity — its ancient name being 
 Cahir-duna-ascaigh, or The circular stone fortress of the fish-abounding 
 Dun, or fort, which would seem to indicate that an earthen Dun or fort, 
 had originally occupied the site on which a Cahir, or stone fort, was 
 erected subsequently. 
 
 From Cahir we made an excursion to the celebrated Caves of 
 Mitchelstown, situated ten miles to the south-west, and half-a-dozen miles 
 
CAVES OF MITCHELSTOWN. 
 
 127 
 
 short of the town which gives them their name, our roads being over a 
 wild country, but giving us grand views of the valley of the Suir, and of the 
 Knockmeiledown and Galtee ranges which respectively bounded the horizon 
 on our left and right. Between these chains are two small hills of gray 
 limestone, which mark the locations of the old and new caves, the former 
 of which has been almost forsaken since the discovery of the latter in 
 1 %3o by a quarryman whose crowbar dropping from his hands led to a 
 search which revealed this hidden national wonder. Guides and over -all- 
 dresses having been first provided at a public house some little distance 
 from the mouth, the new cave is entered midway up the side of the hill 
 and about sixty feet above the level of the road. A narrow sloping 
 passage, about four feet' in height, and between thirty and forty in 
 length, terminates in an almost vertical precipice, fifteen feet deep, 
 which is descended by a ladder. Then, after passing for 250 feet 
 through a lane of gray limestone, a sudden turn exhibits the lower 
 middle cave in all its beauty and grandeur, but to be shortly afterwards 
 surpassed by the upper middle cave, reached through a passage of 
 sixty feet, varying in height and breadth from five to fourteen feet 
 From these caves, passages, ranging from twenty to thirty-five feet in 
 height, extend in different directions to numerous other chambers ol 
 various dimensions, the principal of which are distinguished by the guides 
 as the House of Lords, the House of Commons, the Kingston Gallery, 
 O'Leary's Cave, O'Callaghan's Cave, the Altar Cave, and Kingsborough 
 Hall. The stalactites depending from the roof and the stalagmites 
 rising from the floor are extremely beautiful, and in some places unite 
 and form magnificent columns of spar, while in others they " assume 
 every conceivable shape, shining with the brilliancy of huge diamonds as 
 the small light of a candle is thrown upon them " — the shapes obtaining 
 from their resemblance such names as the Organ, the Drum, the Pyra- 
 mid, etc. The "curtains" which depend from the roofs are "sometimes 
 so transparent that the form of a hand may be seen through them ; and 
 though of immense size, so delicate is their construction, that they 
 actually vibrate to the touch. They hang in folds, as gracefully as if the 
 hand of skill and taste had arranged their draperies. Pools of limpid 
 water, here and there, cover miniature hillocks of crystals — so minute 
 and sparkling as to seem congregated diamonds." The extent of the 
 
128 
 
 FROM KILKENNY TO Q UEENSTO WN. 
 
 caves is from 700 to 800 feet in length, and about 570 in breadth, and the 
 depression of the lowest chamber beneath the level of the entrance is 
 about 50 feet. Gerald Griffin poetically remarks of a visit to one of 
 these caverns :— 
 
 " Grimly it frowned when first with shuddering mind 
 We saw the far-famed Cavern's darkling womb, 
 And for that vault of silence and of gloom 
 Left the fair day and smiling world behind. 
 
 "But what bright wonder hailed our eyes erelong! 
 The crystal well, the sparry curtained dome, 
 The sparkling shafts that propped that caverned home, 
 And vaults that turned the homeliest sounds to song." 
 
 Three quarters of an hour's ride on the railway sufficed to take us 
 from Cahir* to the county town of Tipperary, pleasantly situated at 
 the base of the Slieve-na-muck or Tipperary hills, a spur of the Galtee 
 range. It is a comparatively modern-built town of about 6000 inhab- 
 itants, though it dates back as far as the time of King John, who built 
 a castle here — its name being derived from the Irish Tobar-a-neidth, the 
 Well of the Plains, in allusion to its situation. Henry III. also founded 
 here a monastery for Augustinians, and an arched gateway of the abbey 
 is the only remnant of antiquity the town possesses. 
 
 The beauty of the mountains and the robustness of the men of 
 Tipperary are equally remarkable, and both have formed subjects for 
 the pen of the poet. The "Hills of Sweet Tipperary" find their 
 attraction in the emerald hue of their verdure, diversified by the 
 blooming heather, whilst the size of the native and his strong attach- 
 ment to his home and prejudices is a popular theme of local boast : — 
 
 " Tall is his form, his heart is warm, 
 His spirit light as any fairy, — 
 His wrath is fearful as the storm 
 That sweeps the hills of Tipperary ! " 
 
 * On the east bank of the Suir, a few miles above Cahir, and prominently visible to the country around, is " the 
 Moat of Knockgraffon," an artificial mound, rising about seventy feet above the summit of a hill, with the ruins of 
 an extensive castle at the base. It was built in 1108, and ranks among the oldest constructions of the kind iu 
 Ireland, tradition stating that eighteen of the Kings of Munster were born and reared within its walls. A ford over the 
 Suir in the plain below is pointed out as the place where the prince of Leinster murdered Fiacha Muillathan, " of the 
 flat sconce " (whom he was visiting), in order that he might bathe in the blood of a King, being informed that it was 
 a remedy for the Evil with which he was afflicted. Tradition, however, does not record whether a cure was affected, 
 but it has given to the ford the distinctive title of the " stream of noble blood." 
 
 1 
 
THE ROCK OF CASHEL. 
 
 129 
 
 The old coach road from Tipperary to Cashel is about ten miles 
 in length, leading by the village of Thomastown, passing the picturesque 
 grounds of its castle, a long two-storied building in the Tudor style 
 having battlements and numerous towers and buttresses, and through a 
 highly cultivated country called the " Golden Vale " from its great fertility. 
 About midway it crosses the Suir at the pretty village of Golden, situated 
 on both sides of the river ; and on a stone bridge of great antiquity, 
 having the remains of a castle in the centre and connecting the two 
 divisions, William III. is said to have signed a letter restoring the charter 
 of Cashel. Close by is the birthplace of the late Father Alathew, the 
 Apostle of Temperance, and a mile down are the remains of the ancient 
 Augustine priory of Athassel, founded about the year 1200 by William 
 Fitz Adelm de Burke, steward to Henry II., and ancestor of the 
 illustrious family of De Burgo. The ruins cover an area of considerable 
 extent, the choir which overlooks the river being 44 feet by 26, and 
 lighted by lancet windows ; the nave of the same breadth, and supported 
 by lateral aisles ; and the external walls, 1 1 7 feet in length. 
 
 Towering high above the " Golden Vale " a stupendous rock arrests 
 the eye of the traveler, from whatever point of the compass it may be 
 directed. The Approach to Cashel, as sketched by our artist from its 
 northern side (the opposite direction to that we journeyed thither), 
 enables the reader to judge of the peculiar bold and abrupt aspect of this 
 eminence, which, though only 300 feet in height, appears more colossal in 
 its proportions from its marked contrast with the verdant and fruitful 
 plain that surrounds it. It would be hard if, in a country where there is 
 a legendary reason for everything, there were not found one for the 
 singular isolation of this rock. Some miles to the north lies a range of 
 hills, known as the Devil's Bit mountains, on the summits of which it is 
 said his Satanic Majesty was once benighted ; and, being at the time in a 
 famishing condition, he bit a morsel out of the ridge, but, finding it too 
 hard for mastication, dropped it here in disgust on his flight southward. 
 The ancient name of Cashel, according to one account, was Carsiol, the 
 "Habitation in the Rock;" and it has in later ages been popularly styled 
 the " City of the Kings," from its having been the residence of the mon- 
 archs of Munster, as Kildare has been styled the " City of the Saints," 
 from its religious associations. Tradition, however, somewhat varies this 
 
 17 
 
130 
 
 FROM KILKENNY TO Q UEENSTO WN. 
 
 derivation, by informing us that Cashel was first pointed out to the 
 herdsmen of Core, King of Munster, by a heavenly messenger, who 
 foretold the coming of St. Patrick, and that the king immediately erected 
 a royal palace on the spot, then known as Carrie k-Phadring, or Patrick's 
 Rock ; and from receiving here the rent or revenue of his kingdom, it was 
 called Ciosoil — cios signifying tribute, and oil a rock. 
 
 But Cashel has sadly fallen from its regal importance, and has now 
 dwindled into a place of very moderate pretensions. " The want of a 
 navigable river," says Wright, " is the only assignable cause for the 
 desertion of this royal seat, encompassed by a great extent of country, 
 fertile as cupidity could desire, and diversified by gentle undulations." 
 The populated portion lies nestled on one side of the rock, and possesses 
 little to attract the attention of the visitor, except the modern Protestant 
 Cathedral (the present parish-church), a rather handsome building; the 
 Dominican Priory, a fine old ruin ; and Hacket's Abbey, formerly a 
 Franciscan Monastery, transformed into the modern Roman Catholic 
 Cathedral. This monastery was founded in the reign of Henry III. by 
 the person whose name it bears, and on the night of February 14, 1757, 
 its lofty and beautiful spire fell to the ground. 
 
 Far different, however, are the claims upon our attention of the 
 Rock of Cashel, the ascent of which is steep and precipitous ; but, 
 its summit gained, we find it not only crowned with a pile of the 
 noblest assemblage of monastic ruins in Ireland, but presenting to the 
 eye an extensive view of a beautiful and variegated plain spread out 
 on every side below, richly cultivated and bounded by mountain ranges 
 — embracing on the north the valley of the Suir, with the country 
 around and beyond Holy Cross and Thurles, and bounded by the 
 Devil's Bit mountains ; on the east, the Sliev-na-man and the Com- 
 meragh hills ; on the west the sombre Slieve Phelim mountains ; on 
 the south the beautiful and luxuriant "Golden Vale" of Tipperary, 
 with the Galtee mountains for the limit ; and immediately beneath, 
 around the base of the rock, the little city and the remains of Hore 
 Abbey. The ruins on the summit are supposed by some to be those 
 of both a monastic edifice and a regal residence ; and the buildings from 
 the want of regularity in plan, as well as peculiarities in workmanship 
 and style of decoration, seem to have been the work of several periods. 
 
ANCIENT CATHEDRAL OF CASH EL. 
 
 131 
 
 The chief importance of Cashel lies in its having been for centuries 
 the seat of an archbishop. A bishopric was founded here at a very 
 early period, but no certain record of the episcopal succession remains 
 earlier than 901. "But," remarks a writer on the subject, "long before 
 it attained ecclesiastical rank, it was the favorite residence of the 
 Kings of Munster; and it is said a synod was held there about the 
 middle of the fifth century by St. Patrick, St. Ailbe, and St. Declan, 
 in the reign of v^ngus, who is supposed to have commemorated his 
 conversion to Christianity by the erection of a church upon the rock ; 
 thus probably originating the assemblage of sacred edifices, for which, 
 in after times, it became conspicuous ; and there appears to be satis- 
 factory authority for the belief that it had been, for ages previously, 
 the selected site of Pagan worship." In 1 1 5 2 the see was made 
 archiepiscopal by Pope Eugenius III.,* and here, in 11 72, Henry II. 
 received the homage of Donald O'Brien, King of Limerick, and held 
 the memorable synod of the Irish clergy, at which Christian, Bishop 
 of Lismore, the Pope's legate, presided, when "every archbishop and 
 bishop gave sealed charters to the king, conferring on him and his 
 heirs forever the Kingdom of Ireland, which charters were confirmed 
 by Pope Alexander." 
 
 The remains of the Ancient Cathedral, founded in the eleventh centurv, 
 
 * J 9 
 
 of which our artist has given us both exterior and interior views, 
 prove that it must have been a very extensive and beautiful Gothic 
 structure, boldly towering on the celebrated rock of Cashel, and 
 forming with it a magnificent object, bearing honorable testimony to 
 the labor and ingenuity, as well as the piety and zeal of its former 
 inhabitants. The extent of the nave and choir from east to west is 
 
 * The ecclesiastical province consisted of the ancient dioceses of Cashel, Emly, Waterford, Lismore, Cork, 
 Cloyne, Ross, Limerick, Ardfert, Aghadoe, Killaloe, and Kilfenora, a district very nearly co-extensive with the 
 civil province of Munster. In the Roman Catholic church, Cashel remains a metropolitan see, the Archbishop re- 
 siding at Thurles ; but in the Protestant church, by the Church Temporalities Act of 1833, the see of Waterford 
 and Lismore on becoming vacant was annexed to that of Cashel and Emly, and, on the death of the then 
 Archbishop of Cashel, all archiepiscopal jurisdiction ceased, and Cashel and its annexed dioceses became a bish- 
 opric, and with the other sees of the province, became subject to the Archbishop of Dublin. Emly, mentioned 
 by Ptolemy as Imlagh, one of the three powerful towns of Ireland, but now a village, about twenty miles south 
 west of Cashel, was formerly the seat of a bishopric, founded in the fifth century, and originally the metropolitan 
 see of Munster; but in 1152 Pope Eugenius III. made it subordinate to Cashel, with which it was incorporated 
 in 1568. 
 
132 
 
 FROM KILKENNY TO Q UEEN STO WN. 
 
 about 210 feet, and of the transept from north to south about 170 
 feet, and the tower is in the centre of the cross. There are no side 
 aisles, and the windows are of the lancet form usual in the twelfth 
 and thirteenth centuries. During the long feuds of the Butlers and 
 Geraldines, when Cashel was a frequent sufferer, the cathedral was burnt 
 down, in 1495, by the Earl of Kildare, who, on being summoned before 
 the King of England to answer for the act, assured him that he 
 would not have thought of committing so great a sacrilege, if he had 
 not been informed that the archbishop was within ; upon which the 
 King exclaimed, " If all Ireland cannot govern this man, he is the 
 fittest man to govern all Ireland," and so appointed him lord 
 lieutenant. The cathedral was subsequently restored, but during 
 the past century the magnificent pile was again doomed to destruc- 
 tion, and this time by the action of one who should have been 
 its most zealous defender. Archbishop Price, who succeeded to the see 
 in 1744, and died in 1752, not being able, it is said, to ride in his 
 carriage to the church door, owing to the steep ascent, procured an Act 
 of Parliament to remove the cathedral from the summit of the rock 
 into the town ; whereupon, just previous to his death, the old cathedral 
 was unroofed for the value of the lead, and the venerable edifice was 
 abandoned to ruin. Archbishop Agar endeavored to restore it to its 
 pristine glory, but it had become so dilapidated that the effort was 
 fruitless, and a new cathedral was erected in the town. During the 
 present century the progress of decay has been to some extent stayed 
 by Archdeacon Cotton who labored hard to preserve, if he could not 
 restore, the ancient glories of the sacred structure. 
 
 As a notable example of the effect these ruins produce upon the 
 intellectual mind it is stated that upon Sir Walter Scott visiting them 
 en route, he was so unprepared for a spectacle so magnificent 
 — one so suited to the peculiar habit of his soul — that he forgot 
 the continuance of his journey, and was found wandering amongst the 
 lone aisles of the cathedral at the approach of night. And the 
 eloquent Richard Lalor Shiel, in an electioneering address made at 
 Cashel, so felt the inspiration of the ruined pile that he exclaimed : 
 " Here my cradle was first rocked, and the first object that in my 
 childhood I learned to admire was that noble ruin, an emblem as 
 
COR MAC'S CHAPEL AT CASH EL. 
 
 133 
 
 well as memorial of Ireland, which ascends before us, at once a temple 
 and a fortress, the seat of religion and nationality, where councils were 
 held, where princes assembled, the scene of courts and of synods, and 
 on which it is impossible to look without feeling the heart at once 
 elevated and touched by the noblest as well as the most solemn 
 recollections." In the burial ground of the cathedral stands a rude 
 pedestal on which the Kings of Munster were crowned,* bearing the 
 cross of Cashel, one side of which is sculptured with an effigy of 
 St. Patrick. 
 
 Near the east angle of the north aisle of this cathedral is a 
 Round Tower, between which and the church there is a passage. 
 This tower is supposed to be the oldest structure upon the rock, from 
 the fact that all the adjoining edifices are constructed of limestone, 
 while the tower is built of freestone. It is 90 feet high, 54 
 feet in circumference at the base, and the height of the door 
 from the ground is 12 feet. It consists of five stories, each of which, 
 from the projecting layers of stone, appears to have had a window. 
 
 Connected with the cathedral, on the south side of the choir, is 
 Cormac's Chapel, named after its founder, Cormac-Mac-Culinan, King of 
 Munster and Bishop of Cashel (for in his day the regal and ecclesiastical 
 offices were combined), who flourished in the beginning of the tenth 
 century, and was slain in battle by the Danes, f It is supposed by some 
 to have been the first stone-building in Ireland, and it is not improbable 
 that it was built on the very foundation of the church originally erected 
 here by St. Patrick. Dr. Ledwich, who selected it as a subject upon which 
 to found an essay on the " Stone-roofed Churches of the Irish," considered 
 it one of the most curious fabrics in the kingdom, and its rude imitation 
 of pillars and capitals makes it appear to have been copied after the 
 
 * Tradition states that the original coronation stone, which some credited with the power of groaning when 
 pressed by a royal personage, was removed by Fergus, a prince of the royal line of Cashel, who in 513 obtained 
 the throne of Scotland, and was used by him in his coronation at Dunstaffnage. Here it remained until the time 
 of Kenneth II., who removed it to Scone ; and thence, in 1296, Edward I. of England had it conveyed to 
 Westminster, and placed in the seat of the coronation chair, and upon it successive sovereigns have been crowned. 
 
 f Cormac was born in 837, and spent the greater part of his life in a monastery, where, about the year 900, 
 he composed the celebrated "Psalter of Cashel," and a History of Ireland written in the Irish tongue. He was 
 nearly seventy years of age before coming to the throne, and soon became entangled in war with the monarch Flan, 
 which resulted in his own death in the year 908, after a troubled reign of only five years. 
 
134 
 
 FROM KILKENNY TO Q UEENSTO WN. 
 
 Grecian architecture, and long to have preceded that which is usually 
 called Gothic. The chapel, the choir of which is fifty feet by eighteen, is 
 of a style totally different from the cathedral. Both on the outside and 
 inside are columns over columns, better proportioned than one could 
 expect from the place or time. The ceiling is vaulted, and the outside of 
 the roof is corbelled, so as to form a pediment pitch. There is a square 
 tower on each side of the building, at the junction of the nave and choir. 
 It has every appearance of being an ecclesiastical fortress, as its defensive 
 portions exhibit apertures from which to pour molten lead upon an 
 attacking foe. 
 
 On the summit of the rock there are also a hall for the vicar's choral, 
 built by Archbishop O'Hedian in 142 1 ; the old Episcopal palace, originally 
 a strong castle at the west end of the cathedral ; and remains of the 
 ancient wall, by which the whole assemblage of buildings was surrounded. 
 
 The ruins of Hore Abbey, called also St. Mary's Abbey of the rock of 
 Cashel, lie in the vale directly under the rock. This building was founded 
 for Benedictines ; but Archbishop David McCarbhuil, of the family of the 
 O'Carrols, dispossessed them of their houses and lands, gave their posses- 
 sions to a body of Cistercian monks, and at the same time took upon 
 himself the habit of that order.* The noble ruins of this edifice are in a 
 good state of preservation. The steeple is large, and about twenty feet 
 square on the inside ; the east window is small and plain, and in the 
 inside walls are some remains of stalls ; the nave is sixty feet long and 
 twenty-three broad, and on each side was an arcade of three Gothic 
 arches, with lateral aisles, which were about thirteen feet broad ; on the 
 south side of the steeple a small door leads into an open part, about 
 thirty feet long, and twenty-four broad ; the side-walls are much broken, and 
 in the gable-end there is a long window. A small division on the north 
 side of the steeple, with a low, arched apartment, seems to have been a 
 confessionary, as there are niches in the walls with apertures. 
 
 In ancient times, the city of Cashel was a place of no slight impor- 
 tance. Its foundation dates from the early kings of Munster, before the 
 arrival of St. Declan, to whom some attribute the establishment of a 
 church here in the time of St. Patrick ; and it was subsequently fortified 
 
 * Tradition states that the archbishop having told his mother he was warned in a dream that the Black 
 monks would cut off his head, at her advice he removed them and gave their possessions to the Cistercians. 
 
THE ABBEY OF HOLY CROSS. 
 
 135 
 
 by Brian Boroimhe. The town was destroyed in 1179, but soon after- 
 wards rebuilt. It was constituted a borough in 1216. It was visited by 
 Edward Bruce on his invasion of Ireland in 1 3 1 6. In 1320 it was 
 surrounded by a stone wall, and erected into a city by Charles I. in 1640, 
 whose cause the inhabitants espoused until 1647, when the royalist garri- 
 son was expelled with great slaughter by the Parliamentary forces under 
 Lord Inchiquin. The celebrated Dean Swift was born here in 1667. In 
 1871 the population had dwindled down to 3976; but the place returned 
 a member to the British Parliament as late as 1868, after which it was 
 disfranchised. 
 
 Traveling northward, at a distance of eight miles from Cashel, we again 
 came upon the Suir, at the village of Holy Cross, situated in a rich 
 pastoral district, but a humble hamlet enough, yet interesting from its 
 containing Holv Cross Abbev — a fine pile of monastic ruins, which Mr 
 Petrie considers to rank in popular esteem as among the first, if not the 
 very first, in Ireland. They are pleasantly situated on the river's bank, 
 with a grove of woods for a background. The " gentle Suir " is here but 
 a small stream ; yet we have no doubt that the monks who peopled this 
 abbey found its waters in their day to yield a plentiful supply of fish 
 wherewith to stock their larders — a monastic requirement which would 
 seem to afford a reason for the very general erection of religious houses 
 either upon the banks or in the immediate neighborhood of piscatory 
 haunts. This abbey is assumed to have been originally founded in 1182, 
 for Cistercian monks, by Donald O'Brien, King of Limerick, and the 
 charter of its foundation was signed by Christian, Bishop of Lismore 
 and Legate of the Holy See in Ireland, Maurice, Archbishop of Cashel, and 
 Britius, Bishop of Limerick. It is said to owe its origin, as well as its 
 name, to a piece of the True Cross, presented in the year 11 10 by Pope 
 Pascal II. to Murtagh O'Brien, monarch of all Ireland, and grandson of 
 Brian Boroimhe. This relic, set in gold and adorned with precious stones, 
 was preserved in the abbey until the approach of the Reformation, when 
 it Avas secured by the family of Ormonde, who transmitted it to the family 
 of Kavanagh, by whom it was restored to the Roman Catholic hierarchy 
 of the district. The identical piece of the cross, which Petrie says still 
 exists, is described by Doctor Milner as being about two inches and a 
 half long, and about half an inch broad, but very thin ; and is secured in 
 
136 
 
 FROM KILKENNY TO Q UEENSTO WN. 
 
 the shaft of an archiepiscopal cross of curious wood, and enclosed in a 
 gilt case.* From the earliest period the abbey was endowed with peculiar 
 privileges and extensive demesnes ; and its charter was confirmed by Kings 
 John, Henry III., Edward III., and Richard II., respectively. The abbot 
 was a peer of Parliament, and styled Earl of Holy Cross ; and was also 
 vicar-general of the Cistercian order in Ireland. At the dissolution the 
 abbey and its extensive possessions were granted to the Earl of Ormonde, 
 at an annual rent of ^15 \os. \d. 
 
 Like other important monastic structures, the plan of the building is 
 cruciform, which would seem to be peculiarly appropriate to this abbey, 
 considering the name it bears. It consists of a nave, aisles, chancel and 
 transept, with a lofty square belfry at the intersection of the cross. In 
 viewing the Interior of Holy Cross Abbey it is at once observable that 
 the architecture of the nave is inferior to that of the tower, transepts and 
 choir, though it has an exquisite six-light window. The tower is supported 
 on lofty pointed arches, the roof being groined in a superior manner, and 
 pierced with five holes for the bell-ropes. A peculiarity of this edifice is 
 that each transept contains two distinct chapels, also beautifully groined — 
 " a feature which imparts much interest and picturesqueness to the gen- 
 eral effect." Contrary to usual custom, the choir arch, evidently a 
 supplementary erection, is placed, instead of beneath the tower, thirty feet 
 in advance of it, thus making the length of the choir 14 feet greater than 
 that of the nave, the entire length of the church being 130 feet. Like 
 the nave, the choir has also a beautiful six-light window. The cathedral 
 is adorned with two rich monumental relics, unlike any sepulchral or 
 ecclesiastical architecture to be seen in other countries. One separates 
 the two chapels in the north transept, and consists of a double row of 
 pointed arches springing from spiral fluted pillars — less rich in design, but 
 resembling the " Apprentice's Pillar " in Roslin Chapel, near Edinburgh. 
 The base is ornamented with trefoils and finials, and on one side is a 
 small font for the reception of holy water. The interior dimensions sug- 
 gest the resting-place of the body during the performance of the funeral 
 mass ; but it is also conjectured to have been erected as a shrine for the 
 
 * According to Camden and other writers, immense crowds flocked to this abbey, from reverence to this holy 
 relic, among them the leading nobility of the land, including the great O'Neil in 1559, and one of the Desmonds in 
 1579- 
 
HOLY CROSS AND THURLES. 
 
 137 
 
 reception and display of the sacred remnant of the True Cross, already 
 spoken of. The second memorial is situated in the choir, and is equally 
 interesting from the beauty of its design. It consists of a projecting 
 canopy of stone, supported by three trefoil arches, springing from slender 
 columns of black marble, having its soffit groined and the pedestal 
 enriched with sculpture. Its position on the south side of the high- 
 altar has led to its being attributed to the founder of the abbey, Donald 
 O'Brien ; but this theory is not tenable as the architectural decorations 
 do not justify so early a date, and the armorial bearings are not those 
 of the family of O'Brien, but of the Butlers and Fitzgeralds. From 
 these heraldic proofs, Sir William Betham concludes that this elegant 
 monumental structure was raised to the memory of Elizabeth, daughter 
 of the Earl of Kildare, and wife of James, fourth Earl of Ormonde, 
 commonly called " The White Earl," who died about the year 1450. 
 
 A delightful drive of about three miles, over a slightly elevated 
 road which afforded us a fine view of the surrounding country, took 
 us to Thurles, likewise situated on the Suir, and a station on the 
 Great Southern and Western Railway. This town is peculiarly inter- 
 esting to Roman Catholics, from its having been the place in which 
 was held the famous Synod of 1850, under the presidency of Cardinal 
 Cullen, which declared against the Queen's Colleges, and recommended 
 the foundation of a Roman Catholic University. It is also the residence 
 of the Archbishop of Cashel, and contains a very handsome Roman 
 Catholic Cathedral ; as well as the College of St. Patrick, erected in 1836 
 and constituted by the Synod a provincial college, embracing lay and 
 ecclesiastical departments. Thurles was the scene of a great battle 
 fought in the tenth century between the Danes and the Irish, at which 
 the latter were the victors. A castle, erected here sometime about the 
 twelfth century, was taken by Hugh de Lacey in 1208. A large portion 
 of the keep, a fine old tower which guarded the bridge across the Suir, 
 fell down in 1868. A monastery of Carmelites was founded here in 1300. 
 but no remains either of it, or of a fortress ascribed to the Templars, 
 now exist. Half a century ago this parish contained ruins of not less 
 than seven castles. The population in 1871 was 4866. 
 
 From Thurles we returned to Oueenstown by railway, the distance 
 between the two places being over 90 miles. On our way thither we 
 
 18 
 
138 
 
 FROM KILKENNY TO Q UEENSTO WN. 
 
 passed the junction where the main line is crossed by that from Water- 
 ford to Limerick ; Kilmallock, once a place of some importance, rich in 
 relics of pagan and mediaeval times, and containing an abbey, the choir of 
 which is still used for service, a Dominican priory and church, a Round 
 Tower, and two gateways ; Charleville, where a second line branches off 
 to Limerick ; Buttevant, another of those decayed Irish towns that still 
 present numerous evidences of former grandeur, the most important in its 
 case being the remains of an abbey founded in the reign of Edward I. ; 
 Mallow, the junction for Killarney and Tralee, and for Fermoy and Lis- 
 more ; and the city of Cork. 
 
 At Buttevant, our railway travel being half completed, we halted for the 
 purpose of visiting the Remains of Kilcolman Castle, six miles east of 
 the line, where once lived Spenser, the gifted author of the inimitable 
 " Faerie Queene." It is impossible to view the ruins of this noble 
 castle, within whose deserted walls the proud Desmonds once held 
 sway, and which more recently had been the dwelling-place of one of 
 England's most accomplished poets, without a feeling of deep sadness. 
 The desolate pile, resting in lonely grandeur on the banks of the Awbeg, 
 or " Mulla fair and bright," seemed brooding over its vanished greatness ; 
 while the poet's favorite stream murmured sadly as it rolled onward to 
 the Blackwater — the lovely river upon whose banks, at Lismore and 
 at Youghal, his friend Raleigh dwelt. Spenser's muse having expatiated 
 so poetically upon the rivers and mountains in this vicinity, it was a dis- 
 appointment to us to find his residence placed in as uninteresting a part 
 of the country as it would be almost possible to select. But the choice 
 was none of his. Spenser had for two years discharged with ability and 
 fidelity the duties of the office of secretary to the Lord Deputy, Lord 
 Grey de Wilton, which Sir Philip Sidney obtained for him in 1580, and 
 returned to England in 1582. As a reward for this duty he obtained, in 
 1586, a grant of 3028 acres of land, part of the forfeited estates of the Earl 
 of Desmond, at an annual rental of £17 13.9. 6d., and on the usual 
 conditions of a personal residence on the acquired property, the policy 
 of Queen Elizabeth being to people the province of Munster with 
 English families. The following year he took up his residence in his 
 Castle of Kilcolman, and in the favorable retirement of its ancient walls, 
 or wandering along the banks of his beloved Mulla, he, during the 
 
KILCOLMAN CASTLE. 
 
 139 
 
 succeeding three years, composed the first three books of the " Faerie 
 Oueene," a work which, for brilliancy of fancy and richness of thought, 
 is unequalled by anything of a similar nature in the English language. 
 Accompanied by his friend, Sir Walter Raleigh, he conveyed his stanzas 
 to London, where they were published in 1590, dedicated to Queen 
 Elizabeth. Upon his return to Ireland he married a girl of humble 
 parentage, and during the following six years composed three more 
 books of the " Faerie Queene." 
 
 Spenser described Ireland as a country formerly possessing such 
 "wealth and goodness" that the gods resorted thither for "pleasure 
 and for rest ; " but notwithstanding this glowing sentiment and all his 
 poetical admiration of the scenery of the country, he displayed in his 
 " View of the State of Ireland," written during his second sojourn at 
 Kilcolman, but not published until more than thirty years after his 
 death, a decided dislike and prejudice against the people, and there 
 can be no doubt that the antipathy was mutual. Holding the office 
 of the clerk of the council of Munster, having been recommended by 
 the Queen for sheriff of Cork, an urgent advocate of arbitrary power, 
 and accused of an unjust attempt to increase his possessions, he naturally 
 became a conspicuous object of hatred to the Irish. Consequently, when 
 the rebellion of Tyrone broke out in 1598. Spenser was compelled to 
 flee from his home in order to escape from the fearful retaliations which 
 were everywhere being directed against the English settlers. He saved 
 his life, but his estate was plundered and his castle burnt, his youngest 
 child, who for some reason had been left behind, perishing in the flames. 
 
 " The castle of the Poet — the man of endless fame — 
 
 Soon hid its head in a mantle red of fierce and rushing flame. 
 Out burst the vassals, praying for mercy as they sped, — 
 Where was their master staying, where was the Poet fled ? 
 But hark ! that thrilling screaming, over the crackling din, — 
 "Tis the Poet's child in its terror wild, the blazing tower within ! " 
 
 In ' consequence of this disaster, Spenser, poor and wretched, was 
 driven back to England with his wife and remaining children, and never 
 recovered from his affliction, for he died a year later, in an obscure 
 lodging in London, in extreme indigence, if not in actual want. The 
 castle was never rebuilt and the estates have long since passed away 
 from the poet's family, who are now supposed to be extinct. 
 
140 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 Old Head of Kinsale — Baltimore Bay — Cape Clear — Dunmanus Bay — Bantry Bay — Harbors of 
 Kerry — Derrynane Abbey — The Skelligs — Island of Valentia and Atlantic Cable — Dingle 
 Bay — The Blaskets — Tralee Harbor and Town — Kerry Head — Ballybunion — Mineral 
 Wealth of Kerry — Sunken City — Loop Head — Natural Bridges at Ross — Kilkee — Remark- 
 able Cave — Bishop's Rock — Puffing Cavern — Romantic Coast Scenery — Cove in Malbay — 
 Birds of the Coast — Milltown Malbay — Lahinch — Kilfoiora — Cliffs of Mohcr — Arran 
 Islands — Bays of Connemara — Ballynahinch — Roundstone — Urrisbeg — Clifden — The Killary 
 — Mweebrea — Delphi Lodge. 
 
 ONCE more upon the ocean, outside of Queenstown Harbor, but with 
 the prow of our little bark this time turned towards the west, and 
 ourselves intent upon a visit to the wild shores and noble bays that not 
 only line the clement southern coast of Ireland, but those also that face 
 westward and buffet the turbulent waters of the broad Atlantic. The first 
 object that strikes the eye of the voyager is that bold promontory, the 
 "Old Head of Kinsale," at the entrance to the harbor of the same name; 
 but as this headland, as well as the boroughs of Kinsale and Bandon, which 
 connect with the ocean highway at this point, have been described in our 
 first chapter, it is unnecessary for us further to allude to them than to 
 state that each of them is represented in the British Parliament — a fact 
 we omitted to mention. Sailing round an irregularly shaped peninsula, at 
 a distance of nearly thirty miles from Roche's Point, at the outlet of 
 Queenstown Harbor, we entered Clonakilty Bay — a place of little consid- 
 eration in a commercial point of view, but possessed of rare attractions 
 for the antiquarian and painter. The country along the shores of the 
 bay is singularly varied, and broken into picturesquely shaped hills ; the 
 vales are watered by many brooks and rivulets, and the coast presents a 
 succession of bold cliffs whose romantic beauty charm and astonish the 
 
FROM GALLEY HEAD TO CAPE CLEAR. HI 
 
 spectator. A few miles further on we doubled Galley Head — a noble 
 promontory jutting boldly into the sea, as if to impede our further prog- 
 ress, and entered a splendid bay, containing within it the lesser harbors 
 of Ross-Carbery * and Glandore. A line of coast more bold, various, 
 and rich in marine scenery, can scarcely be imagined ; winding, wooded 
 inlets of the sea, which, Mr. Inglis says, reminded him of the Norwegian 
 fiords, penetrate into the land, and form creeks and coves of unequalled 
 beaut}-. 
 
 We next passed Castlehaven and Baltimore Bay,f a safe asylum for 
 distressed American vessels. We will not, however, attempt to enumerate 
 the endless bays and islands that cluster along this coast, but hasten to 
 Cape Clear, with its conspicuous revolving light, announcing to the mariner 
 and sea-worn voyager, long tossed on the " storm-vexed " ocean, the cheer- 
 ing tidings of the approach to port. Cape Clear is the most southerly 
 point of the kingdom, and is an island scarcely three miles long, and not 
 more than one and a half wide — high, rugged and precipitous, accessible 
 only by two coves on opposite sides, which, trenching deep into the land, 
 nearly divide it into two, and give it an appearance like to that of an 
 immense wasp. Its population, of less than a thousand, consists of a 
 hardy and primitive people, who contrive to support themselves by fishing 
 and the culture of potatoes. It was formerly a stronghold ot the O'Dris- 
 colls— a family of huge stature, some of whom were a compound of the 
 Irish chieftain and the buccaneer, and whose castle, now a ruin, was 
 appropriately seated on a lofty cliff, overhanging the sea, and only 
 approachable by a narrow and perilous path over a ledge of rock. The 
 
 * Ross-Carbery, pleasantly situated at the head of the bay, is one of the oldest towns in Ireland, its ancient 
 name being Ross-Alithri, the field of pilgrimage. According to Hanmer, " There was here anciently a famous 
 university, whereto resorted all the southwest part of Ireland for learning's sake." This monastery or religious 
 school was founded in 570 by St. Faughnan, otherwise called Mongach, or the hairy, and was the nucleus of 
 the diocese of Ross, the cathedral belonging to which is a cruciform building with a tower and octagonal spire. 
 In the Protestant Church the diocese was, in 1586, united to that of Cork and Cloyne ; in the Roman Catholic 
 Church it is a suffragan see, with the bishop residing at Skibbereen. 
 
 f From the accessibility of Baltimore Bay as a harbor of refuge, the town, which is situated on the east of 
 the bay, had always been such a favorite resort of foreign fishermen, that Edward VI. had it in contemplation to 
 build a fort here, with the intention of compelling them to pay tribute. The place grew up around a castle of 
 the O'Driscolls, the ruins of which now surmount a rock overlooking the pier. The main historical events con- 
 nected with Baltimore Bay are its surrender to the Spaniards by Sir Fireen O'Driscoll in 1602, and its surprise 
 on June 20th, 1631, by the crews of two Algerine galleys, who landed in the dead of night, and bore off into 
 slavery two hundred of its inhabitants. 
 
142 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 laws by which the leaders ruled their little dynasty were somewhat 
 peculiar, one of their severest penalties being transportation to the main- 
 land. In addition to the lighthouse, 455 feet high, the island contains 
 coast guard and telegraph stations, messages from the latter of which 
 effect a saving of six hours in the announcement of the approach of 
 American vessels. There is another light, 148 feet above high water, 
 three and a half miles west by south of Cape Clear, on Fastnett Rock, 
 about which islet the coast peasantry have a superstition that it sails a 
 mile westward, at daybreak, every first of May. 
 
 Proceeding further to the west, we passed Crookhaven, and then soon 
 doubled Mizen Head, and turned eastward into Dunmanus Bay, a long 
 and comparatively narrow inlet, which, though both large and safe, is 
 little frequented by vessels. So well is this bay sheltered by the sur- 
 rounding mountains and the outstretching headlands, that it has all the 
 appearance of an extensive lake when viewed from many points on the 
 land. On its eastern shore are the ruins of Dunmanus Castle, built by 
 the O'Mahony sept, and formerly a place of some strength. Dunmanus 
 Bay is separated from that of Bantry by a narrow, rugged peninsula, of 
 which Sheep Head forms the extreme point. 
 
 Sailing up the noble spreading Bay of Bantry, we found it to present 
 many magnificent features in addition to those we had previously ob- 
 served from the land, so picturesque and varied are its shores. The 
 length of the bay exceeds thirty miles, in breadth it varies from three 
 to eight miles, and in some places it is forty fathoms in depth. The 
 shores of this vast sheet of water are agreeably diversified. On the 
 north side, the mountain barriers which confine it seem to start up 
 precipitously from the water's edge, and give a wild and impressive 
 character to the scenery. At the north-eastern extremity, the junction 
 of the mountain-streams that rush from the romantic Glengariff, form 
 a lesser bay of great beauty. The scenery in the vicinity of the town 
 is softer and more graceful than on the opposite shore ; the grounds 
 and demesne of the Earl of Bantry, which adjoin the town, sweep in 
 fine wooded undulations and beautiful glades down to the margin of 
 the bay. Above all, the blue, lofty mountain chain stretching from 
 Berehaven and Hungry Hill, on the west, to Mangerton and Gougane 
 Barra on the east, with intermediate mountains of the boldest and 
 
HARBORS AND HEADLANDS OF KERRY. 
 
 143 
 
 most fantastic outlines, form the horizon of this magnificent picture. 
 The bay is studded with islands, of which Bere Island and Whiddy 
 are the principal. The first is bold and rocky and lies close under 
 the northern shore in an arm of the bay ; the second, of lesser extent, 
 is situated opposite to Glengariff, at the head of the bay, and consists of 
 three gently undulating hills, the centre one of them being crowned with 
 the ruins of the old castle of the O'Sullivans, erected in the reign ot 
 Henry VI. Bantry Bay is separated from Dunmanus Bay on the south- 
 east, as we have just stated, by a long narrow strip of land, and from 
 Kenmare Bay on the north-east by a longer and broader strip — the 
 former being two and a half miles, and the latter seven and a half 
 miles in mean breadth ; and Dunmanus Bay being about three miles 
 wide at its mouth, and eleven or twelve miles long, while Kenmare is 
 over eighteen miles long, and from one to five miles broad. 
 
 In expatiating upon Bantry Bay, we feel quite unable to convey to 
 the mind of the reader a perfect idea of the wild magnificence of its 
 coast-scenery. Filled with unspeakable awe and admiration at the majesty 
 and vastness of the picture, the spectator at first cannot find language 
 to express the impressions he has received, and it is only by repeated 
 inspection that he becomes able to separate and analyse the multitude 
 of images and emotions that crowd upon his mind. As we continued 
 our course northward, we found the leading characteristics of wildness 
 and grandeur still preserved in the aspect of the coast. The stupendous 
 masses of rock which form headlands, and protect the numerous bays 
 against the mighty waves of the Atlantic ; the rocky mountains, which 
 line the shores of the bays and harbors ; and the wild highland solitudes 
 between Bantry and the northern confines of Kerry, are as fertile in 
 scenes of bold and striking grandeur as the most ardent admirer of 
 pictorial sublimity can desire. 
 
 Along the coast of Kerry are the protecting harbors of Kenmare 
 just mentioned, a long and beautiful estuary called a river, Kilmakilloge, 
 Sneem, Ballinskellig, Valentia, Dingle, Ventry, Castlemaine, Dunmore, 
 Smerwick, Brandon, and Tralee. Of these Ballinskellig Bay is the first 
 we meet of any importance. It is a spacious haven, almost entirely 
 encompassed by lofty mountains. The shores are bold and varied, and 
 the islets with which the spacious basin is agreeably diversified, add 
 
144 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 much to the beauty of the scenery. On the green margin of a sheltered 
 creek, running in from this bay, in the most romantic situation imaginable, 
 stands Derrynane Abbey, the birth-place and the seat of the late Daniel 
 O'Connell, the great Liberator. It is occupied by his descendants, and 
 is a singular-looking patchwork edifice, having been enlarged by additions 
 made at different periods, and in various styles. The mountains which 
 rise precipitously behind, and on either side of the house, completely 
 hem it in, and give it an extremely solitary appearance. The only 
 means of communicating with the country inland is by a narrow road, 
 winding through the craggy defiles of the mountain ; so that a more 
 secluded and interesting spot than Derrynane it would be difficult to 
 find. The ruins of the little abbey, founded in the seventh century, 
 by the monks of St. Finbar, from which the mansion takes its name, 
 stand within view of the house on the extremity of a low tongue of 
 land running into the sea. The rocky eminences afford many striking 
 views. In front, Scariff Island, five miles from the shore, one mile in 
 diameter, and rising 839 feet above the sea, is a striking feature ; while 
 other picturesque islands diversify the prospect seaward. 
 
 The Skellig Islands, which lie some distance outside the bay of 
 Ballinskellig, have the romance of antiquity hanging round them. They 
 are three in number — the Lemon Rock, the Little Skellig, and the Great 
 Skellig— and the modern use of the latter, which lies the farthest out and 
 is little more than a single cliff, as the seat of two towering lighthouses, 
 whose illuminations are seen far out at sea, renders it an object of interest 
 to mariners. On the summit of this lone rock stand the ruins of the 
 abbey of St. Finian, which is reported to have been so desolated in 812 
 by the Danes, that the unfortunate monks were starved in their cells. 
 It has been for ages the annual resort of crowds of devotees, drawn 
 to it, and the station of St. Michael, for the purposes of weary pen- 
 ance — a feature of which, the ascent of a pinnacle 710 feet above the 
 sea, known as St. Michael's pillar, is fraught with great peril to the 
 faithful worshipper. To the south of the Great Skellig is a singular 
 islet known as the Washerwoman's Rock. 
 
 Rounding Bolus Head and passing Puffin Island we soon reached the 
 island of Valentia, separated from the main-land by a narrow channel, 
 and which, with its little town, was seemingly at the world's end and 
 
THE ISLAND OF VALENTIA 
 
 145 
 
 led to nowhere, until it suddenly became an important station on the 
 pathway of telegraphic intercourse between the old world and the new.* 
 Its ancient name, and that still used by the Irish speaking population, 
 is Dairbhere, an oak-forest, which was changed to Valentia by the Span- 
 iards who formerly had an extensive trade along the western coasts of 
 Ireland, and occupied the island and harbor until expelled by Cromwell, 
 whose lieutenant erected forts at both the entrances, in order to put 
 a stop to the privateering purposes to which it was applied. Notwith- 
 standing this, the many advantages the harbor presents, led to its being 
 used, during the Napoleonic war, as a privateering station by the French, 
 whose vessels lay concealed therein ready to pounce upon any unfortunate 
 prey, but prepared to escape out of either end of the channel on the 
 announcement by their sentinels of the approach of an English man-of- 
 war. The island which is about five and a half miles long by two 
 broad, and is the property of the Knight of Kerry, who has upon it a seat 
 and extensive slate quarries from which he derives a large revenue. 
 With the exception of the Blaskets, and a few other outlying islets 
 and rocks, the western end of Valentia Island is the point of the 
 kingdom nearest to the American continent. 
 
 Brav Head at the west of the island of Valentia forms the southern, 
 and Dunmore Head, some fifteen miles northward, the northern head- 
 land of the Bay of Dingle, which penetrates deeply into the land, and is 
 excelled by few places on the coast in magnificent marine scenery. 
 Ranges of mountains, whose fantastic summits pierce the clouds, rise 
 boldly from the shores, and form a singularly picturesque screen to the 
 noble estuary which they overhang. At its head, where it receives the 
 water of the Maine, is the harbor of Castlemaine ; while its northern 
 
 *The first attempt to lay a telegraph cable from Valentia to America, was made in August, 1857 ; but after 380 
 miles had been laid, it parted. A second trial was made, June, 185S, and a very small length laid, when the cable 
 again parted ; but a renewed effort was more successful, and on August 5, 185S, the line was completed to New- 
 foundland ; and though the cable spoke at intervals between August and October, it became silent on the 20th of 
 the latter month. The next effort was made in 1S65 by the " Great Eastern," but on August 2, after 1186 miles 
 had been paid out, loss of insulation was reported, and in the attempt to haul up the cable, it broke. In 1S66, a 
 new cable having been constructed, the final and successful attempt was made, the "Great Eastern " having completed 
 the work between July 13th and 27th, on which latter day she reached Heart's Content, Newfoundland ; and then 
 the big ship grappled for the lost end of the cable of the previous year, picked it up on September 2d, and com- 
 pleted it also to Heart's Content on the 8th of the same month. The telegraph company have a commodious office 
 at Knightstown on the island. 
 
 19 
 
146 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 shore is indented with the harbors of Dingle and Ventry, the neck of 
 land between which is reputed to have been the ground last occupied 
 by the Danes in Ireland. The wild tongue-like peninsula on the north 
 of Dingle Bay, which stretches out into the Atlantic for thirty miles 
 and is ten miles across at its broadest point, is replete with historical 
 associations as well as natural beauties. Here are the remains of 
 fortifications erected by the Spaniards during their occupation of this 
 district, and ruins of old castles are scattered all along-- the coast. 
 Eagle Mountain, nearly 1700 feet high, stands guard at the western 
 extremity of this peninsula, where the rugged shores unfold " numerous 
 bold headlands, singularly formed rocks, and many curious sea-worn 
 caves, never visited but by the sea-fowl, that are congregated in thous- 
 ands along this coast — riding on the waves, covering the rocks, and 
 wheeling on the sides of the cliff." Off Dunmore Head, the western 
 point of the peninsula, are the Blaskets, a group of islets and rocks, 
 formerly belonging to the great Earl of Desmond, who gave them to 
 the family of Ferriter. Slieve Donagh in the Great Blasket is a pre- 
 cipitous cliff rising more than 1500 feet above the water. Tearaght 
 Island, a lofty rock rising 600 feet out of the water, lies further out ; 
 while on the island of Inishtooskert, a little to the north, are to be found 
 the ruins of St. Brendan's Oratory. Exposed to the full force of the 
 south-western gale, we can scarcely imagine a more fearful though 
 magnificent scene, than that which these sea-girt rocks must present 
 Avhen lashed by the fierce billows of the turbulent Atlantic, breaking 
 against their sides, with a roar of thunder, and wreathing their heights 
 with chaplets of snowy spray. 
 
 Passing Dunmore Head and proceeding northward, we soon doubled 
 Sybil Head, and came upon Smerwick, the first point of interest on 
 the northern shore of the promontory. This place gained a melancholy 
 notoriety from the slaughter in cold blood by the commander of the 
 English forces, after their surrender, of a body of Spaniards, who had 
 landed here and taken possession of the town for the Earl of Desmond 
 when in rebellion against Queen Elizabeth. The act was charged on 
 his trial against Sir Walter Raleigh, who pleaded that his position as 
 a subordinate officer compelled him to obey the commands of his 
 superior ; but he was unable to fully exculpate himself from a partici- 
 
BRANDON AND TRALEE BAYS. 
 
 147 
 
 pation in the foul transaction, which must ever remain a dark blot 
 upon his character. Proceeding eastward, we soon reached Brandon 
 and Tralee Bays, on the north of the peninsula, having in full view 
 Brandon and Connor Mountains, the former of which rises to the height 
 of 3126 feet, and stretches out its shoulders to the coast, where they 
 terminate in lofty precipices and sudden escarpments. These bays are 
 separated by a promontory five miles in length, which terminates in a 
 rugged and dangerous coast-line, rendered extra perilous by a cluster 
 of rocky islets called the Seven Hogs. The town of Tralee, the name 
 signifying the strand of the Lee, is situated on the river Lee, a mile 
 above the head of the bay, with, which it is connected by a short 
 ship canal, the river being too shallow for maritime uses. It is a 
 bustling little place of over 10,000 inhabitants, and returns one member 
 to Parliament ; and though an ancient town, it now possesses few 
 antiquarian remains. The scenery around, however, is remarkably fine ; 
 the view of the wide-spreading bay which faces the town, the wild and 
 rugged mountains of Brandon peninsula stretching away to the westward, 
 and the softer beauties of the rich vale that extends to the eastward, 
 form a panorama of surpassing and varied beauty.* 
 
 From the entrance to Tralee Bay the coast-line proceeds north for 
 a few miles, when it is indented by Ballyheigh Bay, a small inlet at 
 the point where Kerry Head projects from the main-land. This bay, 
 however, affords no shelter for ships, and in former years often proved 
 fatal to inward bound vessels, in consequence of an error in the charts 
 having led to it being mistaken for the mouth of the Shannon. 
 
 Rounding Kerry Head, we entered the mouth of the Shannon, and 
 a few miles inland, on a stretch of coast bv which the width of the 
 river is suddenly contracted, came to the. bay and pleasant bathing 
 village of Ballybunion, a favorite summer resort of the citizens of 
 Limerick. The principal point of interest at this place, however, is a 
 series of curious labyrinthian caves, which permeate the cliffs along the 
 
 * Han' a dozen miles northwest of Tralee, is the ancient cathedral of Ardfert, the most interesting monastic 
 remains in the county of Kerry ; and nearby formerly stood a Round Tower, 120 feet high, built of dark marble, which 
 suddenly fell down in 1771. The bishopric of Ardfert, known in ancient records as the bishopric of Kerry, was 
 founded in the fifth century, Cerpain being mentioned as bishop in 500. The Protestant sees of Ardfert and 
 Aghadoe (near Killarney) were united to that of Limerick in 1663 ; but in the Roman Catholic Church these two 
 sees constitute the bishopric of Kerry, of which the Bishop resides in the town of Killarney. 
 
148 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 coast, and are to be classed among the most remarkable wonders of 
 Ireland. " The whole shore here," sayeth the ancient chronicler, " hath 
 a variety of romantic caves and caverns, formed by the dashing of the 
 waves ; in some places are high open arches, and in others impending 
 rocks, ready to tumble down upon the first storm." A boat may pass 
 through their intricate passages for a considerable distance parallel to the 
 coast without entering the sea. The cliffs in which they are found 
 are situated on the northern side of the little bay, extend about 290 yards 
 and rise gradually from the east to the west, or towards the sea, 
 where they attain a height of no feet. They preserve throughout great 
 perpendicularity, and are composed of two large beds, from thirty to 
 forty feet in thickness, of compact ampelite, divided by a seam of the 
 same slate, but fissile and anthracitous, and pour out streamlets of 
 water which contain iron and salts in solution, and tinge the rocks 
 with bright yellow ochreous colors. The several caves with which they 
 are honeycombed, open upon the bay, and are crossed in one place by 
 a fissure, occasioned by the fracturing of a rock which dips at a small 
 angle of inclination (four or five degrees) to the east. The last cave 
 on the sea-side, which has also an entrance from the bay, immediately 
 curves round, and allows the sea to be seen, breasting its foaming 
 way with much impetuosity, even on calm days, up two distinct apertures, 
 through which the light gleams with almost starlight brightness. 
 
 These caves are distinguished by names having references to par- 
 ticular circumstances. The largest of them is called Neptune's Hall or 
 the Pigeon Cave, and is from 70 to 80 feet in height. Others are 
 known as the Hunter's Path, from a tradition that a rider once rode 
 his horse over it ; Smugglers' Bay, from its having been for centuries 
 famous as a safe shelter for contrabandists ; Seal Cave, and other 
 distinctive appellations. A visitor to these extraordinary natural curi- 
 osities says they are " most easily navigated in a boat from the northern 
 side, where the rocky passages may be traversed for a considerable 
 distance, without any communication with the open sea ; and during 
 this navigation, which is chiefly carried on in a line parallel to the 
 western face of the cliff, the various entrances are often crossed at 
 right angles, affording the most striking contrast of light and shade — 
 the color of the waters being often of a hue so sparklingly bright, 
 
THE CLIFFS OF BALLYBUNION. 
 
 149 
 
 and so extensively vivid, as to resemble molten silver ; while the boat 
 hurries through the deep and wave-worn arcades into light and airy 
 arched or vaulted chambers, only in their innermost recesses dark and 
 repulsive, and passes from cave to cave, and hall to hall, with inlets, 
 pointing to the sea, or high cliffs affording their protection against the 
 waves, and occasionally well-like apertures, which open through the 
 roof to yield a telescopic view of the heavens, assisting, more especially 
 with the sudden transitions from absolute darkness to the most brilliant 
 light, in giving to the whole an appearance of fairy scenery." 
 
 The cliffs of Ballybunion contain a great quantity of alum, iron 
 pyrites, etc., which have occasionally taken fire from being exposed to 
 the action of the atmosphere, and which fire was formerly supposed to 
 be of volcanic origin. " Some years back," remarks a tourist, in writing 
 upon this phenomenon, " a part of these cliffs, between the castles of 
 Sick and Dune, assumed a volcanic appearance. The waves, by continual 
 dashing, had worn and undermined the cliff, which, giving way. fell with 
 tremendous violence into the sea. Several great strata or beds of pyrites, 
 iron, and sulphur, were in consequence exposed to the action of the air 
 and salt water, the natural effects of which were that they heated and 
 burned with great fierceness. The clav near it was calcined to a red 
 brick, and, mixed with iron ore, melted in many places like cinders thrown 
 from a smith's forae. Many who did not consider well the causes, and 
 the effects naturally to be expected from them, have supposed this to 
 be volcanic." 
 
 The river Shannon at its mouth forms the northern limit of the 
 county of Kerry, which can boast of some of the wildest, most romantic, 
 and diversified scenery to be met with in any part of Ireland. That 
 portion of Kern' which lies in the neighborhood of this river is less 
 elevated than the southern parts. The central district is an upland 
 country, gradually rising towards the confines of Limerick and Cork. 
 The valleys in this tract consist mostly of reclaimable bog. from which 
 several streams and rivulets descend southward to Dingle Bay, and 
 eastward by the Blackwater towards Cork. The southern district is 
 composed of lofty mountain-ranges, of which we have spoken when 
 describing Killarney, Glengariff, and the coast-scenery northward from 
 Kenmare River. The prevailing component of this mountain-chain is 
 
150 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 clay, slate, (quarries of which we have noticed are worked with con- 
 siderable success at Valentia,) coal, culm, and limestone. Hard and 
 beautiful crystals, known to lapidaries as Kerry stones and Irish diamonds, 
 are found in the limestone caverns along the coast. Amethysts and 
 pearls have also been discovered in some of the lakes and rivers : — in 
 short, the county of Kerry may be said to possess many peculiar 
 advantages, that if properly embraced, would be most influential in 
 creating wealth. 
 
 Sailing across the broad estuary of the Shannon, we reached Loop 
 Head in the county of Clare, which like Kerry Head on the southern shore 
 of the river's mouth, is a narrow promontory jutting out into the Atlantic 
 from the mainland, the two, as it were, forming immense natural piers 
 to mark the entrance of fair Erin's most noble stream, " the spacious 
 Shenan spreading like a sea." The people point to a part of the river 
 within these headlands over which the tides rush with extraordinary 
 rapidity and violence. They say " it is the site of a lost city, long 
 buried beneath the waves, and that its towers and spires and turrets, 
 acting as breakers against the tide-water, occasion the roughness of this 
 part of the estuary. The whole city becomes visible on every seventh 
 year, and has been often seen by the fishermen sailing over it ; but 
 the sight bodes ill luck, for within a month after, the ill-fated sailor is 
 a corpse. The time of its appearance is also rendered farther disastrous 
 by the loss of some boat or vessel, of which, or its crew, no vestige 
 is ever after found."* 
 
 High above the water, and perched upon the lofty cliff of Loop Head, 
 stands a lighthouse, by night shedding its rays upon the surging waters 
 that break with echoing thunders against the rocks beneath. From 
 this point an extensive and magnificent panorama is opened to the 
 view. Looking towards the north, the line of coast is traced as far as 
 the eye can reach, fading into hazy distance at Slyne Head, fifty-two 
 miles away, to the right of which the Twelve Pins and other mountains 
 of Connemara are plainly discernible. To the south, Kerry Head and 
 
 * The city is believed to have been visible in the summer of 1823, on which occasion there perished a sail-boa: 
 with a crew of fifteen men. The day happened to be Sunday, and it was reported, and of course credited, that the 
 whole fifteen were seen about the same time at the parish chapel, mixing amongst and conversing with their neighbors 
 and relatives, as was their custom in life ; although a few hours later, the dreadful tidings of their loss reached their 
 families, and filled the whole community with sorrow and lamentations. 
 
NATURAL BRIDGES AT ROSS. 
 
 151 
 
 the Blaskets appear deceptively near, though the latter are forty miles 
 away ; Brandon Mountain appears like an immense sugar-loaf ; and beyond, 
 full fifty miles distant, are seen the blue summits of McGillicuddy's 
 Reeks and the other Killarney Mountains. To the east is traced the course 
 of the Shannon ; and to the west the eye wanders over the billowy 
 surface of the wide Atlantic, until sea and sky blend in the horizon 
 and are faintly discernible one from the other. The Head is precipitous 
 at the point, but the land slopes gently as it trends towards the Shannon. 
 A narrow channel of great depth, through which the sea rushes with 
 violence, and known as the Lover's Leap, is the result of a long, 
 narrow strip of cliff being separated from the mainland. 
 
 From Loop Head the shore stretches for a score miles to the north- 
 east, and is indented along the whole line with many little bays and inlets. 
 Three miles from the point, close to the village of Ross, are some 
 Natural Bridges, which hold an important place in the wonderful 
 features of this coast. In describing them we shall make free use of 
 the language of Mrs. M. J. Knott, who approached them from the land, 
 and has given a graphic picture of their peculiar formation and won- 
 derful character. The bridges are two in number, both picturesque, yet 
 quite different, and extend across the same natural canal or inlet ; which 
 canal appears as if cut out of the solid rock, is eighty feet deep, 
 varies from fifty to seventy feet in width, and in its course makes 
 nearly a right-angle. The inner bridge, which is the larger, is seventy 
 feet in span, bears a resemblance in the spring of its beautiful arch to 
 the Rialto of V enice, and is formed of numerous thin strata of rock, 
 like sheets lying closely over each other. The under side of the arch 
 looks as smooth as if covered with a coat of dark plaster ; and it would 
 seem that at some period the whole was a mass of rock, whose strata 
 took an extraordinary curved or arched direction inland, (a peculiarity 
 apparent in many other places here and along the cliffs to Loop Head) 
 and that by some convulsion of nature a portion of the under strata 
 was forced out, as the broken edges can be seen at low water, appear- 
 ing like a sort of abutment from which the perfect arch springs. In 
 fact, lines of these indented ed^es are visible in an undulating course 
 along the side of the canal nearlv to its mouth, seeming- as if chiselled 
 out by the hand of art. 
 
152 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 The outer bridge is even a more remarkable structure, being nearly 
 as level on the upper as it is on the under surface. When we consider 
 that the span is forty-five feet, the thickness above the arch, nine feet, 
 and the width, thirty feet, and reflect how impossible it would be for 
 man, with all his boasted powers, to construct, or for a moment to 
 support, so great a mass, without a curve underneath, the mind can only 
 contemplate this extraordinary structure as one of the wonderful works 
 of nature's Divine Architect ; and one, which from its exposed situation 
 close to the ocean, has for ages withstood the force of the overwhelming 
 billows of westerly tempests. Nearly under this bridge are low caverns 
 or openings between the rocks, seemingly caused by the coast having 
 been shaken and rent into great fissures ; and, upon large stones being 
 cast therein, they were heard bounding and echoing to a great depth. 
 The bridges are formed of coarse carbonacious slate ; and many of the 
 fissures in some places are lined with minute crystals, which sparkle 
 beautifully in the sun's rays. The geological reason for the present 
 appearance of the bridges is attributed to the softness of the stone, 
 and its inability to resist the force of the waves and the action of 
 atmospheric elements ; and to the falling in of the lower beds, after 
 being eaten away, while the upper ones, dipping both to sea and inland 
 at low angles have formed natural arches. The canal, or wild rockv 
 valley, is, when the tide is out, above a quarter of a mile in length ; 
 and, when the visitor walks along the bottom of it, he can only see 
 naked rocks, the sky, and the breakers foaming in at the end. The 
 bay is lined with a high bank of boulders, or large rounded stones, 
 which from their bulk appear to have been accumulating for centuries. 
 
 Proceeding along the coast, at about fifteen miles from Loop Head, 
 we came to an anchorage in Moore Bay, for the purpose of visiting 
 Kilkee, and of viewing the extraordinary coast-scenery in the vicinity. 
 Formerly a mere fishing village, Kilkee has, since the middle of the 
 century, become the most fashionable watering-place in the southwest of 
 Ireland ; and, though distant from Kilrush, on the northern bank of the 
 Shannon, not less than forty miles by water, it is only nine miles by 
 road across the peninsula to that place, whence a steam packet runs to 
 Limerick. The town commands a fine view of the bay, is built close 
 to the sea, and assumes a semicircular form from the shape of the 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF KILKEE. 
 
 1>3 
 
 strand, which presents a smooth, white, sandy surface of above half-a-mile 
 in length, where the invalid can, without fatigue or interruption, enjoy the 
 exhilarating sea-breeze and watch the Atlantic wave dashing into foam 
 against the cliffs which circumscribe its power, and the rocks of Dungana, 
 which run nearly across the bay; and 
 
 Soccng ffce sod? cove of lone Kflkee." 
 
 Kilkee has a resident population of about 2000, consists 01 two wide 
 intersecting and many minor streets, and an aristocratic quarter or "west- 
 end," containing well-built squares and handsome terraces, the houses in 
 which, suited to every gradation of life, are rented furnished during the 
 season to visitors who are drawn hither to avail themselves of the benefits 
 of sea-bathing. The mildness of the climate, caused by the influence of 
 the Gulf stream which impinges on this coast, the facilities of intercourse 
 with Kilrush and Limerick, and the liberal and economical supply not 
 only of the necessaries of life, but of many of its luxuries, have tended 
 greatly to increase the popularity- of Kilkee as a summer resort. Beyond 
 these the town has no special interest, but there is a peculiar charm in 
 the grandeur of the surrounding scenery that attracts to it not the invalid 
 alone, but the votary of art and the lover of nature. 
 
 The boat in general use by the natives of Kilkee is a species of 
 canoe composed of a frame of light timber or strong wickerwork, 
 covered with sailcloth, and rendered waterproof with pitch and tar. The 
 best kinds have slight timber hoops to support the cloth. Some years 
 ago, however, the canoes were covered with horse and cow-hides, after the 
 custom of the ancient Irish. These little vessels have neither keel nor 
 rudder; they are particularly calculated to skim over the surface of the 
 waves, and pass safely amongst the rocks on this dangerous shore, where 
 a timber-boat might be dashed to pieces. The expert rowers, with a 
 light paddle or oar in each hand, glide very swiftly over the waves, and 
 turn their boats with great dexterity. It is surprising at times to see 
 them going along shore ; when a breaker approaches that would fill the 
 canoe if it struck the side, they instantly turn the head, which from its 
 being elevated, enables them to ride over the swell as safely as a cork. 
 
154 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 after which they as quickly return to their course. These canoes are 
 considered much safer when well managed than timber-boats of the same 
 size. The weight of the latter would preclude their general use along 
 the coast ; as where there are not any sheltered harbors, the fishermen 
 on landing have to carry their canoes above the reach of the waves. 
 Besides, when the sail-cloth happens to be torn it is most expeditiously 
 repaired— a sod of lighted turf is held near the rent until the pitch is 
 melted, a fresh piece is stuck on the aperture, and the canoe is imme- 
 diately re-launched, and the fishermen jump in and row off, the water 
 hardening the cement. 
 
 Two miles southwest of Kilkee is another of those peculiar caves found 
 upon this romantic coast ; and we are sure the reader will excuse us if 
 we give Mrs. Knott's account of her visit to it, as related in her interest- 
 ing little work on Kilkee. That lady premises by stating that the sea 
 had become smooth by the wind blowing off shore for a couple of days, 
 the weather was settled, and the excursion made late in the day in a 
 ship's small boat, which had been picked up at sea by some fishermen, 
 and continues: — "After rowing out of the bay, and finding ourselves on 
 the mighty Atlantic, I may acknowledge we felt more at ease in a boat 
 with a keel and rudder than we had done in a canoe, although the 
 motion was much slower from the boat being heavier. We were accom- 
 panied by another party in a canoe, who soon got ahead of us. Having 
 cleared the rocks of Dungana, the great expanse of water presented a 
 magnificent appearance ; the nearest point on the opposite shore was that 
 of Newfoundland, two thousand miles distant. In passing along the dark 
 cliffs, the Amphitheatre, the Puffing Cavern, the Flat, or Diamond Rocks in 
 succession arrested our attention and excited admiration. Having arrived 
 at the mouth of the cave, we lay to, in order to take soundings, and 
 to examine the majestic perpendicular cliffs, one hundred and fifty feet 
 high, by which we were surrounded, throwing their dark shade on the 
 water, which gave it the appearance of a sea of ink. The water here was 
 thirty-three feet deep. We were gently wafted into this magnificent 
 cavern, of which I can only give a faint sketch ; but, to enable the reader 
 to form some idea of its size, I shall give the best computation we were 
 able to make. The height of the rude arch at the entrance, by com- 
 parison with the cliff above, appeared to be about sixty feet, and lowered, 
 
THE CA VE AT K ILK EE. 
 
 155 
 
 as it receded, to thirty or forty ; the breadth at the bottom was the same ; 
 there were great blocks and angles of rock projecting on either side; 
 within the entrance to the left were a number of stalagmites, formed bv 
 the dropping from above, and standing on a sloping rock, like small 
 brownish sugar-loaves. The roof presented a beautiful variety of rich metallic 
 tinges, from the copper, iron, and other mineral substances held in solution 
 by the water, which kept continually dropping from the top, and gave 
 increased effect to the light thrown in at the entrance, which formed a 
 striking contrast with the darkness at the upper end. On the right a 
 number of stalactites lined the side, having the appearance of a drapery 
 of sea-weeds, and produced a handsome effect. The echo here is aston- 
 ishing. After proceeding inward about two hundred and fifty feet, the 
 light becomes very dim, and the cavern narrower, making an angle to the 
 left. A jutting rock at the entrance of this angle shuts out the little 
 light, on which account the inner chamber is rendered nearly dark. Pro- 
 ceeding on slowly, and having a boat not liable to be injured by touching 
 a rock, we allowed it to float in by the effect of the swell, until the awful 
 and profound silence was broken by the noise of the boat touching the 
 rock at the extreme end, which broke upon the ear with an indescribably 
 deep and impressive sound, as it reverberated from the roof and sides. 
 Whilst in the dark part we perceived what was also noticed by another 
 pany, that the dipping of the oars and the dropping from the roof pro- 
 duced a sparkling appearance under the water — caused, no doubt, by the 
 air-bubbles reflecting the little light which we could scarcely perceive. On 
 leaving this gloomy place and emerging into day, the sunbeams were 
 shining outside the entrance of the cave, about two hundred and fifty feet 
 distant, and hence reflected on the dark rippling water within; and again, 
 being thrown upon the rough-arched roof, rendered still more brilliant by 
 its beautiful metallic tints, broke like a scene of fancied enchantment 
 upon the delighted vision." 
 
 Not far from this cave is Bishop's Island, containing an area of about 
 an acre of land, the herbage on which is noted for its superior quality, 
 causing sheep fattened on it to fetch a higher price than those fed upon 
 the mainland. The island is quite inaccessible except on the northern 
 side, where men are enabled to climb the rocks, the shores elsewhere 
 rising to a height of 160 feet. When sheep are carried thither 
 
156 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 they are taken in boats to the base of these cliffs and drawn to the top 
 by ropes. A huge natural pillar washed by the waves supports a portion 
 of the island ; and when, by the continued action of the waters, the prop 
 gives way, a quarter of the surface must sink into the sea. Upon the 
 top are the ruins of a bee-hive oratory, and a house evidently once 
 belonging to some primitive hermit, both now to be counted as memorials 
 of the earliest ages of Christianity. Legendary history informs us that here 
 lived a bishop who was filled rather with the spirit of greed than with 
 that of religion, and who in a season of great scarcity retired with his 
 hoard to this safe but desolate spot. Here he vainly hoped to enjoy his 
 wealth, but, when the storms of winter came on, the billows of the ocean 
 wore away the land and increased the chasm between the island and the 
 shore, heretofore crossed by a plank or bridge, so that communication was 
 impossible, for no boat could live in the storm ; and the result was that, 
 when the bishop's provisions were exhausted, he came to a miserable end 
 in his wave-girt prison. And this bold and escarped rock has ever since 
 been known in Irish as Oilean-an-Easpoig-gortaigh, the Island of the 
 Hungry Bishop. 
 
 Another remarkable feature of the coast near Kilkee is the Puffing 
 Hole or cavern, which is approached by descending some rough steps 
 to the bald surface of a rock, about fifty feet above the sea. " Beneath 
 this," remarks the guide-book, "is a cavern, over which a flue, or open- 
 ing, thirty feet wide, has been worn by the action of the waves. When, 
 with the rising tide, a strong wind blows from the west, the waves, as 
 they roll in, shoot showers of spray through this aperture, producing, probably 
 as exquisite an effect as the Geysers in Iceland exhibit. Dashing up, 
 with a booming noise, to a height of sixty or eighty feet, the jet seems 
 to pause, and then slowly descends, glistening, and brilliant, as though 
 a beam of light had dissolved into a shower of stars, and showing a 
 superb iris in the sunshine. A young officer and his affianced bride were 
 one day watching this very striking phenomenon, when, having incautiously 
 ventured too near the opening, an unusually large wave dashed over them, 
 and in its return drew them into the gulf below, where they perished 
 among the breakers." 
 
 The hills of Moveen, and Look-out Cliff, a little inland, are eminences 
 from 200 to 450 feet in height, from which most magnificent views are 
 
THE VICINITY OF K ILK EE. 
 
 15? 
 
 obtained ; but as these are in many respects similar to that observed at 
 Loop Head, it is unnecessary that we should describe them. In the 
 vicinity of Look-out Cliff is the chalybeate spring of Fouagh, which is 
 considered to be a spa of superior strength and efficacy ; and in the 
 neighborhood is the Holy Well of Toberkee, reputed by the peasantry 
 to possess more than ordinary sanative power in cases of ophthalmic 
 disease. 
 
 The antiquarian finds matter of interest at Kilkee in the shape of two 
 of the ancient raths — one on each side of the village. That on the east 
 seems of great antiquity. The circumference outside the rampart is two 
 hundred and fifty-six yards ; the top of the mound, one hundred and 
 twenty-six ; the height of the top of the rath, above the fosse, which has 
 been filled considerably, is twenty feet. At the south side of the top of 
 the mound is a passage, covered with large flags, and leading into the 
 interior, which contains a chamber of twelve feet diameter, walled at the 
 sides and covered with broad thick flags. 
 
 From the complete absence of ooze, and the character of the sand and 
 rock which form the western coast of Ireland, the sea-water at Kilkee is 
 remarkably pellucid and bright. Consequently, the persons engaged in recov- 
 ering the sunken cargo of the Intrinsic, wrecked against the neighboring 
 rocks January 30th, 1836, worked to great advantage, being able to see 
 objects distinctly at fifty feet below the surface. Very uncommon and 
 peculiar varieties of sea-weed are found here, particularly the Carrigheen 
 moss, used by invalids, and said to be as nutritious as isinglass. 
 
 Continuing our survey of the coast we found, for some miles after we 
 passed Kilkee, a continuance of the strange freaks of nature which give 
 a weird and gloomy character to the scene ; in fact, all the way from 
 Loop Head to Dunbeg, a distance of twenty miles, says Frazer, "the 
 shore presents on a magnificent scale the ruins of Nature in the numerous 
 and endlessly varied caverns, chasms, bays, and island-rocks, into which 
 the ceaseless roarings of the Atlantic waves have broken this bold rocky 
 coast." 
 
 A short distance northeast of Kilkee is George's Head — " a magnifi- 
 cent but dangerous rock, about 100 feet high, indented and undermined 
 by the violence of the waves, which continually surge through a natural 
 arch worn by their constant action." From this spot may be obtained 
 
158 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 a good view of the Horse-shoe — a bay so called from its form. Near 
 by is another and very perfect natural bridge, " crossing a chasm about 
 thirty feet wide ; and about forty yards east of this bridge, between two 
 declivities, a huge mass of stone has fallen like a wedge, which can be 
 reached by clambering down, whence may be had a fine view of 
 George's Head, set, as it were, in the frame of stone." A little beyond 
 the Horse-shoe rises the hill of Coosheen, 240 feet in altitude, but, like 
 Look-out, presenting a view very similar in character to that obtained 
 from Loop Head. A conspicuous object to the north, with its tower 
 forty feet high, is " turret-crowned Baltard," whose castle was built in 
 the early part of the century as a coast-guard signal station, on the summit 
 of a hill 300 feet high, and overlooking the sea. At the foot of the hill 
 is Lake Farrihy, reputed to contain a tower visible to the keen-eyed 
 fishermen as they row on the surface. This body of water, we are informed, 
 was the result of the negligence of Noule, the chieftain's daughter, 
 'whose duty it was to watch an enchanted well; but who, beguiled by 
 the sweet singing of a fascinating stranger who came to her father's 
 castle, neglected her trust, and in the night the well overflowed and 
 submerged the district, drowning all the inhabitants." 
 
 Donegal Head, another of those rocky points which fret this coast, is 
 completely tunnelled by the sea ; and although the land has partly fallen, 
 the promontory is still preserved from insularity by two natural bridges, 
 one at either end of a yawning chasm. The first bay of any importance 
 after rounding this point is that of Dunbeg, almost the only straw of 
 safety within the clutch of the unfortunate mariner whose frail bark may 
 be subjected to the mercy of the winds and the waves that beat against 
 and lash this dangerous coast. The western coast of Clare, or the space 
 between Loop Head and the Arran Islands off the entrance to the bay 
 of Galway, is called Malbay ; and justly so, for if a vessel happens to 
 be embayed therein, the only places where there is the least chance of 
 saving the ship are in the inner bays of Dunbeg and Liscannor. In 
 addition to the views already given, our artist has sketched one of a 
 Cove in Malbay, which we present in this place, as it gives a very 
 correct idea of the manner in which the ceaseless action of the Atlantic 
 waves have worn away, and scooped the stratified cliffs into natural 
 bridges, caverns, and chasms — so as, we repeat, to give the shores here the 
 
MILL TOWN MA LB A Y AND SPANISH POINT. 
 
 159 
 
 appearance of stupendous ruins, or the fragments of a half-formed world 
 thrown into the wildest confusion by the hand of nature. 
 
 The rocks along this coast are the resort of thousands of sea-gulls 
 and other marine birds, whose young, in the autumn, ranged on narrow 
 shelves of rock, utter loud screams for food, which the parent birds 
 answer as they skim along the surface of the water, looking down for 
 their prey. We are indebted to Captain Sabine for an account of the 
 birds met with on these coasts: "Of sea-birds. I recognized in flight, of 
 terns, the hirundo and minuta ; of gulls, the argentahcs, fuscus, and tri- 
 dactylns, and I heard of a gull with very red legs, which was, I suppose, 
 the ridibundus ; of the guillemots, the troile, brunnichii, grylle, and alba. 
 Cormorants and oyster-catchers abundant ; the oyster-catchers more fre- 
 quently in groups than in pairs, although it was the breeding season ; 
 puffins and razorbills. Of land-birds, the only species worth particular 
 remark is the chough, which breeds in the rocks at Ballybunion, as does 
 the rock-pigeon." 
 
 On the shores of an inlet a dozen miles noitheast of Donegal Head 
 is Milltown Malbay, a small watering-place principally patronized by the 
 people of Galway and Limerick. Its climate is remarkably healthy, its 
 atmosphere richly laden with ozone ; and its waters, like those of Kilkee, 
 are so clear that the bottom can be plainly seen, even where the depth 
 is considerable. A few miles inland is observable Slieve Callan, 1282 feet 
 high, having the appearance of a flat-topped hill with terraced sides. At 
 Spanish Point, the northern headland of the bay, is another puffing cavern, 
 " where in rough weather the waves rise fifty feet high, and in the sun- 
 shine the iridescent hues of the spray form an object of great natural 
 beauty." But Spanish Point, remarks the guide-book, has its historical 
 tale of horror, for here were wrecked two of the "great fleet invincible," 
 that 
 
 " Bore, and bore in vain, 
 The richest spoils of Mexico, the stoutest hearts of Spain." 
 
 " The sea that engulfed them was," says the same authority, " at least 
 as merciful as the Lord Deputy of Ireland, Sir William Fitz-William, 
 who had ordered that all who might reach the shore alive should be 
 massacred, and at Galway caused several of these unfortunates to be 
 beheaded." The waves roll with tremendous force against the cliffs 
 
i60 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 that line this part of the coast, and even in calm weather no vessel 
 can venture near them without being subjected to great peril. 
 
 Liscannor Bay lies between Spanish Point and Hag's Head, and is, 
 we have already remarked, almost the only safe haven on this part of 
 the coast ; it yields large quantities of the finny tribe to the toiling fisher- 
 men. Lahinch, on the eastern shore of the bay, is another small sea- 
 bathing resort, but it has in late years succumbed to the superior attractions 
 of Kilkee. A few miles inland to the northeast is the ancient cathedral 
 city of Kilfenora, Cill-fionnabrach, formerly a place of some importance 
 and celebrated for the number of its crosses, two of which only remain. 
 The venerable cathedral has a massive square tower, and contains a mon- 
 umental effigy supposed to be that of the founder, St. Fachnan.* Half-a- 
 dozen miles north of Lahinch are the famous spas of Lisdoonvarna, to 
 which some 1500 people flock annually. There are four springs, contain- 
 ing in various proportions sulphur, iron, magnesia, and copper ; and the 
 waters are said to be highly beneficial in cases of dyspepsia, dropsy, and 
 rheumatism, as well as in bilious and scorbutic affections. 
 
 In our voyage northward we sailed out of Malbay and rounded the 
 promontory of Hag's Head, whose nomenclature is thus poetically 
 accounted for : — 
 
 " That last and loftiest cape, whose wasted front 
 Looks down the Atlantic waters evermore, 
 Far out above the main sustains a gaunt 
 Colossal head (so seems it) bending o'er 
 With stony gaze perpetual, the wild shore." 
 
 Here commence the remarkable cliffs of " mightiest Moher," which run in 
 a northeasterly direction for five miles towards Black Head, and present 
 to the sea a precipitous wall of over 600 feet in height. 
 
 " These iron-rifted cliffs, that o'er the deep, 
 Wave-worn and thunder-scarred, enormous lower, 
 Stand like the work of some primeval Power." 
 
 They are neither as high as those of Croghan in Achill, nor Slieve League. 
 
 * No trustworthy account of the foundation of this small diocese exists. The first bishop of whom an 
 record has been preserved is Christian, who died in 1254. From 1606 to 1617 the Protestant diocese of 
 Kilfenora was held by the Bishop of Limerick ; in 1661 it was united to the archbishopric of Tuam, and formed 
 part of that diocese till 1742, when it was held by the Bishop of Clonfert ; and in 1752 it was annexed to Kill- 
 aloe. In the Roman Catholic church the diocese is united with that of Kilmacduagh, and has the Episcopal resi- 
 dence at Lahinch. 
 
THE ARRAN ISLAXDS. 
 
 161 
 
 in Donegal, the latter being 2000 feet high, yet they constitute one of 
 the grandest objects of this wild coast, and attain their most sublime 
 aspect in rough weather, when the huge waves of the Atlantic are hurled 
 against them with mighty force and crown their heads with showers of 
 spray. A most extensive view is obtained from an observatory on the 
 summit of the highest cliff, and comprises within the wide scope of vision, 
 Loop Head, the mountains and coast of Kerry, the Arran Islands, and 
 the Twelve Pins and jutting headlands of Connemara. "About a quarter 
 of a mile from the shore, but apparently close under the cliffs, a pointed 
 rock rises from the sea to an altitude of nearly 200 feet, and, seen from some 
 points of view, greatly resembles the tapering spire of a Gothic church. 
 In tempestuous weather it is an impressive sight to observe the convulsed 
 waters thundering and dashing against this rock, making its foam-covered 
 surface look in the sunlight like an obelisk of silver. Innumerable sea- 
 birds build their nests in the recesses of the jutting crags. At certain 
 seasons the peasants of the district gather the eggs and feathers, by 
 lowering an expert with a rope tied round his body." 
 
 A few miles to the north-west of Moher lie the Arran Islands 
 sheltering the entrance to the Bay of Galway. They extend in a north- 
 westerly direction and are three in number — Arranmore the largest 
 and most westerly, nine miles long, and one and a half broad ; Innis- 
 main, the central, three miles long, and one and a half broad ; and 
 Innisheer, the eastern, two and a half miles longr, on which is a lig-ht- 
 house 112 feet high — the group forming one of the seventeen baronies 
 into which Galway is divided. The principal island has been poetically 
 apostrophised by Thomas Moore in the lines — 
 
 " O Arranmore, loved Arranmore, 
 
 How oft I dream of thee, 
 And of those days when by thy shore 
 I wandered young and free ! " 
 
 These islands are reported by ancient writers to be the remains of a 
 high barrier of land, which the Atlantic broke through at an early period 
 of the world. Kirwan, the mineralogist, in his essay on the " Primitive 
 State of the Globe," supposes the Bay of Galway to have been originally 
 a granite mountain, shattered and swallowed during a great convulsion ; 
 and adds, that a vast mass of granite, called "The Gregory," which 
 21 
 
162 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 was torn to pieces by lightning in 1774, stood on one side of the 
 islands, 100 feet at least, above the level of the sea. Bare as these 
 islands are at present, they were once overshadowed by woods, which, 
 combined with their retired situation and wild appearance, rendered 
 them peculiarly adapted to the celebration of the Pagan rites of the ancient 
 Irish. The immense cairns, upright stones, circles, altars, and other 
 Druidical remains yet to be seen in them, prove that they were 
 formerly one of the favorite retreats of that mysterious order of the 
 heathen priesthood. Giraldus Cambrensis attributes to the air of 
 these islands peculiar properties which we must admit we are unable 
 to learn that it possesses at the present day. He speaks of the 
 atmosphere as being so pure that it was needless to bury dead bodies 
 owing to there being no contagion of carrion to infect them ; and that, 
 though Ireland were infected with rats and mice, if any were brought 
 here they either leapt into the sea, or instantly died. 
 
 These islands are still considered by the peasantry to contain the 
 nearest land to the far-famed but shadowy island of O'Brazil or Hy 
 Brizail t the blessed paradise of the pagan Irish, supposed to be still 
 visible from their shores on particular and rare occasions. The earliest 
 reference to their history is found in the accounts of the battle of 
 Muireadh, in pre-Christian times, " in which the Firbolgs, having 
 been defeated by the Tuatha-de-dannans, were driven for refuge into 
 Arran and other islands on the Irish coast, as well as into the 
 western islands of Scotland." Three brothers named Aengus, Conchovar 
 and Mil, are said to have come from Scotland to Arran in the first 
 century of the Christian era, and their names are still preserved in 
 the nomenclature of buildings. St. Ibar, a Christian missionary, is said 
 to have resided here previous to the advent of St. Patrick. In the 
 fifth or sixth century, St Endeus, having received a grant of the larger 
 island from the Christian King of Munster, established on it several religious 
 institutions and became the first abbot ; and the island soon became famous 
 for the sanctity and learning of its ecclesiastics, many of whom flocked hither 
 from the abbeys of the mainland to seek a retreat affording superior 
 opportunity for contemplation and study, which caused it to obtain the 
 name of Ara-Naomh, or "Arran of the Saints;" and many remains 
 are still extant of the religious edifices these ecclesiastics were wont 
 
THE COAST OF CONN EM A RA . 
 
 163 
 
 to frequent. In 546 the islands were allowed immunity from tribute 
 by the Kings of Munster and Connaught ; in 1081 the Danes ravaged 
 the great island and its churches; in 1334 Sir John D'Arcy with a 
 fleet of fifty-six ships plundered the inhabitants and committed barbarous 
 outrages; in 1485 a monastery and abbey were built for Franciscans; 
 in 1 65 1 the Marquis of Clanricarde fortified the Castle of Ardkyn, 
 which held out against the Parliamentary army for more than a year 
 after the surrender of Galway, and on the occupation of the island 
 Cromwell's soldiers demolished the great church of St. Endeus to 
 furnish materials for the repair of the fort. 
 
 The islands are inhabited by a population of about 3000 people 
 residing in several villages, and obtaining their livelihood mainly by 
 fishing and preparing kelp in the burning of a particular species of sea- 
 weed that grows upon the shore. The people are very primitive in 
 their character, have not ceased to speak their native tongue, and 
 retain -the manners and customs of bygone times. Though the geological 
 features of the group assimilate to those of the main-land, and though 
 the islands contain numerous crags, and fissures, and puffing caverns, 
 still there are valleys affording choice pasturage for sheep, while the 
 cultivation of the land is carried on to a limited extent. 
 
 Although our destination was the port of Galway, before proceeding 
 thither we directed our course round Slyne Head, the western extremitv 
 of the county of Galway in the province of Connaught, and visited 
 a few places of import on the wild Connemara coast. But, as we 
 afterwards journeyed through that romantic region during our inland 
 wanderings, and shall describe its peculiar features in our second volume, 
 we shall here but speak of the places we touched at upon its shores. 
 No land-view can equal in sublimity and grandeur the coast-scenery 
 that presents itself upon sailing out of the Bay of Galway through the 
 northern passage between Arranmore and the main-land. A succession 
 of noble bays open to the view, protected from the fury of the Atlantic 
 waves by the numerous islands which lie near their entrance. A glance 
 at the map will be sufficient to show the singular formation of the 
 coast, whose irregular indentations, running far into the land, form deep 
 harbors, yet almost so completely unknown and unfrequented, that scarcely 
 a sail, save those of the poor fishermen's boats, is ever to be seen on their 
 
164 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 undisturbed broad waters. Some idea may be formed of the extraordinary- 
 facilities which this sequestered district possesses for trade and commerce, 
 when, according to a late eminent engineer's report, no part of it is 
 more than four miles distant from existing navigation. " There are," 
 says he, " upwards of twenty safe and capacious harbors fit for vessels 
 of any burden ; about twenty-five navigable lakes in the interior, of a 
 mile or more in length, besides hundreds smaller — the sea-coast and all 
 these lakes abounding with fish. The district with its islands possesses 
 no less than four hundred miles of sea-shore. On Lough Corrib it 
 has about fifty miles of shore, so that with Lough Mask, etc., there 
 are, perhaps, as many miles of the shore of the sea, or navigable 
 lakes, as there are square miles of surface." Of the harbors on the 
 sea-coast, the principal are Cashla, Greatman's, Kilkieran, Bertraghboy, 
 Roundstone, Bunowen, Ardbear, Cleggan, Ballynakill, and Killary, which 
 last separates the counties of Galway and Mayo. Kilkieran is the largest 
 of these bays ; it runs into the land upwards of ten miles, and contains 
 within its spacious bosom the inhabited islands of Gorumna, Lettermore, 
 and several of lesser note. 
 
 Bertraghboy Bay is also of considerable extent, and has the beautiful 
 little river of Ballynahinch falling into it at its upper extremity. This 
 river has its rise in Ballynahinch Lake, at about four miles distance 
 from the shore. On the banks of this lovely and secluded sheet of 
 water stands Ballynahinch House, formerly the residence of the Martins, 
 proprietors of the greater part of this wild district, who were once 
 veritable Kings of Connemara — the peasantry even now speak of the " reign " 
 of the Martins, clearly denoting the almost royal sway* of this family, 
 from whose hands the immense property (upwards of 200,000 acres of 
 land, and the mansion) passed some years since for ,£180,000, the last 
 owner having mortgaged it to the Law Life Insurance Company. The 
 cause of this loss of patrimonial acres, must, we fear, be attributed to 
 that unselfish and boundless Irish hospitality, and to that extravagant 
 manner of living which has been the downfall of more than one once 
 
 * It is related of Colonel Martin, the representative of the family in the early part of the century, that he 
 " endeavored to put the Prince Regent out of conceit with the famous Long Walk of Windsor, by saying that the 
 avenue which led to his hall-door was thirty miles in length. The pleasantry was true to this extent, that the greater 
 part of the distance of forty miles from Galway to Ballynahinch lay within the Martin estates, while the road from 
 the one to the other stopped short of the mansion, beyond which, there was little else but rugged paths." 
 
BALL YNAHINCH CASTLE. 
 
 165 
 
 wealthy family ; for Mr. Thackeray who visited Ballynahinch in 1842, was 
 led to remark from what he saw there : — " There may be many comparisons 
 drawn between English and Irish gentlemen's houses ; but perhaps the 
 most striking point of difference between the two is the immense 
 following of the Irish house, such as would make an English house- 
 keeper crazy almost." And, after particularizing some of the domestics, 
 he added, " and, if I might venture to say a word more, it would be 
 respecting Connemara breakfasts ; but this would be an entire and 
 flagrant breach of confidence ; and, to be sure, the dinners were just 
 as good." 
 
 The mansion is a plain building, but the situation it occupies is surpassingly 
 beautiful, backed by dark and lofty hills and overlooking the lake that sleeps 
 in calm repose at the foot of the impending sides of Lettery and Bengower, 
 which here form the front of the magnificent group of conical mountains, 
 called the Twelve Pins of Binabola. From the bridge which crosses the 
 river near the house, a fine view may be obtained of the lake and the 
 ruins of the old castle, standing on a small island in the lake, and forming 
 a picturesque object in the landscape. This castle, it is said, was built by 
 the O'Flahertys once the possessors of vast estates in the western part of 
 the county and whose frequent acts of oppression and lawless violence 
 obtained for them the appellation of " The bloody O'Flahertys;" and so 
 great was the dread felt for them by the peaceable inhabitants of Galway, 
 that the west gate of the town (that on the side nearest their troublesome 
 neighbors) bore, while standing, the inscription 
 
 "From the ferocious O'Flahertys — Good Lord deliver us." 
 
 The downfall of this turbulent family is said to be due to the chief of 
 the O'Flahertys having obtained the materials for the erection of the 
 castle by the demolition of the convent of Timbola on the mainland, 
 compelling the friars to convey the stones on their backs to the shore 
 of the lake, at a spot which has in consequence obtained an Irish 
 name signifying " The Friar's Bend," indicative of the attitude of bearing 
 a burden. The eccentric Colonel Martin, who for many years represented 
 the county in Parliament, once resided in this castle ; but it was 
 afterwards, previous to its being allowed to fall in decay, merely used 
 as a sporting-lodge. 
 
166 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 On Roundstone Bay, adjoining Bertraghboy, stands the modem 
 village of Roundstone, built by the late Alexander Nimmo, the celebrated 
 engineer, whose scientific knowledge led to the conviction that the best 
 mode of raising the commercial prosperity of Ireland, was by means 
 of her noble harbors on the western coast. Impressed with this opinion, 
 he expended large sums of money in building here a handsome pier 
 and erecting houses. His exertions were received either with apathy or 
 jealousy by those who should have aided his efforts, and he died in 
 the prime of life, leaving his noble designs undeveloped ; but not until 
 he had done enough to prove the soundness of his theory and the 
 correctness of his expanded views. The Bay of Roundstone is backed 
 by the lofty eminence of Urrisbeg, 987 feet high, upon whose steep 
 acclivities grow many rare and beautiful plants, and amongst them 
 the Mediterranean heath, not we believe to be found elsewhere in Ireland. 
 
 The popular traveler Inglis, in speaking of the view from the summit 
 of Urrisbeg, describes it as "more singular than beautiful," and adds; 
 " Here, Connemara is perceived to be truly that which its name denotes 
 'Bays of the Sea.' The whole western coast of Connemara is laid, 
 open with its innumerable bays and inlets : but the most striking and 
 singular part of the view is that to the north, over the districts called 
 Urrisbeg and Urrismore. These are wide, level districts, spotted by 
 an unaccountable number of lakes, and mostly entirely uncultivated and 
 uninhabited. I endeavored from my position to reckon the number of lakes, 
 and succeeded in counting upwards of one hundred and sixty. Shoulders 
 of the mountain, however, shut out from the view some of the nearer 
 part of the plain, and other parts were too distant to allow any very accurate 
 observation ; so that I have no doubt there may be three hundred lakes, 
 large and small, in this wild and very singular district. Several of the 
 lakes have islands upon them, and by the aid of a good telescope which 
 I carried with me, I perceived that many of these islands were wooded." 
 
 From Roundstone our seaward course was past Ballyconnelly, Bunowen, 
 and Ballynallama bays, and of Slyne Head, crowned with a couple of 
 light-houses, upon whose rocky shores the wreck of many a stately 
 ship has been strewn. On the northern side of this peninsula lies the 
 sequestered little Bay of Ardbear, on a navigable inlet on which stands 
 the neat and thriving town of Clifden, charmingly situated with a back 
 
CLIFDEN AND ITS CASTLE. 
 
 167 
 
 ground of mountains on every side except to the west, where it is 
 open to the broad Atlantic. This place like its neighbor, Roundstone, 
 is quite a modern town, there having been but one house on its site 
 as late as 1 8 1 5 ; and, like it, Clifden is the outgrowth of individual 
 exertion. Its existence is due to the forethought of the late John 
 D'Arcy, Esq., who being impressed with the advantages likely to arise 
 from the establishment of a town in such a position, granted building 
 leases in perpetuity, together with four acres of the neighboring mountain 
 land, at the nominal rent of twenty-five shillings per annum. The 
 scheme progressed so satisfactorily that the town now possesses 
 several hundred houses, and the usual public edifices, with a well-attended 
 market, and considerable export trade in butter and grain, for the traffic 
 in which, vessels of 200 tons burden load and unload in the harbor. 
 
 From the neighboring Cloughanard Hill, 420 feet in height, there 
 is a splendid view of the Atlantic Ocean, of the bold and rugged 
 coast, and "of the innumerable sea inlets that break through and enclasp 
 the land on all sides with their glittering arms," whilst, turning the eye 
 landwards, the Twelve Pin Mountains are seen to great advantage, 
 especially when viewed at sun-rise. Without the town, but sufficiently 
 near for its falling waters to be heard within its streets, is a beautiful 
 watertall upon the Owenglen river which takes its rise in the Twelve 
 Pins. Sir John Forbes on his visit here as far back as 1852 seems 
 to have been enraptured with the place, for he then wrote : " Although 
 I hardly know in what the charm consists, I have certainly seen no 
 spot in Ireland which, from the attractiveness of mere locality, would 
 claim my suffrage, as a place of residence, so entirely as Clifden. 
 Over and above its scenic beauties, its position is such as to ensure 
 for it every terrestial and climatorial condition that is found most 
 conducive to health." 
 
 The scenery about Clifden, and along the water-side to Clifden 
 Castle about two miles distant from the town, is, thinks another 
 visitor, "more Swiss-like in its character than any in Connemara." The 
 Castle is a modern turretted structure, of no particular beauty in 
 itself, but the charm of its situation is unrivalled. " Mountain and 
 wood rise behind, and a fine sloping lawn in front reaches down to 
 the land-locked bay, while to the right the eye ranges over the ocean 
 
168 
 
 THE SOUTHERN AND WESTERN COASTS. 
 
 until it mingles with the far and dim horizon." The pleasure grounds 
 exhibit in their laying out, considerable taste and judgment, and may 
 be considered examples of the highest perfection in landscape gardening. 
 It is much to be regretted that the D'Arcys, who have done so much 
 to raise the position of this portion of Connemara, should have been 
 so reduced by their liberality, as to have been compelled to part with 
 their mansion and demesne which were some years ago sold under 
 the operation of the " Encumbered Estates Act." 
 
 From Clifden we sailed round Aughrus Point another of those bold 
 peninsulas which, jutting into the ocean, receive the first shock of the 
 Atlantic billows. A little to the northward, and about six miles distant 
 from the main-land, the island of Inishbofin appeared to view rearing its 
 dark form above the waves. Though now little thought of in a political 
 point of view, it was esteemed of sufficient importance during the 
 stormy period of the civil war to be made a place of arms. A castle 
 built there by Cromwell was besieged by King William's army, and 
 surrended upon honorable terms. Near the extremity of the narrow 
 headland which lies north of the harbor of Ballynakill stands the solitary 
 mansion of Renvyle, which, with the surrounding improvements, forms 
 an interesting feature in the coast scenery, and engaged our attention 
 while our little cutter was gliding towards The Killary, a deep, narrow 
 bay, penetrating inland for about nine miles, though in no part more 
 than a mile in width. As we slowly sailed up this inlet we were 
 forcibly struck by the novel character of the scenery, which, Mr. Inglis 
 considers more to resemble a Norwegian fiord than anything he had 
 elsewhere seen nearer home. The bay, which is deep enough to receive 
 vessels of great burden, is, in many places, not more than a quarter of 
 a mile across ; and the shores, rising precipitously from the water's edge, 
 impart an air of stern grandeur and majestic beauty to the picture. 
 But the banks, though picturesque in form, are unadorned with wood, 
 without which no landscape can be perfect. This deficiency was noticed 
 by the intelligent tourist just mentioned, who observes that, " if the 
 mountain sides on the Killary were wooded, it would be almost 
 unnecessary to travel into Norway in search of scenery." Now, as pine- 
 covered mountains form a distinctive feature of the fiord, it is difficult 
 to harmonize Mr. Inglis' comparisons. 
 
MWEELREA AND DELPHI LODGE 
 
 The scenery on the north or Mayo bank is undoubtedly the grandest, 
 for there Mweelrea, the " Giant of the West," and Bengorm, elevate their 
 lofty heads. Mweelrea is most correctly pronounced by Frazer to be the 
 "grand alpine feature" of the region, and in its visual effect as surveyed 
 from the sea, from which it directly springs to a height of 2688 feet, a 
 sublime object. " Its summit level is about a mile from the shore, and its 
 acclivities extend along the water for six miles — that is, from the mouth of 
 the strait to the glen of Bundorragha ; and thence the mountain boundaries 
 of the strait are prolonged by Bengorm, which, in its turn, attains to an 
 elevation of 2286 feet." 
 
 Landing at the little fishing village of Bundorragha we proceeded for 
 a mile or more by the side of the mountain stream of the same name, 
 which courses through the gorge, to Delphi Lodge, a hunting seat which 
 formerly belonged to the Marquis of Sligo, but is now the property of 
 the Hon. Mr. Plunket. The house is situated on the eastern side of the 
 small Lough Finn, whose banks are covered by the woods planted by the 
 former noble owner. The sides of the hills, as they rise from the little 
 lake, are singularly picturesque and beautiful ; for, as the ranges of rock 
 ascend, they assume a tortuous and wavy form, and between each wave 
 of the uprising stratification, the fresh green grass of the young summer 
 seemed to grow luxuriantly-; there were then before you, as in manifold varie- 
 gations, the green and the gray, tinting the whole sides of the mountains. 
 There are two lakes in the valley, the one close by the lodge ; and the 
 vale, a little above the small pleasure-ground, taking a turn at nearly right- 
 angles, contains the other, Lough Doo. By ascending a green eminence 
 you can see both lakes ; the upper and larger one, drawing its waters from 
 the magnificent Mweelrea, must present sublime views of the gorges of 
 that noble mountain. 
 
 We had here at the Killary reached the northern confines of the 
 county of Galway, and it became time for us to part from the little craft 
 upon whose deck we had spent many pleasant days, and whose locomotive 
 abilities had enabled us to visit many points of peculiar interest. Her 
 prow was therefore turned and we retraced our seaward course as far as 
 the Arran Islands, where we entered the Bay of Galway, and sped over 
 its waters, traversing its entire length, to the town from whence it 
 derives its name. 
 22 
 
170 
 
 FROM GAL WAY TO LIMERICK. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 FROM GALWAY TO LIMERICK. 
 
 Pay of Galway, for?nerly a lake — Totvn of Galway — Spa?iish Aspects — Origin of the name — Early 
 History — The Tribes of Galway — Sieges the town has undergone — Lynch Castle and the Lynch 
 family — Tragical story of the Warden of Galway — Collegiate Church of St. Nicholas — 
 Queens College — Eminent men of Galway — The Claddagh, its people and their peculiar 
 customs — Population and trade of Galway — Its commercial advantages — Proximity to America 
 — Natural features — Abbey of Clare — Galway — Athenry — Tuam and its two cathedrals — 
 Gort — Lough Cooler and its eccentric outlet — Cathedral and Round Toioer of Kilmacduagh — 
 Ennis — Ruined Abbeys of Clare and Killone — Clare Castle. 
 
 THE Bay of Galway is recorded in the traditional annals of Ireland to 
 have been in the pre-historic period a freshwater lake known as 
 Lough Lurgan, one of the three principal lakes in Ireland, and con- 
 verted into a bay by the Atlantic breaking over the barriers and uniting 
 with the waters therein ; and, geologically considered, there seems to be 
 little doubt but that the bay has been formed through a submergence of 
 the land, but whether gradual or otherwise it is impossible to determine.* 
 It is however certain that this bay was, a few centuries back, one of the 
 most important of the entrances to Ireland ; and it might be so again if 
 proper advantage were taken of its geographical position, and of the 
 navigation of the line of lakes that connect its headwaters with the 
 interior of the country. Proceeding up the bay from the Arran Islands 
 at its mouth the shores exhibit much diversity. On the right hand the 
 
 * A castle of the O'Haynes in the vicinity of Kinvarra, on the southern shore of the bay, opposite the town of 
 Galway, remarks a topographical writer, "was shaken down and partly swallowed up by the waters, on the first of 
 November, 1755 — that day so memorable for the awful earthquake at Lisbon. Another neighboring castle shared 
 the same fate ; the rock was rent into a chasm several fathoms deep, and into this the castle reeled and fell. This 
 circumstance is curious, if taken in connection with the legend, which affirms that ages ago a beautiful country, 
 adorned with towns and villages, flourished where the western waves now have dominion, but during an earthquake 
 disappeared. There are many reasons for believing that the coast line of Clare and Galway was once exterior 
 to the Arran Islands." 
 
SPANISH ASPECTS OP GAL WA Y. 
 
 171 
 
 noble range of the Burrin Mountains, in the county of Clare, form a 
 majestic boundary to the scene ; while on the left or Galway side the 
 country is delightfully varied, exhibiting the mingled beauties of rich 
 cultivation and primeval wildness. The bay is over thirty miles long, and, 
 though not less than twenty miles broad at the mouth, gradually decreases 
 in breadth as it penetrates into the country. Its surface spreads over an 
 area of 200 square miles, and it contains a number of inner creeks, inlets, 
 and harbors, upon one of which the port of Galway stands, near the head 
 of the bay. 
 
 Galway, the capital of Connaught, is mainly situated on gently rising 
 ground upon a tongue of land, bounded on the east by Lough Athalia, 
 an arm of the bay, and on the west by the river which forms the outlet 
 of Lough Carrib ; the other and smaller part of the town lying on the 
 opposite bank of the river, which is spanned by three bridges, one of 
 them, the present West Bridge, having some years ago replaced an ancient 
 structure of the date of 1442, protected by two tower gateways. 
 
 The first impression received by a stranger in Galway induces the 
 belief that he has suddenly been transplanted from Irish soil to the 
 interior of a foreign city. The very garb of the women, with their red 
 petticoats and little mantilla-fashioned cloaks, leads to the conviction that he 
 is in the land of Velasquez and Murillo ; while the dark glistening eyes of 
 the peasantry betoken a descent from the Spanish traders, who brought 
 their wines and other merchandise to Galway when as a port it was 
 only excelled in the British Isles by London and Dublin. And it is not 
 in the people alone that this foreign aspect is observable, for many of the 
 ancient houses still standing in different parts of the town have a 
 decidedly Spanish look about them. Our view of a Street in Galway, 
 depicting " Lynch's Castie," of which we shall have something to say 
 directly, illustrates this. Inglis, who visited Spain prior to making his tour 
 of Ireland, found at every step he took in Galway something to remind 
 him of the peculiar characteristics and customs of the cities of the Iberian 
 Peninsula. " I found," he says, "the wide entries and broad stairs of Cadiz 
 and Malaga : the arched gateways with the outer and inner railing, and 
 the court within — needing only the fountain and flower-vases to emulate 
 Seville. I found the sculptured gateways and grotesque architecture 
 which carried the imagination to the Moorish cities of Granada and 
 
172 
 
 FROM GAL WAY TO LIMERICK. 
 
 Valencia. I even found the little sliding-wicket for observation in one 
 or two doors, reminding one of the secresy, mystery, and caution observed, 
 where gallantry and superstition divide life between them." 
 
 Galway is said to obtain its name from that of Gaillemh, the daughter 
 of Breasil, the prosperous king of the Firbolgs, who was drowned while 
 bathing near a rock, marked on the western bank of the river in a map 
 of Galway made in 1651, and in memory of which event there was 
 erected a monument which has been allowed to disappear. Ancient Irish 
 writings, however, indicate other origins for the name of Galway, some 
 speaking of it as Dun Gaillve, the Doon or fortified place at the mouth 
 of the river Gaillve, and in the modern vernacular it is always called 
 Cahir Gallieve ; while others attribute the name respectively to the Gallaeci 
 of Spain, and to the Gaels or merchants by whom the town was 
 occupied. 
 
 The earliest historical record we have of Galway is the destruction 
 in 835 by Turgesius, the sanguinary Danish commander, when he overran 
 Connaught, of the ancient town, which is supposed to have been the 
 Nagnata of Ptolemy. Hardiman, the historian of the place, relates that 
 a fortress or castle was built at the mouth of the river, soon after the 
 defeat of the Danes at Clontarf in 1014, and that its erection and the 
 improvement of the town were viewed with jealousy by the people of 
 Munster, between whom and those of Connaught there was considerable 
 competition. In 1132 the castle was besieged and taken by Cormac 
 MacCarthy and a body of troops which Connor, king of Munster, 
 despatched thither by sea; and again, in 1149, Connaught was invaded, 
 and the town and castle of Galway destroyed by Turlough O'Brien, king 
 of Munster. However, after the invasion of Henry II., these ravages 
 were repaired and walls erected for the protection of the town, which 
 drew to the place a large influx of inhabitants, among whom there were 
 thirteen families, bearing the names of Athy, Blake, Bodkin, Browne, 
 D'Arcy, Ffont, Ffrench, Joyes, Kirwan, Lynch, Martin, Morris, and Skerrett, 
 "whose descendants," says the writer just named, "are known to this 
 day under the general appellation of 'The Tribes of Galway,' an 
 expression first invented by Cromwell's forces, as a term of reproach 
 against the natives of the town for their singular friendship and attach- 
 ment to each other during the time of their unparalleled troubles and 
 
HISTORICAL SKETCH OF GAL WAY. 
 
 173 
 
 persecutions, but which the latter afterwards adopted as an honorable 
 mark of distinction between themselves and their cruel oppressors." It 
 is related of these people, that they were greatly averse to intercourse 
 with the native Irish, an instance of which is given in a by-law of the 
 date of 1 5 1 8, which forbade any of them receiving into their houses 
 ''at Christemas, Easter, nor no feaste elles, any of the Burkes, McWilliams, 
 the Kellies, nor no cepte elles, without license of the mayor and councill, 
 on payn to forfeit that neither O' nor Mac shalle strutte ne swaggere 
 thro' the streetes of Gallway." This may in some measure account for 
 their antipathy to the O'Flahertys, of whom we spoke in the last 
 chapter, and for the inscription over the west gate which we there 
 mentioned. But, notwithstanding this Anglo-Norman origin, the fact must 
 not be lost sight of that the favorable position of Galway, causing it for 
 centuries to enjoy the monopoly of the trade with Spain, led to its being 
 unmistakably impressed with Spanish features, both in the architecture of 
 the streets and in the dress and manners of the population. 
 
 Galway obtained from Edward III. a charter of incorporation, which 
 was confirmed in successive reigns. It had obtained the zenith of its 
 opulence and popularity at the beginning of the Rebellion in 1641, during 
 which it was so staunch in its loyalty to the king that it suffered a 
 
 re, but was compelled to surrender in 1651, when it was surrounded 
 by walls, defended by fourteen tow T ers, and entered by as many gates. It 
 was. however, afterwards so mercilessly treated by the Parliamentarians, 
 that at the Restoration the town had almost completely fallen into decay. 
 Galway was once more besieged after the battle of Augrim, in July, 
 1691, by General Ginkell with 14,000 of King William's troops; and after 
 holding out some days compelled to surrender, but "on condition of a 
 safe conduct for the garrison to Limerick, and a free pardon of the 
 inhabitants, with preservation of their property and privileges." After the 
 middle of the last century the fortifications rapidly disappeared, and now 
 but little more than an ancient gateway remains to mark their former 
 importance. 
 
 The march of improvement has to a great extent either obliterated 
 or practically buried many of the ancient remains, so that now it is 
 necessary to hunt in back streets for the Spanish houses that so charmed 
 Mr. Inglis nearly half a century ago. The only really perfect existing 
 
174 
 
 FROM GAL WAY TO LIMERICK. 
 
 example is found in Lynch's Castle, depicted in our street view, a large 
 square building, corner of Shop and Abbeygate Streets. It is richly 
 decorated with ornamental mouldings and cornices with grotesque heads, 
 and bears a medallion containing the arms of the family with their crest, 
 a lynx, as well as the carved figure of a monkey and child, betokening 
 the saving of an infant by a favorite monkey on the occasion of the 
 burning of the house. The name of this family is believed to have 
 originally been Linz, the founder having come from a place in Austria 
 so called, of which a member was governor during a siege, and as a 
 reward for his energy he was permitted to adopt the sharp-sighted lynx 
 for his crest. The family immigrated to Ireland in the thirteenth century, 
 and flourished to the middle of the seventeenth, and the records of the 
 city show that during their time they seem to have been public bene- 
 factors. " In 1484 Pierce Lynch was made first mayor under the charter 
 of Richard III., while his son, Stephen, was appointed first warden by 
 Innocent VIII., and during the period of 169 years 84 members of 
 this family were mayors." 
 
 A tragical story, which has afforded a theme for romance and drama, 
 is connected with this family. The scene of the occurrence in Lombard 
 Street (known as Dead Man's Lane), is still marked by a skull and 
 cross-bones in black marble placed over a doorway, and the motto 
 
 Remember Deathe — Vaniti of Vaniti, and all is but Vaniti. 
 
 1524- 
 
 Briefly narrated the story runs thus : James Lynch Fitzstephen, Warden 
 of Galway in 1493, traded largely with Spain, to which country he sent 
 his son on a voyage to purchase and bring back a cargo of wine. 
 Young Lynch, however, wasted the money intrusted to him and obtained 
 credit from a Spanish merchant, who sent a young relative back with 
 him to obtain payment and establish further intercourse. As the ship 
 approached her destination, the former determined upon concealing his 
 crime by committing another, and so, having prevailed upon his crew to 
 participate therein, threw the young Spaniard overboard. On his return 
 home, the warden's son was received with joy, and eventually became 
 himself a prosperous merchant. Time lulled every sense of danger, and 
 he was on the eve of wedding the daughter of a wealthy neighbor, 
 
STOR Y OF THE WARD EX OF GAL WA Y. 
 
 ITS 
 
 when one of the seamen on the point of death, being stricken with 
 remorse, summoned old Lynch to his bedside and confessed the villany 
 of his only and beloved son. Young Lynch was tried, found guilt}-, and 
 sentenced to execution — the father being his judge. But the wretched 
 prisoner had many friends and relatives, who resolved on preserving him 
 from a shameful death. When the day of execution dawned, the father 
 rose and assisted the executioner to remove the fetters which bound 
 his unfortunate son. and then, unlocking the prison door in order to 
 proceed to the scaffold, placed the culprit between the priest and himself; 
 but their progress was soon arrested by a clamorous throng collected 
 by the wretched mother, whom, failing in her personal exertions, she had 
 prevailed upon to effect a rescue. For this purpose they had armed 
 themselves, and their outcries for mercy would have shaken any nerves 
 less firm than those of the warden, who, first exhorted them to yield 
 submission to the laws, and then, finding his efforts useless to accomplish 
 the ends of justice by the hands of the executioner at the usual place, 
 determined, by a desperate victor}- over parental feeling, to perform the 
 sacrifice himself. Therefore, retaining hold upon his son, he mounted 
 with him by. a winding stair to an arched window overlooking the 
 crowded street, and then securing to an iron staple in the wall one end 
 of the rope T of which the other had already been placed round the 
 culprit's neck, he took a last embrace, and finally gave the law its due 
 by launching his son into eternity-. The intrepid magistrate expected 
 instant death from the fury of the populace ; but the people seemed so 
 much overawed or confounded by the magnanimous act that they retired 
 slowly and peaceably to their several dwellings. The unhappy father 
 ever after secluded himself from all society, except that of his mourning 
 family. 
 
 The collegiate Church of St. Nicholas, an ancient structure dating from 
 1320, and now judiciously restored, was in early days much associated 
 with the Lynches, one of whom built the south transept, while others 
 contributed to its adornment. The interior contains monument^ 
 dedicated to various members of the family, and especially one to the 
 stern warden who figured so prominently in the tragedy just related. 
 It is a cruciform building, consisting of "nave, with aisles, chancel, 
 transepts, and centre tower, surmounted by a singular pyramidal belfry 
 
 BOSTOS COLLt,; t Ui^-uiy 
 CHE6TSUT til I J 
 
176 
 
 FROM GAL WAY TO LIMERICK. 
 
 of much later date than the rest of the church. The breadth across 
 the transepts is 126 feet, and the total length 152 feet." The east and 
 west windows were formerly remarkable for their beautiful stained glass. 
 Galway was anciently included within the diocese of Annaghdown or 
 Enachdone, whose dilapidated ecclesiastical buildings lie a few miles to 
 the north, but it was in 1324 united to the archbishopric of Tuam. The 
 church was in 1484 made collegiate, and was afterwards put under the 
 charge of a warden who had jurisdiction distinct from that of the 
 diocese ; but on the death of the last warden, and the last of his kind 
 in Ireland — 1840 — it again became subject to the see of Tuam ; and thus 
 from the title of city, which Galway had held for some centuries, it was 
 reduced to that of town. In the Roman Catholic Church, Galway is 
 the seat of a diocese, and has three places of worship with several 
 monasteries and nunneries. 
 
 The principal part of the town is Eyre Square, in which are situated 
 the leading hotels, railway station, bank, club house, several private 
 residences, and a statue of Lord Dunkellin, late M. P. for the county. 
 In other parts there are the usual buildings of a county town, 
 with two barracks, a "tholsel" or exchange, a handsome modern court 
 house with a Doric front, and a jail, remarkable for being built without 
 any timber. Galway also possesses one of the three modern colleges 
 instituted in 1845, and of which we have already spoken of that of Cork. 
 Queciis College, situated on a fine open site on the west side of the 
 river, is a neat Gothic building with a spacious quadrangle, from designs 
 by Mr. J. B. Keane, and was opened for the reception of students in 
 1849. The general conduct and the course of studies pursued being 
 similar to those at the sister institution at Cork, it is unnecessary to 
 repeat them here. This "Western Metropolis" has in the past been 
 either the birthplace, early home, or school residence of many eminent 
 men, among whom we may name Lynch, the author of "Cambrensis 
 Eversus," Kirwan, the chemist, and Kirwan, the orator, Duald MacFirbis, 
 the genealogist and antiquary, Roger O'Flaherty and James Hardiman, 
 the historians, and Father Peter, who was for so long a period "the 
 man for Galway." 
 
 One of our illustrations represents a view of Galway from the 
 Claddagh, a populous maritime suburb of some thousand inhabitants. 
 
THE KING OF THE CLAD DA GHS. 
 
 177 
 
 lving to the right of the harbor. The dwellers are fishermen of a 
 strange, gipsy-like character, who till lately held aloof from the inhabitants 
 of the town of Galway, whom they looked upon as "transplanters."' It 
 has long been their custom to adhere to certain primitive local laws, 
 one being the annual election of a fisherman as 11 King of the Claddagh " 
 who was appealed to upon all disputed points in which his decision 
 was final. His majesty's boat was distinguished from that of his subjects 
 by having white colors flying from the mast-head. Wright remarks of 
 the annual election of mayor and sheriffs by the Claddagh boys, on 
 St. John's eve : " Their mock ceremony is accompanied by real mirth ; 
 fires are lighted up in various places through the town, round which 
 boys and girls dance in joyous hilarity, armed with long-handled besoms 
 made of dock-stems, with which they gently touch each passenger who 
 refuses to obey the mandate of ' honor the bonfire.' The attendants 
 of the mayor and sheriffs are also armed with like rude fasces of 
 authority, which in the plenitude of fun, are ultimately set on fire, 
 and whirled round over the heads of the noisy corporation." 
 
 These Claddagh people, who are quiet, temperate and industrious, 
 are peculiar in both their dialect, which differs from the Irish of other 
 districts, and in their dress ; but in the personal features of the women 
 the dark eyes and blue-black hair of other Galway girls are apparent. 
 They always intermarry among themselves and consequently are all 
 cousins, uncles, and aunts. One of their primitive customs makes the 
 wedding-ring an heirloom, descending from mother to daughter. " The 
 rings are of massive gold, and usually decorated with a heart, in some 
 instances bearing a crown upon the top supported upon two clasped 
 hands. So superstitious are they with regard to the pattern of the 
 ring, that they would not consider a marriage legal were the ordinary 
 wedding-ring substituted instead." Sir John Forbes tells us that he was 
 informed that the Claddaghites " had very rigid, yet rather peculiar 
 notions respecting hospitality to strangers, within their own precincts. 
 Let a stranger insult a Claddaghite ever so much in Claddagh, all 
 must be borne with calmness and equanimity, and no retaliation thought 
 of there. The stranger is. however, carefully guarded out of the sacred 
 limits, and then the Claddaghites are said to take their revenge, with 
 full interest for delay of repayment " 
 
 23 
 
178 
 
 FROM GAL WAY TO LIMERICK. 
 
 Between the years 1820 and 1850 the area of Galway covered by 
 buildings was enlarged one-fourth, and the population, trade, and com- 
 merce also increased, but in a somewhat less ratio. Since 1850, however, 
 the number of inhabitants has fallen off, the population in 1871 having 
 been 13,134, returning two members to Parliament; but the trade has 
 been increased by the introduction of several industrial establishments, 
 among them the Iodine Chemical Works, for the manufacture of iodine 
 from sea-weed. And yet, says James Frazer, " considering the vast 
 natural advantages which Galway possesses — her geographical position, 
 her fisheries, her deep, sheltered and capacious bay, her immense water 
 power in Lough Corrib, now rendered navigable for steamers, containing 
 an area 43,485 statute acres, running up, as it were, to the borders 
 of the town, there maintaining a level of thirty feet above the sea, and 
 discharging a mighty volume of water through her very centre, her 
 inexhaustible supply of limestone and granite, alike suited to every 
 structural purpose to which these rocks are applicable, and these minerals 
 separated only by the channel through which the river carries 
 the redundant waters of the lough to the ocean ; add to all these 
 natural and adventitious advantages the facilities which government has 
 afforded to her trade and commerce in the formation of tidal and 
 floating docks, the deepening of the Corrib River, and in the equal 
 distribution of its great, and, comparatively speaking, unemployed water 
 power ; the connection of the lough with the docks by means of an 
 admirably constructed canal, at the same time rendering it fit for steamers 
 to ply on ; and the extension of a railway (opened in 1851) which 
 connects the town with the different parts of the kingdom ; considering, 
 we would repeat, all these governmental aids, natural advantages, 
 and the many other resources which kind nature has distributed so 
 liberally around this ancient town, as if it were to woo her inhabitants 
 to the paths of industry, of independence, and of peace, it is impossible 
 to overlook either the apathy with which all these advantages have for 
 so many years been regarded, or the inefficiency of the means 
 which even now are employed for their proper application to industrial 
 progress." It is, however, a hopeful sign that public attention has been 
 at last aroused to these advantages, which, if properly appreciated, must 
 enhance in an important degree the welfare of Galway. 
 
THE ABBEY OF CLARE-GAL WA Y. 
 
 179 
 
 Considerable public attention was attracted to Galway in 1858 by 
 the opening of steam communication between that port and America 
 under the favorable auspices of a subsidy from the British Government 
 — one of the mail steamers performing the distance from Cape Race 
 in four days and twenty-three hours. Owing to an alleged breach of 
 contract the subsidy was withdrawn in 1 86 1. It was restored in 1863, 
 but it again lapsed the following year, through mismanagement on the 
 part of the company, which consequently ceased to exist. As the 
 British station for trans-atlantic intercourse between the old world and 
 the new, Galway undoubtedly possesses the advantage of the greatest 
 proximity to America, for it is only 1636 miles to St. Johns, New- 
 foundland, 2165 to Halifax, Nova Scotia, 2385 to Boston, Mass., and 
 2700 to New York. 
 
 Behind the town of Galway the land rises into a succession of bold 
 and picturesque hills, which stretch along Lough Corrib as far as Killary 
 Harbor to the northwest, inclosing within their chain the wild and romantic 
 Connemara and Joyce's Country. We shall describe these latter districts 
 in our second volume, to which we shall also defer an account of Lough 
 Corrib, as it geographically belongs to what has not inaptly been termed 
 the Alpine region of Western Ireland. 
 
 Before leaving this district we visited the interesting ruins of the 
 Abbey of Clare-Galway, six miles northwest of the town and upon 
 the banks of a stream of the same name, which conveys the surplus water 
 from Turloughmore Lough to Lough Corrib. The venerable edifice was 
 founded for Franciscans in 1290 by John De Cogan, a descendant of Miles 
 Cogan, one of the companions in arms of Strongbow. It is cruciform in 
 shape, with nave, choir, and transepts, surmounted by a graceful tower of 
 three stages, and possesses an Eastern window, which, though greatly 
 dilapidated, still exhibits marks of great beauty. A portion of the building 
 was restored a few years ago for the use of some friars of the order to 
 which it originally belonged. Near the abbey are the ivy-covered remains 
 of a massive square tower, which formed part of a castle built at the 
 close of the fifteenth century by the Burkes or De Burgos, and was 
 garrisoned by the Marquis of Clanricarde in the war of 1641. " It 
 would indeed," says the Picturesque Tourist of Ireland., " be difficult to 
 find a prettier combination for a picture than that presented by the 
 
180 
 
 FROM GAL WAY TO LIMERICK. 
 
 abbey, as seen from the opposite side of the river, and so happily 
 chosen by W. H. Bartlett, Esq. ; in the foreground, the limpid stream, 
 ruffled by the miniature cataract at hand ; the dark bridge which spans 
 it, with the strong square keep of the old castle on the opposite side ; 
 and beyond, the ruined church with its Gothic windows and ivy- 
 mantled tower." 
 
 From Galway we proceeded by railway to Limerick, a distance of 
 73 miles, our route lying for the first thirteen miles upon the line 
 to Dublin as far as Athenry, where the road is crossed by another 
 line connecting the city of Tuam on the north with that of Limerick 
 on the south. Emerging from the magnificent Galway station we were 
 carried over a portion of Lough Athalia by a splendid bridge, and 
 skirted the northern shore of the bay to Oranmore lying at the head 
 of one of its numerous arms, and thence over a moorland tract and 
 along the northern margin of the great plain that was once the hunting 
 ground of Queen Meave, to Athenry, the city of " the ford of the 
 King," said to be the most ancient town in Galway, and to have been 
 the chief burial place of the Earls of Ulster and of the principal 
 families of Connaught. Its old walls and gateway are in fair preservation 
 and the town is crowded with ancient civil, military, and ecclesiastical 
 remains, beyond which there is nothing to interest the visitor. 
 
 From Athenry we made an excursion of sixteen miles to the ancient 
 ecclesiastical and now evidently thriving little city of Tuam, the seat of 
 a Roman Catholic Archbishop and of a Protestant Bishop*. An abbe)-, 
 said to have been founded here in 487, was converted into a cathedral 
 by St. Jarlath in the sixth century ; and the sacred structure after 
 passing through many vicissitudes has been recently restored by Mr. 
 Deane of Dublin, who has preserved many of its important features. 
 An arch, a chief feature in the chancel of the old structure, now forms 
 the western doorway and is " as magnificent a specimen of Norman 
 
 * The diocese of Tuam was founded by Si. Jarlath, at Cluain Fois, near Tuam, about 501 ; and in 11 52 was 
 made archiepiscopal, under Edan O'Hoisin. In 1559 it was enlarged by the addition of Mayo (founded in 665), 
 and in 1573 by that of Annaghdown. In the Protestant Church, Kilfenora formed part of the archbishopric from 
 1661 to 1742 ; in 1742 Ardagh was incorporated with it, but transferred to Kilmore and Elpin in 1839, when Tuam 
 ceased to be a metropolitan diocese ; and by the act of 1833 Killala and Achonry were annexed to Tuam on their 
 voidance in the following year. In the Roman Catholic Church, Tuam is an archiepiscopal and Killala and Achonry 
 distinct episcopal dioceses, with episcopal residences of the latter at Ballina and Ballaghadereen respectively. 
 
GORT AND LOUGH COOTER. 
 
 181 
 
 work as any building in Great Britain can boast." An ancient cross, 
 erected, like the cathedral, of red sandstone, and once broken into 
 three pieces and divided amongst as many owners, has also been 
 restored by the re-union of its parts. It bears inscriptions commemora- 
 tive of O'Hoisin the abbot, and of Turlough O'Connor, King of Con- 
 naught, who founded a priory here in 1140, which along with other 
 ecclesiastical edifices, were destroyed by fire in 1240. The Roman 
 Catholic Cathedral, one of the finest of its kind in Ireland, was erected 
 in 1823, and is an elaborate cruciform edifice, of the pointed Gothic 
 style, with highly decorated interior ; and as it is picturesquely situated 
 on elevated ground, forms a prominent feature in the landscape. The 
 College of Jarlath, formed in 1814, is an institution for the education of 
 Roman Catholic priests. Within the last few years the town has greatly 
 improved both in the aspect of its streets and in the volume of its 
 trade ; and Tuam has now become a great thoroughfare, and an 
 important commercial centre, 
 
 The first place of any importance that we reached upon our railway 
 ride, south of Athenry, was the town of Gort, which Thackeray found 
 to be in 1842, " a regularly built little place, with a square and street," 
 which, he added, " looked as if it wondered how the deuce it got 
 into the midst of such a desolate country, and seemed to bore itself 
 considerably." It is, however, now an important little market-town in 
 which cattle fairs are held several times in the year. In its immediate 
 vicinity is Lough Cooter which the guide book tells us " is surrounded 
 by woods and meadows, rocks and mountains, in the most diversified 
 style ; it holds, like jewels in its sparkling waters, seven islands of the 
 freshest emerald lustre ; whilst on its shores, and close enough to 
 reflect itself in the lake, rises a magnificent castellated mansion," 
 erected by Lord Gort, and subsequently the property of Viscount 
 Gough, the distinguished Indian commander, by whom it was enlarged. 
 From this lough issues a stream, which after running through a deep 
 wooded ravine reaches " the Ladle," a precipitous hollow clothed with 
 trees to the water's edge, where it disappears under a perpendicular 
 rock, and then a hundred yards further on emerges in " the Punch- 
 Bowl," a circular basin 90 feet in diameter and 150 in depth, situated 
 in a similar hollow. It again disappears for 300 yards and emerging takes 
 
182 
 
 FROM GALWAY TO LIMERICK. 
 
 / 
 
 the name of the Blackwater, and after running rapidly for a short 
 distance once more disappears. At the " Beggarman's Hole," a 
 smaller basin than the " Punch-Bowl," it is again visible, and soon 
 afterwards enters the " Churn," resembling an extremely deep well, ten 
 feet in diameter. A quarter of a mile further it re-appears from under 
 a beautiful natural arch in the rock, passes through the town of Gort 
 and then sinks again, and finally, after alternately appearing and disappear- 
 ing, flows by a subterraneous channel into the Bay of Kinvarra. 
 
 Three miles to the south-west of Gort are the ruined cathedral and 
 seven churches and the Round Tower of Kilmacduagh, where St. Colman, 
 son of Duach, founded a see* in the seventh century, the date also 
 ascribed to the erection of the Round Tower. The latter is remarkable 
 for leaning out of the perpendicular over seventeen feet ; and a few 
 years since the fall of the upper portion of the western side, brought 
 down four out of the eight small windows by which the top floor was 
 lighted, and caused such a rift in and bulging of the wall, as to make, 
 its condition precarious. It is traditionally stated to have been the 
 work of Ghoban Saer, the architect of Antrim and Glendalough Towers. 
 The doorway is twenty-six feet from the ground, and has a semi-circular 
 arch, hewn out of the horizontal stone. The church was built for 
 St. Colman by his kinsman Guaine Aidhne, King of Connaught, and 
 is characterized by a Cyclopean doorway which was closed up in the 
 fourteenth or fifteenth century, when the church was partially rebuilt 
 and enlarged, and a new doorway in the Pointed style inserted in the 
 south wall. The relics of the seven churches can now hardly be 
 traced. 
 
 A few miles after leaving Gort, we passed from the county of 
 Galway into that of Clare, and left the province of Connaught once 
 more to re-enter that of Munster. The country along the line of rail- 
 way is dreary and uninteresting, the eye being wearied by the sight 
 of the bare limestone crags, but here and there relieved by intervening 
 spots of cleared land which have evidently been won by incredible 
 labor from the general waste. A run of eighteen miles from Gort 
 brought us to Ennis the county town, and a Parliamentary borough, 
 
 * The Protestant bishopric of Kilmacduagh was annexed to Clonfert in 1602, and the two sees were added to 
 Killaloe by the act of 1833. In the Roman Catholic Church the see of Kilmacduagh is united with that of Kilfenora. 
 
EXJOS AXD CLARE CASTLE. 
 
 ua 
 
 having in 1871 a population of 7175 and returning one member. This 
 place, under the name of Iniscluan ruadha. was celebrated for a 
 Franciscan abbey founded in 1240 by Donald Cabrac O'Brien, Prince 
 of Thomond, whose descendant on laying down his title of O'Brien, 
 and receiving that of Earl of Thomond, in the reign of Henry VIII.. 
 so enraged his liege-men and followers that they fired his dwelling 
 and would have burned him in the flames but for the interference of 
 McClanchy, the Chief-justice of the native Irish in North Munster. 
 The remains of the abbey form part of the old parish church and 
 are rendered picturesque by ivy-covered gables, and a five-light Early 
 Pointed window. The interior contains the abbot's chair, and the 
 ancient altar, both adorned with highly sculptured figures in relief 
 Ennis also contains a handsome new church ; several other places of 
 worship ; a classic gray-marble court-house ; and a column erected to 
 the memory of Daniel O'Connell, who represented Clare in the House 
 of Commons. It is situated on the Fergus, a mile down which are the 
 ruins of Clare Abbey, a graceful cruciform church with a lofty tower, 
 erected by Donald O'Brien, King of Limerick ; and a couple of 
 miles further south, and pleasantly situated on the banks of Killone 
 Lough, stands the ruined abbey of Killone, founded at the same time 
 as Clare by a daughter of O'Brien, who " excelled all the women in 
 Munster for piety, almsdeeds, and hospitality." Two miles below Ennis 
 is the little town of Clare Castle, which, from its position at the 
 mouth of the river Fergus, and at the head of the estuary of that 
 name, an internal basin of the Shannon, ought, as Mr. Inglis justly 
 observes, to have been the county seat. The old castle, now used as 
 infantry barracks, is situated on an island in the bed of the river 
 connected with the banks by bridges, and beneath its wall the river 
 rushes over a ledge of rocks to meet the tide-water. 
 
 From Clare Castle the railway runs in a south-easterly direction 
 for twenty-two miles to Limerick. The tourist, as he approaches the 
 termination of this journey, has a good view of the noble estuary of 
 the Shannon on his right, and then, n earing the city, and crossing 
 that river, he winds round one-half the town to the general terminus 
 for all the railroads that enter it. 
 
184 
 
 LIMERICK AND THE LOWER SHANNON. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 LIMERICK AND THE LOWER SHANNON. 
 
 Kilrush — Scattery Island, its Churches and Legends — Grave of " The Collaen Bawn" — Tarbert — 
 Castle of Glin — Foynes — Adare, its Castle and Ecclesiastical Edifices — Castle of Bunratty — 
 Carrig-o-Gunnell Castle, and its Commanding View — Approach to Limerick — Wellesley Bridge 
 — English and Irish Towns — Newton Pery — Limerick compared with New York — The 
 Bridges — Historical Events and Memorable Sieges — The Violated Treaty — Limerick Castle — 
 Old Thomond Bridge and the Treaty Stone — St. Mary's Cathedral — Legend of its Bells — 
 Other Religious Structures — Public Buildings and Commercial Enterprises — Limerick Lasses 
 and Street Minstrels — Garryowen — Mungret and its Monastic Remains. 
 
 \ S we shall devote the two next chapters to a description of the 
 
 A scenery along the banks of the most important of Irish streams, 
 it is better we should speak of Limerick, the leading city on its 
 shores, in its proper geographical position. We shall therefore ask the 
 reader to join us at the river's mouth, whither we must be supposed 
 to have transported ourselves by one of the steamboats that traverse 
 its waters. 
 
 In our voyage along the western coast of Ireland we crossed the 
 mouth and inspected the headlands of the Shannon, {Shan, old ; Avon, 
 a river) we accordingly now commenced the ascent of that stream 
 from Kilrush, a score miles from its embouchure, and the place at which 
 we have previously stated steamboat passengers from Limerick to 
 Kilkee disembark and transfer themselves to land conveyances. Kilrush, 
 a thriving little town, the second in importance in the county of 
 Clare, is situated at the head of a small inlet and possesses a quay at 
 which steamboats can land their passengers at any state of the tide. 
 It is rendered quite lively in summer time owing to its being the 
 thoroughfare by which, we repeat, tourists approach Kilkee, and 
 to which it is becoming a not insignificant rival, from its favorable 
 
SCATTER Y ISLAND AND ST. SEN AN. 
 
 185 
 
 position on the northern bank of the Shannon, and its proximity to 
 the wide Atlantic. 
 
 In leaving Kilrush to sail up the Shannon we immediately passed 
 Scattery Island, a mile from the northern shore and three miles in cir- 
 cumference, containing a village, lighthouse, and battery, with a Round 
 Tower, some monastic ruins, and a holy well to which it is indebted for its 
 celebrity. The legend of this place, called in Irish Inis-Cathaig, is that it 
 was the residence in pre-historic times of an amphibious monster, who 
 guarded it by day, and by night lay coiled around it, holding his tail in 
 his mouth. So fierce is he said to have been that no warrior dare 
 approach him ; but he was at length vanquished by St. Senan, or Senanus,* 
 who had battled with demons in the dark places of the earth, and, armed 
 with spear and shield, was borne hither by an angel. It is probable, 
 however, that more trust may be placed in the statement that St. Senan 
 established a place of worship here before the arrival of St. Patrick ; and 
 that like St. Kevin he sought a remote spot which he vowed should ne'er 
 receive the impress of a female foot, and was rude enough one night to 
 refuse admission to St. Cannera, whom an angel had taken to the island 
 for the express purpose of introducing to him, and who herself appealed 
 for permission to share in his morning and evening prayers. But, upon 
 the authority of Moore, we are informed : 
 
 " The Lady's prayer Senanus spurned ; 
 The winds blew fresh, the bark returned ; 
 But legends hint that had the maid 
 'Till morning's light delayed, 
 And given the Saint one rosy smile, 
 She ne'er had left his lonely isle." 
 
 It is said that the island contained at one time eleven churches ; but 
 there are at present discernible the remains of only six, of which the 
 principal is the cathedral, 68 feet long by 27 wide, having, like most ancient 
 churches, nave and chancel only and no transepts, but a lateral sacristy. 
 The edifice is usually spoken of as one of the "seven" churches, but the 
 true number is only six, the remaining five of which are of little impor- 
 tance ; the mystic number may, however, be obtained by counting the 
 sacristy as an independent church. The Round Tower is now 87 feet in 
 
 * According to Dr. Ledwich, St. Senanus was a personification of the river Shannon ; but O'Connor and 
 other antiquarians indignantly deny such a metamorphosis. 
 24 
 
186 
 
 LIMERICK AND THE LOWER SHANNON. 
 
 height, but, the capstone having fallen, it was probably originally three feet 
 higher ; internally its diameter is seven feet nine inches, and its walls are 
 four feet four inches in thickness. The door is level with the ground, an 
 unusual feature in these buildings ; but, like many of the others, this tower 
 has on the same plane near its summit four small windows looking 
 towards the cardinal points, and lower down, but at different levels, five 
 smaller windows fronting the same direction. The tower has been rent 
 by lightning, and the wall bulges somewhat ; but the structure has been 
 preserved from falling through the exertions of a public-spirited clergyman, 
 who caused its repair — an important matter to mariners, to whom it is a 
 useful landmark. Among the monastic ruins exists an old alder tree, the 
 breaking off a branch of which, it is asserted, results in some dire calamity 
 befalling the rash devastator ; the fate being, we presume, somewhat akin 
 to that which overtook the despoiler of the yew tree at Muckross. Here 
 are also to be found some cells of a monastery, and traces of a castle, 
 which, with the other sacred ruins, are supposed to have been devastated 
 by the Scandinavians, who ruthlessly ravaged the coast during the ninth 
 and tenth centuries. It is recorded that in the year 975 Brian Boroimhe 
 recovered this island from the Danes ; it also appears that Queen Elizabeth 
 granted it to the mayor and corporation of Limerick and their successors, 
 who lately established their right by a suit at law. 
 
 Tourists between Kilrush and Limerick have the option of traveling 
 all the way by steamer, or of going by water from Kilrush to Foynes, a 
 X distance of about 20 miles, and from thence by railroad 26 miles in length 
 to Limerick, the entire distance being about the same either way. We 
 adopted the former route, as Leitch Ritchie had told us of it, that " the 
 scenery is as agreeable as sloping hills and verdant dales, with a noble 
 stream running between, can make it." Leaving Kilrush Bay we passed 
 between Scattery, with Hog Island in front of it, near the northern or 
 Clare shore, and the towers and islands of Carrigafoyle, on whose rocky 
 coasts were wrecked two ships of the Spanish Armada, situated near the 
 opposite or Kerry bank of the river. At this point the Shannon narrows 
 from an estuary of several miles broad, to a stream of from one to two 
 miles wide, at which breadth it continues for some distance. On the 
 Clare side of the river stands the ruined church and graveyard of 
 Killimer, where a stone cross, inscribed "The Colleen Bawn, July, 1819," 
 
TARBERT AXD THE CASTLE OF GLIX. 
 
 1ST 
 
 denotes the last resting-place of Eily O'Connor, of the drama, and of 
 Gerald Griffin's " Collegians," whose body was cast up by the sea on the 
 adjacent point of Moyne. At eight or nine miles from Kilrush a light- 
 house on the southern side of the river marks the fortress-defended 
 entrance to the little bay of Tarbert, the small town of which name is 
 situated near its head and a mile from the landing stage. Another but 
 much larger inlet in the opposite shore, called Clonderlaw Bay, gives the 
 river at this point a much wider appearance than it possesses immedi- 
 ately above and below. Tarbert is merely noticeable as being the station 
 on the river from which travelers proceed to Killarney — 26 miles by car 
 to Listowell and Tralee, and thence for 16 miles further by railway. 
 The place lies on the confines of Kerry, to which county Limerick now 
 succeeds on the southern side of the river. 
 
 Continuing on our course up the river, soon after leaving Tarbert we 
 had on our right the beautiful mansion of the Knight of Glin, with its 
 charming lawns and shady forest trees. " Glin and the adjacent territory," 
 says the guide book, "were granted by Henry II. to John Fitz-Thomas 
 Fitz-Gerald, from whom were descended the Earls of Desmond, princes 
 palatine of Ireland, who claimed the power of making tenures in capite, 
 and creating barons. Bv such authoritv the Fitz-Gerald of Glin received 
 the title of Knight." The rebellious Earl of Desmond, the former lord of 
 Lismore, was of this family. After his death and in the insurrections 
 which succeeded the revolt of O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone, the Knight of Glin 
 was an energetic leader; and in July, 1600, his castle was besieged by Sir 
 George Carew, the Lord President, and nobly held out for two days, the 
 brave defenders refusing to yield, but either perished with the Knight in 
 the affray or finally leaped from their lofty battlements into the sea, 
 shouting, as thev fell, their defiant war-crv, Shan7iid-a-boo — meaning- Shannid 
 victorious, or Hurrah for Shannid ! Higher up the river on the same 
 side we noticed Mount Trenchard, the seat of Lord Monteagle ; and on 
 the opposite shore the steep rocks of Cahircon, in which lurk harmonious 
 echoes that were roused at the call of a sonorous bugle. 
 
 At ten or a dozen miles above Tarbert, and on the same shore, are 
 the island and town of Foynes, with the harbor, the security and capabil- 
 ities of which led to its being, a few vears ago, recommended as a trans- 
 Atlantic station. It is almost a day's sail nearer to America than 
 
188 
 
 LIMERICK AND THE LOWER SHANNON. 
 
 Oueenstown, and thirty miles nearer to New York than Galway ; and it 
 is now connected with the railroad system of Ireland by a branch line to 
 Limerick. The island merely possesses a few residences, the little town 
 being situated upon the mainland. On the heights overlooking the harbor 
 is a memorial cross, erected to the memory of the eldest son of the first 
 Lord Monteagle. A mile or two further up, the Shannon assumes the 
 appearance of a lake, from the mouth of the Deel, piercing its southern 
 bank, while the opposite shore expands into the wide estuary of the 
 Fergus, studded with islands, some of which are covered with ecclesiastical 
 ruins. A lighthouse here situated in the centre of the river warns vessels 
 off a dangerous sunken rock. 
 
 A little more than half-way from Foynes to Limerick, on the right, 
 to employ the language of Gerald Griffin, 
 
 " There winds the Maigue, as silver clear, 
 Among the elms so sweetly flowing ; 
 There fragrant in the early year 
 
 Wild roses on the banks are blowing." 
 
 These lines, however, refer to the stream at half-a-dozen miles or more 
 above its mouth, where is also to be found the town and vicinage of 
 which the poet has sung 
 
 " O sweet Adare, O lovely vale, 
 
 O soft retreat of sylvan splendor ! 
 Nor summer sun nor morning gale 
 
 E'er hailed a scene more softly tender. 
 How shall I tell the thousand charms, 
 
 Within thy verdant bosom dwelling, 
 When lulled in Nature's fostering arms, 
 
 Soft peace abides and joy excelling !" 
 
 There is not, perhaps, in the whole province of Munster, a more 
 beautifully situated place than Adare — the ruins of its magnificent castle, 
 where the proud Desmonds held sway — the meadows, sloping gently to 
 the margin of the stream — the ivy-mantled walls of the stately abbeys that 
 once flourished there — the lonely shades, the venerable trees, and the 
 quiet walks, 
 
 " Where heavenly meditation, musing, dwelt — " 
 
 awaken in the contemplative mind emotions of the most exquisite nature. 
 Though we took the place in an excursion from Limerick, we shall 
 
ARCH ALO LOGICAL REMAINS A T AD ARE. 
 
 189 
 
 describe it here in order to introduce it in its proper geographical 
 position among the picturesque sights that lie within easy distance of the 
 shores of the Shannon. 
 
 The early history of Adare is involved in considerable obscurity. The 
 ancient town, which derived its name from Aith-dhar, or " The Ford of 
 the Oaks," lay upon the eastern bank of the Maigue, and about half a mile 
 from the modern town, situated on the opposite side of the river, 
 which is spanned by a bridge. Its most remarkable features are the 
 Archaeological Remains of three religious houses, and one of the many 
 fortresses with which the Fitzgeralds dotted Munster. The Franciscan 
 Abbey, an exceedingly picturesque ruin, was built in 1464, and forms a 
 beautiful and striking object in the landscape. It possesses a nave, 
 choir, and south-transept, with a very graceful tower rising from the 
 intersection, and has chapels and oratories attached to the transept. 
 The choir presents some elaborate workmanship in its interior, and 
 has an elegant four-lioht window at its eastern end. The Augaistinian 
 Abbey, erected in the early part of the fourteenth century, and containing 
 nave, choir, tower, and cloisters, was restored and appropriated to the 
 services of the Protestant Church by the late Earl of Dunraven, who built 
 a mausoleum close by. The zealous antiquarian tastes of that nobleman 
 also led to the restoration, for the uses of the Roman Catholic Church, 
 of the Monastery of the Holy Trinity, or Black Abbey, situated in the 
 town. This latter consists of nave and choir surmounted by an 
 embattled tower, and is of more ancient date than the other abbeys, 
 having been founded in 1279, by John, first Earl of Kildare, shortly after 
 the town came into the possession of the Fitzgeralds. 
 
 The castle, built to command the bridge over the river, is now 
 reduced to a pile of ruins ; but the portions of the structure which 
 remain, consisting of a keep and an inner ward surrounded by a moat 
 and enclosed by a spacious quadrangle, show that it must have been a 
 place of great strength, and that its position was admirably chosen to 
 protect the pass it was intended to defend. It was erected by the 
 second Earl of Kildare, in 1326, on the site of a fortress of the 
 dispossessed family of O'Donovan. Like many other Irish strongholds 
 it has been the scene of repeated conflicts, and the subject of more 
 than one confiscation. It was one of the castles seized by the crown 
 
190 
 
 LIMERICK AND THE LOWER SHANNON. 
 
 on the occasion of the Earl of Desmond's rebellion. In 1600 the 
 fortress was besieged for many days, during which its defenders were 
 compelled to excavate a subterranean passage to the river, in order to 
 procure water. It was again the scene of strife in 1641, when it 
 succumbed to the army under the Earl of Castlehaven ; and in 1657 it 
 was dismantled by order of Cromwell. 
 
 Adare gives the titles of baron and viscount to the ancient Irish 
 family of Quin, Earls of Dunraven and Mountearl. Adare House, the 
 family seat, which has of late years been rebuilt, is situated on the western 
 bank of the river, in a very extensive and highly-ornamented demesne, 
 and commands a fine view of the ancient castle and venerable abbeys 
 in its neighborhood. It is a castellated Tudor edifice, and its archi- 
 tecture entitles it to be considered as one of the finest mansions in 
 the country. By a succession of artificial dams the Maigue has here been 
 successfully transformed from a still, muddy stream, to a clear, lively river. 
 
 A sail along the Shannon presents to the eye so many castles and 
 abbeys, each possessing either some authentic history or interesting 
 legend, that it is impossible for us to notice more than a few of them. 
 Of these we must not omit the Castle of Bunratty, which stands on 
 the northern shore, and nearly opposite the mouth of the Maigue. The 
 De Clares, to whom were assigned this portion of Thomond, suffered 
 many severe defeats in their attempt to possess themselves of the 
 territory, but eventually obtained sufficient foothold to enable them, 
 towards the close of the thirteenth century, to erect this fortress. " The 
 wars of Thomond then commenced with great intensity, and lasted for 
 many years; at length, in 13 18, Robert De Clare, with his son, was 
 killed at the battle of Disert, and the Dalcassian clan regained and 
 held their independence, institutions, and laws down to the year 1542, 
 when Murrough O'Brien, foreseeing that he could not longer maintain 
 his title of King of Munster, without exciting the suspicion of the 
 English Court and creating strife, wisely consented to accept a patent 
 of his territory from Henry VIII., with the title of Earl of Thomond. 
 In those troublous times the castle was repeatedly attacked. In later 
 days (1646) it was occupied by Parliament troops, and besieged by the 
 Royalists under the Earl of Glamorgan ; but the attacking forces were 
 repulsed with considerable loss, and had to retreat to Limerick. Subse- 
 
CA RRIG- O- G UNNELL CASTLE. 
 
 191 
 
 quently it was invested by Lord Muskerry and the Papal Nuncio, to 
 whom it surrendered." The old castle, which is now used as a 
 constabulary station, is in excellent preservation, and is remarkable for 
 the thickness of its walls and its many outworks. It is a quadrangular 
 structure, with lofty towers at the angles connected by arches ; and its 
 apartments, from the spacious banqueting-hall to the confined dungeon, 
 denote the characteristic propensities of its former possessors. 
 
 The stream here commences to narrow considerably, and - the scenery 
 along its shores greatly improves in appearance. Handsome villas 
 embowered in trees and cultivated farms enliven the landscape, while 
 the view to the east embraces glimpses of the distant mountains of 
 Tipperary, and that to the north is bounded by those of Clare. On 
 the southern bank, half-a-dozen miles from Limerick, the crumbling ruins 
 of Carrig-o-Gunnell Castle crown the summit of a steep basaltic 
 rock, that rises abruptly some hundreds of feet above an extensive plain 
 and presenting a noble and striking object to the surrounding country. 
 Carrig-o-Gunnell, " The Rock of the Candle," was inevitably an impreg- 
 nable position before the introduction of gunpowder and the weapons 
 it has given birth to ; and this, coupled with its commanding situation, 
 undoubtedly led to its selection as a stronghold by the descendants of 
 Brian Boroimhe. Archdall, in his JMonasticon Hiberniaim, informs us 
 that there was here a house for Knights Templars, which, in the year 
 1530, was the seat of Donough O'Brien, Lord of Poble O'Brien ; but 
 the place appears to have troubled historians but little till the Revolution 
 of 1688, towards the close of which, in 1691, it was held for King James, 
 when the Irish forces retreated to Limerick after the disastrous battle 
 of Aughrim. The fortress, however, surrendered to General Scravemore, 
 and then, owing to its strategetic position, and the inexpediency of 
 leaving troops to garrison it, an order was issued for its demolition, 
 and the castle was dismantled and blown up. The immense masses of 
 masonry strewing the courtyard and lying in picturesque confusion at the 
 top of the crag bear evidence to this day how effectually the mandate 
 was executed ; but it is fortunate that the principal tower escaped 
 destruction, for a flight of stone steps which ascends to its top affords 
 the tourist an opportunity of obtaining from its lofty summit an exquisite 
 view of the surrounding country. 
 
192 
 
 LIMERICK AND THE LOWER SHANNON. 
 
 The prospect that is here presented is thus admirably portrayed : 
 " The magnificent Shannon, enlivened with shipping and islands, as far 
 as the bridge at Limerick ; the chimneys, and roofs, and steeples of the 
 city ; the broad meadow-land on either bank, rich with its wealth of 
 sheep and cattle ; the verdant hills of Clare ; the soft blue tints of the 
 far-off Keeper Mountains ; and below us the green woodlands and bright 
 Manor of Tervoe — all these constitute a panorama of rare beauty. If 
 we turn to the west we trace the Maigue in its sinuous course from the 
 Shannon to Adare. Castle after castle lie before us : the lofty towers 
 of Dromore, perched on a rock which rivals Carrig in configuration ; 
 the tall ruin of Court guarding Ferry Bridge ; the broken keep of Pallas, 
 the fortalice of Bolane, Shannid Castle, and many others, show us that 
 we overlook the old fighting ground of the Desmonds. Nestling amongst 
 those 'gray old feudal towers we detect the white walls of cheerful 
 farmhouses, and the smiling lakelets of Dromore reflecting the tranquil 
 azure of heaven. Nearer are the golden cornfields and blossomed 
 orchards of Court, rife with the recompense of well-directed industry. 
 From the valley beneath, borne on the fresh breeze, come the voices of 
 merry children, the songs of farm laborers, and the tinkling of sheep 
 bells, uniting with the harmony of countless feathered songsters." And 
 the grandeur of the scenery is augmented at eventide, when the sun, 
 e'er it sinks into the waters of the Atlantic, sheds his rays horizontally 
 upon the glittering surface of the stream, for then— 
 
 " Light barks with dusky sails scarce seen to glide, 
 Bend their brown shadows o'er the burnished tide ; 
 And hark ! at intervals the sound of oars 
 Comes, faint with distance, to the listening shores, 
 Blent with the plaintive cadence of the song 
 Of boatmen chanting as they drift along ; 
 But see ! the radiant orb now sinks apace, 
 Gradual and slow he stoops* his glorious face; 
 And now but half his swelling disk appears, 
 And now, how quickly gone ! he scarcely rears 
 One burning point above the mountain's head,— 
 And now the last expiring beam has fled." 
 
 The approach to Limerick from the lower Shannon has all the 
 aspect of a sea-port town, and presents on the right, or Limerick side 
 of the stream, a succession of docks, quays, storehouses, factories, and 
 
LOCAL DIVISIONS OF LIMERICK. 
 
 193 
 
 other accessories of commercial life, while on the opposite or Clare side 
 the river partakes more of the semi-country character of a residential 
 suburb. Wellesley Bridge, the first and finest on the Shannon, and 
 probably one of the handsomest in Ireland, is a conspicuous object 
 in the picture. It was erected about 1827 from the designs of the 
 eminent engineer Alexander Nimmo, was eleven years in course of 
 construction, and consists of five elliptic arches of 70 feet span each 
 over the river, as well as a swivel bridge of 80 feet on the city side 
 to permit the passage of vessels, and two dry or quay arches. It has a 
 level roadway and an elegant stone balustrade, and in appearance 
 resembles the beautiful Pont Neuilly over the Seine, near Paris. A 
 statue has been erected on the bridge " to commemorate the bravery 
 of Viscount Fitz-Gibbon, 8th Royal Irish Hussars, and of his gallant 
 companions in arms, natives of the county and city of Limerick, who 
 gloriously fell in the Crimean War, 1855." It consists of a granite 
 pedestal eleven feet high, surmounted by a life-size figure in bronze, 
 representing the gallant officer in the act of drawing his sword, and 
 is the production of Patrick MacDowell, R. A., the celebrated Irish 
 sculptor. 
 
 The city of Limerick is situated in an extensive plain and upon the 
 southeast bank of the main bodv of the Shannon, which river divides 
 about half a mile above the city into two streams, the eastern or 
 narrowest, though most rapid, being called the Abbey River, and the two 
 enclosing King's Island. On the southern portion of this island where 
 the streams re-unite is situated what is now known as English Town, 
 but was in early times the entire city ; and in contra-distinction to this 
 is Irish Town, which lies still further to the south and on the other 
 side of the Abbey River. Up to the time of Edward II. English Town 
 alone was defended by walls, but these were extended in 1495, so as to 
 include Irish Town, which had been allotted to the native inhabitants 
 as early as the reign of King John. A third division, covering the 
 triangular space between Irish Town and the river and called Newton 
 Pery, has been added during the past hundred years, the work being 
 commenced in 1769 by the Right Hon. Edmond Sexton Pery, whose 
 descendants became Earls of Limerick. It is thus not inaptly remarked 
 that it has taken three towns to make one Limerick. English Town, 
 
 - 85 
 
194 
 
 LIMERICK AND THE LOWER SHANNON. 
 
 from its houses being built in the Flemish fashion, is said to resemble 
 Rouen, in Normandy ; but it is now deserted by wealthy inhabitants, 
 who have .migrated to Newton Pery, which is equal to any city in 
 Ireland for the breadth and general appearance of the streets. Of these 
 the principal is George Street, a handsome thoroughfare of a mile in 
 length, terminating at the south in Richmond Place, which consists of 
 two handsome crescents and is adorned with a bronze statue eight feet 
 hi^h of Daniel O'Connell, placed thirteen feet above the ground on a 
 granite pedestal. The late N. P. Willis, in writing of this 'Street in 
 1839, said, "An American traveler could scarcely enter Limerick without 
 exclaiming in the principal street, 'How very like New York!' The 
 tall and handsome brick houses, the iron railings, the broad and clean 
 sidewalks, and something in the dress and style of the people would 
 remind him very forcibly of his native country." It was nineteen years 
 after that date, and at the time of the laying of the first cable, that 
 the present writer had a favorable opportunity of comparing the two cities, 
 and then he found that any close resemblance there might have been 
 between their leading thoroughfares had all but faded away ; and now 
 after the era of extravagance, which unhappily has befallen the Empire 
 City, and caused the erection of a brick residence to be a rarity, any 
 comparison of the character made by Mr. Willis is entirely out of the 
 question. In the vicinity of Richmond Place is Pery Square, in which 
 is erected a Doric column, surmounted by a statue of the popular 
 Chancellor of the Exchequer Spring Rice, afterwards Lord Monteagle. 
 
 Several bridges were thrown over this part of the Shannon as 
 early as the twelfth century, two of them by King Turlough O'Connor. 
 It is supposed, however, that these were of wood, and that the first 
 stone bridges were erected by the Anglo-Normans. It is now spanned 
 at this point by three bridges, the first of which, Wcllcsley Bridge 
 already mentioned, connects the new town with the road from Limerick 
 to Ennis ; Thomond Bridge, higher up the river and lately rebuilt, 
 connects English Town with the popular suburb on the Clare side, 
 called Thomond Gate, and was formerly the only entrance to the ancient 
 city and protected by King John's Castle ; Athlunkard Bridge, still 
 higher up the stream, and some little distance outside the city, like the 
 first-named, consists of five large elliptic arches, and forms a new line 
 
EARL Y HIS TOR Y OF LIMERICK. 
 
 1 9.-i 
 
 of communication between Limerick and Killaloe. The Abbey River is 
 also crossed by three bridges, the lower being Mathezu Bridge, so named 
 after the temperance advocate, which connects Newton Pery with English 
 Town ; and the upper or Park Bridge, an old lofty structure of five 
 irregular arches. Nearly midway between these and at the spot where 
 the Lock Mills Canal, cutting off a long reach of the Shannon, falls 
 in, is Baal's Bridge, connecting English and Irish Towns. It is a 
 beautiful structure of a single arch, built in 1831, and erected on the 
 site of one of great antiquity, represented in our engraving, denominated 
 the Tide Bridge in maps of the time of Elizabeth, which, along with some 
 houses that overhung the river, was washed away by an unusually high tide 
 in 1775. The present name is assumed by some to have been derived 
 from "Bald" Bridge, being so designated in Latin documents from having 
 no battlements ; while others attribute it to Boyle, Earl of Shannon, 
 from forming part of the grant made to him. 
 
 Limerick, ancient Lumneach* seems to have been an important place 
 as early as the fifth century, when it was visited by St. Patrick ; but 
 little is known of its history till the ninth century, when it was captured 
 by the Danes, who fortified it and held it until 1013, when Brian 
 Boroimhe rendered the invaders tributary to the King of Munster ; and 
 it afterwards became the seat of the Kings of Thomond, or North 
 Munster, who were hence called Kings of Limerick. Upon the arrival 
 of Strongbow, Donald O'Brien swore fealty to Henry II., but subsequently 
 revolted, when Raymond le Gros laid siege to and captured the city. 
 For some years afterwards it was alternately in the possession of the 
 English and Irish, and eventually became an appanage to the English 
 crown. Richard I., in the ninth year of his reign, granted it a charter 
 to elect a mayor — a privilege not then awarded to London, and only 
 granted to Dublin a century later. King John, on his visit, was so 
 struck with the importance of Limerick, that he caused Thomond Bridge 
 and the castle which guarded its passage to be erected, and established 
 a mint. Edward Bruce, on his invasion of Ireland in 13 16, made it 
 the rendezvous for his troops, and burnt its suburbs. The city remained 
 
 * The name of Lumneach, meaning a spot made bare by feeding horses, was given to the island on which 
 the ancient city stood, in consequence of a band of freebooters occupying it and bringing to it their plunder 
 and horses, attracted thither by the security afforded by its insular position. 
 
190 
 
 LIMERICK AND THE LOWER SHANNON. 
 
 strictly loyal during the troublous reigns of Henry VIII. and Elizabeth, 
 though the Papal bull against the latter was placed upon its gates. 
 In the war which succeeded the Rebellion of 1641 Limerick was seized 
 by the Roman Catholics under Lords Muskerry and Skerrin, and in 1643 
 it became the headquarters of the party. It was besieged by Ireton 
 with the Parliamentary army in 1651, but capitulated after a severe siege 
 of six months ; but " worse than the horrors of bombardment were the 
 devastations of the plague, which broke out amongst the besieged people, 
 and of which, on the surrender, Ireton catching the infection, died," not, 
 however, until after he had wreaked his vengeance upon several of the 
 Irish leaders who had been most active in delaying him before the walls 
 of the city. 
 
 But the most memorable episode in the history of Limerick is the 
 stubborn resistance it made to the assaults of William of Orange, and 
 of his commander, Ginkell, victoriously repelling the attack of the first, 
 and only capitulating to the last after a bombardment of more than 
 three weeks. The battle of the Boyne had been fought, and James II. 
 had fled from Ireland, when King William advanced upon Limerick, 
 then garrisoned by the flower of King James' army under the command 
 of the French general Boileau and of Sarsfield, whom James had created 
 Earl of Lucan. Early in August William summoned the city to surrender, 
 but was compelled to defer his attack, owing to Sarsfield having, by a 
 brilliant manoeuvre, captured and destroyed his siege guns while en route 
 from Waterford. Another battery being procured, fire was opened, and 
 a practical breach being effected on the 26th, an assault was made next 
 day, when some of the troops forced their way into the town, where 
 they were assailed with such intense fury by a mixed crowd of soldiers, 
 citizens, and women, that they were almost entirely exterminated, the 
 loss in killed and wounded being over 2,000. The result was the 
 raising of the siege on the 30th, and the departure of William for 
 England. After the battle of Aughrim in the following year, the Irish 
 forces under Sarsfield withdrew to Limerick, their only evident tenable 
 position. The city was invested, August 25th, 169 1 . by General 
 Ginkell, who on the 30th opened his batteries, which were replied to 
 with spirit. The besieged being straitened for provisions, and expected 
 supplies from France not arriving, were eventually compelled to sue for 
 
THE VIOLATED TREATY. 
 
 a cessation of hostilities ; and a truce was agreed upon, September 23d, 
 and the war was terminated on October 3d, by the signing of the 
 celebrated compact, which has since given to Limerick the unenviable 
 title, "The City of the Violated Treaty."* Two days after the capitu- 
 lation, a French fleet, consisting of eighteen ships of the line, having 
 on board a large supply of men, money, and arms, cast anchor in the 
 Shannon ; but all that these could now do was to convey the greater 
 part of the Irish army to the continent, "where they formed the nucleus 
 of that Irish Brigade, so conspicuous for valor in the subsequent 
 continental wars, and who fought against the English at Blenheim, 
 Ramillies, and Fontenoy. " 
 
 "With one exception," remarks a talented Irish writer on the siege 
 of Limerick, " no city of Ireland has contributed so largely to maintain 
 the honor and glory of the country. The brave defenders of Limerick 
 and Londonderry have received — the former from the Protestant, and 
 the latter from the Catholic historian — the praise that party spirit failed 
 to weaken ; the heroic gallantry, the indomitable perseverance, and the 
 patient and resolute endurance under suffering of both, having deprived 
 political partisans of their asperity — compelling them, for once at least, 
 to render justice to their opponents ; all having readily subscribed to 
 the opinion that ' Derry and Limerick will ever grace the historic page, 
 as rival companions and monuments of Irish bravery, generosity, and 
 integrity.' " 
 
 The Castle of Limerick was, as we have remarked, erected by 
 King John in 1205, and has not only played an important part in 
 the conflicts just recorded, but has been perhaps the most coveted 
 object amongst contending parties in Ireland. It is still a formidable 
 looking fortress, notwithstanding the rough usage to which it has had 
 
 * The treaty consisted of two parts, civil and military. The military articles stipulated for the surrender of 
 Limerick and other fortresses in the hands of the Irish, and provided that the garrisons should march out with the 
 honors of war, and, if required, conveyed to France or elsewhere at the cost of the British government. The 
 civil articles were thirteen in number, of which the first and ninth are those that have been violated. The 
 ninth provided that Roman Catholics should be required to take the oath of allegiance, and no other ; and the 
 first granted them religious liberty consistent with the laws of Ireland, "or as they did enjoy in the reign of 
 King Charles the Second." And th^y were promised that an Irish Parliament should be summoned, and desired 
 to grant such further security as might be necessary to preserve them from any disturbances on account of their 
 religion. That not only the letter and spirit of this solemn compact were broken, but laws were subsequently 
 enacted that were more oppressive than any that had previously existed, every unprejudiced mind must now admit. 
 
198 
 
 LIMERICK AND THE LOWER SHANNON. 
 
 to submit, and is one of the best specimens of Norman military 
 architecture in Ireland. The battlements were demolished about the 
 close ol the last century, but there remain seven towers (including two 
 flanking the entrance), connected by high walls of prodigious thickness, 
 to denote its former strength ; while the marks of shot and shell upon 
 its walls exhibit to this day how great must have been its powers of 
 resistance. The interior of the quadrangle is now used as infantry 
 barracks, the modern buildings of which are little in harmony with the 
 ancient structure ; the exterior however, forms a noble and picturesque 
 object from the opposite shore. The old Thomond bridge* close to 
 the castle, and also built by King John, was taken down in 1838, by 
 order of the Shannon Commissioners. The celebrated treaty, called 
 the Pacification of Limerick, is said to have been signed on a large 
 stone on the Clare side of the river, near to this bridge. This 
 "Treaty Stone," was in 1865 placed on a plain limestone pedestal 
 about ten feet high, appropriately inscribed, and now stands at the 
 north end of the new bridge. It is a rough, oblong, block of limestone, 
 and was used for many years by the country people as a horse-block, 
 when leaving the city. 
 
 The Cathedral of St. Mary is situated in English Town not far 
 from the castle ; and though an older edifice than the latter, having 
 been founded in 1194 by King Donald O'Brienf on the site of his 
 palace, it has subsequently been so enlarged and beautified at various 
 times, that it may fairly lay claim to being a comparatively modern 
 
 * The most remarkable incident that took place during the siege of 1691, was the slaughter that occurred 
 on this bridge, in consequence of the treachery or pusillanimity of a French major. "On the 22nd of September 
 the works which defended the Clare side were ordered to be attacked ; the Irish fought bravely, but were 
 ultimately beaten, and made a rush to the bridge. The Frenchman, fearing, it is said, that the English 
 grenadiers would enter with the retreating soldiery, ordered the drawbridge to be raised, and left the fugitives 
 to the mercy of their pursuers. The consequence was, that nearly all the Irish were destroyed — 600 having 
 been put to the sword, and 150 drowned, in the vain attempt to reach the walls by swimming." 
 
 f The reputed founder of the diocese of Limerick is St. Munchin, of whom but little is known. Sii 
 James Ware on the contrary contends that it was founded by Donald O'Brien about the time of the English 
 invasion, toward the close of the twelfth century ; which can hardly be the case, for Gille, or Gillebert, the 
 first bishop of whom anything is known, occupied the see in 1106, three quarters of a century before that time. 
 Edward Synge, Protestant Bishop of Limerick in 1600, also held the sees of Ardfert and Aghadoe, which were 
 permanently united to Limerick in 1663. In the Roman Catholic church, Limerick is a separate diocese, 
 while the ancient sees of Ardfert and Aghadoe constitute the bishopric of Kerry. 
 
THE CA THEDRAL AXD ITS BELLS. 
 
 199 
 
 structure — in fact it has quite recently been very judiciously restored. 
 Still it is a venerable Gothic building, retaining much of the architectural 
 features of the 12th and 13th centuries. The church has three aisles, 
 surrounded by graduated battlements, and has at the western end a 
 square tower, rising to the height of 120 teet, with turrets at each 
 angle. A pillared arch beneath the tower, forming the porch or entrance, 
 is such an anomaly in ancient church architecture, that it has led to 
 the belief that the tower formed part of the original palace. The 
 length of the cathedral from the east to the west door is 156 feet, 
 and the breadth from north to south is 114 feet. In the interior, 17 
 Gothic arches springing from massive square pillars support the roof and 
 separate the choir from the lateral aisles, in which, as well as in the 
 nave, are several recesses formerly used as chapels. A fine proportioned 
 eastern window and some higrhlv wrought windows on the northern 
 side are filled with stained glass. Previous to the Commonwealth, the 
 church was profusely decorated with statues ; but these, with many of 
 the mural monuments, fell a prey to the Puritan soldiers. However, 
 many modern monuments of an elaborate character now decorate the 
 interior of the sacred pile. 
 
 The cathedral tower contains a chime of eiorht bells, noted for their 
 sweetness of tone, said to have been originally brought from Italy 
 and recently repaired at the expense of the Earl of Limerick. There 
 is a pretty story to the effect that they were manufactured by a 
 young Italian, who prided himself upon his work ; and with the 
 proceeds of their sale purchased a villa near the convent in which 
 thev were hunor in order that he migrht listen to their sonorous tones. 
 As a result of one of those revolutionary storms which devastate the 
 countries over which they burst, the Italian lost his property, the 
 convent was destroved, and the bells were carried off to a foreign 
 land. Weighed down with misfortune, his hair turned gray, and years 
 having rolled on, the broken-hearted artisan became a wanderer, and it 
 is said that a desire to once more listen to the sounds of the offspring 
 of his early toils, brought him to Limerick in 1559. The ship which 
 conveved him having anchored in the Shannon, he eneaeed a small 
 boat to transport him to the city. St. Man's tower loomed up in 
 the distance, as he sat in the stern of the boat, and he looked fondly 
 
200 
 
 LIMERICK AND THE LOWER SHANNON. 
 
 toward it. " It was an evening so calm and beautiful as to remind 
 him of his own native haven in the sweetest time of the year — the 
 depth of the spring. The broad stream appeared like one smooth 
 mirror, and the little vessel glided through it with almost a noiseless 
 expedition. On a sudden, amid the general stillness, the bells tolled 
 from the cathedral ; the rowers rested on their oars, and the vessel 
 went forward with the impulse it had received. The old Italian looked 
 towards the city, crossed his arms on his breast, and lay back in his 
 seat ; home, happiness, early recollections, friends, family — all were in 
 the sound, and went with it to his heart. When the rowers looked 
 round they beheld him with his face turned towards the cathedral, 
 but his eyes were closed, and when they landed they found him cold ! " 
 He had expired from excess of joy. More authentic chronicles, however, 
 state that the bells were cast by one William Purdue who died in 
 1673. 
 
 The view of The Shannon from the Tower of Limerick Cathedral 
 is very extensive, and embraces not only a good view of the city, 
 its busy harbor and handsome bridges, but of the rich and level plain 
 that surrounds it, and the Clare mountains ; while the windings of the 
 river above the city and its gradual expansion into an estuary below 
 give a grandeur to the picture which would otherwise be wanting. 
 
 Near the castle, but on the opposite side of the street, a flight of 
 stone steps leads to St. Munchiri s Church, a plain, Gothic structure, 
 occupying the site of one erected in the seventh century. The guide 
 book tells us that the first church built by the Saint was on the south 
 side of the river, and that in regard to it tradition says, the zealous 
 bishop when collecting funds for its erection, found the Limerick people 
 so unwilling to contribute, that he became provoked and cursed them, 
 declaring that the natives of the city should never prosper therein. A 
 large distillery now occupies the site of the primitive erection. The 
 Cemetery of St. Munchin is bounded on the river side by a part of 
 the old city wall, which remains in good preservation. Several fragments 
 of the wall are also found south of the burial ground • and there are 
 considerable remains on the opposite side of the city in the vicinity 
 of John Square, extending about 100 yards in a westerly direction, 
 and being 35 feet thick. 
 
RELIGIOUS AND PUBLIC EDIFICES. 
 
 201 
 
 Near to John Square is the Roman Catholic Cathedral of St. John. 
 a handsome Gothic structure, erected in 1856. Its extreme length is 
 168 feet, and the height of the nave to the apex is 80 feet. The nave 
 is separated from aisles 19 feet wide by piers and arches, and the transepts 
 extend 116 feet from north to south; two small chapels open from the 
 eastern side of each transept, the latter being lighted by beautiful rose 
 windows. The chancel is 43 feet long and 30 feet wide, and contains an 
 elaborately decorated high altar and a life-size statue of the Madonna by 
 Benzoni, which are the gifts respectively of a benevolent lady and the 
 Right Hon. W. Monsell, M. P. On the north side of the church is a 
 tower 70 feet high, above which it is intended to place a spire measuring 
 253 feet. In the same vicinity stands the Protestant Church of St. John, 
 erected in the Norman style of architecture upon the site of an older 
 structure taken down in 1843. 
 
 The other ecclesiastical edifices worthy of special mention are St. 
 Alphonsus Church, built in 1862 by the Redemptorist Fathers, and St. 
 Saviors Church, erected from the unsolicited subscriptions of citizens of 
 different creeds and political opinions. Both are extremely graceful struc- 
 tures of cathedral proportions, have highly decorated interiors, and reflect 
 great credit upon the citizens of Limerick for their exquisite taste. 
 
 Limerick, being eminently a Catholic city, possesses, as a matter of 
 course, several religious institutions. Among these are the Convent of 
 Mount Vincent, a handsome building- of blue limestone, with a fine Gothic 
 church ; the Laurel Hill Convent, a well-known educational establishment ; 
 and the Convent of the Sisters of Mercy, situated near the Cemetery of 
 St. Munchin. Within the precincts of the last named convent are " the 
 remains of the ivy-covered transept wall of a church with high lancet 
 windows ; this, with a curious double porch, is all that exists of the great 
 Dominican Convent founded in 1227, in which many princes and prelates 
 were interred. Amongst the rich possessions of this magnificent institution 
 was the important fisher}- of the salmon weir." 
 
 The city also contains several public buildings of a civil and military 
 character, the latter embracing four large Barracks, and the former the 
 Custom House, Post Office, and Chamber of Cofnmerce, together with the 
 usual county and charitable institutions. It has likewise extensive quays, 
 warehouses and docks, for the transaction of its export and import trade. 
 
 36 
 
202 
 
 LIMERICK AND THE LOWER SHANNON. 
 
 "The harbor extends about 1600 yards in length, and 150 in breadth, 
 with from two to nine feet at low water, and 19 at spring tides; which 
 latter enables vessels of 600 tons to moor at the quays." Vessels of 1000 
 tons, however, can ascend the Shannon to within five miles of the city. 
 By the inland navigation of the Upper Shannon, Limerick commands a 
 water communication with Dublin ; and by railway it is connected with 
 all parts of Ireland by five different lines entering the same station. 
 
 In its manufactures Limerick has been long celebrated for its lace, in 
 the production of which no machinery is employed, all the work being 
 done by hand on frames or patterns. Some of the varieties, especially that 
 known as " guipure," are extremely beautiful, and often fetch very high 
 prices. Fish-hooks of beautiful finish and temper, and gloves, the leather 
 of which is so fine that a pair will pass through a wedding-ring, or may 
 be packed up in a walnut-shell, are also among its excellent productions. 
 In addition to these manufactures, the linen trade has been established 
 during late years, and there is the army clothing factory of Sir Peter Tait, 
 one of the largest establishments of its kind in the kingdom, in which 
 about 3000 complete suits of uniform are turned out weekly for various 
 European or American States. Sir Peter Tait's energy and enterprise 
 have indeed so materially increased the prosperity of Limerick, that the 
 citizens have erected a town clock in his honor. There are also numerous 
 flour mills and breweries ; and a large export trade in provisions and 
 agricultural produce. Limerick had in 1871 a population of 39,823, 
 returns two members to Parliament, and takes the fourth place among 
 Irish cities in mercantile importance and number of inhabitants. 
 
 But Limerick is not more noted for its lace, its fish-hooks, and its 
 gloves, than it is for its beautiful lasses. When Thackeray visited the 
 city he found that every car that passed with ladies in it was sure to 
 contain a pretty one, and remarked that he never saw a greater number 
 of kind, pleasing, clever-looking faces among any set of people. It lays 
 claim to being the birthplace of Catherine Hayes, the best lyric vocalist 
 that Ireland has ever produced. 
 
 Garryowen, meaning "John's Garden," is a famous suburb of Limerick, 
 and, as a tea garden, was formerly a favorite resort of the citizens. It 
 is the scene of the opening chapter of Gerald Griffin's " Collegians " , 
 yet, even notwithstanding the excellence of the ale brewed at the place, 
 
THE WISE MEN OF MUNGRET. 
 
 203 
 
 it would have been long since forgotten but for the popularity of a 
 lively song, which has been elevated into a party tune. 
 
 A drive of three or four miles to the south of Limerick took us 
 to Mungret, one of the most ancient abbeys in Ireland, founded by 
 St. Nessan, a contemporary and co-laborer of St. Patrick. Its ruins, 
 though even now considerable, represent but a fragment of the ancient 
 monastery, which, "according to unquestionable authority, contained 1500 
 monks, exclusive of many scholars who flocked to a shrine of piety and 
 learning famous throughout western Europe." There were originally six 
 churches within the precincts, but the remains of only three are now 
 noticeable, the architecture of one at least of which Dr. Petrie assigns 
 to the earliest Christian ages. The crumbling walls choked up with 
 a populous graveyard but faintly indicate the original magnitude of 
 this ancient monastic institution, which was repeatedly plundered and 
 burnt by the Danes between the years 820 and 1107. "The monastery," 
 we read, " was the home of 500 learned preachers, whose repute for 
 polemical disputation induced the divinity doctors of a noted school, 
 according to the fashion of the age, to make a long journey in order 
 to hold discussions with them. The wise men of Mungret hearing of 
 this intention, and probably feeling their own inability to reason with 
 such renowned disputants, determined, it is said, if possible to evade 
 the encounter. Some of them accordingly, disguising themselves as 
 women, commenced vigorously washing clothes in a pond near which 
 the foreign doctors should pass. As the learned strangers came up 
 they stopped to ask the way, and were at once answered in Greek. 
 So remarkable an acquirement made all the party pause, and after a 
 conversation, in which the putative washerwomen proved their ability to 
 discourse fluently in Latin and Hebrew, the doctors consulted together, 
 and determined at once to return, considering that, if the women of 
 Mungret were possessed of so much erudition, they could never hope 
 to outwit the ecclesiastics." 
 
204 
 
 THE MIDDLE AND UPPER SHANNON. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE MIDDLE AND UPPER SHANNON. 
 
 Course of the River — Doonass Rapids — Castle Connell and its Historical Associations — Killaloe — 
 Kinkora, the Palace of Brian Boroimhe — Lough Derg — fnnis-Ceallra or Holy Island — 
 Picturesque Scenery — Portumna — Archaeological Discoveries — Clonfert — Grand Canal — River 
 Suck — Ballinasloe and its Famous Fair — Battle of Aughrim — Seven Churches of Clonmacnoise 
 — Temple McDermott — Round Towers — Ancient Cross — Athlone and its Brave Defenders — 
 Lissoy, the Scene of the "Deserted Village" — Upper Shannon — Lough Ree — Rincruin — 
 Roscommon — Seven Churches of Kilbarry — Car rick-on- Shannon — Source of the River. 
 
 THE middle section of the Shannon, or that part of the river which 
 
 J- lies between Limerick and Athlone, presents probably the most 
 beautiful route for travel in the inland portion of Ireland. In ascending 
 the stream from its mouth to Limerick, the course travelled is eastwardly. 
 With the exception of the short bend to the north immediately above 
 the city, that course is continued for about four miles further, when 
 the river trends to the north-east, and that becomes its general bearing 
 to its source. Between Limerick and Killaloe, twelve miles above, the 
 Shannon is unnavigable on account of the rapids and shallows with 
 which it is beset, the fall of the river between those two cities 
 comprising two-thirds of the whole fall from its source to its embouchure 
 — the total being 147 feet, and that between the two points named 
 97 feet. The navigation, however, between Limerick and Killaloe is 
 carried on by a lateral canal, those places being further connected by 
 a railway of 17 miles in length. 
 
 Above Limerick the banks of the Shannon are adorned by many 
 beautiful mansions, the principal of which is Mount Shannon, the seat 
 of the Earl of Clare, a fine residence, surrounded by gardens and 
 plantations. But one of the most beautiful parts of the river is Doonass 
 Rapids, near Castle Connell, greatly resorted to by the citizens of 
 
DOONASS RAPIDS AND CASTLE CONNELL. 
 
 205 
 
 Limerick on Sundays and holidays. At this point the river, for 
 a considerable distance, resembles the rapids of the St. Lawrence. 
 Mr. Inglis remarks that "the Shannon is here almost a cataract," and 
 adds. " pours that immense body of water, which above the rapids is 
 40 feet deep, and 300 yards wide, through and above an aggregation 
 of huge stones and rocks, which extend nearly half a mile ; and offers 
 not only an unusual scene, but a spectacle approaching much nearer 
 to the sublime than any moderate-sized stream can offer even in its 
 highest cascade. None of the Welsh waterfalls, nor the Geisbach in 
 Switzerland, can compare for a moment in grandeur and effect with the 
 rapids of the Shannon." Yet experienced boatmen of the neighborhood 
 shoot the rapids with dexterity and apparent safety, not, however, 
 without sensations of alarm to the nervous voyager, at the, to him, 
 hazardous experiment. Nor is the river the only attractive object at 
 Castle Connell ; its adjuncts are all beautiful. 
 
 The neat little village of Castle Connell derives its name from the 
 ancient fortress of the O'Briens, which stands on the summit of an 
 isolated rock near the river, and of which all that is left is part of 
 the entrance tower, with an arched doorway, and ruined walls thickly 
 covered with ivy. It was here that the treacherous Prince of Thomond, 
 upon a visit to the chief who held it, a descendant of Brian Boroimhe, 
 caused his unfortunate host, after his eyes had been put out, to be 
 murdered by some troops whom he had brought unobserved to the 
 castle. It was one of the earliest places of which the English became 
 possessed, and it was, in 11 99, granted by King John to William de 
 Burgh, one of whose successors was created by Queen Elizabeth Baron 
 of Castle Connell. Ireton strongly garrisoned the fortress on his march 
 to Limerick ; and in 1690 it was held by the troops of James II., 
 who surrendered to Brigadier Stewart. In the following year, however, it 
 was again occupied by 250 of the Irish army, who, after a two days' 
 attack, were compelled to surrender to the Prince of Hesse, and then 
 General Ginkell ordered it to be blown up ; and the huge masses of 
 masonry strewing the face of the rock show how effectually his order 
 was executed. Lady Chatterton mentions that there is a tradition among 
 the peasantry which assumes that the ruins of the old castle will fall 
 upon the wisest person in the world, if he should chance to pass under , 
 
206 
 
 THE MIDDLE AND UPPER SHANNON. 
 
 and it is reported that a gentleman of much consideration in the neigh- 
 borhood, fancying himself entitled to the honor, never could be prevailed 
 on to approach the ruins, and when obliged to ride along the high-road 
 to Limerick, which runs near, always passed at full gallop. The late 
 American philanthropist, George Peabody, annually spent some weeks at 
 Castle Connell, in the enjoyment of trout and salmon fishing, for which 
 the place is noted ; and liberally contributed to the erection of its Roman 
 Catholic church. There is a chalybeate spa here long famed for its 
 efficacy in scorbutic and liver complaints. 
 
 A short distance above Castle Connell, the Shannon, is crossed by 
 O'Brien's Bridge, originally an ancient buildings the antiquity of which 
 has been almost obliterated by its partial destruction by the Earl of 
 Ormonde in 1556, and by numerous alterations and repairs. Crossing 
 the bridge into the County of Clare, a drive of a few miles leads to 
 Killaloe, which is also reached by railway from Castle Connell. The 
 line, after running some distance to the east of the Shannon, enters 
 Tipperary, and forms a junction at Birdhill with one to Nenagh, the 
 assize town for the Northern Riding of that county, but possessing 
 little of interest except the circular keep of the castle of the Butlers, 
 commonly called " Nenagh Round," and one of the largest and most 
 important structures of its kind in Ireland. 
 
 At Killaloe another series of rapids in the river make a fall, it is 
 said, of 21 feet in the course of a mile. The small but ancient city 
 stands on the Clare shore, and is connected with the opposite or 
 Tipperary bank by a curious old bridge of 19 arches, which forms a 
 beautiful object in the landscape when looking down the river from the 
 steamboat pier a mile above. It is situated at the southern end of 
 Lough Derg (into which the river expands over a score of miles 
 further north), and has long been the seat of a bishop, its ancient 
 cathedral, attributed to Donald O'Brien, King of Limerick in 1160, being 
 a cruciform structure in the Early Gothic style, and having a massive 
 tower springing from the intersection of the nave and transepts. There 
 is, however, a magnificent Romanesque doorway of much earlier date, said 
 to have been the tomb of Muircheartach O'Brien. This cathedral, the 
 choir of which is now used as a parish church, occupies the site of one 
 founded in the sixth century by St. Lua, or Molua (hence the name 
 
KILLALOE AND KINKORA 
 
 207 
 
 Kill-da-Ltia, Church of St. Lua), who "was the first bishop, and was suc- 
 ceeded by St. Flannan, consecrated A.D. 639, son of Theodoric, King of 
 Munster, through whose piety the place speedily attained great celebrity, 
 and became the burial-place of Muircheartach O'Brien, King of Ireland, 
 1 1 20."* Within the churchyard is a second ancient building — a stone- 
 roofed church — attributed to both SS. Molua and Flannan, but Dr. Petrie 
 considers it to be erected by the latter, assigning to the former another 
 church, to be found on an island in the river. The city has been 
 repeatedly destroyed and restored, having been burnt successively in 1061, 
 1080, 1 1 16, 1 154, and 1 155. A timber bridge was built here in 1054, 
 but evidently did not outlast two centuries, as in the beginning of the 
 fourteenth the passage was only known by its ford. 
 
 A mound or fort called Bal-Boroimhe is pointed out as the site o£ 
 Kinkora, the palace of Brian Boroimhe, referred to in one of Moore's 
 deathless lyrics. It was, however, " the residence of several of the 
 kings of Munster and North Munster, before the accession of the most 
 distinguished of them, Brian Boroimhe, in the latter part of the tenth 
 century ; but it was under Brian himself, who held his court here both 
 as King of Munster and afterwards as monarch of all Ireland, that the 
 place obtained its greatest celebrity. After his death, at the celebrated 
 battle of Clontarf in 1014, where the power of the Northmen was forever 
 broken in Ireland, his children and successors continued to inhabit 
 Kinkora for some generations, but the 'palace' shared largely in their 
 reverses. Connected with Kinkora was a character not less famed than 
 the patriot monarch Brian himself, although in a different vocation ; 
 this was his chief bard, Mac Liag, a few of whose productions have 
 reached posterity." This bard did not long survive his master, for 
 he died in the year succeeding the fatal battle of Clontarf. After 
 numerous vicissitudes, in which Kinkora was subject to destruction and 
 re-edification, the palace was finally literally flung into the Shannon in 
 1 1 18, by the army of Turlough O'Connor of Connaught. 
 
 Killaloe pleasantly rests between the Arra and Slieve Bernagh 
 
 * The sees of Roscrea and Inis-Cealtra were united to Killaloe about 1195. Roscrea (in Queen's County) 
 was the seat of a monastery founded by St. Cronan, who nourished about 620, was abbot and bishop, and 
 of such sanctity and learning that several miracles were attributed to his prayers. In the Roman Catholic 
 Church the diocese of Killaloe continues distinct ; but in the Protestant Church, that of Kilfenora was 
 united to it in 1752, and the sees of Clonfert and Kilmacduagh in 1833. 
 
208 
 
 THE MIDDLE AND UPPER SHANNON. 
 
 Mountains, respectively 15 17 and 1746 feet in height, and was formerly an 
 important military pass. It was here, in 1691, that Sarsfield intercepted the 
 artillery of King William, which was coming up to aid in the siege of 
 Limerick. The place is declared to be " the Utopia of Irish anglers, 
 who have in the broad weirs and rapids of the Shannon one of the 
 finest opportunities for sport in all the kingdom." Here are also situated 
 extensive slate quarries, which are said to produce a million tons annually ; 
 and an extensive mill has recently been erected for sawing and polishing 
 the much-esteemed Killaloe marble. From this point there was formerly 
 regular communication northward by steam through Lough Derg and up 
 the Shannon to Athlone, and southward by packet boat to Limerick 
 through the canal which branches off near the foot of the lake. It is 
 much to be regretted, however, that the services are now discontinued, 
 especially that up the stream, compelling the tourist who desires to 
 traverse the most picturesque portion of this noble river to incur the 
 expense of hiring a sail or row boat. 
 
 Leaving Killaloe then by boat we traversed the waters of Lough Derg 
 from the point where the Shannon reassumes the river form to Portumna 
 where its banks recede and it becomes a lake. This Lough Derg, 
 which must not be confounded with a namesake in Donegal County, 
 is twenty-four miles long and from two to six miles broad, and in one 
 part, where bays indent the land to the east and to the west, it is 
 thirteen miles across. It is of considerable depth, there being close 
 to the shore from 10 to 15 feet of water, sometimes 40 feet, while 
 its average depth in mid channel is from 70 to 80 feet. Sir John 
 Forbes, who considers it one of the finest lakes in Ireland, remarks 
 that, while it contains many islands, " it presents also in many places a 
 magnificent and unbroken sea-like expanse. At its lower extremity, and 
 indeed during a large part of its course, it is bordered by magnificent 
 mountains ; and those in the vicinity of Killaloe, before the lake opens 
 out into its greater width, constitute, with the waters the)' shelter and 
 enclose, one of the grandest and most beautiful views in Ireland. There 
 is nothing in the Lower Shannon in an)- way comparable to this scene, 
 which of itself will well repay the traveler for any circuitousness in the 
 journey he may make to see it, and compensate for any tameness which 
 may greet him in his subsequent course." 
 
LOUGH DERG AND INIS-CEA L TRA. 
 
 209 
 
 The most noteworthy of its islands is that known as Inis-Cealtra or 
 Holy Island which occupies about 30 acres, and was the home of St. 
 Cainim* who founded a monastery in it, in the beginning of the seventh 
 century. It contains the ruins of seven churches, the most perfect of 
 which are said to have been rebuilt by Brian Boroimhe after their 
 destruction by the Danes in 834. Here is also a Round Tower of the 
 date of about the tenth century, 80 feet in height, the upper story 
 wanting, celebrated as being the residence of an anchorite of the name 
 of St Cosgrath, " the miserable ; " and an ancient cemetery, with some 
 of its tombs resembling those of the chiefs on the island of Iona. 
 
 The scenery of the western shore of the lake presents a lofty range of 
 mountains, while that of the eastern shore is not particularly interesting ; 
 from the latter side, however, we have a glimpse at the widest portion 
 of the lake, of the Devil's Bit mountains, and of the notch whence 
 the erring personage whose name they bear extracted the morsel 
 which constitutes the Rock of Cashel. The shores are also dotted 
 with remains of several castles, which serve, says Forbes, " to give 
 variety and dignity to the landscape, by recalling the old legendary 
 days of Ireland, when those fortresses were the abode of kings and 
 king-like chieftains," The county of Tipperary extends along the 
 eastern shore of the lake, while that of Clare bounds it on the south- 
 west, and Galway on the north-west. 
 
 At Portumna, situated at the head of the lough, we were once more 
 in the province of Connaught, and at the point where the Shannon 
 in its course expands its banks and becomes an inland sea. The town, 
 mainly consisting of two parallel streets, though situated upon a plain, 
 commands fine views of the lake and of the Slieve Baughta hills on 
 the west. The river was here formerly crossed by a wooden bridge, 
 constructed by Lemuel Cox, the American bridge builder, of whose 
 works at Waterford, Wexford, and New Ross, we have already spoken ; 
 but it has been replaced by a stone structure, 766 feet in length, with 
 its centre resting on an island in the stream, and having a swivel- 
 
 * The venerable Bede mentions that St. Columbus of Inis-Cealtra died in 548, when there was great mortality 
 in Ireland, which would indicate that St. Cainim was not the first ecclesiastic who resided there. An abbot of Inis- 
 Cealtra named Stellanus flourished in 650, which would lead to the impression that he had an establishment distinct 
 from that of Cainim, who was probably bishop of this island, with a jurisdiction distinct from that of abbacy. In 
 951, Dermot McCahir died bishop here. The bishopric was united to that of Killaloe about 1195. 
 27 
 
210 
 
 THE MIDDLE AND UPPER SHANNON. 
 
 bridge to facilitate navigation. Portumna once possessed an ancient castle 
 of the De Burgos, but no traces of it are left ; and there are but 
 few remains of a Dominican abbey founded about the thirteenth 
 century. A handsome model castle belonging to the Marquis of 
 Clanricarde, the owner of the town, was burnt down in 1826, along with 
 many valuable works of art it contained, and has been replaced by another 
 on an eligible site, from the designs of Mr. T. N. Deane. On the 
 opposite, or Tipperary side of the river, is Belleisle, the seat of Lord 
 Avonmore, having within its ground the keeps of two castles. 
 
 Not only the lough but the mountains which stand guard over its 
 western shores here terminate ; and, to quote Forbes, " henceforward, 
 all the wav to Athlone, the Shannon retains the characteristics of a 
 low-land river, flowing, with singular placidity, through a country that 
 is sometimes tame, sometimes ugly, not seldom beautiful, but never 
 either grand or picturesque. The river itself, however, may be said 
 to be always grand in its display of tranquil power." A few miles 
 above Portumna the Shannon was too shallow for navigation until the bed 
 of the river was deepened by the Commissioners. In the performance 
 of the work several interesting pre-historic relics were discovered. "In the 
 greatest depths stone hatchets were found, evidently indicating a very 
 early state of society. In a stratum overlying this were bronzed spears 
 and swords ; a still newer deposit contained implements of iron, as swords 
 and spear-heads ; and in the strata nearest the surface more modern 
 implements, among which were antiquated firelocks.'' 
 
 In the thirteen miles between Portumna and Banagher, the Shannon 
 in some places divides and is tortuous and uncertain, and in one a canal 
 has been cut to improve the navigation. About midway between these 
 places the county of Tipperary and the province of Munster cease to 
 border the eastern shore of the river, and give way to the county of 
 King's and the province of Leinster. At Banagher a bridge of six arches 
 with a swivel has replaced an ancient bridge, which was probably one of 
 the oldest in the country, having, it is supposed, stood for over 400 years.* 
 
 * Five miles to the northwest of Banagher is the little ecclesiastical city of Clonfert (Cluainfcarth, the 
 retired spot), where, in 558, St. Brendan founded a monastery and a church famous for its seven altars, and 
 became the first bishop of the diocese. The cathedral, now used as a parish church, is of little interest. In 
 1602 the Protestant see was united to that of Kilmacduagh, and in 1833 these were annexed to the sees of 
 Killaloe and Kilfenora. In the Roman Catholic church Clonfert is a separate diocese, with the bishop 
 residing at Loughrea, a small town some miles to the west. 
 
BALLINASLOE AND ITS GREAT FAIR. 
 
 211 
 
 Somewhat less than five miles further brought us to a place called 
 Shannon Harbor, spoken of by Lever in " Jack Hinton." When railway 
 traveling was a thing of the future, this was an important station, 
 owing to its location at the junction of Shannon navigation with that 
 of the Grand Canal, which flows eighty miles eastward to the Liffey at 
 Dublin, and sends off an extension of fifteen miles from the opposite 
 side of the Shannon northwest to Ballinasloe. Five miles higher up, 
 the river Suck enters on the west, dividing the counties of Galway and 
 Roscommon, both in Connaught, so that, with King's county on the 
 opposite shore of the main stream, three counties meet at this point. 
 The Shannon is here crossed by a bridge of 18 arches, having the town 
 of Shannonbridge at its Leinster end, and a tete du pont and an artillery 
 barrack at its Connaught terminus. 
 
 A few miles up the Suck, and on the line of railway between Dublin 
 and Galway, is Ballinasloe, a busy town of about 4000 inhabitants, and 
 the scene of the greatest live stock market in Europe. Its more ancient 
 name, Bal-atha-na-sluighcadh, the Mouth of the Ford of Hosts, indicates 
 that it was a place of meeting and probably of barter in early times. 
 The oldest name of the place was, however, Dun Leodha, or Dunlo, 
 from its dun or fort, which formerly stood over the Suck, but was 
 removed in 1838 and a Roman Catholic chapel built on its site. 
 Nearly 100,000 head of sheep alone have been sold at one of its annual 
 fairs which take place in October and last several days, in addition to 
 which several thousands of horses and horned cattle have changed owners. 
 
 o 
 
 The fair is held partly in the town and partly in the grounds of 
 Garbally Castle, the beautiful residence of Lord Clancarty ; and the 
 extensive cattle raisers of Connaught annually exhibit their flocks on 
 the same plot, the right to the possession of which they stoutly contest 
 with intruders. 
 
 Not far from Ballinasloe is the village of Aughrim, rendered famous 
 by the memorable battle fought on the neighboring heights of Kilcom- 
 madan, July 12, 1691, between the army of James, under St. Ruth and 
 Sarsfield, and that of William, under Ginkell and Talmash, in which the 
 former was defeated with the loss of 7000 men and one of its com- 
 manders, St. Ruth, who was slain by a cannon ball. 
 
 Some singular gravel ridges or hills, forming the Aisgir Riadha 
 
212 
 
 THE MIDDLE AND UPPER SHANNON. 
 
 which intersect Ireland from east to west, cross the Shannon about four 
 miles above its confluence with the Suck, and cause the river to be 
 deflected and make a bend. The hills breaking their direct lines as 
 they approach the stream, form an amphitheatre, upon the southern curve 
 of which stand the remains of the Seven Churches of Clonmacnoise. 
 Here was the school where the nobility of Connaught had their children 
 educated, which obtained for the place the name of Cluan-mac-nois, " the 
 Secluded Recess of the Sons of Nobles." Of this famous school and the 
 abbey it is recorded, that " its landed property was so great, and the 
 number of cells and monasteries subjected to it so numerous, that almost 
 half of Ireland was said to be within the bounds of Clonmacnoise." 
 The abbey was founded in 548 by St. Kieran, and, having been endowed 
 with lands by the Irish king Dermid Mac Cervail, became an episcopal 
 see. " This foundation," writes Wills, " was afterwards enlarged by several 
 additions in different periods. The piety — or pride— of kings and princes 
 added nine churches for the sepulchre of their remains, all within the 
 same enclosure, and within the small space of two acres." In 1 199, 
 having then become a place of much importance, it was attacked by 
 the army of William De Burgo, was next year plundered by the forces 
 of Milor Fitz-Henry, who in the year following revisited it and ruthlessly 
 completed the despoliation De Burgo began. In these ravages the town 
 and the cathedral suffered great violence and depredation, and the monks 
 and priests were despoiled of vestments, books, chalices, plate, provisions, 
 and cattle, and their grounds laid waste. Notwithstanding this, the 
 ecclesiastical institution posssessed sufficient vitality to be considered 
 again worth plundering by De Burgo in 1204; an d continued to flourish 
 under a regular succession of prelates until 1568, when the see was 
 united to that of Meath. 
 
 The most important and the gem of the ecclesiastical remains at 
 Clonmacnoise is Dahmliag Mor, or Great Church, recorded to have 
 been erected in 909 by Flann, a King of Ireland, and Colman 
 Conaillech, Abbot of Clonmacnoise, and subsequently re-edified in the 
 thirteenth or fourteenth century by Tomultach McDermott, chief of 
 Moyhurg. A tablet on the wall records that it was repaired in 1647, 
 by McCoghlan, the last of the Irish chiefs. Its most ancient portion 
 is the great western doorway, which Petrie considers to have been part 
 
SEVEN CHURCHES OF CLONMACNOISE. 
 
 213 
 
 of the original church. But the Northern Doorway of Temple 
 McDermott, by which name the church is known, is the leading 
 feature of the edifice. An inscription in Latin on the pillars attributes 
 its erection to Dean Odo, and, wrote Caesar Otway half a century 
 ago, " the elaborate tracery, on which the whole fancy and vagary 
 of Gothic license is lavished, stands forth as sharp, fresh, and clean, 
 as if but yesterday from under the chisel." Three effigies over the 
 arch represent St. Patrick in his pontificals, in the centre, with St. 
 Francis and St. Dominick on either side, and the portraits of the 
 group are repeated on a higher row. This beautiful doorway and 
 some other of the remains at this place were wantonly mutilated some 
 years ago, and the alleged offender very properly prosecuted by the 
 Kilkenny Archaeological Society, but the jury failed to agree upon a 
 verdict. Tcampul Finghin, or Fineen's Church, is believed to have been 
 erected about the thirteenth century by Fineen McCarthy More, and 
 presents little of interest beyond its chancel and a Round Tower, of 
 which we shall speak directly, attached to the south-east junction with 
 the nave. A third church known as Tcampul Connor, founded in the 
 tenth century by Cathol, the son of Connor, is now used as a parish 
 church, and has for its only antiquity a circular headed doorway of 
 that period. In addition to these there also exist some ruins of a 
 small church or oratory of St. Kieran, where he is supposed to have 
 been buried, and which, when perfect, must have been so small that 
 a tall man could scarcely have laid at length in it. In former days 
 it was the custom to hold an annual pattern here, when from 3000 to 
 4000 pilgrims from all parts of Ireland came to listen to preaching 
 and perform a special round of devotion. " Many of the devotees 
 sought relics of the Saint, and dug down deep amongst the stones 
 and rubbish of this little oratory for some trace of soil or bone, 
 believing that the fortunate possessor had a specific against sickness and 
 disease ; " it being the custom of such people to steep the holy earth 
 in water and drink it. Among the archaeological remains is a beautiful 
 arch of the most florid Gothic workmanship, which evidently formed 
 the opening from the body of a church into its chancel. And it is 
 a wonder that it exists to this day and that pilgrims are still enabled 
 to perform the penance of creeping under it, for when Otway saw it, 
 
214 
 
 THE MIDDLE AND UPPER SHANNON. 
 
 he remarked of it : " It now totters to its fall — it is even surprising 
 that it does not tumble ; and I suspected that it would long ago 
 have fallen a victim to the elements or to the barbarous violence of 
 the people, were it not that it is considered as part of an expiating 
 penance for the pilgrim to creep on his bare knees under this arch 
 while approaching the altar-stone of the chapel, where sundry paters 
 and aves must be repeated as essential to keeping the station." Adjoining 
 is a holy stone on which St. Kieran sat, and the sitting on it now, 
 under the affiance of faith, is presumed to be a sovereign cure in all 
 cases of epilepsy. 
 
 There are two Round Towers at Clonmacnoise, of which the largest, 
 or O'Rourke's, is roofless, and declines from, the perpendicular, " like the 
 well known tower of Pisa, and, strangely enough, having a similar tradition 
 that the designing mason built it so in order to show his matchless 
 skill." It is 90 feet in height, stands on an elevation, is composed 
 partly of the gray limestone of the district, is entered by a door 15 feet 
 above the ground, and has eight apertures at the top — double the usual 
 number. It is presumed to have been erected about 908, coeval with 
 the Dahmliag Mor, but shows signs of having been repaired at a 
 considerably later period. In alluding to its elevated position, which 
 makes it a conspicuous feature to the country around, it has been 
 observed : " It was high enough to take cognizance of the coming 
 enemy, let him come from what point he might ; it commanded the 
 ancient causeway that was laid down at a considerable expense across 
 the great bog on the Connaught side of the Shannon ; it looked up 
 and down the river, and commanded the tortuous and sweeping reaches 
 of the stream, as it unfolded itself like an uncoiling serpent along the 
 surrounding bogs and marshes ; it commanded the line of the Aisgir 
 Riadha ; could hold communication with the holy places of Clonfert ; 
 and from the top of its pillared height send its beacon light towards the 
 sacred isles and anchorite retreats of Lough Rea ; it was large and roomy 
 enough to contain all the officiating priests of Clonmacnoise, with their 
 pixes, vestments, and books ; and though the pagan Dane or the wild 
 Munsterman might rush on in rapid inroad, yet the solitary watcher on 
 the tower was ready to give warning, and collect within the protecting 
 pillar all the holy men and things, until the tyranny was overpast." 
 
ROUND TOWER AND ANCIENT CROSS. 
 
 215 
 
 The other, or McCarthy's tower, is that attached to the church of 
 which we have spoken above. " This tower," Otway remarked, " though 
 small, is one of the most perfect in Ireland; it is conically capped, and 
 the ranges of stone forming the cover are of the most beautiful and 
 sineular arrangement. The tower stands on the south side of the 
 chancel of the church, and the doorway of the tower instead of beine 
 elevated ten or fifteen feet from the ground is on a level with the 
 floor of the chancel from which it leads ; it is within a few feet of 
 the altar ; moreover, the archway leading from the nave of the church 
 into the chancel, which is of the most finished and at the same time 
 chaste order of Gothic construction, is wrought into the body of the 
 Round Tower, part of whose rotundity is sacrificed to give room and 
 form to the display of its light and elegant span. Now these two 
 circumstances convince me that, in the first place, the church and tower 
 were built at the same time ; moreover, that as the church was placed 
 more remote than other churches, and nearer invaders coming across 
 the Shannon, the tower was provided as a look-out station and place 
 of ready retreat for the priests to retire to with their sacred vessels 
 and books." The tower measures but seven feet in diameter within, 
 and is but fifty-five feet high ; and the writer just quoted thought he 
 could discern the marks of stairs that rose spirally to the top, a 
 peculiarity unnoticed in other Round Towers which, though they present 
 evidence of floors, story over story, in no instance show marks of spiral 
 stairs. 
 
 The third great feature at Clonmacnoise is an Ancient Cross, 
 situated in front of, and evidently of the same date as Teampul 
 McDermot. and consisting of a single elaborately carved stone 15 feet 
 high. An inscription in Irish on the lower compartment of the western 
 front of the shaft requests "a prayer for Flann, son of Maelsechlainn : " 
 and one on the reverse, " a prayer for Coleman, who made this cross 
 on the King Flann." The sculpture on the west side commemorates 
 the original foundation of Clonmacnoise by St. Kieran, while that on 
 the opposite side delineates scenes in the life of our Saviour, whence it 
 has obtained the name of the Cros na Screaptra, or Cross of the 
 Scriptures. St. Kieran himself is represented with a hammer in one 
 hand and a mallet in the other. 
 
216 
 
 THE MIDDLE AND UPPER SHANNON. 
 
 That the Episcopal palace and castle of the O'Melaghlin's, which 
 overlooks the river, must have been a fortress of immense strength, is 
 apparent from the huge fragments which are either strewn in the fosse 
 or lie in heaps around ; and the tenacity of the cement which holds 
 the gigantic pieces together is very remarkable. Some distance to the 
 northeast are the remains of a nunnery founded by Devorgilla, daughter 
 of O'Melaghlin, which is said to be connected with the church by a 
 subterranean passage. The cemetery having long been the burying 
 place of kings, princes, and chiefs, possesses great interest to antiquarians, 
 and contains several crosses and inscribed tombstones of some of the 
 ecclesiastical dignitaries of the place, of the tenth century, and of Suibne 
 MacMaelhumai, one of the three Irishmen who visited Alfred the Great. 
 In fact the whole place is crowded with gravestones, indicating the 
 popularity of Clonmacnoise as a place of interment. " Here," quoth 
 Otway, " is the largest enclosure of tombs and churches I have anywhere 
 seen in Ireland. What a mixture of old and new graves ! Modern 
 inscriptions recording the death and virtues of the sons of little men, 
 the rude forefathers of the surrounding hamlets ; ancient inscriptions in 
 the oldest forms of Irish letters, recording the deeds and the hopes of 
 kings, bishops, and abbots, buried a thousand years ago, lying about 
 broken, neglected, and dishonored, what would I give could I have 
 deciphered ! " 
 
 The Shannon, in the nine miles of its course between Clonmacnoise 
 and Athlone, is a dull and uninteresting river surrounded by bogs. To 
 once more employ the language of Caesar Otway, " it creeps through 
 dismal flats and swamps ; and the narrow tracts of meadow and small 
 patches of cultivation along its banks, only tend, like green fringes to a 
 mourning drapery, to mark off, as by contrast, the extreme dreariness 
 of the picture." A pile of stones at the end of an island in the middle 
 of the river marks the union of three counties — King's, Westmeath, and 
 Roscommon. 
 
 Athlone is situated on both sides of the Shannon, partly in the 
 county of Westmeath and partly in that of Roscommon. Its position 
 consequently made it the great gateway from Leinster into Connaught 
 for several centuries, and it was the scene of many a bloody battle long 
 before the war of the Revolution. " Although," we read, " a settlement 
 
EARLY HISTORY OF ATHLONE. 
 
 1\1 
 
 existed here, known by the name of Ath-Luain, the Ford of the Moon, 
 or, according to others, Ath-Luan, the Ford of the Rapids, it was not 
 until the reign of John that the castle was erected, and it became an 
 important military station — so important, indeed, that, when Henry III. 
 granted the dominion of Ireland to Prince Edward, Athlone was expressly 
 reserved ; " and, subsequently, when Connaught was assigned to Richard 
 de Burgo, the monarch retained for his own especial use " five cantreds 
 of land contiguous to the fortress." In the insurrection of 1641, Athlone 
 was closely besieged by the Connaught men for 22 weeks, until the 
 relief of the garrison, which was greatly reduced by famine and disease ; 
 and it was taken by the parliamentary army under Sir C. Coote. It 
 was, however, during the great Revolution that Athlone became the scene 
 of important military events. After the battle of the Boyne, in 1690, the 
 victorious army of William appeared before its walls and demanded its 
 surrender ; upon which Colonel Grace, who commanded the garrison, defi- 
 antly replied, discharging his pistol in the air, " These are my terms ; 
 these only will I give or receive ; and when my provisions are consumed, 
 I will defend my trust until I have eaten my boots ; " and then, aware 
 of the impossibility of defending the entire town with the few troops at 
 his disposal, he burned down the eastern portion, destroyed some arches 
 of the only bridge* crossing the river, and retired to the western or 
 Connaught shore, on which stood the castle. After unsuccessfully battering 
 the fortress for eight days, General Douglas withdrew William's forces 
 under cover of night. In the following summer Athlone was again 
 attacked by the main body of King William's army under General 
 
 * The old bridge at Athlone was built in the ninth year of Queen Elizabeth's reign, by order of Sir 
 Henry Sidney, Knt., who availed himself of the mechanical and scientific knowledge of Peter Levis, a dignitary 
 of Christ Church, Dublin. These facts were recorded in a monument placed over the centre of the bridge 
 and still preserved. This tablet has in one of its compartments the figure of Peter Levis attired in his 
 Geneva gown, grasping in his right hand a pistol, or what has been supposed to represent one, with a rat 
 upon it in the act of biting the man's hand. There is a curious story related of the sculpture. This 
 Peter Levis was a monk in an English monastery, who, having adopted the Reformed mode of faith, came 
 to Ireland and obtained preferment in the Protestant church. But the converted monk, though fortunate 
 in his worldly ambition, could never enjoy his prosperity. He was tormented night and day by a righteous 
 rat, who, indignant at his apostacy, continually haunted him. He bore the annoyance patiently for a long 
 time, until one day, descending from the pulpit of St. Mary's Church, Athlone, after preaching, he discovered 
 his tormentor hidden in the sleeve of his gown ; when, unable longer to restrain his rage, he drew a pistol 
 from his breast in order to shoot the animal, whereupon it sprang upon his hand and bit him in the 
 thumb ; and the wound producing mortification resulted in his death. 
 28 
 
218 
 
 THE MIDDLE AND UPPER SHANNON. 
 
 Ginkell, afterwards Earl of Athlone, the Irish army under St. Ruth 
 being at the time encamped in the vicinity. The siege commenced on 
 the tenth of June, and continued with the utmost vigor for ten days, 
 during which 12,000 cannon-balls, 600 bombs, and many tons of stone-shot 
 were expended by the besiegers. Various breaches having been made, 
 Ginkell considered it expedient to attempt an assault. The English, 
 on their side of the broken arch, had thrown up a regular breastwork ; 
 while the defence on the part of the Irish was constructed altogether 
 of earth and wattles, which was set fire to by the grenades and other 
 burning missiles of the opposing force. " While it was fiercely burning," 
 says a writer on the subject, " the English, concealed by the flame and 
 smoke, succeeded in pushing a large beam ■ across the chasm, and now 
 it was only necessary to place boards over the beams, and the river 
 was crossed ; when an Irish sergeant and ten men in armor leaped 
 across the burning breastwork and proceeded to tear up the beams and 
 planks. The British were astonished at such hardihood, and actually 
 paused in making any opposition ; but the next instant a shower of 
 grape-shot and grenades swept these brave men away, who, nevertheless, 
 were instantly succeeded by another party, that, in spite of the iron 
 hail-storm, tore up planks and beams and foiled the enterprise of their 
 foes. Of this second party only two escaped : there is scarcely on 
 record a nobler instance of heroism than this deliberate act of these 
 Irish soldiers, who have died without a name." The two who escaped 
 were precipitated into the river, and swam to the shore — 
 
 " O, many a year upon Shannon's side, 
 
 They sang upon moor, and they sang upon heath 
 Of the twain that breasted that raging tide, 
 
 And the ten that shook bloody hands with Death ! " 
 
 The English commander, disappointed at the failure of his stratagem, 
 resolved to pass the river next day at three places — one party to go over 
 the bridge, a second to ford the river, about 150 feet above it, and a third 
 to cross at another point over a bridge of boats and pontoons. " The 
 attempt," remarks the historian, " was considered to be rash and desperate, 
 as no discovery had been made whether the river was fordable. Three 
 Danish soldiers, under sentence of death, were offered their pardon if 
 they would undertake to try the river. The men readily consented, 
 
CAPTURE OF ATHLONE. 
 
 219 
 
 and putting on armor entered at three several places. The English in 
 the trenches were ordered to fire seemingly at them, but to aim over 
 their heads, whence the enemy concluded them to be deserters, and 
 did not fire till they saw them returning. The men were preserved, 
 two of them being only slightly wounded ; and it was discovered that the 
 deepest part of the river did not reach their breasts, the water having never 
 been known so shallow in the memory of man." The order at length 
 being given for the passage of the English army, such was the alacrity 
 with which it was obeyed that in half an hour the troops had passed 
 over, were masters of the fortress, and turned its guns upon the retreating 
 Irish. The French general, St. Ruth, whose confidence in the strength 
 of the town betrayed him into culpable security, was at the time amusing 
 himself with his officers, dancing- and gambling; in a house about a mile 
 distant, and laughed to scorn the first account brought him of the English 
 having taken the place. The disastrous intelligence was, however, soon 
 fully confirmed ; and this rash but brave man was obliged to make a 
 precipitate retreat into Connaught, where he was shortly afterwards killed 
 in the battle of Aughrim, as we have already mentioned. 
 
 The old fortress is still formidable, but was almost impregnable 
 previous to 1697, in the October of which a flash of lightning exploded 
 the magazine, then containing" 260 barrels of gunpowder, 10,000 charged 
 grenades, matches, and other combustibles. The concussion was naturally 
 most terrific, shaking the strong castle, and more or less injuring every 
 house in the town ; and yet, remarkable to relate, there was but little 
 loss of life. The castle and its surroundings are now employed as 
 military barracks for infantry, cavalry, and artillery, with arms for 15,000 
 men ; and stores, hospitals, parade-grounds, etc. — the whole occupying an 
 area of 15 acres. The military defences command the approaches from 
 the Connaught side and the bridge which leads into Leinster ; and a 
 canal, constructed to avoid the fords of the Shannon, adds to their 
 strength. The celebrated old bridge, only twelve feet broad, was removed 
 some years ago by order of the Shannon Commissioners, and its place 
 supplied by a handsome commodious new one. The river is also crossed 
 at Athlone by a magnificent iron railway bridge, supported by twelve 
 cast-iron cylindrical piers, and 560 feet in extreme length, including two 
 spans over roads on the sides of the stream. 
 
220 
 
 THE MIDDLE AND UPPER SHANNON. 
 
 The town, of which a good view is obtained from the fortified 
 heights on the west, is the most important place between Dublin and 
 Galway ; and, though its streets are the reverse of picturesque, they 
 still present a bustling appearance, from the place being an important mili- 
 tary station. At the taking of the census in 1871, Athlone had a popula- 
 tion of 6227, and returns one member to Parliament. Its churches and 
 public buildings possess little of interest. A branch of the Great Southern 
 and Western Railway, which passes for a considerable distance over the 
 great bog of Allen, connects Athlone with Portarlington, and forms the 
 pathway of travel from hence to Cork and the south of Ireland. 
 
 From Athlone we made a pilgrimage to the modest little village of 
 Lissoy, now more poetically named Auburn, the early home of the poet 
 Goldsmith, and the reputed scene of his " Deserted Village." It is eight 
 miles north of the town, is situated in a district more remarkable for 
 quiet pastoral beauty than romantic grandeur, and is in perfect harmony 
 with the character that pervades all the writings of that delightful poet 
 of nature. Goldsmith was born at Pallas, near Ballymahon, a few miles 
 from Lissoy ; but he spent many of his youthful days at the latter 
 place, where his brother, the Rev. Charles Goldsmith, resided and brought 
 up a large family on a miserable pittance. The house is still pointed 
 out, but alas ! time and neglect have reduced it to ruins, and a roofless 
 shell is all that now remains to point out the place where 
 
 " The village preacher's modest mansion rose." 
 
 But though the mouldering walls be crumbled into dust, and the hearth 
 be cold around which " the long-remembered beggar," " the ruined spend- 
 thrift," and " the broken soldier " forgot their sorrows, the memory of 
 that good man, whose picture has been drawn with the feeling of a 
 poet and the affection of a brother, will live forever in the purest page 
 of English literature. To this brother, to whom he was tenderly 
 attached, Goldsmith dedicated his exquisite poem of " The Traveler " ; 
 and in him he found the original of Dr. Primrose, in his admirable 
 novel, " The Vicar of Wakefield." 
 
 Many of the features depicted in the poem have disappeared from 
 the village, and others have been replaced. 
 
 " The never-failing brook, the busy mill ; 
 
 The decent church that topp'd the neighboring hill," 
 
" THE DESERTED VILLAGE: 
 
 221 
 
 are still to be seen ; but the village inn, the " Three Pigeons,"* was 
 rebuilt by Mr. Hogan, and the hawthorn was, unfortunately, knocked 
 down by a cart, and the tree sold piece by piece to tourists, many of 
 whom have doubtless had palmed upon them sprigs of other bushes 
 as relics of the renowned tree. Though it is evident that the scenes 
 of Goldsmith's early life at Lissoy became the sources from whence he 
 drew the picture of 
 
 " Sweet Auburn ! loveliest village of the plain, 
 
 Where health and plenty cheer'd the laboring swain ; 
 Where smiling Spring its earliest visits paid, 
 And parting Summer's lingering blooms delayed," 
 
 it is equally certain that his picture of " The Deserted Village " is 
 sufficiently general in character to apply with equal accuracy to many 
 places in England. 
 
 The upper Shannon, or that part of the river which lies north of 
 Athlone, is not generally visited by tourists ; yet it presents many scenes 
 that are really beautiful. About a mile and a half above the town the 
 river's banks recede where its waters emerge from another lake, but a 
 somewhat smaller one than that through which we had already passed. 
 Lough Ree, (formerly called Lough Ribh, and sometimes Great Lough 
 Allen) is 17 miles long and in no part more than 7 in width, and 
 situated in the counties of Roscommon, Longford, and Westmeath. It 
 contains many pleasant wooded promontories, bays, and creeks ; and its 
 islands, though not numerous, are, some of them, very beautiful, and 
 nearly all possess some ruins of ancient ecclesiastical edifices. The 
 principal are Inchcleraun, Saints' Island, Inch Turk, Inchmore, and Hare 
 Island, " the latter a perfect gem of woodland scenery, aided by art in 
 the shape of a lodge belonging to Lord Castlemaine, who occasionally 
 resides here." The waters of this lake appear to have been navigated 
 at a very early date, for the Annals of the Four Masters record 
 " The shipwreck of Dealbhna-Nuadhat on Lough Ribh, with their Lord 
 Duimasach, of which it is said, ' Thrice nine vessels and three of 
 
 * The name of the public house, called " The Pigeons " in the time of Goldsmith, does not occur in 
 xhe poem of "The Deserted Village"; but "The Three Pigeons" is the name given to the inn in which 
 Tony Lumpkin plays his pranks, and where he misleads the hero of the comedy " She Stoops to Conquer," 
 into mistaking the mansion of Squire Hardcastle for a tavern. There is little doubt that such an incident 
 did actually happen to the poet himself ; and that many other of his early adventures were subsequently 
 introduced into his fictitious narratives 
 
222 
 
 THE MIDDLE AND UPPER SHANNON. 
 
 Gamhawraighe of Lough Ribh, there escaped of them with life, except 
 alone the crew of one vessel.' " And the same source informs us that 
 in 1 137 the lake possessed a fleet of 130 vessels. It is rarely that 
 the Shannon lakes are frozen over ; the Annals, however, mention 
 a memorable instance, in 1 1 56, in the reign of Roderick O'Connor, 
 monarch of Ireland, when " there occurred a great fall of snow and a 
 frost in the winter of this year, so that the lakes and rivers of Ireland 
 were frozen over. The frost was so great that Roderick O'Connor was 
 enabled to have his ships and boats carried on the ice from Blein 
 Gaille to Rinn-Duin." St. John's, or Randown Castle {Rinn-Duin, " the 
 point of the fort "), occupies a promontory on the western shore of the 
 lake. " It is," says Mr. Weld, " built in the form of a P, the tail of 
 the letter being short in proportion, and occupied by a spacious apartment 
 for banqueting or assembly. The keep, as beheld both from the land 
 side and from the lake, presents a very imposing mass, its outer walls 
 being entire, and its great tower rising to a very considerable elevation ; 
 but the edifice on the land side appears almost shapeless, owing to the 
 extraordinary luxuriance of ivy with which it is overrun, originating from 
 two vast platted stems which spring up over the base of the walls, just 
 over the long fosse." A wall, 1692 feet long, carried right across the 
 peninsula on which the fortress stands, originally defended it. 
 
 The town of Roscommon, situated about eight miles to the west of 
 the lake, possesses nothing of interest, except its ancient monastery and 
 its castle. The latter, built in 1268 by John D'Ufford, presents an 
 imposing appearance on the side of a hill, and is, for its extent, one 
 of the finest castles in the kingdom ; and, according to tradition, was 
 in good preservation up to a later date than most fortresses, having 
 been inhabited as late as the battle of Aughrim, when it was set fire to 
 by the fugitive Irish. The town formerly returned two members to the 
 Irish Parliament. 
 
 At the upper end of Lough Ree, at Lanesborough, we once more 
 met the Shannon in the river form, crossed by a fine bridge of six 
 arches and a swivel arch. Proceeding northward from this point for 
 about half a dozen miles, through a boggy and uninteresting country, 
 and passing on the way Termonbarry, where the Shannon is joined by 
 the Royal Canal, on which the products of this part of Ireland were 
 
THE SOURCE OF THE SHAXXOX. 
 
 •223 
 
 mainly conveyed to the capital in ante-railroad days, we reached another 
 but much smaller expansion of the river, of somewhat triangular form, 
 known as Lough Forbes. Here are seen the seven churches of Kilbarry, 
 once, like those of Clonmacnoise, famous as seats of learning and piety ; 
 but, like them, now masses of ruins that have even been subject to 
 greater despoliation. Their establishment is attributed to St. Barry, who 
 flourished in the sixth century ; and a night passed in the walls of one 
 of the three churches, of which, along with the foundations of a Round 
 Tower, there are still some remains, is believed to be a certain cure 
 for mental and physical maladies. 
 
 Though the distance from Lough Forbes to Carrick-on-Shannon is 
 in a direct line not more than ten or a dozen miles, the course of the 
 river between these points is so very circuitous that on traversing the 
 stream we found the distance greatly increased. The only part worthy 
 of mention is about midway, where the Shannon expands and forms 
 Lough Boderg, or the Lake ot the Red Cow. in shape resembling 
 the letter T, the river flowing through the horizontal portion. Carrick 
 is the assize town of the County Leitrim, and formerly returned two 
 members to the Irish Parliament ; but it possesses few features of 
 interest to the tourist. The Sligo branch of the Midland Great Western 
 Railway passes through it ; but leaving our visit to that town lor a 
 future route, we now determined to quit the Shannon and turn our 
 steps towards the Irish capital. However, before passing from this noble 
 stream, the reader will naturally desire to know something about its 
 source. 
 
 The actual head waters of the Shannon, we are told, are those of 
 the Owenmore, a fine river with numerous confluents which flows into 
 the head of Lough Allen. The traditionary source is a tributary stream 
 which takes its rise in a limestone cauldron, the " Shannon Pot," from 
 which the water rises in a copious fountain. The real source of the 
 river, however, is in a little lough situated about a mile from this 
 " Shannon Pot," which receives considerable drainage from the ground 
 surrounding it, and has no visible outlet ; but it has been discovered 
 that the waters from the little lough flow into a subterranean channel, 
 and re-appear in the so-called " Source of the Shannon." The stream 
 thus started, after winding its way through the valley and collecting its 
 
224 THE MIDDLE AND UPPER SHANNON. 
 
 tributary branches, falls into Lough Allen, about nine miles south of its 
 source, having in this short course swelled to a considerable river from 
 fifty to sixty yards wide, varying in depth from five to ten feet. Lough 
 Allen is about ten miles long, and is deeply imbedded in lofty hills, 
 which contain rich and copious stores of iron and coal. Out of that 
 lough the river flows in a narrow and rather shallow and impeded 
 channel for some half a dozen miles. The navigation, however, is carried 
 on by a lateral canal, which enters the river about three miles above 
 Carrick, at Leitrim, where the Erne and Shannon Canal also joins the 
 river. 
 
 Between the head of Lough Allen and the ocean, thanks to the 
 improvements of the Shannon Commissioners, that river now possesses, 
 with the assistance of its lateral canals, 254 miles of continuous navi- 
 gation, and washes the shores of ten counties, viz. : Leitrim, Roscommon, 
 Longford, Westmeath, King's, Galway, Tipperary, Clare, Limerick, and 
 Kerry. " Rising," says Kane, " in one coal formation, emptying itself 
 through another, and washing the banks of our most fertile counties, it 
 delivers into the sea the rain collected from an area embracing 3613 
 square miles of country north of Killaloe." It has been remarked that 
 on the whole face of the globe probably no river exists of so large a 
 size in proportion to that of the island through which it flows ; and 
 we may add that there is scarcely one whose story is more closely 
 entwined with its nation's history. Of it, writes Sir Aubrey de Vere — 
 
 " River of billows, to whose mighty heart 
 The tide-wave rushes of the Atlantic sea ; 
 River of quiet depths, by cultured lea, 
 Romantic wood, or city's crowded mart ; 
 River of old poetic founts, which start 
 From their lone mountain-cradles, wild and free ; 
 Nursed with the fawns, lulled by the woodlark's glee, 
 And cushat's hymeneal song apart ; 
 River of chieftains, whose baronial halls, 
 Like veteran warders, watch each wave-worn steep, 
 Portumna's towers, Bunratty's royal walls, 
 Carrick's stern rock, the Geraldine's gray keep, — 
 River of dark mementoes ! must I close 
 My lips with Limerick's wrong, with Aughrim's woes?" 
 
LONGFORD AND EDGE WOR THSTO WN. 
 
 225 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 FROM THE SHANNON TO THE METROPOLIS. 
 
 Longford — Edgeworthstown and the Edgeworths — Multifarnham and its Abbey — Lough Ouel — 
 Mullingar — Lough Ennel — Bog of Allen — Ancient Seminary of Clonard — Dangan Castle 
 and the Wellesleys — Hill and Castle of Car bury — Maynooth Castle and College — Approach 
 to Dublin. 
 
 THE railway from Carrick to Dublin runs for the first dozen miles 
 or more down the valley up which we had come, and not only 
 gave us occasional glimpses of the Shannon, but compelled us to cross 
 it twice at a point where the stream is circuitous ; and then, parting 
 company with the river, it carried us out of the county of Leitrim in 
 Connaught into that of Longford in Leinster. The first place of 
 importance that we reached was the town of Longford, twenty-one miles 
 from Carrick, formerly possessing a castle and priory, and now a hand- 
 some Roman Catholic cathedral* with lofty tower, which consumed 
 twenty years in its erection. 
 
 Passing for nine miles through a flat and boggy country we next 
 came upon the village of Edgeworthstown, a name familiar to every lover 
 of pure literature. The family whose name it bears have resided here 
 since 1583, when one of its members became bishop of Down and Connor; 
 and successive generations have interested themselves in the improvement 
 of the social condition of the Irish people, and none more practically 
 so than the father of the talented Maria Edgeworth, whose charming 
 
 * Longford is the residence of the Roman Catholic Bishop of Ardagh, whose ruined ecclesiastical edifice 
 lies a few miles to the southeast The see is one of the earliest established in Ireland, and is said to 
 have been founded by St. Patrick, who appointed his nephew, St. Mell, or Mael, first bishop in 454. In 
 the Protestant Church, Ardagh was united to Kilmore in 1660, but separated from it and united to Tuam 
 in 1742 ; however, in 1839 it was severed from Tuam and re-united to Kilmore ; and Kilmore, Elphin, 
 and Ardagh were constituted one bishopric, with the Episcopal residence at Kilmore, three miles from Cavan. 
 In the Roman Church these latter constitute three distinct sees, the Bishop of Kilmore residing at Cavan, 
 and the Bishop of Elphin at Sligo. 
 89 
 
226 
 
 FROM THE SHANNON TO THE METROPOLIS. 
 
 writings after more than half a century held a high place in English 
 literature. Four miles after leaving this village we entered the county 
 of Westmeath, and shortly afterwards passed the junction for Cavan, 
 which lies 25 miles to the north ; and then a few miles further on 
 drew up at Multifarnham, where there is a Franciscan monastery with 
 a slender square steeple, 90 feet in height. This house was founded 
 in 1236, and is remarkable for having maintained its early splendor later 
 than any other establishment ; for, says Lewis, " although formally dissolved 
 by Henry VIII., those to whom it was granted did not dispossess the 
 monks, who, in 1622, even attempted the formation of a branch of their 
 society at Mullingar." The civil war of 1641 is said to have derived 
 much support from plans which were originated here, and led to the 
 friars being driven away. A body of Franciscans, however, returned in 
 1823, and some still reside in the precincts of the church. A couple 
 of miles northeast of this village, but out of our line of travel, is Lough 
 Deveragh, six miles in length, the shores of which are boggy and tame 
 at one end, but mountainous and studded with many pleasing mansions 
 at the other. 
 
 Shortly after leaving Multifarnham the railway skirts the margin of 
 Lough Ouel, and we passed along its entire length of five miles, to 
 within about a couple of miles of Mullingar. The lake is a little over 
 a mile in breadth, and its area is 2295 acres. It is 329 feet above 
 the sea, and forms the summit level supply of the Royal Canal. It 
 boasts, it is true, none of the sublime characteristics of Killarney, the 
 wild magnificence of the mountain lakes of Connemara, or the solitary 
 grandeur of Gougane Barra ; yet it is excelled by none in the softer 
 traits of pastoral beauty, and in the many charms of richly cultivated hills 
 and verdant lawns that slope gently to its margin. It is a favorite resort 
 of the Waltonian, who at the period of the May-fly can draw from its 
 waters trout varying in weight from one to ten pounds. 
 
 At Mullingar, situated 28 miles east of Athlone and 50 west of 
 Dublin, we came upon the trunk line of the Midland Great Western 
 Railway, traversing " that uninterrupted plain which extends across the 
 island from east to west for 126 miles, from the Irish Sea to the 
 Atlantic Ocean." Mullingar, the assize town of Westmeath, and now 
 mainly noted for its extensive annual horse fair, and as being one of 
 
THE GREAT BOG OF ALLEN. 
 
 227 
 
 the principal military depots in the country, is pleasantly situated on 
 the Brosna, which in English signifies " a bundle of fire-wood." It 
 was long an important station on the Royal Canal, over which passengers 
 were formerly carried at the rate of four miles an hour, and near to 
 whose banks we traveled for the remainder of our journey to the Irish 
 Metropolis. Though, like Longford, Mullingar now possesses no archaeo- 
 logical remains, it, too, could once boast of religious establishments, 
 among which may be named the Augustinian Priory of St. Mary, 
 founded in 1227, a Dominican establishment, and a castle. Lovers of 
 the gentle art, attracted by its neighboring lakes, generally make the 
 town their headquarters. Lough Ennel, or, as it is now called, Belvidere 
 Lake, from an adjoining estate, lies about the same distance south of 
 the town that Lough Ouel does to the north. It is somewhat larger 
 than the latter, and its scenery partakes of a similar pastoral character. 
 Its eastern shore, adorned with gentlemen's residences, has a rich, park- 
 like appearance ; and the numerous woody islands that are scattered 
 over its surface add considerably to the beauty of the picture. 
 
 The first half of the ride between Mullingar and Dublin is dreary 
 in the extreme, as in its course the railway passes over the northern 
 portion of the great bog of Allen. This immense bog, or rather series 
 of bogs which form the great central plain of Ireland, stretches from 
 the borders of the county of Dublin, across the county of Kildare and 
 King's county, as far as the Shannon, and even beyond it westward into 
 the counties of Galway and Roscommon ; spreading laterally through the 
 counties of Meath and Westmeath to the north, and through Queen's 
 county and the county of Tipperary to the south. It has been computed 
 that it formerly contained 1,000,000 acres, but by means of cultivation 
 and drainage it is now diminished to one fourth of that area, and it is 
 not improbable that in course of time nearly the whole of the immense 
 and dreary tract will be reclaimed. Although the bogs of Ireland in 
 their natural state are unprofitable to the agriculturist, they are not 
 without their advantages to the poor peasantry, who derive from them 
 their fuel ; consequently those dingy and barren wastes covered with 
 patches of coarse grass and brown heath, suggesting to the mind only 
 feelings of desolation, contain within their dark bosoms the cheerful peat 
 that bestows warmth and light to the cotter's humble hearth. 
 
228 
 
 FROM THE SHANNON TO THE METROPOLIS. 
 
 About 17 miles from Mullingar, and shortly after entering the county 
 of Meath, the railway crosses the historic Boyne (of which we shall 
 have much to say in a future chapter), but at an early part of its 
 course where it has few picturesque features to present to the tourist. 
 We here passed within view of Clonard, the site of a seminary, where, 
 as far back as the days of Alfred, young Saxons flocked in hundreds 
 to be educated. Clonard (Cluain Ioraird, the Retirement on the 
 Western Height), was in its day the most famous bishopric* in Meath, 
 the first bishop, in 520, being St. Finian, one of the immediate successors 
 of St. Patrick. It was also the great Irish centre of learning, and its 
 world-famed college numbered 3000 students, with among them St. Kieran, 
 St. Columb, and many other illustrious saints. Of its edifices, which 
 consisted of abbeys, chapels, Round Towers, etc., absolutely no traces are 
 left, though some existed at the commencement of the present century. 
 
 Within a few miles north and south of Enfield, a station almost 
 midway between Mullingar and Dublin, are two places that are closely 
 woven in with the history of that great Irish soldier, the victor of 
 Waterloo. About half a dozen miles north of the line is the place 
 where once stood Dangan Castle (represented on the title-page of 
 this volume), the seat of the Earl of Mornington, father of the celebrated 
 Marquis of Wellesley and of the Great Duke of Wellington. Here the 
 latter spent some of his early days, but he was not born at Dangan, 
 as some of his biographers have erroneously stated, the honor of his 
 birthplace being now attributed to a house in Upper Merrion Street, 
 Dublin. The general effect of the once noble edifice must have been 
 exceedingly beautiful when viewed in its perfect state, with its battlements 
 and turrets emerging from the crowding woods. But, unfortunately, the 
 demesne and castle passed from their original possessors into the hands 
 of strangers, who added a modern mansion built in the Italian style. 
 The buildings were, however, many years ago destroyed by fire ; and, at 
 the time our sketch was taken, all that remained of the stately edifice 
 was a naked and desolate shell, and even these venerable relics of its 
 former grandeur have now almost disappeared, and but little remains to 
 mark the early home of the illustrious warrior. The noble woods, too, 
 
 * The diocese of Clonard was merged, in 1 1 74, with several other minor sees in the diocese of Meath, and 
 the seat was transferred from Clonard to Newtown Trim, in 1206, by Simon de Rochefort. 
 
THE HILL ANL> CASTLE OF CARBURY. 
 
 229 
 
 which adorned the demesne, have shared in the general destruction ; 
 and all the giants of the sylvan scene have been prostrated by the 
 ruthless axe. How different was the appearance it presented when Mr. 
 Trotter visited it in 1814! "From every part of the adjacent country," 
 he writes, " the woods, and frequently the Castle of Dangan, were visible. 
 We continued to walk on magic ground : — the varied landscapes of a 
 fine corn country, always terminated by the widely extended woods of 
 Dangan, could not but please." Yet even at that time decay and neglect 
 had begun to do their work upon the place, for he also remarks, that 
 " the improvements and lakes which once highly adorned the demesne 
 are lost through neglect, and the fine gardens are uncultivated." 
 
 A car drive of half a dozen miles to the south of Enfield took us 
 to the Hill of Carbury, in the county of Kildare. It is 471 feet in 
 height, and has on its summit the ruins of an ancient castle, whose 
 predecessor was erected by the Berminghams, one of the earliest English 
 settlers within the Pale. In the fifteenth century the fortress suffered 
 many severe attacks, and was more than once demolished and burnt. 
 The property eventually passed, in 1548, into the hands of the Colleys, 
 or Cowleys ; and, in 1728, their descendant, Richard Colley, who, 
 O'Connell said, " used to be picking potatoes after the crows in the 
 county of Meath," succeeded to the estates of his cousin, Garrett 
 Wesley, Esq., of Dangan, assumed the name and arms of Wesley, or 
 Wellesley, and was elevated to the peerage of Ireland, in 1746, by the 
 title of Baron Mornington. His son was raised to the dignities of 
 Viscount Wellesley of Dangan Castle, and Earl of Mornington, and 
 became the father of the two distinguished men of whom we have but 
 just written. The peculiar features of the old manorial building are 
 its pointed gable, graceful chimneys, and mullioned windows. From the 
 summit of the hill, on which also stand some pagan remains and a 
 ruined church, to quote the language of Sir William R. Wilde, " we 
 gain a most commanding and extensive prospect, extending over the 
 counties of Dublin, Kildare, Meath, Carlow, Westmeath, King's, and 
 Queen's counties, with the hills of Allen, Carrick, Balrennet, Edenderry, 
 and Croghan, standing up like so many acropoles amidst the deep 
 pasture and meadow lands rich beyond description, and diversified by 
 green hedgerows and occasional plantations, which stretch along the 
 
230 
 
 FROM THE SHANNON TO THE METROPOLIS. 
 
 Boyne as far as the eye can reach ; with the ruins of some of the 
 ancient castles of the Anglo-Normans bursting through the surrounding 
 foliage." The Boyne is said to rise at Trinity Well,* two or three miles 
 from here, but, according to the writer just quoted, its true source is a 
 small stream which empties itself into it, and rises in an adjoining bog 
 or marshy ground to the north, a branch of the great bog of Allen. 
 
 Resuming our railway journey at Enfield, a ride of a dozen miles 
 carried us from the dreary, flat, and boggy district, which had lined our 
 route from Mullingar, into the more picturesque and wooded region of 
 northern Kildare, and landed us at Maynooth, whose college has for 
 years been prominent in the political and ecclesiastical history of the 
 kingdom. Conspicuous in the landscape are the ruins of the ancient 
 castle, once a principal fortress of the bold GeralHines, ancestors of the 
 present Duke of Leinster. It is reputed to have been founded, in 1426, 
 by the sixth Earl of Kildare ; but there is every reason to believe that 
 the castle then raised covered the site of some preceding structure. f 
 During the rebellion of Lord Thomas Fitz-Gerald, (known as Silken 
 
 * The Boyne is said to have obtained its name from Boan, the queen of a celebrated poet and King of 
 Leinster in the first century, called Nechtain, or Nuadha-Neacht. The well, considered by some to be the 
 river's source, was in that monarch's garden, and possessed, among other miraculous properties, the power of 
 instantly bursting the eyes and destroying the sight of all those who approached it, except the King and his 
 three cup-bearers. Boan, impelled by female curiosity, determined to test the mystical powers of its waters, and 
 so arrogantly approached and defied it to mar her beauty, passing three times round it to the left in accor- 
 dance with the practice of incantations. Upon the completion of the third round the charm was broken, the 
 spring rose, and three enormous waves burst over the hapless lady, mutilating her and breaking one of her eyes. 
 To hide her deformity she at once fled towards the sea, followed by the waters now loosened from their source, 
 and in time reached the Imbher, or present mouth of the river. Dabella, her lap dog, it is said, shared her 
 fate, and was swept by the rushing stream into the sea, where it was transformed into the rocks, since called 
 Da Billian, situated at the river's mouth. Notwithstanding this overwhelming of Boan, her monument is 
 recorded to have been raised in the great royal cemetery of Brugh na Boinne, of which we shall have some- 
 thing to say in the next volume. Without giving credence to this legend, it appears almost certain that the 
 name of the river was really derived from that of an Irish princess named Boinn, Boann, or Boan ; and it is 
 an undoubted fact that it possesses some medicinal properties. 
 
 \ A potent reason for supposing that the castle was preceded by some other defensive structure, is found 
 in the positive knowledge that the Kildare branch of the Geraldines resided at Maynooth before the fifteenth 
 century. The first Earl of Kildare, John Fitz-Thomas, created in 1316, was at variance with William De 
 Vescy, Lord of Kildare and Lord-justice of Ireland in 1291, which led to their both appealing to the King, 
 and to the former challenging the latter to single combat or ordeal by battle. Although De Vescy accepted 
 the ordeal, and a day was appointed for its decision, he fled to France ; whereupon the King bestowed his 
 lordship and manors upon his rival, saying, " that although he had conveyed hts person into France, he had 
 left his lands behind him in Ireland." 
 
MAYXOOTH CASTLE AND COLLEGE. 
 
 231 
 
 Thomas, from the magnificence of his attire, and the housings of his 
 retainers being embroidered with silk), it was treacherously surrendered 
 by its governor, Christopher Parese, a foster-brother of the Geraldine, 
 who, expecting further reward in addition to the price of his treason, 
 was asked what favors he had received from Sir Thomas. Hoping 
 thereby to advance his claims, he recounted the many favors he had 
 received, upon which the deputy remarked : " How, Parese, coulds't thou 
 find it in thy heart to betray the castle of so kind a lord ? Here, 
 Mr. Treasurer, pay down the money he has covenanted for ; and here, 
 also, Executioner, without delay, as soon as the money is counted out, 
 chop off his head." The ruins, consisting of a massive keep and extensive 
 outworks, are maintained in good order by the Duke of Leinster. whose 
 handsome seat, called Carton, with its beautiful grounds, adjoin the town 
 and lie between it and Leixlip. 
 
 Xot far from the castle is the celebrated College of Mavnooth, 
 established in 1 795. A previous college, however, was founded here in 
 15 13 by Gerald, eighth Earl of Kildare, who endowed it with lands 
 surrounding the Round Tower of Taghadoe, a few miles distant. The 
 present institution resulted from the inability to transport students to 
 and from foreign colleges, owing to the French wars. It was founded for 
 the exclusive education of fifty Roman Catholic ecclesiastics by the Irish 
 Parliament without a dissentient voice, and annually endowed with about 
 ^8000. After the union, this sum with additions, raising it to nearly 
 ^9000, was annually continued for its maintenance by the Imperial 
 Parliament until 1845. The latter also made a specific grant, in 1807, 
 of /5000 for the enlargement of the buildings, to which purpose many 
 other donations and bequests were applied. The students increased with 
 the enlarged accommodation, so that in course of time their numbers 
 gradually rose to over 400. By an act passed in 1845 tne college was 
 permanently endowed for the maintenance and education of 500 students, 
 and of 20 senior scholars on the foundation bv Lord Dunbovne ; and 
 in addition to a special grant of ^o.ooo for the erection of necessary 
 buildings, the annual endowment was increased to £26.2,60. By the Irish 
 Church Act of 1869 this annual payment, which has often been a bone 
 of contention in British politics, was commuted to a capital sum equal 
 to 14 years' purchase, amounting to /"369,04c), which, with the help of 
 
232 
 
 FROM THE SHANNON TO THE METROPOLIS. 
 
 private bequests, enables this institution to continue to educate the same 
 number of students as before. The course of study requires eight years 
 for its completion, and no student is admitted except intended for the 
 Irish priesthood. Of the present Roman Catholic clergy of Ireland 
 about one half have been educated at this college. The earlier collegiate 
 buildings were unsightly and inconvenient, having been, in fact, merely 
 additions, made from time to time, to a house built by Lord Leinster's 
 butler. These eventually gave way to the present structure, consisting 
 of a quadrangle 340 by 300 feet, from the designs of Mr. Pugin, in his 
 peculiar Gothic style. The southern and western portions of the edifice 
 were unfortunately, on November first, 1878, destroyed by fire, caused by 
 overheating, and the library narrowly escaped demolition. 
 
 From Maynooth we hurried on to the metropolis, the train at the 
 end of the first four miles passing Leixlip, whose Salmon Leap we 
 visited in our survey of the environs of Dublin. We next crossed the 
 valley of the Rye, a tributary of the Liffey, by a viaduct, entered the 
 county of Dublin, and traveled half a score miles with the latter river 
 on our immediate right and the Dublin and Wicklow Mountains beyond ; 
 and then, after passing through some of its pleasantest suburbs, and 
 skirting the Phcenix Park, we entered the city at the Broadstone Railway 
 Station. 
 
 END OF VOLUME I. 
 
THE LAND OF EIRE. 
 
 Part I II.— DESCRIPTIVE and HISTORICAL. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 Ancient Divisions of Ireland — Situation of the Metropolis — Origin of its name and important 
 events in its history — Population and Social Classification — Castle of Dublin, its history and 
 past and present uses — Cathedral of St. Patrick, its erection and restoration — Notable monu- 
 ments and choral music — The story of "Stella " — Christ Church Cathedral and its restoration — 
 Monument to Strongbow — Lord Portlester's Chapel — St. Michaels Church and its antiseptic- 
 vaults — Modern Protestant churches — Roman Catholic edifices — Trinity College — College 
 Green and its statues — Bank of Ireland — Old Parliament House — Theatres — Royal Dublin 
 Society — Stephen s Green — Exhibition Palace — International Exhibitions. 
 
 THE plain which stretches across Ireland from the mouth of the Liffey 
 to the Bay of Galway severs the island into two almost equal parts. 
 It was indeed anciently considered the centre of the country, for when 
 Conn of the Hundred Battles and Mowa Eoghan, two of the descendants 
 of Milesius, undertook to divide the island between them, they drew a line 
 from Dublin to Galway, and called the portion north of that line Leah 
 Cuin, and that to the south Leah Mow, or the shores of Conn and Eoghan 
 respectively. In the partition of our work into two volumes we have 
 adopted nearly the same line of division, the exceptions being that we 
 have appended our surveys of the Connemara coast, visited on our cruise, 
 and of the upper Shannon, (so as not to disconnect our account of that 
 stream,) to our description of the southern portion of the island ; whilfc 
 
 II.— 30 
 
2 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 we shall annex to the present or second volume, devoted to the north of 
 Ireland, our account of Wicklow and some other districts lying to the 
 south of the city of Dublin, as they are the most readily visited from 
 that central point. 
 
 Dublin, though the metropolis and the largest and wealthiest city 
 of Ireland, from being built on an extensive plain and from possessing 
 so few lofty structures, presents no striking features when viewed from 
 its approaches either by land or water ; but, claims a local writer, "its 
 ample streets and spacious squares — its magnificent public buildings — 
 the Liffey, with its quayed walls and parallel avenues, flowing for two 
 and a half miles through its centre, purifying and refreshing it at every 
 ebb and flow of its tide — the beauty of its environs and the fertility 
 of the country lying around it" — make ample amends for its deficiency 
 in picturesque effects. It stands at the head of the beautiful bay 
 bearing its name, and forming the estuary of the Liffey, in addition to 
 which it is watered by the small rivers Dodder and Tolka, falling into 
 the bay respectively at Ringsend and Clontarf, and the Cammock into 
 the Liffey near the Royal Hospital. It also possesses a vicinity of 
 which few cities in the world can boast, its southern outlook being 
 especially picturesque, for there the Dublin Hills, backed by the Wick- 
 low Mountains, form striking features in the landscape, and approach 
 sufficiently near to constitute backgrounds to many of the street views. 
 
 Before entering upon a description of the city, let us take a glance 
 at its ancient history. The earliest authentic mention we have of it is 
 by Ptolemy, who flourished in the second century after Christ, and who 
 notices it, as a town built on piles, and upon a somewhat muddy 
 strata, under the name of Eblana. By the ancient Irish it was called 
 Drttm-coll-coil, i.e., "the Brow of the Hazel-wood;" as well as Ath-cliath, 
 or "the Ford of the Hurdles;" and Bally-atJi-cliath, or "the Town of 
 the Ford of Hurdles." Added to this, Stanihurst, on the authority of 
 Giraldus Cambrensis, asserts that the present name of the city is 
 derived from Avellanus, a Danish sea-king, who at an early period 
 established himself on the spot where it now stands ; and he draws 
 his etymological conclusion thus : Avellana — Eblana — Dublana. " But this 
 cannot be the derivation," observes a writer in the Diiblin Penny ^Journal, 
 " for Ptolemy, upwards of six hundred years before, gave it the title 
 
EARLY HISTORY AND DANISH POSSESSION. 
 
 3 
 
 of Eblana Civitas." After all, perhaps, the most simple and obvious 
 etymology of the name will be found in the Irish Dubh-linn, signifying 
 " Black-water," by which designation the ford upon the Liffey at this 
 place was known to the inhabitants. 
 
 According to the annals of Dublin, a great battle was fought here 
 in 291, when the inhabitants of Leinster were defeated by Fiacha 
 Sravtine, one of the earliest monarchs of Ireland ; and about 448, St. 
 Patrick converted the King of Dublin and his subjects to Christianity, 
 and founded the cathedral which bears his name. 
 
 We have unquestionable historical evidence to show that it was the 
 Ostmen, or Danes, who first fortified Dublin, and who, in the words 
 of Harris the historian, " rendered it fit for defence and security soon 
 after they possessed it, which seems to have been about the year 838." 
 It is certain that, although these barbarous intruders were opposed by 
 the Irish, they were enabled to maintain the settlement they had made 
 in Dublin and the contiguous districts until the year 1014, when a 
 number of Irish chieftains united in a patriotic league under the 
 renowned monarch, Brian Boroimhe, for the purpose of extirpating the 
 unwelcome intruders. The Danish king, Sitric, collected a large army 
 to oppose them, and the adverse forces met at Clontarf, near the city, 
 on the 23d of April, when they waged one of the most memorable 
 battles in which the Irish were ever engaged with a foreign enemy upon 
 their own soil. This sanguinary action terminated in the defeat of 
 the Danes ; but the brave Brian was slain in his tent by a straggling 
 party of the enemy while in the act of returning thanks to heaven 
 for his victory. Yet, though the power of the Ostmen was much 
 reduced in Ireland after their defeat at Clontarf, they still maintained 
 possession of Dublin for many succeeding years. However, when the 
 Anglo-Normans obtained a footing in the country, the lordship of Dublin 
 was bestowed on Earl Strongbow, after he had become son-in-law to 
 Dermot McMurrough, King of Leinster ; and the city having been 
 besieged and taken by him, September 21st, 11 70, he appointed Milo 
 de Cogan as his deputy. 
 
 The city was invested in 11 71 by a large army under the command 
 of Asculph the Dane, but the brave Milo de Cogan succeeded in 
 repulsing the enemy with great slaughter ; and the fierce Asculph, 
 
4 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 having been taken prisoner, suffered decapitation, after which his head 
 was placed upon a spike on the castle gate. Thus terminated the 
 sway of the sea-kings in Ireland, for this was the last attempt made 
 by the Danes to regain possession of Dublin. " Many of them," writes 
 Harris, "had before incorporated with the Irish, and now upon this 
 great revolution, such as remained in the city or neighborhood became 
 quiet subjects of the English, and by degrees one people with them." 
 
 The visit of Henry II. to Ireland, in the following year, was 
 productive of the most important consequences. On his arrival in 
 Dublin, he summoned all the Irish kings to attend and do him homage 
 as their liege lord. He was obeyed by the greater number of these 
 petty dynasts ; and in a spacious pavilion, constructed of smooth wattles 
 plastered with clay, that monarch kept his Christmas with as much 
 pomp and ceremony as were practicable under the circumstances. Here, 
 surrounded by the mail-clad chivalry of England, he entertained the 
 Irish princes, and confirmed them in the opinion of his wealth and 
 power. Having established courts of justice, held a parliament, and 
 exercised other prerogatives of the sovereign, he returned to England, 
 and distributed his new and easily acquired kingdom amongst those 
 leaders who had first invaded the island, except the city of Dublin, 
 which he granted by charter to his subjects in Bristol, to hold with 
 all the liberties and free customs they had in their own city. From 
 this date a new era commences in the history of Dublin. To use the 
 words of a writer on the subject, "We have hitherto viewed the city 
 as the abode of a rude colony, whose territory was limited to the 
 district immediately contiguous. We are now to consider Dublin 
 ascending progressively in the scale of cities : first, as the capital of 
 the English Pale, and afterwards as the metropolis of the whole kingdom." 
 
 The records of Dublin for the five succeeding centuries, until the 
 Revolution which placed William III. on the throne, though not deficient 
 in interest, are principally occupied with the bloody struggles which 
 were obstinately maintained between the English and Irish interests. 
 Within this period the city was visited by Richard II. in 1394 and 
 again in 1399, and by Henry V. in 141 3. One of the most memorable 
 events however that occurred in it was the Rebellion, at the beginning 
 of the sixteenth century, of Lord Thomas Fitzgerald, " Silken Thomas." 
 
REBELLION OF " SILKEN THOMAS: 
 
 appointed Lord-Deputy in the absence of his father, the Earl of Kildare, 
 upon the latter being summoned to appear before Henry VIII. and 
 answer charges preferred against him. Lord Thomas having heard 
 that the Earl had been thrown into prison in London, and afterwards 
 put to death, armed his followers and proceeding to St. Mary's Abbey, 
 where the council was sitting, threw down the sword of state, and 
 declared that he would depend upon his own weapon to revenge his 
 father's death, and that from that hour he was no longer the King's 
 deputy but his mortal foe. He then, at the head of his adherents, 
 notwithstanding the remonstrance of Cromer, the primate and chancellor, 
 took possession of the city, and laid siege to the castle, the conduct of 
 which latter, however, he left to his followers, while he marched against 
 and defeated the Earl of Ossory. But Henry having sent a supply 
 of troops under Sir William Brereton against him, and his castle of 
 Maynooth having been surrendered through the treachery of his foster- 
 brother, as described in the last chapter, Lord Thomas was compelled 
 to make terms with Lord Leonard Grey, who solemnly promised him 
 a pardon, and, under the pretence that it would require the King's 
 ratification sent him to London, where he was committed to the Tower. 
 " Henry," says an historian, " now vowed vengeance against the whole 
 lineage of Kildare ; and Lord Grey received orders to arrest his five 
 uncles, whom he entrapped by inviting them to a banquet, where they 
 were made prisoners, conveyed to London, and, with their nephew, 
 most foully put to death, although they took no part in his insurrection, 
 and two of them were decidedly opposed to it. Nor was the brutal 
 rage of the monarch satiated with this. His wily deputy received 
 instructions to exterminate the whole race, which he but too faithfully 
 carried into effect ; entering their country with an immense force, those 
 who resisted he slew, and those who surrendered he brought prisoners 
 to Dublin, where sixteen of them were executed as traitors in one day. 
 Gerald, a younger son of the Earl only escaped ; and the vengeful 
 monster thirsting for his blood too, pursued him from court to court, 
 demanding him from the respective monarchs, when he at length found 
 safety in the protection of Cardinal Pole, Henry's relative and declared 
 enemy, who educated him suitably to his birth, and preserved him to 
 regain the honors of his family." In 1689 James II. arrived in Dublin, 
 
6 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 amidst the acclamations of the people; and William III. entered the 
 city in the following year a few days after the Battle of the Boyne, 
 and treated the inhabitants with considerable harshness. 
 
 During the century succeeding the Revolution, the chronicles of the 
 metropolis are of a more peaceable character, so that at its close Dublin 
 had assumed a new aspect, having improved so rapidly in appearance 
 that no European city of similar extent could then vie with it in the 
 magnificence of its streets, squares, and public buildings. It was, 
 however, not a stranger to the terrible scenes that combined to form 
 the tragic drama of '98, for the city was proclaimed, and many frightful 
 excesses committed, while under the influence of martial law. After 
 this, in 1803, occurred the insurrection, commonly called Emmet's Rebel- 
 lion, in which Lord Kilwarden, Chief-justice of the King's Bench, and 
 his nephew lost their lives ; and the gifted leader who organized it was 
 arrested, tried, and executed. Of the notable events in the history of 
 Dublin, which have taken place since that period, we may mention the 
 visits of George IV. in 182 1, and of Queen Victoria in 1849 ar *d 1 853, 
 the latter being on the occasion of the International Exhibition, only the 
 second of its kind in the world's history, and the result of the liberality 
 of a public-spirited citizen, William Dargan. In 1861 the Queen again 
 visited the Irish metropolis ; in 1865 a second Dublin International 
 Exhibition was opened by the Prince of Wales, and in 1872 a third by 
 the Duke of Edinburgh. 
 
 The population of the city of Dublin in 1644 was only 8159, but 
 in 1682 it had increased to 64,483. In 1728 it had advanced to 146,075, 
 but in 1753 it had become reduced to 128,570. However, the number 
 of its inhabitants again rose, and in 1798 was 182,370, living in 16,401 
 houses. In the immediately succeeding censuses the number rose and 
 fell, and in 1821 was little in advance of that last given; yet in 1851 
 it reached 258,361, which had become reduced in 1871 to 245,722. This 
 latter, however, did not include the suburbs, which advanced the total 
 population to nearly 320,000. The city of Dublin returns two members 
 to the British House of Commons, in which body, it will be also noticed, 
 the University of Dublin is represented. The residential portion of the 
 city may be said to occupy a space three and a half miles long from 
 east to west, by two and a quarter from north to south, of which area 
 
THE CASTLE AXD ITS HISTORY. 
 
 7 
 
 nearly two-thirds is found south of the river. In 1610 it was confined 
 entirely to the latter, and did not exceed a mile in circumference. Like 
 other populous places, Dublin has, of course, its social demarcations. In 
 the south-eastern corner are situated its finest streets and squares, and 
 its principal public institutions ; in its south-western are its two cathedrals 
 and ancient churches, its poplin manufactories, and streets now of a 
 character more apt to repel than attract the visitor, though in olden 
 times some of them contained many abodes of wealth and luxury. Its 
 north-western quarters, on the opposite side of the Liffey, embraces its 
 markets, hospitals, foundries, breweries, and distilleries ; while its north- 
 eastern is mainly devoted to commerce, and comprises the custom house, 
 docks, and warehouses. The heart of the citv mav be said to be that 
 in which lie the courts of law on the north of the river, and the seats 
 of municipal and national government on the south, the former occupying 
 the Roval Exchange, and the latter the Castle. 
 
 Notwithstanding its antiquity, Dublin has few ancient edifices, either 
 public or private — the cumbrous works of the early inhabitants having 
 given place to the lighter productions of their sons. Even the Castle 
 of Dublin, though nominally ancient." is in reality a modern building. 
 It was formerly moated and flanked with towers, but the ditch has 
 been long since filled up, and the old buildings rased ; and the 
 Wardrobe or Record Tower + is all that now remains of the ancient 
 fortress. The castle at present consists of two courts, called the upper 
 and lower castle yards. The former is an oblong square formed by 
 four ranges of buildings, containing the state and private apartments 
 of the viceroy. St. Patrick's Hall, a spacious and handsome room, with 
 
 * The building of the Castle of Dublin was commenced about the year 1205 by Meyler Fitzhenry, 
 Governor of the city, and was completed in 1220 by Henry de Loundres, Bishop of Dublin ; but it 
 was not until the reign of Queen Elizabeth that it became the seat of government. The court was 
 previously held, sometimes at the archbishop's at St. Sepulchre's, sometimes in Thomas Court, and some- 
 times at the Castle of Kilmainham. 
 
 \ In the Record Tower are now preserved the statute rolls and the parliamentary and other national 
 records ; its walls are of great thickness, and built upon a rock of black stone, and it occupies the 
 place of one more ancient, known as the Birmingham Tower, which was the prison of the castle, where 
 for five hundred years all state offenders were confined. It is now also called the Wardrobe Tower 
 owing to its being the depository of the Royal robes. Its original title was conferred upon it from its 
 having been the place of confinement of Sir William Birmingham who was accused of treasonable offences 
 in 1331, for which he was hanged the following year. 
 
8 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 an emblematically decorated ceiling, and the Bedford Tower, emblazoned 
 with Corinthian pillars, and surmounted by a lofty dome, from which 
 the royal standard is displayed on days of state. The external 
 appearance of this quadrangle is exceedingly plain, but it is entered by 
 a fine gate, surmounted by a statue of Justice. The lower yard 
 contains several of the government offices, and a beautiful little Gothic 
 chapel, built in 1814, of which latter a critical writer remarks, that 
 "though of limited dimensions, it must be viewed as the most elaborate 
 effort made in recent years to revive the ancient ecclesiastical style of 
 building, and is beyond a question the richest modern casket of pointed 
 architecture to be witnessed in the British empire." It must however 
 be confessed, that Dublin Castle is deficient as a whole, having no 
 uniformity of plan, and is so scattered that the eye can take in but little 
 at once ; it has no dignity of appearance, and bears such evident marks 
 of the various repairs it has undergone, that, like Sir John Cutter's 
 worsted stockings so often darned with black silk as to have changed 
 their original nature, all traces of its venerable origin is lost in the 
 incongruous embellishments of modern art. It is nevertheless a place 
 of considerable excitement on the occasion of the Lord-Lieutenant's 
 levees, which the elite of Dublin make a point of attending ; as well 
 as upon St. Patrick's day when the Viceroy invariably appears on the 
 balcony with a bunch of shamrock in his button hole, while the military 
 bands play national airs, and the festivities terminate with a ball in 
 the evening in St. Patrick's Hall, which latter event is the leading 
 feature of the season. 
 
 Like the British metropolis, that of Ireland possesses two stately 
 ecclesiastical edifices ; for while the former can boast of its St. Paul's 
 and Westminster Abbey, the latter has every occasion to be proud of 
 its St. Patrick's and Christ Church Cathedrals. Though in point of 
 age of erection the latter claims to be the senior, the antiquity of 
 foundation is generally awarded to the Cathedral of St. Patrick, 
 as it occupies the site on which stood a small church, supposed, 
 with every appearance of probability, to have been founded by native 
 converts to Christianity, and dedicated to the apostle of Ireland, 
 long before the Danes acquired possession of the city, and having 
 near to it a holy well, also dedicated to him. John Comyn, Archbishop 
 
ST. PATRICK'S CATHEDRAL. 
 
 9 
 
 of Dublin,* pulled down the ancient church in 1190, in which year a 
 great fire devastated a large portion of the city, and erected on the 
 ground a more extensive structure, and placed in it a collegiate establish- 
 ment. Henry de Loundres, the successor of this prelate, made it a 
 cathedral in 1225, uniting it with the priory of the Holy Trinity, or Christ 
 Church, and securing to the latter the prerogative of honor, notwithstand- 
 ing that the other was the larger and more imposing pile.f The 
 architectural character of St. Patrick's is of the pointed style, with some 
 occasional innovations in the additions made at various periods. The 
 most remarkable of these supplementary portions of the edifice are the 
 square tower and spire — the former, erected by Archbishop Minot in 1370 
 with restorations necessitated by the destruction of a great portion of 
 the building by fire in 1362, while the latter, which has been compared, 
 not inaptly, to a vast extinguisher, owes its origin to a legacy bequeathed 
 by Dr. Sterne, Bishop of Clogher, in 1 750. The height of the tower 
 is 120 feet, that of the spire by which it is surmounted, 101 feet, making 
 a total of 221 feet. Notwithstanding this elevation, St. Patrick's is far 
 from possessing grandeur of appearance, owing partly to the low situation 
 in which it stands, and in a great degree to the clumsiness of its pro- 
 portions, for it is only by comparing it with the buildings in its unpre- 
 possessing neighborhood that an idea can be formed of its great height. 
 St. Patrick's, however, like many other cathedrals, has been subject to 
 vicissitudes, for in the reign of Henry VIII. it was appropriated to courts 
 
 * St. Patrick is said to have placed a bishop over the church he founded at Dublin in 448. The see is a 
 union of the ancient bishoprics of Lusk, Finglas, Clondalkin, and Tallagh, of which the earliest known prelate is 
 Livinus, who was promoted to it in 633. In II 52 Bishop Gregory was raised to the archiepiscopal dignity ; and 
 in 1214 the diocese was enlarged by the addition of the see of Glendalough. The question of precedence 
 between the sees of Dublin and Armagh was agitated for centuries with great violence, and both pleaded 
 authority in support of their pretensions. It was at length determined, in Queen Mary's reign, in 1552, that each 
 prelate should be entitled to primatial dignity, and erect his crosier in the diocese of the other ; that the Arch- 
 bishop of Dublin should be entitled the "Primate of Ireland," while the Archbishop of Armagh should be 
 styled, with more precision, " Primate of all Ireland," — a distinction which continues to the present day in both 
 the Roman and Protestant churches. George Brown, who succeeded to the archiepiscopal throne in 1535, was 
 the first Protestant archbishop of Dublin. By the church temporalities act of 1833 the Protestant province of 
 Cashel was united to that of Dublin in 1838, and the diocese of Kildare was annexed in 1846. In the Roman 
 church, however, the provinces remain distinct, and the diocese of Kildare is united to that of Leighlin. 
 
 \ In the agreement for union between the Chapters it was decided that each church should be called 
 Cathedral and Metropolitan, but that Christ Church should have precedence as being the elder church, 
 and that the Archbishops should be buried alternately in the two cathedrals. 
 
 n.— 31 
 
10 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 of law; but in 1555 it was restored to its original ecclesiastical purposes 
 and immunities. The body of the cathedral, the outline of which is 
 cruciform in shape, consists of a nave with aisles ; a north and south 
 transept each with a western aisle ; a choir with two aisles of great 
 length, and a Lady chapel. The extreme length of the main body of 
 the building, including the nave, choir, and Lady chapel, is 300 feet ; 
 that of the transept 160, its breadth being 80 feet. The internal length 
 of the nave, choir, and Lady chapel are respectively 130, 90, and 55 
 feet. The aisles of the choir extend beyond the east end to half the 
 length of the Lady chapel, which latter is so much lower than the 
 choir that externally it appears detached. 
 
 The cathedral, being then greatly dilapidated, was in 1864-5 entirely 
 restored, at the sole cost of the late Sir Benjamin Lee Guinness, 
 Bart., the celebrated brewer, at a cost of about ^"160,000, on which 
 occasion all the external walls were newly faced, several of the flying 
 buttresses and pinnacles rebuilt, two new porches constructed, and the 
 tower and spire thoroughly repaired. The interior walls of the nave 
 and transept were also renewed, the ceiling groined, the north transept, 
 formerly used as a parish church, rebuilt, and the partitions which 
 separated the transepts and nave from the choir removed, and the whole 
 building thus thrown open for the purposes of worship. A fine organ 
 was placed at the right of the communion table, the principal windows 
 filled with stained glass, and a new pulpit erected in memory of the 
 donor's friend, the late Dean Packenham. The Lady chapel, rebuilt 
 by Dean Packenham, was formerly used as a church for French 
 Protestants, and by George IV. as a chapter house for the Knights of 
 St. Patrick, whose stalls in the choir are each surmounted by the helmet, 
 sword, and banner of the order. 
 
 St. Patrick's Cathedral contains several monumental sculptures, more 
 remarkable for the celebrity of the names they commemorate than for 
 the excellence of their design or execution. Amongst them the stranger 
 will pause with interest before the black marble slab which bears the 
 name of Jonathan Swift, dean of this cathedral, whose wit and public 
 spirit need no encomium here. Near to the remains of the eccentric 
 dean lie the ashes of Esther Johnson, celebrated by his muse under 
 the name of " Stella ;" whose history and connection with him continue 
 
MONUMENTS IN ST. PATRICK'S. 
 
 11 
 
 to be involved in mystery.* The most conspicuous and elaborate, but 
 at the same time the most tasteless monument in the church, is that 
 intended to perpetuate the memory of sixteen members of the family 
 of Boyle, Earl of Cork. It was erected by Richard "the Great Earl," 
 in the reign of Charles I., and remains a huge memorial of the gaudy 
 style which prevailed at the period of its erection. There is also a 
 mural tablet in black marble to the memory of Frederick, Duke of 
 Schomberg, the celebrated general of William III., who was killed at 
 the battle of the Boyne. His ashes were suffered to remain without 
 any monumental record until Dean Swift erected this simple memorial 
 at his own cost. Mr. Brewer says that "Swift did not undertake his 
 task until he had made repeated unsuccessful applications to the family, 
 who derived the whole of its affluence and honors from the duke ; and 
 the indignant severity with which he composed the inscription on a 
 tablet thus raised by alien hands, although it gave some offence at the 
 time, redounds to the honor of his humanity and public spirit." Of 
 the other monuments we may specially note, in consequence of the 
 celebrity of the names they record, one of the Rev. Charles Wolfe, author 
 of "The Burial of Sir John Moore," and a bust, by Christopher Moore, 
 of the talented John Philpot Curran. 
 
 The excellence of the choir of the cathedral attracts a large con- 
 gregation to the Sunday afternoon services to listen to the singing of 
 the anthems. "The choral music of St. Patrick's Cathedral," says the 
 
 * Esther Johnson was the reputed daughter of Sir William Temple's steward, but presumed to be 
 the illegitimate offspring of the statesman himself, to whom Swift was private secretary. She was 15 
 years younger than Swift, who not only aided in her education but won her constant affection, which led 
 to her becoming the "Stella" of his poems and letters, and to their two names being associated in a 
 mysterious history. In 1700, when Swift became Vicar of Laracor, near Trim, at his invitation, Esther 
 Johnson and a friend, Mrs. Dingley, removed to the neighborhood, when Swift and Stella daily either 
 saw or corresponded with each other, and during the former's frequent absences the latter superintended 
 his household, indifferent, apparently, to the scandal which the equivocal position provoked. Though Swift 
 declared to Stella that he "loved her better than his life a thousand million times," he was unwilling to 
 enter into matrimonial relations with her until the arrival in Ireland, in 1714, of Miss Vanhomrigh, who 
 figures in his writings as "Vanessa." Then, at the solicitation of Stella, who, after having for 15 years 
 waited patiently to have justice done to her, found the idea of being replaced in Swift's affections by 
 another intolerable, it is said he finally consented to a private marriage, which took place in 1716 in the 
 garden of the deanery in Dublin. The union was, however, at the dean's express stipulation, kept secret, 
 and was, at best, but a nominal one, as their relations remained unchanged ; and, though they were never 
 known to meet except in the presence of a third person, throughout her life Stella commonly passed, not 
 for his wife, but for his mistress. She died in 1727 in the forty-sixth year of her age. 
 
12 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 poet Longfellow, " is almost unrivalled in its combined powers of voice, 
 organ, and scientific skill. The majestic harmony of effect thus pro- 
 duced is not a little deepened by the character of the church itself, 
 which, though small, yet with its dark rich fretwork, knightly helmets 
 and banners, and old monumental effigies, seems all filled and over- 
 shadowed by the spirit of chivalrous antiquity. The imagination never 
 fails to recognize it as a fitting scene for high solemnities of old, — a 
 place to witness the solitary vigil of arms, or to resound with the 
 funeral march at the burial of some warlike king." Indeed, the music 
 of St. Patrick's formed a theme, in her day, for the muse of Mrs. 
 Hemans, who wrote : — 
 
 "Again, O, send that anthem peal again 
 
 Through the arched roof in triumph to the sky ! 
 Bid the old tombs ring proudly to the strain, 
 The banners thrill as if with victory. 
 
 " Such sounds the warrior awe-struck might have heard, 
 While armed for fields of chivalrous renown ; 
 Such the high hearts of kings might well have stirred, 
 While throbbing still beneath the recent crown." 
 
 The Cathedral of Christ Church, which, like that of St. Patrick, is 
 situated in anything but a prepossessing neighborhood, lies a quarter of a 
 mile to its north, and about an equal distance to the west of the 
 castle. The "Black Book of Christ Church" informs us that its vaults 
 were formed by Danes before the visit of St. Patrick to Ireland, who 
 afterward celebrated Mass in of one them. The present building however 
 dates back to 1038 (a century and a half before the erection of St. 
 Patrick's), upon a site presented by Sitric, a Danish prince, to Donat, 
 Bishop of Dublin, who dedicated it to the Blessed Trinity."' It was 
 subsequently enlarged by Lawrence O'Toole, who in 11 63 changed the 
 canons, originally secular, into canons regular of the order of Arras ; 
 then by Archbishop John Comyn in 1190, and by Strongbow and 
 Fitzstephen, and later still by Raymond le Gros, who added the choir, 
 steeple, and two smaller chapels, and by John de St. Paul, who in 
 1360 erected the chancel. The cathedral, which is a plain structure 
 
 * There was attached to the church a monastic establishment, which existed until the dissolution of these 
 religious communities by Henry VIII., when the priory was changed into a dean and chapter, and the 
 ancient name of Church of the Blessed Trinity was altered to that of Christ Church 
 
CHRIST CHURCH CATHEDRAL. 
 
 13 
 
 both in its exterior and interior decorations, is, like the sister church, 
 built in the form of a cross, the extreme length of the nave and 
 choir being 260 feet, the length of the transept 110 feet, the extreme 
 breadth of each 80 feet, and the tower which springs from the inter- 
 section not remarkable for its height. It was in this cathedral that 
 the church Liturgy was first read in Ireland in the English tongue ; but 
 in 1553 Mass was again performed in it by order of Queen Mary, and 
 continued till 1559, in which year a Parliament was held in the church, 
 the English Bible first placed for use on its desks, and the Reformed 
 style of worship finally restored. Christ Church has in its time been 
 made the repository of various relics, among which may be named the 
 shrine of St. Cubie, taken by the people of Dublin from the Welsh ; 
 and the church was esteemed of such high sanctity, that pilgrims to 
 it enjoyed the rights of sanctuary in Dublin during their stay. In the 
 sixteenth century many of its relics were publicly destroyed, including 
 St. Patrick's staff, which was committed to the flames. 
 
 Though Christ Church had been restored in 1833, it was afterwards 
 so neglected, that at the time of the disestablishment of the Protestant 
 church in Ireland, in January, 1871, it was in such a dilapidated con- 
 dition, that, notwithstanding its historical importance, there were serious 
 thoughts of handing it over to the Roman Catholic church. But this 
 was frustrated by the cathedral having acquired, like St. Patrick's, a 
 public-spirited and wealthy renovator, in the person of Mr. Henry Roe, 
 of Mount Anville Park, Dundrum, a prosperous distiller of Irish whiskey, 
 through whose liberality the sacred edifice has not only been thoroughly 
 restored, but a Synod Hall, for the use of Irish church conferences, 
 annexed, at a cost altogether of about ,£250,000. The improvements 
 included the demolition of the mean houses and decaying walls of the 
 exterior, and the raising of the stunted tower and crowning it with 
 battlements, turrets, and a low spire. The restored, or more properly 
 rebuilt cathedral, was opened for public worship on May 1, 1878. The 
 choral services of this church, like those of St. Patrick's, are noted 
 for the musical ability with which they are conducted. 
 
 Among the monuments contained in Christ Church is the tomb, 
 somewhat defaced, of Henry the Second's renowned English chieftain, 
 Strongbow, with recumbent figures, said to be those of the knight in 
 
14 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 armor, and Eva, his wife. Doubts have, however, been entertained of 
 the authenticity of the figure of Strongbow, as the arms emblazoned on 
 the shield are not those which belonged to that warrior. It has, in 
 fact, been affirmed that it represents the Earl of Desmond, lord chief- 
 justice, who was conspired against by those who looked with jealousy 
 on his kindness to the Irish people, and was beheaded at Drogheda 
 in 1467, to about which period the date of the memorial is ascribed. 
 It is recorded that the monument was broken by the fall of the roof 
 of the church in 1562, and that it was " set up " again in 1570, by 
 Sir Henry Sydney, then lord-deputy of Ireland. Though its authenticity 
 may be questioned, there can be little hesitancy in believing, from the 
 testimony of Giraldus Cambrensis, a contemporary historian, that the 
 mortal remains of Strongbow were actually entombed within these walls. 
 The accompanying half-length effigy is also an object of dispute, as it 
 has been reputed by some to have been erected not in honor of 
 Strongbow's wife, but of his son, a youth of seventeen, who, as tradition 
 records, deserted his father in a battle with the Danes, and fled to 
 Dublin in the utmost consternation, declaring that Strongbow and all 
 his forces had perished. When afterwards convinced of his mistake, he 
 appeared before the earl to congratulate him upon his victory ; but the 
 incensed warrior, after sharply upbraiding his degenerate offspring for his 
 cowardice, caused him to be put to death, the executioner severing him 
 in the middle with a sword.* 
 
 We cannot attempt even a cursory description of the numerous 
 other churches of every denomination with which Dublin abounds. 
 Those who delight in antiquarian research will examine Lord Portlester's 
 Chapel, the only portion now used of the ruined St. Audeoris Church, 
 south of the Liffey, which contains, amongst many interesting monumental 
 remains, the tomb of Roland Fitz-Eustace, Baron Portlester, erected in 
 the year 1455, and still very complete. The lovers of scientific inquiry 
 
 * With regard to the identity of the knightly figure, it has otherwise been asserted that the effigy of 
 the earl was entirely destroyed by the falling of the roof, and that the lord-deputy directed that the 
 monument of Earl Desmond, which was at Drogheda, should be removed to Dublin and placed by the 
 side of the demi-figure of the son, all that could be recovered from the ruins. Stanihurst assures his 
 readers that the half-figure is the original, and deplores the melancholy fate of the young chieftain, whom 
 his father, he remarks, with Roman ferocity, actually cut in two, for a violation of military discipline in engaging 
 the enemy during his absence, and not for cowardice, as other historians relate. 
 
ST. MICHAN'S ANTISEPTIC VAULTS. 
 
 IS 
 
 will not fail to visit the vaults of St. Micharis Church, near the Four 
 Courts, which are remarkable for a strong antiseptic quality, by which 
 bodies deposited there have been kept for centuries in such a state of 
 preservation as to keep the features discernible, and the bones, cartilages, 
 and skin astonishingly perfect. A minute description of these vaults 
 was written by a professional gentleman of Dublin, early in the present 
 century, when their singular properties first attracted public attention. 
 " The bodies," says he, " of those a long time deposited, appear in all 
 their awful solitariness at full length, the coffins having mouldered to 
 pieces ; but from those, and even the more recently entombed, not the 
 least cadaverous smell is discoverable ; and all the bodies exhibit a 
 similar appearance, dry, and of a dark color. The floor, walls, and 
 atmosphere of the vaults of St. Michan's are perfectly dry, the flooring 
 is even covered with dust, and the walls are composed of a stone 
 peculiarly calculated to resist moisture. This combination of circum- 
 stances contributes to aid nature in rendering the atmosphere of those 
 gloomy regions more dry than the atmosphere we enjoy. In one vault 
 are shown the remains of a nun who died at the advanced aee of 
 one hundred and eleven ; the body has now been thirty years in this 
 mansion of death, and although there is scarcely a remnant of the 
 coffin, the body is as completely preserved as if it had been embalmed, 
 with the exception of the hair. In the same vault are to be seen the 
 bodies of two Roman Catholic clergymen, which have been fifty years 
 deposited here, even more perfect than the nun. In general, it was 
 observed that the old were much better preserved than the young." 
 A story is related, that the air, the dryness of which was so complete 
 in these vaults, was changed some years ago, owing to the night visits 
 of a rascally sexton, for the purpose of stealing away the lead coffins 
 of the dead, when the damp air entered, and threatened to play havoc 
 with the mummies ; and it adds, that upon his releasing the body of 
 a lady from its coffin, it looked him fiercely in the face with a pair 
 of vengeful eyes, and so terrified him that he left his lantern and ran 
 home half dead with fright, while the lady appropriated the light, and 
 with its aid walked quietly to her own home, where for years after she 
 lived a happy life. Any reader who may doubt the authenticity of this 
 story is strongly advised not to express any skeptical notions to the 
 
16 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 present sexton, or, indeed, in Dublin at all. St. Michan's Church was 
 founded in 1095, by the pious Dane whose name it bears ; but the 
 present edifice, built on the site of an older one, only dates back to 
 1676, and up to 1700 it was the only church in Dublin north of the 
 Liffey. In its vaults rest the remains of many whose names were 
 memorable at the close of the last century — the brothers Sheares. Oliver 
 Bond, Dr. Charles Lucas, and the Rev. W. Jackson, the latter of whom 
 acted as agent in France for the United Irishmen, and " sunk in the 
 dock," from the effects of poison, before the bench could pronounce 
 sentence upon him. 
 
 Of the modern religious edifices St. Georges Church is decidedly 
 one of the handsomest in Dublin, although the union of the Grecian with 
 the Gothic style of architecture which it exhibits has been much 
 censured. It is situated on the very north of the city, near Mountjoy 
 Square, and was erected in 1802 from designs by the late Mr. Francis 
 Johnston, at a cost of ,£90,000. St. Wer bergs Church, on the south 
 of the river, near the castle, is a mixture of the Corinthian and Ionic 
 orders. Its tutelary saint was the daughter of Wulfhere, King of 
 Mercia, and was entombed in the cathedral of Chester. The interior 
 is venerable and elegant and contains monuments of ecclesiastics and 
 knights, while its vaults contain the remains of Lord Edward Fitzgerald, 
 who died of wounds received during his arrest in 1798. St. Anne's, 
 near the Mansion House, has a spacious and elegant interior, but is 
 specially noticeable for its musical services, and as being the resting 
 place of Felicia Hemans and the Rev. Caesar Otway. 
 
 Of the numerous Roman Catholic churches to be found in Dublin, 
 the Cathedral of the Conception, in Marlborough Street, is most worthy of 
 notice, not only from its being the Metropolitan church but also from 
 its architectural character. It is a splendid pile built in the Grecian 
 style, with a portico of six Doric columns, in imitation of the facade 
 of the Temple of Theseus at Athens. The grand aisle is enclosed by 
 a double range of columns, but so massive that they completely 
 obstruct the view, and injure the fine effect which the simple grandeur 
 of the interior would otherwise produce. At the western end is a 
 beautiful white marble altar, detached from the wall, and enclosed by 
 a circular railing. There is accommodation for a congregation of 2000 
 
RELIGIOUS EDIFICES. 
 
 17 
 
 persons. The late Cardinal Cullen was accustomed to preach here every 
 Sunday, and the choir, which is excellent, almost invariably received 
 the assistance of the artists of the Italian Opera whenever they visited 
 the city. St. Saviours Church in Dominick Street must also be men- 
 tioned as it possesses one of the most elaborately decorated fronts in 
 the city, and a rose-window of exquisite design. St. Nicholas Church 
 in St. Francis Street occupies the site of the ancient monastery of 
 St. Francis, is ornamented with a portico of four Ionic columns, and 
 has a square tower with Corinthian pilasters erected by the Rev. Dr. 
 Flanagan at his own expense. It has also a richly decorated interior, 
 comprising figures of St. Luke and St. Nicholas, by Hogan, over the 
 side altars, and groups representing the Virgin with the body of Christ, 
 the baptism of our Saviour, and the scene of his first miracle in Cana. 
 St. Andrews Church, near the Westland Row Terminus, has a fine 
 spire, and contains a group representing the Transfiguration, another of 
 the works of Hogan, undoubtedly one of the greatest sculptors to which 
 Ireland can lay claim. 
 
 Of the religious edifices belonging to other denominations the most 
 attractive are the Presbyterian Church on Ormond Quay, with handsome 
 Tudor front of cut limestone ; another of the same denomination in 
 Adelaide Road, of mountain granite in the Grecian style with Ionic 
 portico on high rustic basement ; and a third in Rutland Square, built 
 and endowed by the Messrs. Findlater ; and the Wesleyan Centenary 
 Church in Stephen's Green, with its fine Ionic portico, entablature, and 
 pediment, constructed of mountain granite. 
 
 Half a mile to the east of the castle stands Trinity College, an 
 institution of learning of so high a character that its fame is world- 
 wide and undoubtedly greater than that of any other establishment in 
 Ireland ; for the roll of its alumni contains perhaps a larger number 
 of names of persons specially noted for brilliant wit or solid erudition 
 than can be found in that of any r other seat of learning — in fact, so 
 proud are its graduates of their Alma Mater that they almost invari- 
 ably place the initial letters " T. C. D." after those designating their 
 degrees, as it were, to add force and character thereto. The history 
 of this college may be said to date back to 131 1, when Pope Clement 
 V. granted a bull to John Leek, Archbishop of Dublin, to erect a 
 n.— 38 
 
It 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 university, which he left undone, and so his successor, A. de Bicknor, 
 obtained a like authority from Pope John XXII., when the college 
 was founded. It was, however, like many similar institutions, closed 
 in the reign of Henry VIII. ; but his daughter, Elizabeth, granted to 
 Archdeacon Usher (afterwards Archbishop of Armagh), a new charter 
 for a university on the site of the dissolved monastery of All Saints, 
 and designated it the "College of the Holy and Indivisible Trinity, near 
 Dublin." It now, however, forms a component part of the city, so 
 much has the latter increased during the past three centuries. The 
 first stone of the present college was laid March 13th, 1 591 , and 
 students were admitted January 8th, 1593. The college fell to a low 
 ebb during the civil war and the Cromwellian era, but resumed its 
 prosperous career at the restoration. In its time it has been richly 
 endowed with lands or granted additional privileges by James I., Charles 
 I., George IV., and Queen Victoria, and by bequests of private indi- 
 viduals, one of whom, Erasmus Smith, has endowed five professorships. 
 
 The front of Trinity College, east of College Green, is of the 
 Corinthian order. The principal buildings constitute several spacious 
 quadrangles, and the premises extend to a considerable distance and 
 cover an area of thirty acres. It is impossible for us to enter into a 
 description of the various apartments, but special attention may be 
 drawn to the chapel, to the theatre for examinations, the dining hall, 
 the library, and the old and new museums. The theatre and dining 
 hall are adorned with many portraits and busts of eminent graduates 
 and benefactors, while statues of Goldsmith and Burke, by Foley, are 
 placed before the main entrance to the college, and are justly admired 
 for the exactness of their likenesses and the spirit of their design. 
 The library occupies the entire side of one of the quadrangles, and is 
 270 feet in length. It is entitled by law to a copy of every work 
 published in Great Britain, and contains upwards of 200,000 volumes. 
 At the eastern end is the Fagel Library, containing 18,000 volumes 
 of books, the collection of the Fagel family in Holland, which were 
 removed from that country to London in 1794, upon the invasion of 
 the French, and purchased by the University of Dublin for the 
 moderate sum of ^8000. The manuscript room, however, is one of 
 the leading attractions, as it contains a great number of Irish, Icelandic, 
 
/ 
 
 TRINITY COLLEGE AND ITS GOVERNMENT. 19 
 
 and Oriental MSS. of inestimable value — the Irish alone comprising 
 over 140 volumes, several of them on vellum, dating from the early 
 part of the twelfth, down to the middle of the last century. The old 
 museum, over the college gateway, contains among other antique and 
 interesting articles what is reputed to be the harp of Brian Boroimhe, 
 presented by his son Donogh in 1023 to the Pope, who, in turn, gave 
 it to Henry VIII., who presented it to the first Earl of Clanricarde, 
 from whom it passed through several hands until it finally found a 
 resting place here. A new museum has recently been erected in the 
 college park, which latter is often the scene of many well-contested 
 cricket matches honored by the attendance of the rank and beauty of 
 the Irish metropolis. 
 
 Trinity College is governed by a provost, vice-provost, and senior 
 and junior fellows. When a vacancy occurs amongst the senior fellows, 
 the eldest of the juniors, if no objection lies against him, is elected 
 by the provost and seniors to the position ; but the admission to a 
 junior fellowship is obtained only by sustaining one of the severest 
 trials of the human faculties of which there is any modern experience, 
 or even knowledge from history. The examination is in Latin, and 
 the days appointed for it are the four days immediately preceding 
 Trinity Sunday. None but young men of the highest abilities ever 
 think of standing for a fellowship : they generally read from fourteen 
 to eighteen hours a day for a period of five, often of seven years, 
 before venturing upon the ordeal. Such intense study has materially 
 injured the constitution of hundreds — many have become blind, and 
 some have lost their lives from the fatal effects of such continued 
 mental exertion. There is not, perhaps, a solitary instance of a fellow 
 whose health has not been injured and talents impaired by it. The 
 university has attached to it, schools of theology, medicine, and civil 
 engineering, which are placed under the charge of talented professors, 
 and conducted with an ability worthy of the high character of the main 
 institution. James I. conferred upon the college the privilege of 
 returning two members to the Irish Parliament. At the time of the 
 Union, in 1801, it was restricted to the return of one member to the 
 British Parliament; but, by the Reform Bill of 1833, it was restored to 
 the privilege of returning two members, and at the same time the 
 
20 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 elective franchise was conferred upon all the graduates who had taken 
 the degree of Masters of Arts or any higher degree, instead of being 
 as previously, limited to the corporation of the College, the fellows, 
 and the scholars. 
 
 College Green contains a statue of Henry Grattan, by Foley, erected 
 in 1876, and an equestrian statue of William III., in lead covered with 
 bronze and gilt, erected in 1701 by the citizens of Dublin, to commem- 
 orate the Revolution of 1688. The adherents of James regarded this 
 memorial of their defeat with no very amicable feelings, and from the 
 time of its erection until very recently the statue became a fruitful source 
 of discord and ill-will between the Protestant and Roman Catholic inhab- 
 itants. Irishmen, however, of all religious creeds and of every political 
 opinion, can appreciate the statue of their national poet, Thomas Moore, 
 executed by his namesake the sculptor, which stands but a few steps 
 away at the junction of College and Westmoreland Streets. Another 
 memorial standing near to this latter is a drinking-fountain raised in 
 honor of the late Sir Philip Crampton, Bart., the eminent surgeon, whose 
 bust surmounts it. 
 
 The Bank of Ireland, on the north side of College Green, is decidedly 
 the noblest specimen of architecture which the metropolis can boast ; 
 indeed, it is scarcely saying too much to assert that it is unequalled in 
 grandeur of design, simplicity of arrangement, and majesty of effect by 
 any public building in the British Empire. This magnificent pile was 
 originally the Parliament House of Ireland, but in the year 1802, after 
 the incorporation of the Irish Parliament with that of England, by the 
 union of the two countries, the building was purchased by the governors 
 of the Bank of Ireland for a sum of ,£40.000, subject, however, to an 
 annual rental of ^240.* The central facade and projecting wings, which 
 form a colonnade of the Ionic order, are admitted to be a chef-d'ceuvre 
 of modern art. The noble portico, which is without any of the usual 
 architectural decorations (with the exception of a statue of Hibernia, 
 between Fidelity and Commerce, the last two modelled by Flaxman, 
 surmounting the centre pediment), derives all its beauty from the harmony 
 of its proportions, and is one of the few instances of simple form only 
 
 * Previous to occupying this building the business of the Bank of Ireland was carried on in Mary's Abbey 
 north of the Liffey. 
 
THE BANK OF IRELAND. 
 
 21 
 
 expressing true symmetry. The east front, added in 1785, rather incon- 
 sistently possesses a Corinthian porch of six columns, and has over the 
 tympanum a statue of Fortitude, with Justice on her right and Liberty 
 on her left hand. The west front, which is of still later date, has a 
 portico of the same style of architecture as the main entrance.* The 
 entire structure is built of Portland stone. On the conversion of this 
 building into a bank, several alterations internally and externally were 
 found necessary to adapt it for its changed uses, which, however, have 
 been executed with judicious taste and a strict regard to the preservation 
 of the original design. The fine quadrangular room employed as the 
 cash office occupies the site of the old House of Commons, which was 
 a large oval apartment. The old House of Lords, now appropriated to 
 the use of the Court of Proprietors of the bank, however, is almost 
 unchanged ; the chairs remaining in their places, with the long table in 
 the centre, and the old tapestry, in excellent preservation, still hanging on 
 the walls — that on the left representing King William crossing the Boyne, 
 with Schomberg expiring under his horse's feet, and that on the right 
 depicting the siege of Derry. A statue of George III. occupies the site 
 of the old throne. It is impossible to saunter through and contemplate 
 this historic edifice without the mind being recalled to the noble bursts 
 of eloquence or the brilliant sallies of wit that are indelibly associated 
 with it and form part of the legislative annals of the land. 
 
 But as an arena for the display of genuine Irish wit there is scarcely 
 an)" place in Dublin that can compare to the auditorium of the theatre, 
 between the acts of a popular performance, when there is almost certain 
 to be some characteristic exhibition of Irish humor. The Theatre Royal,\ 
 
 * The edifice occupies the site of a building erected early in the seventeenth century by the then High 
 Treasurer, Sir G. Carey at a cost of ^4000, originally intended for a hospital, but which became successively 
 the seat of justice and a mansion. Of the present building, commenced in 1729, during Lord Carteret's admin- 
 istration, and completed in 1787, it is not very clearly ascertained who was the original architect, but the 
 Corinthian portico erected at the entrance to the House of Lords, in 1785, was the design of James Gandon, and 
 the Ionic portico at the entrance of the House of Commons was that of Mr. Robert Parke in 1787. The 
 original cost of the entire structure was nearly ,£100,000. 
 
 f Anecdotes of the Dublin Theatres might form a curious and interesting history. The earliest was 
 built in 1635, under the patronage of Lord Strafford, by John Ogilby, the translator of Homer, for whom 
 Shirley wrote his play of "The Royal Master," originally performed in Dublin. The next was erected in Smock 
 Alley, then Orange Street ; but it fell in during representation, and several persons were killed. It was subsequently 
 repaired, and Farquhar (a native of Londonderry) made his first appearance there ; so also did Peg Woffington. 
 Early in the last century there were no fewer than five theatres in the city. The Crow Street Theatre was opened 
 in the year 1758. 
 
22 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 in Hawkins Street, a little distance from the college and the bank, is the 
 leading place of amusement in the city, and has an entrance yard and a 
 colonnade, and a large and deep stage. It was erected in 1820 by 
 Samuel Beasley, Esq. The Gaiety Theatre, a recently erected structure 
 near Stephen's Green, on the other side of Trinity College, presents no 
 external attraction, but its internal arrangements are tasteful and exten- 
 sive, and enable it to accommodate an audience of 2000 persons, who are 
 principally entertained by pieces of the lighter order, the more solid and 
 pretentious dramas and grand operas being left to the older house. A 
 smaller but popular house, called the Qiceeris Theatre, in Great Brunswick 
 Street, is mainly devoted to the production of dramas of the sensational 
 class. 
 
 The growing influence of taste has in late years been so great as to 
 lead to a very close connection between the useful and fine arts, and 
 certainly there is no institution in Ireland more conducive to this union 
 than that of the Royal Dublin Society, to whose buildings and grounds we 
 must now take the reader. This society originated with a few eminent 
 men in 1 73 1 , and, says Arthur Young, "has the undoubted merit of 
 being the father of all the similar societies now existing in Europe." In 
 1749 it received a charter of incorporation, as "The Dublin Society for 
 promoting husbandry and other useful arts," and for a century back has 
 received a very liberal annual Parliamentary grant. In 18 15 it purchased 
 its present mansion in Kildare Street, between College Park and Stephen's 
 Green, which from the date of its erection in 1745 had formed the mag- 
 nificent town establishment of the Duke of Leinster. Agricultural and 
 industrial exhibitions have from time to time been held under the aus- 
 pices of the society, which possesses a museum, schools of art, and a 
 library of 30,000 volumes within its buildings ; and two miles distant, at 
 Glasnevin, north of the city, and on the banks of the Tolka, a botanical 
 garden of over 40 acres, laid out with much taste, and containing fine 
 palm houses and conservatories. This garden was founded in 1 790 by 
 the Irish Parliament, who voted to the Dublin Society the sum necessary 
 for the purchase of the ground. It is a most popular resort, and for 
 picturesque situation has scarcely a rival. 
 
 Stephens Green, which lies just beyond the Dublin Royal Society's 
 premises, is a pleasant square, tastefully laid out, and surrounded by 
 
EXHIBITION PALACE AND WINTER GARDEN. 
 
 some of the finest houses in the city. This fine enclosure contains 
 in its centre a statue of George II., of whose predecessor there is also 
 one opposite the Mansion House in Dawson Street. The square 
 likewise contains a recently erected statue of the late Lord Eglinton, 
 a very popular Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. 
 
 Immediately south of the Green, on Earlsfort Terrace, are the 
 buildings and ornamental grounds, 15 acres in extent, of the 
 Exhibition Palace and Winter Garden, to which Dublin is indebted to 
 the liberality of Sir Arthur Guinness and his brother (sons of the bounti- 
 ful regenerator of St. Patrick's Cathedral), who redeemed them from 
 destruction, upon the ruin of the company to whom they originally 
 belonged.* The palace is composed of stone, iron, and glass, and 
 contains large and small concert halls, lecture hall, rehearsal room, 
 large banquet hall, 107 feet by 30, refreshment rooms, sculpture court, 
 and extensive picture galleries. The pleasure grounds are laid out in 
 raised and sunken terraces, and are ornamented with a cascade ; while 
 fountains, surrounded with figure groups, decorate both the interior 
 of the buildings and the grounds. In addition to the permanent 
 exhibition of arts and manufactures, the palace is sometimes the scene 
 of flower shows and musical entertainments of hicrh class. 
 
 The first great international exhibition in Dublin was held in 1853, 
 in a temporary building erected in Merrion Square, east of the premises 
 of the Royal Dublin Society; and a full length figure of William Dargan 
 now stands as a fitting memento of its public-spirited promoter and 
 benefactor to the extent of ,£80,000, and who declined the honor of a 
 baronetcy tendered by the Queen. Near by there has also been raised 
 to the late Prince Consort, who is credited with the parentage of 
 international exhibitions, a memorial designed by Foley, consisting of a 
 shaft surmounted by a figure of the Prince, with minor figures at the 
 corners of the base. 
 
 * The beautiful structure erected as a "Crystal Palace" for Dublin, and of which the late Sir 
 Benjamin Guinness was in the main the promoter, was opened with the second Dublin international exhibition, 
 inaugurated May 9th, 1865, by the Prince of Wales, and was subsequently turned into a Winter Garden 
 and place of varied entertainment, similar to the Crystal Palace near London. It eventually, as above 
 stated, became the property of the younger Guinnesses, who not only nobly offered it as the scene of the 
 third great Dublin exhibition, opened in 1872 by the Duke of Edinburgh, but undertook to supply the 
 necessary funds and meet any deficiency that might occur. 
 
24 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 (CONTINUED.) 
 
 Quays of the Liffey — Kilmainham Hospital — The Bridges — The Four Courts — Queens Inn — 
 Royal Exchange or City Hall — Views from Carlisle Bridge — Sackville Street — Nelsons 
 Pillar — Post Office — Rotunda and Lying-in Hospital — Statues to Smith O'Brien and 
 O'Connell — Custom House — North and South Walls — Docks and Basins — Commerce and 
 Manufactures — Literary and Benevolent Institutions — Railways — Eminent Natives — Phoenix 
 Park — Wellington Testimonial — People's and Zoological Gardens — Vice Regal Lodge — 
 Origin and beauty of the Park — The " Fifteen Acres" and the Good Old Days. 
 
 IT is not our intention, for we have not the space at our command, 
 to speak of all the public buildings and valuable institutions with 
 which this metropolis is embellished ; but we cannot deny ourselves the 
 pleasure of taking a stroll with our readers along the line of noble 
 quays which stretch east and west through the centre of the city, from 
 King's Bridge to the North Wall Lighthouse on the northern bank, a 
 distance of three miles, and on the southern bank to the South Wall 
 Lighthouse, a distance of over six miles. Travelers who have only seen 
 the busy wharfs, docks, and quays of other seaport towns, black, dirty, 
 and crowded with dingy-looking warehouses, can scarcely form an idea 
 of the beauty and grandeur of the banks of the Liffey, confined by 
 walls and parapets of hewn stone, which extend from Phoenix Park on 
 the west, and passing through the city run some distance into the bay 
 on the east, and its numerous magnificent bridges connecting the 
 handsome quays that extend on either side of the river. 
 
 Leaving, then, behind us the Sarah and King's Bridges, the two most 
 westerly of the nine roadways connecting the northern and southern 
 portions of the city, and a railroad bridge (all three of which will be 
 referred to hereafter), we will commence at the castellated entrance to 
 
THE BRIDGES OVER THE LI F FEY. 
 
 30 
 
 ' the Military Road, which forms an agreeable promenade between the 
 Royal Hospital* at Kilmainham and that part of the city which lies 
 on the north side of the river. As we proceed in an easterly direction 
 on the southern side of the stream along Usher's Island and Usher's 
 Quay, we are first attracted by Victoria Bridge, of four semi-circular 
 arches, (lately called Barrack Bridge from its contiguity to the Royal 
 Barracks), which in 1858 replaced one of wood, known as the Bloody 
 Bridge. Tradition traces the ancient title of this bridge to a sanguinary 
 conflict fought in its vicinity in 1408, between the native Irish led by 
 a chieftain of the O'Kavanaghs and the army of the Pale under the 
 command of the Duke of Lancaster, when the latter was mortally 
 wounded ; and it is said the river ran red with blood for three days 
 afterwards. The old wooden bridge was, shortly after its erection 
 in 1670, also the scene of one of the apprentice riots, by no 
 means uncommon at that period, in which four of the rioters were 
 killed. 
 
 We next come to Queens Bridge, 140 feet long, of three stone arches, 
 named after Queen Charlotte, and erected in 1 768, on the site previously 
 occupied by Arran Bridge, built in 1681, and swept away by a flood in 
 1 763. Following in order comes Whitworth Bridge, connecting two of 
 the oldest streets in Dublin — Church Street on the north, and Bridge 
 Street on the south side of the river. It is a very handsome structure of 
 three arches, and was erected in 1816, during the Lord-Lieutenantcy of 
 Earl Whitworth, after whom it is named. It replaced the most ancient 
 of the Dublin bridges (known as the Old or Dublin) swept away by the 
 
 * This institution occupies the site of an ancient priory, founded in 1 1 74 by Strongbow, Earl of 
 Pembroke, for Knights Templars. The present hospital was instituted by Charles II. in 1679, who granted 
 64 acres of ground for the purpose, and for its erection and maintenance ordered sixpence in the pound 
 to be deducted from the pay of all military men, until otherwise provided for with sufficient support, 
 which was afterwards supplied by Parliament in 1794. The present edifice was erected in 1683, from 
 designs by Sir Christopher Wren. It is a quadrangular structure, and contains in its dining hall many 
 portraits of celebrities of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It is, like Chelsea Hospital, an asylum 
 for invalid soldiers and officers, (deserving veterans selected from the out-pensioners of Ireland); and also 
 the residence of the Commander of the Forces in Ireland and his official staff. In Dublin and its 
 vicinity there are eight extensive barracks, one of them being for the drilling of recruits for the constabulary. 
 The number of troops stationed in Ireland is generally about 20,000, while the constabulary force is about 
 12,000. The military institutions of Dublin also comprise the Hibernia Military School, for the education 
 of 400 sons of soldiers ; the Drummond Institution for the education of the orphan daughters of soldiers ; 
 the Royal Military Infirmary, etc. 
 n.-33 
 
26 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 flood in 1812, and built in 1427 by the Dominicans "for the convenience 
 of their school at Usher's Island," to replace a still earlier but fallen 
 structure, erected in the reign of King John. And this latter was 
 evidently not the first bridge, as upon sinking for the foundations of the 
 present bridge those of its predecessor were found to rest upon a very 
 ancient structure, supposed to have been built even before that of King 
 John's reign. Richmond Bridge, a little lower down the stream, was, 
 like the two last named, constructed to replace a predecessor that fell 
 a prey to the turbulent waters, its forerunner, known as Ormond Bridge, 
 having been swept away in 1802. The present structure, commenced 
 in 1 81 3, was erected at a cost of ,£25,800, and opened on St. Patrick's 
 day, 1 816. It is 220 feet long and 52 broad, and consists of three 
 arches of Portland stone, the keystones of which bear colossal heads 
 representing Peace, Hibernia, and Commerce on the one side, and Plenty, 
 the Liffey, and Industry on the other. 
 
 The space on the north of the Liffey between the two last named 
 bridges is occupied by The Four Courts, a noble edifice, presenting a 
 beautiful portico facing the river, consisting of six Corinthian columns, 
 supporting a pediment ornamented with three statues, Moses in the 
 centre, flanked by Justice and Mercy. At the two extremities of the 
 front are sitting statues of Wisdom and Authority. From the centre 
 of the building rises a circular colonnade, surmounted by a handsome 
 dome, whose massive proportions injure the effect of the light and 
 elegant portico beneath. The arrangement of the interior, however, is 
 not liable to the same objection ; for the great circular hall, 64 feet 
 in diameter, and having situated around it the law courts and offices, 
 is conspicuous for the beauty and simplicity of its design. This hall 
 is illuminated by jets of gas, issuing from a torch borne in the hands 
 of a colossal statue of Truth, and in term time is a busy scene, as it 
 is the general rendezvous of lawyers, while it is also the birthplace of 
 half the bon mots, epigrams, and witticisms which are scattered upon the 
 stream of Dublin society. From this hall, each occupying an angle and 
 being uniform in size, radiate the four Superior Courts — Chancery, 
 Queen's Bench, Common Pleas, and Exchequer — the panels over whose 
 entrances exhibit historical pieces in bas-relief, illustrative of four great 
 events in British history ; while the great central apartment is further 
 
» 
 
THE FOUR COURTS AND QUEEN'S INN. 
 
 27 
 
 decorated with colossal allegorical statues of Punishment, Eloquence, 
 Mercy, Prudence, Law, Wisdom, Justice, and Liberty, situated between 
 the windows of the dome, and with a statue of Sir M. O'Loghlen, by 
 M'Dowell. Minor courts and offices occupy the wings of this vast 
 edifice, which is erected on the site of a decayed Dominican monastery. 
 It was constructed at a cost of ,£200,000, and was commenced in 1 786, 
 under the superintendence of the architect, Thomas Cooley, who, previous 
 to his death, resigned the task to James Gandon, by whom it was 
 completed in 1800, just in time for the consummation of the Union. 
 The facade of the building facing the river is 450 feet in length, and 
 occupies a central position between the bridges, two of the handsomest 
 spanning the Liffey. These bridges, with King's Inn Quay wall 
 between them, are finished with a fine metal balustrade that seems to place 
 the building, when viewed from the opposite bank of the river, on a 
 magnificent terrace of 800 feet in length.* 
 
 Continuing our course down the river we find it next crossed by 
 Grattan Bridge, built in 1874 by the Dublin Port and Docks Board, 
 and having a roadway of 50 feet, and pathways of 12 feet each. It 
 received its present appellation on January 1st, 1875, lis predecessors 
 havino- each been known as Essex Bridge. The first of these was erected 
 in 1676, during the viceroyalty of Arthur, Earl of Essex, but its 
 foundations decaying, it was supplanted in 1756 by a second bridge of 
 five arches, (on the exact model of old Westminster Bridge), which, in 
 its turn, has now given way to a more modern edifice. Grattan Bridge 
 affords a communication between Capel Street on the north to 
 Parliament Street on the south side, and leads in a direct line to 
 
 * Previous to their removal to the present edifice, the Courts of Law were from a remote period 
 situated in Christ Church Lane, with the exception of the Courts of Common Pleas and Exchequer, which, 
 strange enough, in the reign of Edward III. were held in Carlow. The courts are now almost entirely 
 consolidated in this locality, the exception being the Queen's Inn, fronting Constitution Hill, in the 
 northern part of the city. In this latter are held the Consistorial, Probate, and Prerogative Courts ; and 
 in its large dining hall the Irish law student is required to eat his regulation dinners in order to be 
 entitled to become a member of the Irish Bar, after the manner of the be-wigged and be-gowned gentry 
 of the British Metropolis. Queen's Inn was erected at the close of the last century, and is an imposing 
 edifice, consisting of a centre and two wings, surmounted by an octagonal cupola. The large dining hall 
 contains many statues and paintings, while a library, added in 1827, at a cost of ,£20,000, offers many 
 advantages to the plodding student. Dublin did not possess an inn of court until the reign of Edward I., 
 when Collet's Inn was established : this was followed by Preston's Inn, but both were eventually pulled 
 down, and their societies were compelled to migrate. 
 
28 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 the Royal Exchange, at the foot of the latter, and to the Castle, just 
 beyond. 
 
 The Royal Exchange, now the City Hall, is situated on Cork Hill, 
 at the head of Dame Street, and commands from the portico of its 
 northern or principal front a view of Parliament Street, Grattan Bridge, 
 and Capel Street beyond. The form of this superb edifice is nearly 
 a square of one hundred feet, having three ^beautiful fronts of Portland 
 stone in the Corinthian style, that on the north having a portico of six 
 columns, and that on the west one of four columns. The building is 
 surrounded at the top by a handsome balustrade, except where it is 
 interrupted by the pediment on the north side. Owing to the acclivity 
 upon which it stands, the entrance at the end where the ground is 
 lowest is approached by a kind of terrace protected by a light metal 
 balustrade supported by rustic-work.'"' The interior of the edifice is even 
 more remarkable for architectural beauty than the exterior; and the effect 
 produced upon the spectator when he enters is strikingly impressive. 
 Twelve fluted pillars of the composite order, thirty-two feet high, are 
 circularly disposed in the centre of a square area, and covered by a highly 
 enriched entablature, above which is a beautiful cylindrical lantern, about 
 ten feet high, perforated with twelve circular windows ornamented with 
 festoons of laurel leaves ; the whole crowned with a handsome spherical 
 dome, divided into hexagonal compartments, enriched and well-propor- 
 tioned, and lighted from the centre by a large circular skylight. Opposite 
 to the north entrance is a statue, by Roubillac, of George III. in a 
 Roman military costume. On the stairs in the northwestern angle of 
 the building is one, by Edward Smith, of Dr. Lucas, through whose 
 exertions in Parliament a grant was obtained to aid in the erection of 
 the building. The other statues are a finely executed one, by Chantrey, 
 of Henry Grattan ; one by Hogan, of O'Connell ; and one of Thomas 
 Drummond, formerly Under-Secretary for Ireland. The first stone 
 was laid August 2, 1769, by Lord Townsend, then Lord-Lieutenant of 
 Ireland, and the building occupied ten years in erection. It is from 
 the design of Thomas Cooley, architect of the Four Courts, and is 
 
 * On the 24th of April, 1814, a vast crowd having assembled to witness the whipping of a sweep 
 who had caused the death of his apprentice by cruelty, the balustrade gave way, and numbers were 
 precipitated into the street ; several persons were killed on the spot, and others seriously injured. 
 
WELLINGTON AND CARLISLE BRIDGES. 
 
 29 
 
 generally considered, next to the Bank of Ireland, the handsomest 
 edifice in Dublin.* 
 
 Resuming our route along the quays, we pass Wellington Bridge, 
 so named after the " Iron Duke," a light, handsome metal structure, 
 spanning the river by a single arch of 240 feet. It was erected in 
 1 81 6, at an expense of ^3000, by two private individuals, for foot 
 passengers only, who pay a toll of one halfpenny each, and to whom it 
 is a great accommodation, in consequence of the extent of space inter- 
 vening between the bridges next above and below. Carlisle Bridge 
 follows, and is not only at present the lowest of the bridges on the 
 Liffey, but forms the limit of navigation, vessels of considerable burden 
 being able to come close up to it at high water. The old bridge 
 was a handsome structure, composed of three arches of cut stone, and 
 was commenced in 1782, during the vice-royalty of the fifth Earl of 
 Carlisle, from designs by James Gandon, the architect of the Corinthian 
 front to the Bank of Ireland ; and, though it was afterwards consider- 
 ably widened by the Dublin Port and Docks Board, it has been found 
 necessary to rebuild it on an enlarged scale, in order to accommodate 
 the increasing traffic, as it connects the two leading thoroughfares of 
 Sackville Street and Westmoreland Street, and is situated in the heart 
 of the metropolis. It is intended to make the new bridge the same 
 width as those two noble boulevards, and when completed it will make 
 the main artery of the city one of the finest in the world. 
 
 The panorama of the river and the city which encircles the spectator 
 on Carlisle Bridge, is, with perhaps the single exception of that from 
 Waterloo Bridge, London, unequalled in grandeur and beauty by any 
 similar view that can be obtained in any other European city. Glancing 
 northward, we have Sackville Street, extending its full perspective of 
 architectural beauty, uninterrupted, save by the memorial of the brave 
 
 * The Royal Exchange was built by means of a lottery, established and conducted by the merchants 
 of Dublin, which produced ,£65,000. Before the assimilation of the English and Irish currency, 'Change was 
 held in it three times a week, when considerable transactions took place in English bills, but few in 
 merchandise, the dealing in which was generally effected at the Commercial Buildings, Dame Street. 
 Eventually monetary business between England and foreign ports became monopolized by the banks, and 
 •"or a time the building was handed over to the Commissioners of Bankruptcy, whose duties in due course 
 became absorbed by the Court of Bankruptcy. Then, with the exception of an occasional public meeting 
 held in it, silence and solitude reigned in the Royal Exchange for many years, till in 1852 it was purchased 
 by the Corporation of Dublin and converted into a City Hall. 
 
30 
 
 f 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 Nelson, which rises boldly from its centre, and with the facade of the 
 Post Office and the corner of the Rotunda both in view. Turning- to 
 the south, we look down Westmoreland Street, with the view terminated 
 by Trinity College, and the noble Corinthian portico of the Bank of 
 Ireland. Westward, the eye wanders up the Liffey, bordered by its noble 
 quays and crossed by its many bridges, and encompasses the towers of 
 St. Patrick's and Christ Church and the dome of the Four Courts, 
 with the Wellington obelisk towering aloft from Phoenix Park in the 
 distance. And then facing eastward, we have the magnificent Custom 
 House and again the river, but here alive with shipping to the extremity 
 of the north wall. 
 
 Let us walk up Sackville Street, a broad and noble thoroughfare. 
 Nelsons Monument attracts us at every step. It was erected at a cost 
 of ^6856, raised by public subscription among the Irish admirers of the 
 hero of Trafalgar. It is a fluted column with a capital of the Tuscan 
 order, 121 feet high, surmounted by a statue of the naval hero, 13 feet 
 high, by Thomas Kirk, a native sculptor. An interior spiral staircase 
 leads to the summit of the pillar, where, from a safely-railed platform, 
 a most magnificent view is obtained of the city and its surroundings, 
 extending to the Mourne Mountains in the County Down at the north, 
 the flat lands of Meath and Kildare on the west, the mountains of 
 Wicklow on the south, and Dublin Bay with the Irish Sea beyond 
 to the eastward. Nelson's Pillar is the central or starting point of 
 several tramways or street railroads, the cars of which branch off 
 in various directions. 
 
 Close to the pillar, and on the western side of Sackville Street, 
 stands the General Post Office, erected in 1815, from designs by Francis 
 Johnston, at a cost of ,£50,000. It is a handsome granite structure, 
 having a portico of Portland stone, consisting of a pediment bearing 
 the royal arms, supported by six massive Ionic columns, and surmount- 
 ed by three finely-executed figures of Hibernia, Mercury, and Fidelity. 
 The building is 223 feet in length, 150 feet in depth, and 50 feet in 
 height, and is well adapted for postal purposes. The old General 
 Post Office was situated in College Green, and after the removal of 
 the business converted into an arcade. 
 
 Some little distance, further, and at the extremity of Upper Sackville 
 
THE ROTUNDA AND LYING-IN-HOSPITAL. 
 
 31 
 
 Street, in Rutland Square, stands the Rotunda, a fine series of rooms 
 used for public meetings, balls, and concerts ; and connected with and 
 adjoining the Lying-in- Hospital, an elegant building, having a Doric 
 facade flanked by Tuscan colonnades terminated by porticoes. The 
 latter institution was founded in 1751, and is supported by profits 
 obtained from the rental of the former, and an annual government grant 
 °f £5°° ! anc ' it is to be regretted that its handsome building has not 
 been placed a little to the eastward so as to have terminated the vista 
 of Sackville Street, a desideratum that would have been effected, but for 
 a quarrel between the founder and the owner of the ground, Lord 
 Mountjoy. The Rotunda is, on the contrary, peculiar and not remark- 
 ably elegant in its external appearance ; but in the extent and accom- 
 modation of its interior it is particularly well adapted for the purposes to 
 which it is designed, and for balls, is perhaps even now, unsurpassed 
 by any other building in Europe. It possesses a ball-room 86 feet, 
 card-room 66 feet, tea-room 54 feet, hall 40 feet, grand supper-room 
 86 feet, minor supper-room 54 feet, waiting-room 36 feet, four dressing- 
 rooms 20 feet each, servants' hall 40 feet, vestibule 20 feet in length, 
 and all of proportionate widths, together with an extensive range of 
 kitchen apartments and other offices." 
 
 Retracing our steps through Sackville Street, and returning to the 
 Carlisle Bridge, we have close to its southern end, at the junction of 
 Westmoreland and D'Olier Streets, a recently erected and faithful 
 statue of William Smith O'Brien, one of the Irish patriots who were 
 convicted of high treason in 1848, but 'who eventually received a full 
 pardon and spent the latter years of his life in his villa at Killiney, 
 avoiding political turmoil and the storms engendered by party spirit. 
 The statue is from the chisel of Mr. Farrell, and is remarkable alike 
 for the gracefulness of the figure, and for the quality of the marble 
 with which it is portrayed. In the course of a few years there is to 
 
 * Formerly, when the nobility and gentry of Ireland had their town residences in Dublin, the sub- 
 scription-balls, card-assemblies, and masquerades of the Rotunda, were regularly and fashionably attended 
 throughout the winter ; and the public promenades on the terrace of its ornamental gardens, formed in 
 summer unfailing attractions to the lovers of pleasure. The promenades alone have survived as a regular 
 entertainment. On certain evenings in the week, during the summer season, the gardens are still open to 
 the public, when the terrace is illuminated, and one or more military bands contribute to the gaiety of 
 .he scene. 
 
32 
 
 THE CITY OE DUBLIN. 
 
 be erected near the northern or Sackville Street end of the bridge, a 
 
 o 
 
 grand national testimonial to O'Connell, at a cost of ,£12,000, raised 
 by the subscriptions of the Great Repealer's friends. It is from the 
 design of John H. Foley, who declared that the work would consume 
 ten years in its construction, and, dying during its progress, has left 
 it to be completed by his representatives. 
 
 The Custom House, on Eden Quay, north of the Liffey, and a little 
 east of Carlisle Bridge ; is another of the magnificent structures erected 
 in Dublin toward the close of the last century. Its great defect, 
 however, is that it is situated so close to the water's edge that the 
 spectator is unable to see to advantage the noble front it presents 
 on that side. When viewed, as Sir Richard Hoare observes, from 
 the opposite bank of the river, it has a very striking effect ; and 
 combined with the numerous shipping immediately adjoining, reminds one 
 strongly of those subjects which the painter Canaletti selected for his 
 pencil at Venice. The building was designed by James Gandon, and 
 it took ten years for its construction, having been completed in 1791, 
 at a cost of ,£255,000, being about ^90,000 in excess of the original 
 estimate. It forms a quadrangle, 375 feet by 209, and being completely 
 insulated presents four fronts which are variously designed. The edifice 
 is described in a work on the " Maritime Ports of Ireland," as being 
 " composed of pavilions at each end joined by arcades and united in 
 the centre. The pavilions are terminated with the arms of Ireland in 
 a shield decorated with fruits and flowers, and supported by a lion and 
 unicorn. The centre presents a group of figures, two of which represent 
 England and Ireland embracing, and holding in their hands emblems of 
 peace and liberty ; they are seated in a naval car drawn by sea-horses 
 and followed by a fleet of merchant ships from all nations. On the 
 right of Britannia is Neptune expelling Envy and Discord. On the 
 attic are placed allegorical statues alluding to Navigation, Commerce, 
 Industry, and Riches. A magnificent dome, 125 feet high, rises in the 
 centre, with a pedestal on which is placed a statue, sixteen feet high, of 
 Hope resting on her anchor. The key-stones of the arches are decorated 
 with colossal heads, emblematic of the principal rivers and provinces of 
 Ireland, and are executed in a bold and masterly style by E. Smyth, 
 a native artist. The south front is composed of Portland stone, the 
 
THE DOCKS AND SHIPPING TRADE. 
 
 33 
 
 other three of white granite. Over the central columns of the north 
 front are four statues, representing Europe, Asia, Africa, and America. 
 The great staircase, with its Ionic colonnade, unites taste with grandeur 
 and novelty of design. The long room is seventy feet long, sixty-five 
 wide, and thirty in height. The simple arrangement of all its interior 
 parts contributes to the general and pleasing effect of light and shade, 
 which harmonize the whole." At the consolidation of all the different 
 Boards of Customs into a general department in London, this building 
 became nearly empty ; however, such parts of it as are not now 
 required for the collection of the customs of the port, are appropriated 
 to offices for the Poor Law Commissioners, Board of Public Works, 
 and Inland Revenue. 
 
 A new bridge, constructing across the Liffey below the Custom 
 House, will afford facilities to the commercial traffic passing between 
 the north and the south of the river. It will extend the number of 
 bridges uniting the two portions of the city to ten ; but, unlike the 
 other nine, it will be an open bridge to permit the passage of vessels 
 desirous of frequenting the quays between it and Carlisle Bridge. 
 
 The North Wall, or that part of the granite-faced quays which 
 extends for a mile to the east of the Custom House, with a lighthouse 
 at the extremity, is the portion of the city mainly devoted to the 
 shipping and export trade. Here are the Spencer Basin, several exten- 
 sive docks and warehouses, the freight and goods termini of the Royal 
 Canal and of the Midland Great Western Railway, principally devoted 
 to the exportation of cattle brought from the interior, graving 
 docks, and extensive ship building yards. The London and North- 
 western Railway has also recently erected here, for the convenience of 
 travelers to and from England, a station for the North Wall Extension 
 Railway, which connects with all the lines leaving Dublin except those 
 to Wicklow, and, after running around the northern part of the city, 
 passes under the Zoological Gardens in Phoenix Park, and crosses the 
 Liffey by a bridge near Kilmainham Hospital. The shipping trade of 
 Dublin, which some thirty or forty years ago was very depressed, has 
 increased enormously of late years. So much so, indeed, that new 
 docks and quays are in course of construction, beyond the present 
 terminus of the North Wall and further into the bay, to meet the 
 n.— 34 
 
34 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 steadily developing trade. The St. Georges Docks were among the 
 earliest constructed on this side of the river, and were opened by 
 George IV. on his visit to Ireland in 182 1. Previous to their forma- 
 tion, however, there were most extensive accommodations for shipping 
 at Ringsend, on the southern bank of the Liffey, opposite the North 
 Wall Lighthouse, and where the waters of the Dodder and the Grand 
 Canal empty into the river. The Great Basin and docks at this point 
 were long considered the finest and most extensive in Europe. They 
 occupy a space of 35 acres, of which 26 are covered with water 16 
 feet deep. The Great Basin is 3015 feet long and 360 feet average 
 breadth, and is capable of containing 300 sail of square-rigged vessels. 
 The upper basin is 2000 feet long, and capable of affording proportionate 
 accommodation.* New and extensive outer docks have lately been added 
 to these basins. 
 
 The southern of the two solid stone causeways which confine the 
 Liffey up to this point, and which were erected for the purpose of 
 keeping the channel free from the sands accumulating on the flat shores 
 of the bay at the embouchure of the river, continues lor a distance 
 of three and a half miles in a straight line into the bay. This 
 extension, having for its purpose the guarding of the harbor against 
 the encroachments of the "South Bull" sands, is known as the 
 South Wall, and bears on its extremity a fine lighthouse ; while half- 
 way is the Pigeon House Fort and Arsenal, and a basin which was 
 much in request prior to the formation of those at Howth and Kings- 
 town. This wall was commenced in 1748, took seven years to complete, 
 is from 32 to 40 feet in breadth, stands five feet above high-water 
 mark, and is formed of large blocks of mountain granite, cemented 
 and strengthened with iron cramps. To protect the harbor against the 
 sands of the opposite shore, or those of the " North Bull," another 
 work, called the Bull Wall, has recently been erected, having its base 
 at Dollymount,f and extending in a south-easterly direction to within a 
 few hundred yards of the South Wall Lighthouse. The North and 
 
 s The Great Basin was opened April 23d, 1796. The "Dorset" yacht, bearing the Earl Camden, 
 and numerous other craft, decorated with flags, entered it from the Grand Canal, amid discharges of 
 cannon, and in the presence of 60,000 spectators. 
 
 f The sands at Dollymount have in late years been the scene of many well-contested shooting matches, 
 uotable among which may be mentioned that between the Irish and American Teams in 1875. 
 
COMMERCE AND MANUFACTURES. 
 
 35 
 
 South Bull are large sand-banks at each side of the entrance to the 
 channel, and receive their peculiar appellation from the almost constant 
 roaring of the billows over them. 
 
 The indefatigable exertions for many years of the " Dublin Port 
 and Docks Board" have so increased the facilities of the port that 
 vessels can now enter it at all times. This has been accomplished by 
 deepening the water along the quays, and by reducing the bar so that it 
 now presents eighteen feet at low water, instead of seven feet as in 
 1830. The result has been the increase of tonnage of oversea vessels 
 trading to the port from 74,688 in 1857 to 312,798 in 1877; and that 
 of coasters trading between Dublin and the ports of the British Isles, 
 from 880,844 m 1857 to 1, 193,731 in 1877; and the consequent increase 
 of income derivable from dues on shipping from ,£26,702 to ,£60,250. 
 Though steam was in operation from the port since 1816, it was not 
 applied to the transmission of goods until 1824; and now a large fleet of 
 steamers arrive at and depart from the Dublin quays, there being com- 
 munications thrice daily with Holyhead, daily with Liverpool and Glasgow, 
 and once or twice a week with London, and the southern English ports 
 the Isle of Man, Bristol, Cork, Waterford, Belfast, Whitehaven, etc. 
 
 The Irish metropolis has in its time obtained some celebrity for 
 its manufactures, but these, in great measure, it has been compelled 
 to resign to more successful rivals. Immediately before the prohibitory 
 laws passed in the reign of William III , the woolen trade, which had 
 been conducted with considerable success for some centuries in that 
 part of the city called the Liberties,* gained the zenith of its popularity, 
 
 * The district called the "Liberties" occupies the extreme south-west corner of the city. After the 
 capitulation of Limerick in 1791, a number of English manufacturers settled in it, built Weaver Square, as 
 well as the Combe, Pimlico, Spitalfields, and other streets, named from corresponding places in London, 
 and it soon became the abode of opulence and respectability, with its Theatre Royal in Rainsford Street. 
 In Thomas Street was the Earl of Meath's mansion, deemed by Sir W. Petty next in magnificence to 
 the Castle of Dublin ; while the Duke of Leinster selected the precinct for his proposed family mansion. 
 It is stated that during the time of the revived trade, at the close of the last and the commencement 
 of the present century, the "Liberties" presented a bustling scene, fully 40,000 people being employed in 
 its manufactories. It was in Thomas Street that, in 1798, the gallant and unhappy Lord Edward Fitzgerald was 
 arrested for high-treason, and on the occasion received wounds of which he shortly afterwards died in Newgate 
 Prison. In this street, also, in 1803, Lord Kilwarden and his nephew, the Rev. Richard Wolfe, were dragged from 
 their carriage and murdered by an infuriated mob during the insurrection of Robert Emmet. Notwithstanding 
 the high, airy, and salubrious position of the " Liberties," the tide of wealthy population has long since set to the 
 flat lands of the east, and thus by a strange perversion of taste the poor are now left to become the sole occupants. 
 
3^ 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 and the district became the residence of many wealthy manufacturers. 
 These arbitrary acts, however, ruined the trade, and an attempt to resusci- 
 tate it toward the close of the last century proved only transitory. The 
 manufacture of silk was introduced by French Huguenots in 1685, tnat °f 
 linen somewhat later, and that of cotton in 1 761, but none of them took 
 very deep root. For the fabrication, however, of poplins, a mixture of 
 wool and silk, Dublin has been justly famed. This trade, though also 
 introduced by the Huguenots, did not assume a degree of importance until 
 about the year 1780; but during the present century it too has rapidly 
 declined, in consequence of the abolition of protective duties, and the 
 competition of rival producers. Yet Dublin continues to possess many 
 tanneries, foundries, distilleries, breweries, etc,, some of whose productions 
 are of world-wide reputation— for who is there that has not either heard 
 of, or possesses a personal acquaintance with, " Guinness' Brown Stout," 
 " Kinahan's L. L. Whiskey," and that particularly pungent nasal irritant, 
 "Irish Blackguard?" 
 
 In the various walks of literature, science, and art, Dublin possesses 
 many institutions besides those to which we have been accompanied by 
 the kind reader, and of which our space only allows us to make brief 
 mention. These are the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy, Dawson 
 Street, devoted to Irish history and antiquities ; the Royal College of 
 Sciences for Ireland, established in 1867, east side of Stephen's Green, 
 containing geological, mineralogical, and chemical specimens, illustrating the 
 economic resources of the country ; the National Gallery of Ireland, 
 opened in 1864, north side of Leinster Lawn, devoted to works of the 
 fine arts in sculpture and painting; the Royal Hibernian Academy, near 
 Sackville Street, in which an exhibition of painting and sculpture is 
 annually held — all of which are more or less supported by Parliamentary 
 grants. Also, Mars/is, or St. Patrick's Library, a very ancient institution, 
 open to all, situated near St. Patrick's Cathedral, and containing about 
 18,000 volumes, including the whole of the collection of Stillingfleet, 
 Bishop of Worcester, placed there by Archbishop Marsh in 1694; the 
 Royal College of Surgeons, on Stephen's Green, possessing an excellent 
 anatomical museum. While in the field of charity we may mention 
 Stevens Hospital, City Hospital, Sir Patrick Dunns, Simpsons, Mercer s, 
 and Swift's Hospitals, Richmond Lunatic Asylum, and many others, for 
 
E.VIXEX T XA TI J ES 
 
 37 
 
 Dublin is extremely well provided with benevolent institutions of all 
 
 The metropolis also possesses five Railway Stations, viz., the Great 
 Northern, in Amiens Street, the most elegant in an architectural point 
 of view : the Midland Great Western, at Broadstone ; the Great Southern 
 and Western, at Kingsbridge ; the Bray and Wicklow, in Harcourt Street ; 
 and the Kingstown, at Westland Row. The traveling community has also 
 ample accommodation in numerous hotels, while many excellent clubs 
 administer to the social comforts of the leading citizens. 
 
 Dublin can lay claim to being the birthplace of many persons of note, 
 while many others of eminence have made it their temporary residence. 
 Among its sons we may name, with respective dates of birth. Richard 
 Stanihurst. 1548. and Archbishop Usher. 1580, historians ; James Ware, 
 1594, antiquarian ; William Molyneux, 1656, mathematician ; Jonathan Swift, 
 1667. Dean of St. Patrick's; Spranger Barry, 1719, actor; Isaac Bickerstaff. 
 1732, dramatist; Sir Philip Francis. 1740. the reputed author of "Junius"; 
 Edward Malone. 1741, critic and antiquarian; John Fitzgibbon. 1749, E ar l 
 of Clare; Henry Grattan. 1750. statesman; Leonard MacXally, 1752. 
 dramatist; John Hickey. 1756. sculptor; Arthur Wellesley. 1769. Duke of 
 Wellington; Thomas Moore. 1779. the national poet; Robert Emmet, 17S0, 
 Irish patriot; Samuel Lover, 1797. poet and novelist; Charles Lever, 1S06. 
 novelist : Richard Chevenix Trench, 1807, Archbishop of Dublin ; Michael 
 William Balfe, 1S08, musical composer; and John Henry Foley. R. A.. 
 1S1S. sculptor. It is also not without celebrity as a literary centre, for. 
 independent of several well-conducted daily and weekly newspapers, it 
 sends forth monthly and quarterly periodicals of high character, while it 
 possesses many enterprising publishers whose presses are continually 
 adding to the stores of knowledge. 
 
 The broad streets, the numerous and extensive squares, and the wide 
 avenue formed by the passage of the limpid Liffey. would seem to aftord 
 to Dublin sufficient opportunities for the free circulation of air, and many 
 a place of equal magnitude would thank its stars if in like manner 
 blessed. But, beyond these sanitary advantages, it possesses on its north- 
 wes: a capacious lung of which any metropolis might be proud. To visit 
 Dublin without taking a drive through PJuzyiix Park, would be consid- 
 ered somewhat tantamount to "'doing" Rome without visiting St. Peters. 
 
38 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 This noble park is 1752 acres in extent, of which 1300 are open to the 
 public free, the rest being occupied by the zoological and people's gardens 
 and the grounds of several public institutions and official residences. 
 At the beginning of the century the only thoroughfare between the city 
 and the park was over Victoria (then Bloody) Bridge, and through 
 Barrack Street, a disreputable outlet in the vicinity of the Royal Barracks ; 
 but this nuisance has long been obviated, by the erection, higher up the 
 river, and nearer the entrance to the park, of a beautiful metal structure 
 called Kings Bridge, in commemoration of the visit of George IV. to 
 Ireland in 1821.* This is the most westerly of the Dublin bridges, with 
 the exception of the railroad extension bridge, and the Sarah Bridge, the 
 former about half and the latter three-quarters of a mile further up the 
 stream and south of the park. The Sarah Bridge consists of a single 
 elliptic arch of 104 feet span, and obtains its name from Sarah, Countess 
 of Westmoreland, by whom the foundation stone was laid in 1 79 1 . 
 
 The first object that attracts attention in the park is the Wellington 
 Testimonial, on the left — a lofty but ungainly f column commemorative of 
 the victories of the great captain of the age, who, we repeat, Dublin 
 claims as one of her sons, the alleged place of his birth being in Upper 
 Merrion Street, in a house now occupied by the Irish Church Commis- 
 sioners. This testimonial was erected in 181 7, at a cost of ,£20,000, 
 subscribed by the citizens of Dublin, and consists of a massive obelisk 
 on a pedestal of Wicklow granite, surmounting a platform approached 
 by a flight of steps. The sides of the pedestal have sunken panels, 
 containing relievos in metal of the hero crowned with laurel, and military 
 scenes, while those of the obelisk are inscribed with the names of the 
 
 * A sum of ,£13,000 was raised by public subscription for the purpose of erecting a national monument to 
 perpetuate this event ; but the good sense of the managers of the undertaking substituted a work not only 
 ornamental but highly useful to the city, instead of an idle pillar-trophy which it was the original intention to 
 erect with the funds subscribed. The foundation stone was laid December 12th, 1827, by the Marquis of 
 Wellesley, then Lord Lieutenant. The bridge is composed of one arch of cast metal of 100 feet span, with 
 abutments of handsomely-cut mountain granite. 
 
 \ It is objected to the Wellington Testimonial that it is of too sepulchral a character, very much out of place 
 when it is considered that the Duke survived its erection for nearly 40 years, and that its tout ensembU is that 
 of a monstrous stone. The last objection is founded probably upon the witty answer of a noble lord to 
 George IV., who, as he passed in his state carriage, inquired the meaning of such a monstrous mass. " Sire," 
 replied he, "it is intended as a milestone by the Irish ; their miles being longer than the English, they think their 
 milestones should be in proportion." 
 
PHCEXIX PARK. 
 
 39 
 
 victories won by the "Iron Duke" during his long military career. The 
 relievos were by Irish artists, and the metal cast from cannon taken in 
 battle. The total height is 205 feet. From the elevated ground on which 
 this memorial is placed, as well as from the powder-magazine and fort, 
 erected in 1735, some little distance to the west, the finest and most 
 comprehensive views of Dublin are obtained. The spectator sees before 
 him the entire extent of the city — its magnificent bridges ; the domes and 
 spires of its public buildings and churches ; and the beautiful " Xelson 
 Pillar," rising from the broad mass of houses ; while the blue outline of 
 the mountains to the south of the city, visible in the distance on the 
 right of the picture, greatly enhance its grandeur and beauty. 
 
 On the right of the road, and for some distance after entering the 
 park, the ground has been tastefully laid out as a flower garden and 
 promenade for the free use of the public, and bears the name of the 
 Peoples Garden. Here is the Carlisle Memorial Statue, another of the 
 successful works of art for which the citizens of Dublin are indebted to 
 the skill of its talented son. Foley. It commemorates the Lord Lieuten- 
 ancy of the seventh Earl, who occupied the vice-regal chair for over eight 
 years. Immediately north of these pleasure grounds lie the Zoological 
 Gardens, established in 1831. and partly supported by an annual Parlia- 
 mentary grant. The public are admitted daily by the payment of sixpence, 
 except on Sunday, when it is only one penny. The natural beauties of 
 the grounds, sloping to the margin of a small lake, have been heightened 
 and embellished by the hands of art ; but the most attractive feature of 
 the place is undoubtedly the collection of animals, which, though not very 
 extensive, is of an interesting- character. 
 
 The Vice Regal Lodge, an unostentatious but tasteful building, situated 
 near the principal road through the park, was purchased from the Earl 
 of Leitrim in 17S4. as a summer residence for the viceroys, and has 
 been subsequently much enlarged and improved. At a short distance 
 from the lodge, in the centre of a small area, stands a fluted Corinthian 
 pillar, thirty feet in height, surmounted by a phoenix.* forming a pictur- 
 
 * The name of die park is said by some to be derived from that of the fabulous bird. Dr. Walsh, 
 on the contrary, maintains, in his History of Dublin, that it comes from a corruption of the Irish term 
 Fiomn~*tisge (clear or fair water), pronounced finniske, and which, articulated in the English manner, might 
 be easily changed into the word Phoenix. The spring or well, believed to have given the name to this 
 demesne, is a strong chalybeate, and is situated, according to the Doctor, "in a glen beside the lower lake. 
 
40 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 esque object when viewed through the leafy avenues which conduct to it. 
 It was erected in 1747 by, the celebrated Earl of Chesterfield, who, when 
 Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, was very influential in converting the park 
 into a popular public resort. The greater part of its area was surrendered 
 to Henry VIII., by Rawson, prior of Kilmainham ; and, although the land 
 was soon proposed to be transformed into a royal demesne, this was 
 not effected fully until the reign of Charles II., and during the vice- 
 royalty of the Duke of Ormond, when it was enclosed, planted, and 
 stocked with deer. It thus continued until the time of Lord Chesterfield, 
 who was so delighted with its natural advantages and position, that he 
 designed and commenced those embellishments and decorations which 
 have led to its becoming a spot of surpassing beauty and interest. 
 
 Throughout the park, roads and drives run in various directions, over 
 which, as well as over the grassy surface, pedestrians and horsemen are 
 permitted to roam at large. It continues to be plentifully stocked with 
 deer, is surrounded by a wall, and communicates with the neighboring 
 country by several entrances having gates and lodges in various styles 
 of architecture ; while within its boundaries are several benevolent and 
 other institutions, invariably of a national character. Though only 
 indebted to the hand of art for improvement in the immediate vicinity 
 of the Vice Regal Lodge, and those portions which adjoin the Zoological 
 Gardens and the grand entrance gate, this large demesne contains in 
 other parts many picturesque spots, romantic glens, and wild retreats, 
 where nature displays her choicest charms to those who love to seek 
 her in her sequestered haunts. Numerous hawthorn groves are scattered 
 over its surface, which in early summer are loaded with snow-white 
 blossoms, and give a delicious fragrance to the air. The open spaces 
 between the woods and copses are for the most part irregular and 
 uneven ; the principal level plain, so to call it, is " the Fifteen Acres," 
 though why so named it would be difficult to determine, as its area is 
 said to contain 300 acres. This space is used for exercising the troops 
 of the garrison, and reviews and sham battles frequently take place upon 
 
 near the grand entrance into the vice-regal lodge, and has been frequented from time immemorial for the 
 supposed salubrity of its waters." Notwithstanding the celebrity of the spring, it remained neglected and 
 exposed until the year 1800, when the Duke of Richmond, then Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, having derived 
 great benefit from the use of its waters, had it enclosed and covered over with a strong structure of 
 Portland stone. 
 
THE "FIFTEEN ACRES.' 
 
 41 
 
 it during the summer season. Here, too, the lovers of polo and cricket 
 find appropriate arenas for the enjoyment of their respective games. 
 
 But the " Fifteen Acres " has obtained its principal notoriety from 
 its being the favorite ground on which affairs of honor, in the hair- 
 trigger days of Ireland, were commonly settled at ten paces distance. 
 It is many years ago since the original compiler of this work was much 
 amused by the observations of an old man, whom he met early one 
 summer's morning wandering near this celebrated spot. At first he 
 imagined him to be engaged gathering decayed brambles for firewood ; 
 but he was soon undeceived in his supposition, for he noticed the poor 
 fellow kept gliding from place to place, apparently without any object. 
 This singular conduct excited curiosity to learn if possible his business 
 there, and the old man being intercepted in one of his traverses, a 
 conversation ensued, which is thus related by the author : 
 
 " A fine morning, my friend," said I. 
 
 " Beautiful, sir, praise be to God for it ! The rain last night will 
 bring up the late pratees finely, though it has made the grass mighty 
 damp, and my ould shoes ain't in the best ordher for keeping out that 
 same," replied the man, exhibiting a pair of tattered and crannied shoes, 
 into which the wet had soaked and penetrated in every direction. 
 
 "Why, then, do you walk here?" said I; "the road and footpaths 
 of the park are dry and pleasant. But you may have business ? " 
 
 " Sorra hap'orth of business has myself here now, sir ; but it wasn't 
 always so ; many's the guinea I aimed before five o'clock in the morning 
 on this very spot, when times was good ; and though my purfession 
 ain't worth following of late, I can't break myself of my ould ways, 
 and I come wandhering out to the ould spot ever}- morning just as I 
 used to do." 
 
 This speech of the old man's puzzled me exceedingly, and I inquired 
 what his profession might be. 
 
 " Why then, sir," replied he, " I'll never deny it ; I'm by thrade a 
 tailor, but I gave up stitching long ago and went into the jewelling line." 
 
 " The jewelling line ? " I repeated, rather surprised. 
 
 " Yes sir ; I'm the boy that you might have heerd tell of — Mick 
 Delany — that attended on all the jintlemin who used to come out here 
 to fight jewels before their breakfasts." 
 a.— 35 
 
42 
 
 THE CITY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 " Oh ! " cried I, with some difficulty repressing my inclination to 
 indulge in a hearty fit of laughter when I understood that the jewels 
 my informant alluded to were those hostile meetings which so frequently 
 took place on that ground. " And pray, in what capacity did you act 
 in these affairs of honor ? " 
 
 '• Why sir," said he with inimitable gravity, " I was the regulather. 
 I could point out the exact spot every jewel had been fought for the 
 last five-and-forty years, and be the same token I was prisint by at the 
 most of them myself ; and so, sir, by that manes, when jintlemin came 
 here to settle their little differences quiet and aisy, they were always 
 glad to meet a knowledgable boy like myself, who could put them up 
 to the business in style, and keep a sharp lookout for the murdhering 
 villyans of polis, that was always spiling our sport." 
 
 " But how," I inquired, " did it happen that you were present at 
 so many of these affairs ? " 
 
 " Oh, aisy enough, sir ! I used to get up at cock-shout every morning 
 regular, and walk out here to the ' Fifteen Acres,' where I was sure 
 of falling in with two or three jewelling parties in the week as I'd be 
 of finding parthridges in stubbles. Most of the jintlemin ped me for 
 my sarvices, and those that had no occasion for them ped me to get 
 quiet of me." 
 
 " So that in either way you were certain of being paid," said I. 
 
 "In coorse, sir ; but that was in the good ould times when jewelling 
 •was in fashion, and when no jintleman could purshume to howld up his 
 head amongst jintlemin till he had been out a couple of times at laste. 
 Now, sir, they settle all their disputes in a mane and dirty way upon 
 paper ; there's no sperrit among the quality of late, like as there was 
 when bould Harry Grattan, and little counsellor Curran, Bully Egan, and 
 the ould joker, Lord Norbury, that by all accounts shot himself up to 
 be a judge, used to take the shine in Dublin. Them was the right 
 sort of jintlemin, sir ; them was the chaps for making any fellow that 
 'ud say ' black is the white of your eye ' shiver upon daisy in no time. 
 But, Lord help us, sir, there's nothing but changes in this world, and 
 all of them for the worse, too ; the polis and the teetotallers have 
 taken the misnagh (courage) out of the people ; jintlemin don't now 
 get into a quarrel over their wine or punch at night, and get out of 
 
TWO WAYS OF SETTLING DIFFERENCES. 
 
 43 
 
 it on the sod in the morning. They're grown as peaceable as mice, sir, 
 and a man might walk the ' Fifteen Acres ' for a twelvemonth of Sundays 
 without seeing the laste bit of divarsion in regard of a jewel? 
 
 " I am glad to find that the barbarous custom so long a disgrace 
 to the country is wearing rapidly away," I replied. 
 
 " Barbarous, sir ! d'ye call a fair jewel at eight or tin paces 
 barbarous ? " 
 
 " Certainly ; the idea of two men going out coolly and deliberately for 
 the purpose of imbruing their hands in each other's blood is perfectly 
 horrible." 
 
 " But consider the convaynience of the thing, sir ; they come out 
 here in the cool of the morning with their sickonds and hair-triagrer 
 pistols, and settle their difference at once ; and if one of them ain't 
 shot clane out, they'll go home together greater friends than ever. I'm 
 sure that's a shorter and better way of making pace than by going to 
 law, and keeping up all sorts of hathred and ill-will towards each 
 other." 
 
 " But, my good friend, I do not advocate litigation because I object 
 to violence. ' Let the angry man,' as the Eastern proverb has it, ' drink 
 of the waters of reflection.' " 
 
 " I wish you a good morning, sir," said my new acquaintance, abruptly 
 turning on his heel, " I must be going ; " and as he hurried away I 
 could hear him muttering between his teeth, "'Drink of the wathers!' 
 I might have aisily known he was a teetotaller." 
 
44 
 
 THE UPPER LI F FEY AND BEYOND KILDARE. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE UPPER LIFFEY AND BEYOND KILDARE. 
 
 Beauty of the Dublin Suburbs — Valley of the Liffey — Castleknock and its Legends — The 
 "Strawberry Beds" — Woodlands — Lucan — Leixlip and its Salmon Leap — Celbridge — Swift 
 and " Vanessa " — Clane — Roman Catholic College at Clangowes Wood — Sallins — Grand 
 Canal — Naas — Falls of Poul-a-Phouca — Kilcullen — Curragh of Kildare — City of Kildare 
 — A thy — Mull i mast and its Historic Associations — Moat of Ascul — Car low — Clondalkin 
 and its Round Tenner. 
 
 FEW cities are more fortunate than Dublin in the beauty of their 
 environs. On the east it has its noble bay, by many travelers 
 placed in rivalry with the far-famed Bay of Naples, guarded at its 
 entrance by Kingstown and the hills of Howth and Killiney ; on the 
 north the villages of Glasnevin and Finglas,* situated on the banks of 
 the meandering Tolka (in whose picturesque vicinity Addison, Swift, 
 Steele, Tickell, Delaney, and Parnell had their constant or occasional 
 residence), the rich meadows of Artane, and the green lanes and pleasant 
 shores of Clontarf ; westward along and beyond the Phoenix Park stretches 
 the beauteous vale through which winds the Liffey's silver stream, its 
 steep banks enriched with gardens and charming villas ; while to the 
 south and southeast are scattered innumerable country seats, backed by 
 the blue chain of the Dublin and Wicklow mountains, extending towards 
 the east until they meet the ocean at the pleasant town of Bray — 
 suburbs forming a succession of picturesque objects, that for beauty and 
 variety are not approached by those of any capital in the world. 
 
 Our first excursion into the country around Dublin took us toward 
 the headwaters of the Liffey, and afforded us a survey of many pleasant 
 
 * Finglas possesses an ancient cross, lays claim to an antiquity almost coeval with St. Patrick, was in early 
 times a bishop's see, which was merged in that of Dublin, and has in later days been the scene of May sports 
 that attracted all the world, and are supposed to have been the relics of the Pagan " feriae." Its name is 
 derived from Fionn Glas, " The Fair or Pleasant Green," indicative of its fertility. 
 
 / 
 
CHAPEL IZOD AND CASTLEKNOCK. 
 
 45 
 
 places to the west and southwest of the metropolis, our journey extending 
 even beyond the limits of the stream to the city of Kildare and into 
 the county of Carlow. In order to afford us a better view of the 
 many pretty places and pleasant prospects that crowded the earlier 
 portion of our journey, we engaged the services of an outside jaunting 
 car, one of those national vehicles that seem to have been invented 
 especially for the uses of discordant couples, as they unsocially compel 
 their passengers to travel back to back ; while as posts of observation 
 they have the disadvantage of only giving you a one-sided view of the 
 world, unless you repeatedly jerk yourself around, a proceeding most 
 conducive to a crick in the neck. But as travelers learn by experience 
 that when at Rome it is always advisable to do as the Romans do, 
 we accepted the situation, and placing ourselves on the left side of one 
 of these conveyances, being told the best views were in that direction, 
 we rattled over Kino's Bridge, and once more entered Phcenix Park, 
 which lay in our course. Ascending, and passing over its picturesque 
 drive to its western side, we were enabled to enjoy at our leisure 
 the beauties of the lower road, and trace the glittering Liffey, flowing 
 through verdant meadows, and watering the rich valley where stands 
 the romantic village of Chapel Izod, named after La Belle Isode, daughter 
 of an Irish King, who had a chapel there, and the place of encamp- 
 ment of Brian Boroimhe in 989, and of William III. in 1690, after 
 his victory on the Boyne ; and beyond, that of Palmerstown which 
 gave to the family of Temple a title whose last possessor made it 
 renowned in modern British history. 
 
 Emerging from Phcenix Park by its southwestern, or Knockmaroon 
 Gate, we soon had on our right, surmounting a knoll, Castleknock,""" 
 
 * Castleknock has two singular legends attached to it : one refers to an old window in the shattered 
 wall of the ruin, of which Stanihurst wrote, " Though it be neither glazed nor latticed, but open, yet 
 let the weather be stormy, and the wind bluster boisterously on any side of the house, and place a candle 
 there, and it will burn as quietly as if no puff of wind blew. This may be tried at this day, who so 
 shall be willing to put it in practice." The other informs us that St. Patrick once came hither to convert 
 to Christianity its possessor, Morrishtac, a Danish king ; when the old infidel, after listening patiently to the saint 
 for a considerable time, commenced to nod, and finally at the close of a forcible argument came out with a 
 most irreverent snore. The saint, enraged at this unchristian conduct, prayed that the king might sleep in the 
 same place and posture till the last day. It is scarcely necessary to add that his prayer was granted, and that 
 the sleeping monarch remains to the present day inclosed in an underground chamber, to which a winding 
 passage in the thickness of the walls is said to conduct. 
 
46 
 
 THE UPPER LIFFEY AND BEYOND KILDARE. 
 
 an ancient and ruined baronial hall. It is related that a royal Danish 
 residence which stood here was granted by Strongbow, in 1 1 77, to one 
 of his officers, Hugh Tyrrell, who built the castle, which was retained 
 by his descendants for two centuries. In 13 16 it fell into the hands of 
 Edward Bruce, brother of the Scottish king, and after many mutations, 
 in 1642, into that of the royalist army under Colonel Monk. From 
 Knockmaroon to the picturesque grounds of Woodlands the northern 
 bank of the Liffey is covered with strawberry beds, whose luscious 
 product is in its season most attractive to the denizens of Dublin. 
 Here, in the genial month of June, when the fruit is ripe, the citizens 
 repair in great numbers ; and here they may be seen on fine sunny 
 evenings sauntering along the sides of the river, scrambling up the 
 precipitous banks, or seated in social groups in the little summer-houses 
 and tea-gardens that invitingly tempt the passing traveler to stay and 
 join in a luxurious repast on the delicious produce of " the Beds," 
 which is sometimes eaten au naiurel, but more frequently, as the old 
 song says, "smothered in cream." 
 
 To Lucan the road runs nearly parallel to the course of the Liffey, 
 whose banks, enriched by ancient woods, overhanging the silent waters, 
 or spreading into verdant slopes, never fail to elicit the admiration of 
 every beholder. It would be impossible for a stranger to pass the 
 demesne of Woodlands, the seat of Lord Annaly, and formerly that of 
 the Earls of Carhampton, without being struck by its eminently beautiful 
 situation. The fine lawn in front of the house is girt by rich groves, 
 in which are many romantic rides and walks, leading through sylvan 
 glades or deep glens, where the sparkling of bright streams, and the 
 glad sound of waters murmuring over their pebbly beds, or leaping 
 down the rocks, soothe the mind to kindred repose. The village of 
 Lucan, which supplied the title of an Earldom for Sarsfield and his 
 descendants, the Binghams, is about eight miles distant from Dublin, 
 and delightfully situated on the southern bank of the Liffey, which is 
 here crossed by a stone bridge of one arch of no feet span. The 
 place was once celebrated for a chalybeate spa, discovered in 1758, the 
 waters of which are said to possess singular virtues in cutaneous and 
 some other diseases. Fashion, however, whose capricious taste merit 
 cannot command, long since withdrew her favoring influence, and the 
 
LEIXLIP AND ITS SALMON LEAP. 
 
 4? 
 
 spa is now little frequented except by those who, attracted by the 
 romantic scenery, spend a few weeks of the summer season in its 
 delightful neighborhood. The ornamental grounds of Lucan House, in 
 which are the remains of the castle of the Sarsfields and the old 
 parish church, occupy the banks of the -Liffey for almost the entire 
 mile and a half which separates Lucan from Leixlip, where we found 
 ourselves once more in the county of Kildare. 
 
 The little village of Leixlip is delightfully situated at the confluence 
 of the Rye Water with the Liffey, in a richly diversified country ; and 
 the picture it presents has been declared to be one of the most 
 beautiful " bits of scenery " in the kingdom. Surmounting the wooded 
 banks of the river stands the castle, a modernized but ivy-mantled 
 structure, having circular and square towers, said to have been originally 
 founded by Adam Fitz-Hereford, an Anglo-Norman follower of Strongbow, 
 and the residence of King John, while Earl of Morton and Governor 
 of Ireland during the reign of Henry II. At a short distance from 
 the village the waters of the Liffey tumble down a succession of rocky 
 ledges and form the romantic cataract popularly called the Salmon Leap. 
 The roar of the waterfall greets the ear as you approach it, and arriving, 
 the eye perceives the cascade to be most picturesque in character, for 
 the water rushes down a broad and rocky steep, and boils into spray 
 and foam. The Salmon Leap is the lowest rapid on the river, and 
 the volume of the stream is at all times sufficiently large to be a 
 pleasing object of interest ; but the scene is considerably heightened 
 when the river is swollen, and the rush of waters is thereby increased. 
 The spot is a favorite resort for pic-nic parties from Dublin, but they 
 cannot command the vaulting exploits of the salmon at will, for it is 
 only at certain seasons the fish perform the feat which has given the 
 cascade its name. The precipitous banks of the river are thickly 
 covered with trees, and the tout-ensemble, though not so extensive as 
 that of any one of the celebrated falls in Scotland, Switzerland, or 
 America, is excelled by few in natural beauty. 
 
 From Leixlip, which is a station on the Midland Great Western 
 Railway, the course of the Liffey ascends for three or four miles, in a 
 south westerly direction, to the village of Celbridge, a little over a mile 
 from the Great Southern and Western Railway, and only noted as being 
 
48 
 
 THE UPPER LIFFEY AND BEYOND KILDARE. 
 
 once the residence of Esther Vanhomrigh, the ill-fated " Vanessa " of 
 Swift."' But as there was nothing of interest to detain us at that place, 
 we hurried on to Sallins, some nine miles higher up the river, which at 
 over half the way thither is crossed by a bridge of six arches at Clane, 
 where there are the ruins of a Franciscan Abbey, founded in the thirteenth 
 century, and near by the Roman Catholic College of Clangowes Wood, a 
 quadrangular structure flanked by four towers. At Sallins the Liffey is 
 crossed by the Grand Canal, the termini of which we have already 
 noticed — the western on the Shannon, near its confluence with the Suck, 
 and the eastern at the point where the river Dodder flows into the bay 
 of Dublin. 
 
 Between its source, in the northwestern corner of Wicklow, and Sallins, 
 the course of the Liffey almost describes a circle, within which stands the 
 town of Naas, whither we now proceeded for a night's rest on our way to 
 the falls of Poul-a-Phouca, near the head waters of the stream. Naas is 
 about three miles south of Sallins, its railroad station, and a lively little 
 town, though not so much so as of old when it was a coaching station, for 
 it is situated at the point where the high road from Dublin sends forth 
 branches to Waterford and Limerick respectively. Its only bit of antiquity 
 is a rath, where the States of Leinster are said to have held their assem- 
 blies ; but it claims to have once been the residence of its kings, 
 to have possessed a castle and three or four abbeys and monasteries, and 
 
 * Esther Vanhomrigh, the daughter of a London family in which Swift visited, being occasionally directed by 
 him in her studies, conceived such a violent attachment for him as to be induced' to propose marriage to him. The 
 offer was declined, but Swift seems to have neglected, as he ought not to have done, to discourage her advances, 
 cither from gratified vanity, or from a genuine personal interest in the young lady, who, under the name of 
 "Vanessa," has gained a celebrity as sad and romantic as that of her companion in misfortune, "Stella." Upon the 
 death of her mother, in 1714, Vanessa removed to Ireland to be near Swift (but lately appointed dean of St. 
 Patrick's), who thus became involved with two women, equally devoted to him, and neither of whom he was willing 
 to marry. Ignorant of his relations with Stella, and absorbed in her own passion, Vanessa patiently endured the 
 coldness and reproaches with which Swift now treated her, in the hope that she might one day become his wife. In 
 1 71 7 Vanessa retired to Marley Abbey, Celbridge, where she lived in deep seclusion with her sister, and where, in 
 1720, Swift renewed his visits, each of which Vanessa commemorated by planting a laurel in the garden where they 
 met. In time, however, she became so tormented by suspicion and impatience, that, in 1721, she wrote to Stella to 
 ascertain the nature of her connection with Swift, who, obtaining possession of the letter, rode at once to Marley 
 Abbey, flung it upon the table before Vanessa with a frown, which struck her dumb with terror, and instantly 
 departed. The shock was so severely felt by the unhappy woman that she survived it but a few weeks. Swift, on 
 learning of her death, was so overcome by remorse, that he retired in solitude for two months to the south of Ireland ; 
 and afterwards published the poem "Cadenus and Vanessa," written in 1713, describing his reception of the 
 advances of his ill-fated admirer. 
 
FALL OF POUL A-PHOUCA. 
 
 49 
 
 to have been in a flourishing state up to the time when the Saxon set 
 his foot on Irish soil. It has now about 3000 inhabitants, is, next to 
 Athy, the largest place in the county of Kildare, and one of its assize 
 towns. Its position is, however, very romantic, being seated on the 
 western slope of the Wicklow Hills, and just beyond the border of that 
 picturesque county. 
 
 From Naas we journeyed for about nine miles to the southeast, and 
 some little distance beyond Ballymore-Eustace, before we came to the fall 
 of Poul-a-Phouca, which the reader will find depicted on the engraved 
 title-page of this volume. The river Liffey, after finding its source amid 
 the hills of the baron)- of Rathdown (from whence the dark Lough Bray 
 also sends forth its waters to course through the Dargle, and enter the 
 sea not far from the point where the Liffey also joins it), passes through 
 the Glen of Kippure to Kilbride Church, where it assumes the character 
 of a river. Then pursuing its devious course for a distance of nine miles, 
 measured in a direct line along the dale through which it flows, the 
 stream, greatly increased in volume, enters, not far above the fall, a deep 
 chasm, whose rocky sides rise to a considerable height above its bed ; and 
 then, as it has been rather poetically expressed, leaps from the hills to 
 the valley, forming in its descent a cataract, 40 feet broad and 150 feet 
 high, which falls over several progressive ledges of rocks, till it is precip- 
 itated into a dark abyss, where it forms a whirlpool of frightful appear- 
 ance and immense depth, and where the Phouca * which gives it its 
 name, it is said, holds its nightly revels, luring unhappy wayfarers 
 into the fearful vortex. Owing to the manner in which the water is 
 broken in its descent, Poul-a-Phouca is by many considered the most 
 picturesque fall in the county of Wicklow. A handsome bridge of a 
 single Gothic arch has been thrown across the chasm through which the 
 stream rushes. The span of this arch is 65 feet, and its key-stone is 180 
 feet above the level of the river. On one side, the glen for some 
 
 * The term Poul-a-Phouca signifies the " Phouca's Hole." In the fairy mythology of Ireland the Phouca or 
 Pooka is described as a misshapen imp, haunting lonely glens and dark recesses, into which he beguiles the unwary. 
 He has been likened to the Tinna-Geolane, or Will o' the Wisp, who lives only to betray. Its habits have also 
 been said to resemble those of the English Puck, his great object being to obtain a rider, and " then he is in all his 
 most malignant glory. Headlong he dashes through brier and brake, through flood and fell, over mountain, valley, 
 moor, or river indiscriminately ; up or down precipice is alike to him, provided he gratifies the malevolence that 
 seems to inspire him." 
 H.-36 
 
50 
 
 THE UPPER LI FEE Y AND BEYOND KILDARE. 
 
 distance, both above and below the fall, is overhung by abrupt and naked 
 rocks ; on the other side, where the land forms a portion of the demesne 
 of the Earl of Miltown, the banks are less precipitous, and are cut into 
 walks and otherwise tastefully embellished. 
 
 On the banks of the Liffey, some little distance below Poul-a-Phouca, 
 where it becomes a fine river winding beautifully through a deep 
 fertile valley, are to be found the interesting ruins of New Abbey, 
 founded in the fifteenth century for Franciscans, by Rowland Fitz- 
 Eustace, and with its lands granted after the dissolution by Elizabeth 
 to Spenser, the poet ; the beautiful demesne of Harristown, which drew 
 forth the praises of the author of "Vanity Fair;" and the small town 
 of Kilcullen, a rambling place, which Thackeray found to tumble down 
 one hill and struggle up another, and sometimes called Kilcullenbridge, 
 to distinguish it from Old Kilcullen, which lies two miles to the south. 
 Previous to the building of the new town in 13 19, the latter was a 
 strong city, fortified by walls and entered by seven gates, and still 
 retains some remains of the abbey founded for monks of the Strict 
 Observance in the fifteenth century, with a stump of a Round Tower 
 and the shaft of an ancient cross. We were, however, unable to spare 
 the time for visiting these places, and so after our survey of the fall 
 hurried back to Sallins, where we dispensed with the further use of 
 our jaunting car, and its loquacious and communicative driver, and 
 betook ourselves to the railway train for the purpose of visiting, 
 previous to our return to Dublin, two or three places that lay a little 
 further south. 
 
 A rapid ride of a dozen miles, during the earlier of which the 
 railway ran along the western bank of the Liffey, and during the later 
 skirted the western boundary of the far-famed Curragh, took us to the 
 city of Kildare. The Curragh of Kildare is an undulating plain, about 
 six miles in length and two in breadth, and contains about 6000 acres, 
 unequalled perhaps in the world for the exceeding softness, elasticity, 
 and verdure of the turf, and is the property of the Crown. This plain, 
 originally standing in the centre of a large forest which comprehended 
 the middle of the country, was in pagan days sacred to heathen super- 
 stition. At its extremity, where the city now stands, early in the 
 sixth century, St. Bridgit, previously a heathen vestal, founded on her 
 
THE CITY OF KILDARE. 
 
 51 
 
 conversion, with the assistance of St. Conlaeth, a church and monaster) - , 
 and afterwards a nunnery, near which she kept the sacred fire burning 
 in a cell in accordance with the pagan custom. The Curragh has for 
 some years been the scene of a permanent military encampment similar 
 to that at Aldershot near London, and has accommodation for 12,000 
 troops, whose block huts are visible from the railway. This, however, 
 is not the first time that it has been appropriated to military uses, for 
 in 1646 it was occupied by forces under General Preston, in 1783 by 
 volunteers, and in 1804 by 30,000 insurgents. Races are also held here 
 four times a year, in April, June, September, and October, and take 
 the first rank in Ireland, owing to the peculiar springiness of the turf, 
 and the facilities offered to spectators. 
 
 The little city of Kildare, (chille-dara, the wood of oaks) possesses 
 no attractions for the visitor beyond its archaeological remains, and the 
 extensive view that it commands from its elevated and open position 
 on a ridge of hills. From it may be observed, in the north-east, the 
 Hill of Allen, situated in the bog of that name, Dunmurry Hill, and 
 the Grange, on which is the Chair of Kildare ; and a wide range of 
 the rich and beautiful country lying to the south. In its early 
 history we find Kildare was a city renowned for saints. The monastery 
 St. Bridgit founded here was for both sexes. To it Black Hugh 
 retired from the throne of Leinster in 638, and afterwards became its 
 abbot and bishop of Kildare, " one of the few instances on record of 
 a crown and sceptre being resigned for a mitre and crozier."* Eiglitigin, 
 abbot and bishop of Kildare, was killed by a priest as he was cele- 
 brating mass at the altar of St. Bridgit in 756, " since which time no 
 priest whatsoever was allowed to celebrate mass in that church in the 
 presence of a bishop." The old cathedral was a cruciform structure, of 
 which little now remains but the choir, used as a parish church. Near 
 to it is a cell, in which it is alleged that the sacred fire kindled by 
 St. Bridgit, is said to have burnt without intermission until the thirteenth 
 century, when it was extinguished by Henry de Loundres, Archbishop 
 of Dublin, but was subsequently relighted, and continued to burn until 
 
 * The first bishop was St. Conlaeth, who died in 519. In accordance with the act of 1833, the Pro- 
 testant diocese was united to that of Dublin on its voidance in 1848. In the Roman Catholic Church the 
 see of Kildare has been enlarged by that of Leighlin, with the Episcopal residence at Carlow. 
 
52 
 
 THE UPPER LIFFEY AND BEYOND KILDARE. 
 
 the general suppression of monasteries. Close to the church is a 
 Round Tower, of the remarkable height of 130 feet, having a fine 
 ornamented doorway, 14 feet from the ground, but surmounted with a 
 sort of parapet or battlement in place of the original conical top. 
 Antiquaries consider this tower to have been of great age even in the 
 twelfth century. Here too, is a castle erected by Lord William de 
 Vesey in the thirteenth century; and, on the south side of the town, 
 the remains of a monastery founded by him for gray friars. A parlia- 
 ment was held in Kildare in 1309; the place was taken by the Marquis 
 of Ormond in June, 1649 ; and it was the scene of a defeat of the 
 Irish insurgents, May 29, 1798. 
 
 From Kildare, the main line of the railway proceeds in a south- 
 westerly direction on its way to Cork and intermediate places already 
 visited by us, while a branch leads almost directly south to Carlow 
 and Wexford, running down the valley of the Barrow, which after 
 flowing for some distance eastwardly from its source in the Slieve 
 Bloom Mountains, in Queen's County, makes an elbow and trends to 
 the south a little below Kildare. We took this latter route to Carlow, 
 26 miles further south, passing a little over midway the assize town of 
 Athy, and the largest in the county. From its having been in early 
 days a sort of neutral ground, the site of a ford, and a frontier town 
 of the Pale, Athy has been the scene of many a bitter contest, and it 
 has in turn been burnt by the Irish in 1308, plundered by the Scots 
 under Edward Bruce in 131 5, occupied by the Irish under O'Neill in 
 1648, and two years later by the Parliamentary army. A turreted castle, 
 erected early in the fourteenth century, still exists and overlooks the 
 bridge, which bears the name of Crom-aboo, from the ancient war cry 
 of the Fitzgeralds. Two spots of great historical interest lie in the 
 vicinity. One of these is the ancient Carmen, now termed Mullimast, 
 or Mullach Masteau, "the moat of decapitation," whither in the time 
 of Elizabeth the neighboring Irish chiefs were invited by some 
 adventurers to have their mutual animosities and grievances redressed, and 
 where, it is said, they were all assassinated ; and in such detestation has the 
 act been held "that the country people believe, to this day, a descendant 
 from the murderers never saw his son arrive at the age of twenty-one." 
 It was, too. at the Rath of Mullimast, O'Connell held one of his great 
 
CARLO W AND ITS HISTORICAL SCENES. 
 
 53 
 
 "monster meetings," and was presented with the crown-shaped cap he 
 occasionally wore in public. The other is " the moat of Ascul," where 
 in 1 3 1 5, a sanguinary conflict ensued between the Scots, under Edward 
 Bruce, in behalf of Irish freedom, and the English, under Sir Raymond 
 le Gros, in which the latter were defeated. 
 
 Carlow (Ceithiarloch, four-fold lake) is the chief town of the county 
 of the same name, next to Louth, the smallest in Ireland. It is situ- 
 ated on its extreme west, and is connected by a bridge over the Barrow 
 with Graique, which, though in the adjoining Queen's County, may be 
 said to constitute part of the town. Carlow lies in the midst of a 
 well cultivated and very fertile district, presenting in great measure 
 the cheerful aspect of a modern town, and is watered not only by the 
 Barrow but by its affluent the Burren, which flows through its centre. 
 And yet, though it possesses few ancient remains, it is a place of con- 
 siderable antiquity, for Hugh De Lacy, lord-deputy of Ireland, erected 
 a castle in it in 1 1 79, to protect the Anglo-Norman settlers from the 
 Irish. It was made a borough in 1208, fortified in 1362 by the Duke 
 of Clarence, who established the exchequer of the kingdom in the town, 
 and held for a considerable time in 1397-8 by Donald Mac Art, who 
 styled himself King of Leinster. The castle was captured in 1494 by 
 James, brother of the Earl of Kildare ; was occupied in 1534 by Lord 
 Thomas Fitzgerald during his rebellion ; was besieged by Rory Oge 
 O'More, and compelled to surrender in 1577, when the town's people 
 were inhumanly massacred; was held in 1642 by Cromwell, for a brief 
 time, and in 1650 alternately by the contending parties, till it was finally 
 occupied by the Parliamentary forces under Ireton ; while to complete 
 the military history of the town we may add that the Irish were on 
 May 24th, 1798, defeated near to it with great slaughter. The only 
 remains of the castle, comprise two corner towers about 60 feet in 
 height, with a connecting wall. Of it, however, at the close of the 
 last century, wrote Sewaid, "On an eminence, overhanging the river 
 Barrow, stands an old castle of an oblong square area, with large round 
 towers at each angle, which has a fine effect;" but in 1814 a physician, 
 desirous of utilizing the spot for a lunatic asylum, applied gunpowder 
 to the walls of the old fortress in order to reduce their thickness, but 
 so effectually as to almost totally demolish the structure. It is to be 
 
5i 
 
 THE UPPER LIFFEY AND BEYOND KILDARE. 
 
 hoped that this crazy doctor's friends were enabled to provide him with 
 a suitable institution. 
 
 Carlow possesses the numerous public buildings and institutions 
 incident to a county town, the principal of which, the court house, has 
 a most attractive front, consisting of a Doric portico, designed after that 
 of the Parthenon at Athens. It is also, as we have stated, the Episcopal 
 residence of the Roman Catholic bishop of the diocese of Kildare, whose 
 cathedral is a handsome cruciform building in the pointed style, and has 
 over its ornamented western front a lofty tower surmounted by a lantern, 
 151 feet high. The interior contains a monument, produced at Rome 
 by Hogan, to the late celebrated Dr. Doyle, bishop of the diocese, whose 
 remains are interred at the foot of the altar. It represents the bishop 
 with prostrate Ireland weeping by his side, and its execution obtained 
 for the sculptor election into the Institute of the Virtuosi of the 
 Pantheon (the oldest society of the kind in Europe), his name being 
 that of the first native of the British Isles ever inserted in the sacred 
 roll. The honor will be better appreciated when it is stated that the 
 society consists of only 45 members, chosen in equal proportions from 
 amongst the most eminent of the world's sculptors, painters, and architects. 
 Close to the cathedral stands a Roman Catholic college, opened in 1 793 
 for the education of divinity students. It is a large, handsome building, 
 situated in a pleasant wooded park of 34 acres, past which the Barrow 
 lazily glides. The town also contains a handsome Protestant Episcopal 
 church, with lofty and elegant spire, and several other places of worship. 
 Its population was, in 1871, 8344, and it returns one member to the 
 British Parliament, but before the Union it sent two representatives to 
 the Irish House of Commons. The trade of Carlow is principally in 
 grain and in the manufacture of flour, which it is enabled to transport 
 down the Barrow to the port of New Ross and Waterford and up that 
 river to Athy, where a branch of the Grand Canal gives it a waterway 
 to Dublin. 
 
 The distance between Carlow and Dublin by railway is 56 miles, 
 and we now return by that iron pathway to the capital, stepping off 
 the train, however, five miles from our destination, for the purpose of 
 viewing the Round Tower at Clondalkin, generally taken in a jaunting 
 car expedition from the city. The pillar, though one of the plainest 
 
ROUND TOWER OF CLONDALKIN. 
 
 55 
 
 in the kingdom, is perhaps the most visited, in consequence of its 
 proximity to the metropolis It is, however, in an excellent state of 
 preservation, is about 85 feet in height, 15 feet in diameter, and like 
 many others of its kind has a doorway 12 feet from the ground, and 
 four square openings or windows near the summit, which like them 
 also is capped by a conical stone roof. The interior presents no traces 
 of a staircase, but steps have been raised to enable the visitor to reach 
 the uppermost story, from whose orifices extremely fine prospects are 
 obtained of the surrounding country. Though the tower is firmly 
 built, it was thought advisable, during the close of the last century, to 
 encase its base for about a dozen feet in height in strong mason work, 
 so that it might better withstand the assaults of time. And it is most 
 fortunate that it was thus judiciously guarded, for a few years after the 
 addition a catastrophe occurred that, but for the protection afforded, 
 must have levelled it to the ground. Some extensive powder mills in 
 the neighborhood exploded, and the tower stood uninjured, though the 
 village was almost laid in ruins, and, to quote a journal of the day, 
 '• the earth seemed to shake from the very centre, and ponderous 
 masses of many tons in weight were cast to the distance of five or 
 six fields." Here was once a bishop's see, called Cluain Dolcain, 
 eventually merged in that of Dublin. It was founded by the abbot 
 St. Mochua, who flourished in the seventh century, and, though an 
 ecclesiastical establishment of importance, nothing now remains of the 
 old abbey, which it is certain was founded here, the only remnants 
 of antiquity being the tower and a granite cross in the church yard. 
 Amloffe, the Dane, who was crowned King of Dublin by his followers 
 in 852, built for himself a royal residence at Clondalkin, and it has 
 been assumed by some who are dear to the theory of the Danish 
 origin of Round Towers, that it is not improbable but that the one 
 here pertained to the rude palace of the rude king. The place con- 
 tinued to be a favorite residence of the barbarian invaders while they 
 maintained their sway in Ireland." 
 
 Of the Round Towers of Ireland we spoke at some length in an 
 
 * One of the most famous duels ever fought in Ireland came off at Clondalkin ; it took place in 1815 
 between Daniel O'Connell and Mr. D'Esterre, and arose from a political quarrel. It resulted in Mr. D'Esterre 
 being shot dead, and in Mr. O'Connell registering a vow, frequently referred to in public life afterwards, that 
 he would thenceforth refuse to be a party to similar rencontres. 
 
56 
 
 THE UPPER LIFFEY AND BEYOND KILDARE. 
 
 early chapter of this work, and it is therefore unnecessary for us to 
 dilate further upon the mystery attached to their origin. We cannot, 
 however, refrain from quoting some remarks on the subject made by 
 Sir John Forbes in his interesting narrative of Irish travel: "Of all 
 the relics of antiquity still preserved in Ireland — I had almost said in 
 Europe — there are none which, in my mind, can vie in point of 
 attractiveness with these towers. No one who sees but once their 
 beautiful, lofty, and slender shafts shooting up into the sky, and dom- 
 inating in solitary grandeur the surrounding landscape — all strikingly 
 resembling one another, and resembling nothing else — but must be struck 
 with admiration and curiosity of the liveliest kind. And yet these 
 primary feelings are but slight in degree^ when compared with those 
 which are excited by the consideration of all the extraordinary circum- 
 stances involved in their history. That these towers have existed for 
 upwards of a thousand years is certain, that they may have existed 
 twice or thrice that period is far from improbable ; but that the 
 era of their origin and the object of their erection remain as secrets 
 yet to be unfolded, are circumstances which only add to the mysterious 
 interest which attaches to them." 
 
MARINO AND CLONTARF. 
 
 5? 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE SEABOARD ENVIRONS OF DUBLIN. 
 
 Marino — Clontarf and its Battle Ground — Malahide Castle — The Widowed Bride — Lambay — 
 Ireland's Eye — Howth Castle and its valiant Possessors — The Stolen Heir — Howth Harbor 
 and ancient Abbey — Bailey Lighthouse — Historical Importance of the Promontory — View 
 of Dublin Bay — Kingstaivn and its fine Harbor — Dalkey Atmospheric Railway — Killiney 
 Hill and the view therefrom — Mock Kingdom of Dalkey — Killiney Village and Bay — 
 Ballybrack — Bray — Kilruddery House — Bray Head and its prospect — Mount Anville — 
 Donnybrook Fair. 
 
 THE environs to the east of Dublin present a very different aspect 
 to those on its west, as here the ocean and the bay, with their 
 greater and lesser expanses of water, form not only component, but 
 prominent parts in nearly every picture. Thanks to the ample accom- 
 modations furnished by frequent railway trains, we were enabled to 
 survey these environs by their aid, supplemented by that of a jaunting 
 car or two to visit outlying places. Turning our steps then first 
 towards Malahide, nine miles to the northeast, we took the train at 
 the Amiens Street Station, passed over a portion of the city by a 
 viaduct, and over the Royal Canal by an iron bridge, and soon found 
 ourselves traversing Clontarf sands on an embankment, which afforded us 
 on the left pictures of many suburban residences, while on the right 
 we had a fine panorama of the harbor and its shipping, of the whole 
 extent of Dublin Bay and of its opposite shore, with the Dublin and 
 Wicklow Mountains in the background. On the left, too, we saw the 
 entrance gateway to the beautiful demesne of Marino, with its lofty 
 Doric temple built by Sir W. Chambers, until recently the property of 
 the Earl of Charlemont, but purchased shortly before his death by the 
 late Cardinal Cullen for the uses of a ladies' home ; while on the 
 right we also had the pleasant little village of Clontarf, with its castle, 
 
 H.-37 
 
58 
 
 THE SEABOARD ENVIRONS OF DUBLIN. 
 
 a modern structure of the Norman style, built on the site of the 
 ancient castle of the Vernons, long owners of the land. 
 
 Clontarf (Chiain-tarf, meadow of bulls), is a name noted in Irish 
 annals, for on its plain was fought on Good Friday, April 23d, 1014, 
 that memorable and decisive battle between Sitric, King of the Ostmen, 
 and Brian Boroimhe, which, though it destroyed the domination of the 
 Danes in Ireland, lost the country its popular monarch and 11,000 of 
 the flower of his army. And such was the respect with which the 
 Irish king was held, that after his death his body was treated by the 
 ecclesiastics with marked distinction. It was, we read, in accordance 
 with his will, " conveyed to Armagh. First, the clergy of Swords* in 
 solemn procession brought it to their abbey, from thence the next 
 morning the clergy of Damliag (Duleck) conducted it to the church of 
 St. Kiaran. Here the clergy of Louth (Lughmach) attended the corpse 
 to their own monastery. The Archbishop of x^rmagh with his suffragans 
 and clergy received the body at Louth, whence it was conveyed to 
 their cathedral. For twelve days and nights it was watched by the 
 clergy, during which time there was a continual scene of prayers and 
 devotion." It was at Clontarf that O'Connell called his last " monster 
 repeal meeting" to be held on Sunday, October 8, 1843; but the 
 preparations included a body of " repeal cavalry," and had such a 
 military air that the government interfered, and issued a proclamation 
 on the previous day warning persons against endangering the public 
 peace by attending the meeting, which led to O'Connell countermanding 
 the same and the public generally absenting themselves. 
 
 Continuing our course we ran for a time through a deep cutting, 
 having half a mile to our right Artane, in 1534 the scene of the 
 murder of Cardinal Wolsey's protege, John Allen, Archbishop of Dublin, 
 while flying from the resentment of Lord Thomas Fitzgerald, and which 
 event is supposed to have resulted from the misconception of a com- 
 mand given by the latter to his retainers ; and then hurried on to 
 
 * Swords lies three miles to the west of Malahide, and was anciently an ecclesiastical place of note, a 
 church, founded there by St. Columb in 512, having subsequently been made the seat of a bishopric by St. 
 Finian. It contains a Round Tower 73 feet high, complete with conical cap, and possessing a doorway three 
 feet above, and a similar aperture 20 feet above the ground ; and an embattled and turretcd castle, once the 
 archiepiscopal residence of the prelates of Dublin, which along with the town is said to have been destroyed no less 
 than four times by the Danes. Previous to the Union the town returned two members to the Irish Parliament. 
 
M ALA HIDE AND ITS CASTLE. 
 
 59 
 
 Malahide, passing the junction, whence a short branch line shoots 
 eastward to Howth and Ireland's Eye. 
 
 Malahide stands in a very secluded spot upon a creek of the Irish 
 sea, and promised at one time to become an important sea-port, in 
 consequence of the inlet on whose margin it stands possessing sufficient 
 depth to admit vessels of considerable tonnage, and from its being 
 guarded against the violence of storms by the adjacent islands of 
 Lambay and Ireland's Eye, and thus rendered a safe asylum in all 
 states of the weather. " These advantages," says Wright, " were fully 
 appreciated by our ancestors, and the preference given to the little cove 
 of Malahide excited the keen envy of the corporation of Dublin, who 
 caused a fine to be imposed upon Sir Peter Talbot, of Malahide 
 Castle, for suffering vessels to break bulk at this port, contrary to the 
 king's grants made to the city of Dublin." Previous to the opening 
 of the Dublin & Drogheda Railway, Malahide was mainly the abode 
 of fishermen, who derived profit and the village fame from the excellent 
 quality of the oysters it supplied to the Dublin market. It is now, 
 however, much resorted to by sea-bathers, who find accommodations in 
 a commodious hotel and several large and handsome boarding-houses. 
 But the most attractive feature in the place is the castle, the ivy-clad 
 baronial residence of the Talbots, originally erected in the reign ot 
 Henry II.. but subjected at various times to much re-edification, in 
 which, however, the ancient character of the building has been retained. 
 
 The lordship of Malahide was granted by Henry II. to Richard 
 Talbot, an ancestor of the present proprietor, the Earl of Shrewsbury 
 and Talbot, and the eldest representative of Sir Geoffrey Talbot, who 
 held Hereford Castle against King Stephen for the Empress Maud. 
 He was contemporary with Sir Amoricus, of Howth, of whom we shall 
 shortly speak, and other bold adventurers, who sought acquisitions by 
 the sword at a time when disorganization amongst the inhabitants 
 appears to have left their country an easy prey. Of all the successful 
 warriors whose grants were confirmed and enjoyed by their descendants, 
 the Talbots and St. Lawrences alone continue in possession — attainder 
 dispossessed some, improvidence impoverished others. The first Talbot 
 who settled here was induced by his piety to grant away a portion of 
 his estate, called Mallagh-hide-beg, to the Abbey of St. Mary's in Dublin. 
 
60 
 
 THE SEABOARD ENVIRONS OF DUBLIN. 
 
 It may be mentioned, in continuation of the family history, that Thomas 
 Talbot was summoned to parliament in 1372, by the style and title of 
 Lord Talbot de Mallagh-hide ; and that in the year 1475, by a grant of 
 Edward IV., in addition to the different manorial rights and privileges 
 of holding courts leet and baron within his lordship, the Lord of 
 Malahide was created high-admiral of the seas, with power to hear and 
 determine upon all offenses committed upon the high seas or elsewhere, 
 by the tenants, vassals, or residents of the manor of Malahide. In the 
 dark records of 1641 Thomas Talbot was proclaimed an outlaw, for 
 having been a participator in the Irish rebellion ; and, in 1653, a lease 
 was granted of the hall of his forefathers, together with five hundred 
 acres of land, for a period of seven years, to Myles Corbet, the regicide, 
 who for some time sustained the weight of his guilt within its walls. 
 
 The exterior of the castle appears venerable, and the principal front 
 displays much grandeur. The latter consists of a centre of strong 
 masonry pierced with windows, flanked by two lofty, handsome drum 
 towers, finished with a graduated parapet, The entrance is through a 
 low pointed doorway in the northern front, giving access by a spiral 
 staircase to the oak parlor, represented in our view of the Interior of 
 a Room in Malahide Castle. This ancient apartment is the most 
 interesting in this spacious and comfortable residence ; it is lined with 
 dark oak highly polished, divided into small compartments, and orna- 
 mented with rich carvings of figures in small life, chiefly scriptural 
 subjects. It is asserted that during the possession of the castle by 
 the regicide the little effigy of the Blessed Virgin, which occupied the 
 panel immediately above the chimney-piece, miraculously disappeared, and 
 that in a manner equally unaccountable it returned to its position upon 
 Corbet's flight from Malahide. A window, whose light is derived 
 through the medium of the stained glass that adorns it, augments the 
 gloomy effect produced by the solemn character of the architectural 
 decorations, and reminds the spectator of the proud spirits of these 
 halls that have passed away from their earthly grandeur. Other ages 
 find here their illustration in coats-of-mail, visors, gauntlets, and greaves 
 of ponderous cast, exhibited to the curious. The other state apartments 
 are spacious, yet comfortable, but have lost much of their interest by 
 being deprived of all their original furniture and decorations. 
 
" THE BRIDAL OF MALAHIDE." 
 
 B1 
 
 The paintings which adorn the walls of the castle are of the 
 highest merit ; and the manner of their acquisition confers upon them 
 a deep degree of interest The portraits of Charles I. and his queen 
 are by Vandyke ; of James II. and his queen by Sir Peter Lely. A 
 fascinating portrait of the Duchess of Portsmouth, together with one of 
 her son, the first Duke of Richmond, were the gifts of that celebrated 
 lady to Mrs. Wogan. from whom they have passed as heirlooms to the 
 present owner. There are also a half-length of King James' faithful 
 adherent, Talbot, Duke of Tyrconnel. and portraits of his daughters, by 
 Sir Peter Lely, and one of Queen Anne, by Sir Godfrey Kneller. But 
 the chef-d'oeuvre of this collection is an exquisite painting by Albert 
 Durer, intended for an altar-piece, and representing the Nativity, 
 Adoration, and Circumcision, divided, as was his manner, into compart- 
 ments. It originally belonged to Man*. Queen of Scots, whose oratory 
 at Holyrood it is said to have decorated, and was purchased for ^2000 
 by Charles II.. who presented it to the Duchess of Portsmouth, while 
 she was in high favor at court. There are also several portraits by 
 Canaletti, Cuyp. Vandyke, and other celebrated painters. 
 
 Near to the castle, and embowered in a thick grove of chestnuts, 
 that in their leaf)* honors cast a melancholy gloom upon the picture, 
 are the roofless ruins of a venerable abbey — silent, sad, and solitary ; 
 its seclusion made more striking by a low and lonely tomb standing 
 in its centre, and bearing the recumbent effigy, in the costume of the 
 fifteenth century, of Maud, daughter of Baron Plunkett of Killeen. who 
 in early life was betrothed to the young Lord of Galtrim. and became 
 the heroine of Griffin's charming- ballad. "The Bridal of Malahide": 
 
 " Before the high altar young Maud stands arrayed, 
 With accents that falter her promise is made, 
 
 From falluT and mother forever to part, 
 7:r ir.i zzztz :: ~zzszr± htr Lear:. 
 
 " The words are repeated — the bridal is done, 
 Tzt rite .. — z.i.ti — ±e — : izzy ire :z.z : 
 The tow, it is spoken all pore from the heart, 
 T~zz: ~z.i: -:: be trtket: till life i'r.L'. itzisz. 
 
 ' Kiri: ~:i tie ;it - -'- - - :; — -i^= : iitir -=- t 
 
 L:~i ir:=-:i ir irztr ::— t ~'-z'lz.z ~-i=s. 
 
THE SEABOARD ENVIRONS OF DUBLIN. 
 
 As wakes the good shepherd, the watchful and bold, 
 When the ounce or the leopard is seen in the fold, 
 So rises already the chief in his mail, 
 While the new-married lady looks fainting and pale. 
 ***** 
 
 " Hark ! loud from the mountain 'tis Victory's cry, 
 O'er woodland and fountain it rings to the sky, 
 The foe has retreated — he flies to the shore, 
 The spoilers defeated — the combat is o'er. 
 
 " With foreheads unruffled the conquerors come; 
 But why have they muffled the lance and the drum ? 
 What form do they carry aloft on his shield ? 
 And where does he tarry, the lord of the field? 
 
 " Ye saw him at morning, how gallant and gay, 
 In bridal adorning, the star of the day : 
 Now weep for the lover — his triumph is sped, 
 His hope it is over — the chieftain is dead. 
 
 " But O for the maiden who mourns for that chief, 
 With heart overladen and rending with grief, 
 She sinks on the meadow in one morning tide, 
 A wife and a widow, a maid and a bride." 
 
 The lady, however, lived long enough to assuage her grief by two 
 subsequent marriages, her third husband being Sir Richard Talbot, of 
 Malahide. 
 
 The scenery around the castle is of a tame and sombre kind. The 
 ancient moat is filled up and transformed into a sloping bank planted 
 with shrubs, while stately timber everywhere ornaments the park. The 
 sea-view which the mansion commands is terminated and adorned by 
 the picturesque island of Lambay, rising with much boldness for over 
 400 feet above the water, about three miles from the coast, and 
 occupying an area of about a square mile. This islet possesses some 
 good pasturage, is inhabited by about 100 persons, and is occasionally 
 visited by its proprietor, Lord Talbot of Malahide, when he occupies 
 an ancient, small, polygonal castle, said to have been built for defence by 
 John Challoner, about the middle of the sixteenth century, and some 
 years ago rescued from ruin to form a sporting lodge. Mr. Dalton, in 
 his " History of the County of Dublin," states " that so early as the days 
 of Pliny Lambay was known by the name of Limnus or Limni, and 
 that in 11 84 Prince John bestowed it on the see of Dublin, an 
 
HILL AND CASTLE OF HOWTH. 
 
 R3 
 
 endowment which Pope Clement the Third confirmed in 118S. In 1551 
 it was, with the consent of Christ's Church, let to John Challoner, and 
 in the time of Elizabeth to Sir William Ussher, ancestor to the 
 celebrated primate Ussher. The latter is said to have retired there 
 during the continuance of a plague in Dublin, and during his abode 
 to have composed some of his works." 
 
 The railway proceeds from Malahide to Drogheda, but as there is 
 little of interest between those two places, and as we proposed to 
 approach the latter by the course of the Boyne, we now returned 
 towards Dublin, and midway, at the junction, switched off for between 
 three and four miles to Howth. The views, both coastwise and 
 inland, as we swept along the short branch line, were singularly 
 attractive ; and, as we approached the promontory of Howth, the shores 
 became bold and rugged, but picturesque. The peninsula, or, as it is 
 usually called, the Hill of Howth, juts into the sea and forms the 
 northern headland of Dublin Bay, the little town and harbor with the 
 Castle of Howth being pleasantly situated on the northern side of 
 the peninsula, and under the shelter of the hill which rises precipit- 
 ously behind them. The town, or more properly the village, consists 
 of one straggling street, and, like Malahide, was in late years almost 
 the sole abode of hardv fishermen, but is now in summer time a 
 favorite resort of those who woo the sfoddess of health through the 
 medium of the breezes and waters of the ocean. Viewed from a 
 favorable point on the commanding eminence of the hill, the white 
 battlements of the venerable castle are seen emerging from the thick 
 woods in which it is embosomed ; lower down the square tower of 
 Howth Church shows itself above the trees ; and beyond these the 
 harbor and piers, the sea-worn islands of Ireland's Eye* and Lambay, 
 
 * Ireland's Eye, a rocky islet lying about a mile from the north side of the Hill of Howth, is only 53 acres 
 in extent. Its ancient name was Inis-mac-Nessan, the " Isle of the Sons of Nessan." Its present name seems 
 to have been derived from the Danes, in whose language "Ey" signifies an island; hence, Lambey, Anglesey, 
 Jersey, etc. A huge rock, on its eastern extremity, evidently riven asunder by some convulsion of nature, pre- 
 sents a very singular appearance. The ruins of a small abbey, with a portion of a Round Tower attached, said 
 to have been built by St. Nessan or his sons in the sixth or seventh century, still exists. In this quiet sanctuary 
 was preserved the celebrated book of the Four Gospels, called "The Garland of Howth," which, according to 
 Archbishop Alan, was "held in so much esteem and veneration that good men scarcely dare take an oath on it 
 for fear of the judgments of God being immediately shown on those who should forswear themselves." To the 
 southward of Ireland's Eye is a smaller islet of about one acre, called Thulla, and connected with it by a sub- 
 merged reef, over which the angry waters sometimes foam with considerable turbulence. 
 
64 
 
 THE SEABOARD ENVIRONS OF DUBLIN. 
 
 and the vast expanse of sea constantly enlivened by the appearance of 
 ships and boats under sail, form a picture whose scene is varied as it 
 is beautiful and extensive. 
 
 Howth Castle, situated west of the village and immediately above 
 the railway station, is the venerable mansion of the ancient family of 
 St. Lawrence, ennobled in 1 1 77 by the baronial title of Howth, and 
 advanced to an earldom in 1767. It is an object of considerable 
 antiquarian and pictorial interest. The estate it was constructed to 
 protect includes the whole romantic peninsula of Howth, and, unlike 
 most Irish estates, has continued in the family without increase or 
 diminution for upwards of seven centuries. The castle, which from 
 repeated alterations contains little of its original character, is a long, 
 plain, embattled edifice, flanked by square towers. The entrance hall 
 is spacious, and approached from the courtyard by an external flight 
 of steps leading to a terrace on the level of the principal apartments, 
 of which the drawing room commands a fine view of a portion of the 
 park and of the craggy rocks surrounding it. 
 
 The great ancestor of the Howth family was the valorous Sir 
 Amoricus Tristram,* one of the first Anglo-Norman adventurers, who 
 obtained by conquest the lands and title of the estate. It is recorded 
 that in 1189, when the Irish resolved upon an effort to regain their 
 country upon the recall of De Courcy from the government, and upon 
 the latter being in danger, Sir Amoricus, then in Connaught, desired 
 to hasten to his assistance, for which purpose he set out accompanied 
 by 30 knights and 200 footmen. But O'Connor, king of Connaught, 
 understanding his design, assembled all his forces to intercept his 
 march, and unperceived surrounded his devoted band. Sir Amoricus 
 
 * The original name of the family is said to have been Tristram, and its great founder a Knight of the 
 " Round Table." The name was changed in consequence of the vow of one of its members, who fought with 
 the Danes at Clontarf, to assume that of his patron saint if he obtained the victory. This he did, and was 
 thence called St. Lawrence. In the year 1177, when Sir John De Courcy was ordered to Ireland, he entered 
 into an agreement with Sir Amoricus Tristram, a worthy knight and his brother-in-law, that "whatever they 
 should win in any land, either by service or otherwise, they should divide between them." They landed at 
 Howth, where they were opposed by the Irish, whom they defeated ; and the victory being mainly attributable 
 to the valor and skill of Amorey, the title and lands of Howth were allotted to him ; but they were dearly 
 purchased, for he lost in the encounter "seven sons, uncles, and nephews." The Bridge of Evora, where the 
 battle is said to have been fought, crosses a mountain stream that falls into the sea on the north side of 
 Howth, nearly opposite the west end of Ireland's Eye. — Hall. 
 
HOWTH CASTLE AND ITS ASSOCIATIONS. 
 
 66 
 
 animated his men to attack the enemy ; but, perceiving that some of 
 his horsemen seemed inclined to preserve themselves in flight, dis- 
 mounted, and drawing his sword exclaimed, " Who will may preserve 
 his life by flight on horseback, but assuredly my heart will not suffer 
 me to leave these, my poor friends, with whom I would sooner die in 
 honor than live with you in dishonor." And then thrusting his sword 
 into his horse's side declared that he should never serve against those 
 whom he had thus far so truly and worthily served. The example 
 was followed by all the horsemen except two. who were ordered to 
 proceed to a neighboring hill, where they were to watch the issue of 
 the unequal conflict and carry information thereof to the chieftain's 
 brother. The enemy, said to be 20,000 strong, were then met with 
 such desperate energy that one thousand were slain ; but the numbers 
 were so overpowering that Sir Amoricus and his brave followers 
 perished to a man. There is another well known and romantic 
 tradition connected with this family, the story of which we will give 
 in the words of Dr. Walsh : " The celebrated Grana Uille, or Grace 
 O'Malley, noted for her piratical depredations in the reign of Elizabeth, 
 returning on a certain time from England, where she had paid a visit 
 to the Virgin Queen, landed at Howth and proceeded to the castle. 
 It was the hour of dinner, but the gates were shut. Shocked at an 
 exclusion so repugnant to her notions of Irish hospitality, she imme- 
 diately proceeded to the shore where the young lord was at nurse, 
 and seizing the child she embarked with him and sailed to Connaught, 
 where her own castle stood. After a time, however, she restored the 
 child, with the express stipulation that the gates should be thrown 
 open when the family went to dinner — a practice which is observed to 
 this day." A painting illustrative of this event is exhibited in the 
 castle. There is also to be seen in the hall a collection of weapons, 
 and amongst them the two-handed sword said to have been wielded 
 •by the ancestor who won renown and the name of St. Lawrence at 
 the battle of Clontarf. 
 
 The harbor of Howth, which lies just below the castle, encloses an 
 area of 52 statute acres, and was constructed in 1807, according to the 
 plans of the celebrated civil engineer John Rennie, at a cost of about 
 half a million pounds. Its entrance is marked by a lighthouse, and it 
 11.— 33 
 
66 
 
 THE SEABOARD ENVIRONS OF DUBLIN. 
 
 was originally intended as a station for the Holyhead mail-packets, when 
 sailing vessels were employed in that service ; but since the introduction 
 of steamers, and the completion of the harbor at Kingstown, the packet 
 station has been transferred to the latter place, and that of Howth has 
 been abandoned to fishermen, who, however, make it a busy spot, some- 
 times crowding it with as many as 700 boats. These constantly land 
 immense "takes" of cod-fish and herrings, which are salted down in 
 barrels and immediately despatched to Liverpool and other English 
 ports. It was at Howth that George IV. landed, August 12, 182 1, 
 upon his noted visit to his Irish dominions. 
 
 The ancient abbey of Howth is romantically situated on a cliff 
 overhanging the ocean, and is said to have been founded in 1235 by 
 Luke, Archbishop of Dublin, on the removal of the prebendal church 
 from Ireland's Eye. The most beautiful portion is an eastern triplet 
 window, which with the ruined belfry is probably the oldest. The 
 interior contains some monuments to the Lords of Howth, many of 
 whom have here found a last resting place. The church is dedicated 
 to the Blessed Virgin, hence styled St. Mary's, and being surrounded 
 by a strong embattled wall presents a striking evidence of the semi- 
 religious, semi-military character of sacred places at the period of its 
 erection, and affords an index to the general state of society at that time. 
 
 The promontory of Howth is two and a half miles in length by 
 two miles in breadth, and contains an area of about 2600 statute acres. 
 It is, in fact, a peninsula, being connected with the mainland by a 
 sandy isthmus three quarters of a mile in width, traversed by the road 
 and railway. Its surface is varied, the lands of its shore being mainly 
 arable, while in the centre it is elevated and rocky, the ridge of the 
 hills being extremely diversified, and the summit attaining an altitude 
 of 563 feet above the sea level. The " big Hill of Howth," as it is 
 not unfrequently called,* rises immediately behind the village and gives 
 
 * "By the big hill of Howth, 
 
 That's a lump of an oath." — Irish Song. 
 
 The history of the Hill of Howth, (anciently called Ben Heder, or Benadar, the Mountain of Birds) 
 is, according to Keating, coeval with the flood. A chieftain of the race of Japhet, named Parthelon, 
 soon alter took possession of Ireland. He held sway over the country for 30 years, when he and his 
 whole race were swept away by a plague, the Hill of Howth being the scene of its most awful ravages. 
 
THE BIG HILL OF HOIVTH. 
 
 its name to the entire peninsula. Of its early history the poet has sung : — 
 
 "Fair hill, on thee great Finn of old 
 Was wont his counsels sage to hold ; 
 On thee rich bowls the Fenians crowned, 
 And passed the foaming beverage round. 
 
 " 'T was thine within a sea-washed cave 
 To hide and shelter Duivne brave, 
 When, snared by Grace's charms divine, 
 He bore her o'er the raging brine." 
 
 " The Hill of Howth," says Frazer, " from its projected and almost 
 isolated position on the bay, from its bold shores and elevation above 
 the sea, is a remarkable feature from the city, the sea, and all the 
 country around ; and from its rocky sides and summits the most varied, 
 the most extensive, and the most lovely views are obtained of the bay and 
 its shores, the city and the country lying around. On the east is seen 
 a boundless expanse of ocean ; on the south, the bay, its shores studded 
 with villas from the metropolis to Dalkey, a distance of nine miles, 
 with all the mountains appertaining to the counties of Dublin and 
 YVicklow stretched out in long array ; on the west, the northern 
 portion of the bay, its villa-clad shores, the city with its piers and 
 harbors backed by the trees of the fertile plain which uninterruptedly 
 stretches westward to the Atlantic ; and on the north, the great extent 
 of champaign lands, whose visual limits are the mountains of Armagh 
 and Down, and whose fiat shores are girt by the ocean, the limited 
 portion of which, before us, is beautifully diversified by the islands of 
 Lambay and Ireland's Eye." 
 
 Two roads lead from the town of Howth to the eastern extremity 
 of the peninsula, near the Baily Lighthouse, by which in a distance of 
 six miles a complete circuit can be made of it. The lighthouse is 
 situated upon a point of land at the extreme head, detached from the 
 promontory by a deep ravine, and which has obtained, from its constant 
 bright verdure, the name of the Green Baily,* signifying the " green 
 town/ Here, it is said, the remnant of the Danes who escaped from 
 
 * The name Baily is probably derived from Ballium, as an ancient stone fortress formerly occupied 
 the site of the lighthouse; "and," says Murray, "it is believed that these remains, which are still faintly 
 visible, indicated the residence of Crimthann-Niadhnair, who reigned over Ireland about the year 10, and 
 whose sepulchral cairn crowns the summit of Sliath Martin." 
 
68 
 
 THE SEABOARD ENVIRONS OF DUBLIN. 
 
 the battle of Clontarf insulated themselves by digging a fosse, and 
 defended their little fortress until they were carried off in their 
 vessels. The lighthouse stands 110 feet above high water mark, and 
 was constructed in 1814, to supersede one erected on a steep cliff close 
 by, whose light was at times rendered uncertain from the mists which 
 often obscured the head. The illuminating power of the lighthouse 
 is supplied by gas, and the light is the most intense of any upon the 
 Irish coast, being visible at sea for a distance of over twelve miles. 
 The appearance of the lighthouse upon entering the harbor is very 
 striking, apparently standing on an insulated rock ; while the view from 
 its galleries is equally fine, and affords a magnificent panorama of 
 Dublin Bay, the numerous villages that dot its southern shore, and the 
 line of coast southward to Bray Head, with, at its very foot, the fatal 
 rocks upon which the " Queen Victoria," Liverpool and Dublin steamer, 
 struck in February, 1853. That melancholy event occurred in a snow 
 storm, and has afforded a theme for many heart-rending stories of 
 suffering and death, for in it 59 out of 112 passengers, and the captain 
 and all his officers perished. 
 
 We had not time to visit, and it is equally impossible for us to 
 describe, even a tenth of the peculiar features, historical scenes, and 
 objects of antiquity, incident to the promontory of Howth, which, says 
 that minute and descriptive observer, Mr. Petrie, " would in itself supply 
 abundant materials for a topographical volume — and a most interesting 
 work it might be made. For the geologist, botanist, and naturalist, it 
 has an abundant store of attractions ; while its various ancient monu- 
 ments of every class and age, from the regal fortress, the sepulchral 
 cairn, and the cromlech of Pagan times, to the early Christian oratory, 
 the abbey and the baronial hall of later years, would supply an equally 
 ample stock of materials for the antiquary and the historian." 
 
 The railway which was mainly instrumental in affording us an op- 
 portunity to view the north-eastern environs of Dublin, was equally 
 available for our visit to its charming south-eastern suburbs. For this 
 latter purpose we entered one of the carriages of the Dublin and 
 Kingstown road at Westland Row, and traversed for six miles the first 
 line opened in Ireland, for its construction by William Dargan dates 
 as far back as 1834, though the extension from Kingstown to Bray 
 
DUBLIN BAY AND KINGSTOWN HARBOR. 
 
 69 
 
 was not completed until twenty years later. The line follows the curve 
 of the estuary, passing through the village of Blackrock on its shore, 
 and a ride over it for a quarter of an hour brought us to Kingstown, 
 from the elevated ground above which Mr. Bartlett has presented us 
 with a comprehensive view of Dublin Bay. The scene, depicted from 
 the spot from whence the stones used in the construction of Kings- 
 town pier have been quarried, is exceedingly beautiful. Looking across 
 the bay, here about six miles in breadth, appears the Hill of Howth, 
 with the Baily Lighthouse on its east, and on its west the flat sandy 
 isthmus which unites it to the mainland. The remainder of the shore 
 on the northern side is low, but all along studded with groups of 
 white-walled houses, behind which the land swells into gentle eminences, 
 clothed with wood, and sprinkled with the villas of the gentry. At the 
 extremity of a long straight line of wall, and apparently in the centre 
 of the bay, stands the South Wall Lighthouse, already mentioned ; 
 while nearer to the spectator the cheerful-looking streets, houses, and 
 gardens of Kingstown, with the basin of the magnificent harbor, circum- 
 scribed by its massive piers, lie distinctly mapped out beneath his feet. 
 
 Kingstown, which is properly a portion of Dublin Harbor, was in 
 the early part of the century a poor village called Dunleary, consisting 
 almost entirely of fishermen's cabins, and received its present name in 
 182 1, upon the embarkation of George IV., at the close of his mem- 
 orable visit to Ireland, to commemorate which a not very attractive 
 column has been erected on the spot where he last stood on Irish 
 ground. It was however four years before that date that the first 
 step was taken to raise the little fishing village into the popular port 
 that it has now become. The first stone of its magnificent artificial 
 harbor was laid in 181 7 by Lord Whitworth, then Lord-Lieutenant ot 
 Ireland, and the work, designed by the late John Rennie, C. E., was 
 subsequently completed at a cost of over ,£800,000. We learn from 
 Marmion's "History of the Ports of Ireland," that "the eastern pier 
 which runs into the bay, is 3500 feet long, and at the base 200 feet 
 in breadth : it terminates nearly perpendicularly on the side of the 
 harbor, and in an inclined plane towards the sea. The western pier 
 is 4950 feet in length, having an entrance of 850 feet, the whole 
 forming an area of 250 acres, varying in depth from 15 to 27 feet. 
 
70 
 
 THE SEABOARD ENVIRONS OF DUBLIN, 
 
 A quay, 40 feet wide, runs along the summit, protected by a parapet 
 eight feet high. Outside there is a beacon to mark the entrance to 
 the harbor. Close to the pier-head there is 24 feet of water at the 
 lowest spring tide, which will admit a frigate, or a merchantman of the 
 largest class, to enter its enclosure, and at two hours tide it will float 
 a first-class ship of war. On the east pier there is a tower exhibit- 
 ing a revolving light, seen every two minutes." A fort has been 
 erected around the lighthouse and from its prominent position commands 
 the entire bay, and though small, is a powerful defence should an 
 enemy come within range. On this pier there is also a monument to 
 the memory of Captain Boyd and the seamen of H. M. S. " Ajax," 
 drowned February 9, 1 861 , in attempting to save life in a great gale. 
 A broad esplanade, 500 feet in length, adjoining deep water, is called 
 the Victoria Wharf, from its having been used by the Queen upon the 
 occasion of her second visit to Ireland in 1853. The importance of 
 Kingstown Harbor began in its establishment as the Irish station for 
 the Liverpool and Dublin mail packets, and it subsequently became, 
 and remains, the station of the Dublin and Holyhead mail and other 
 large steamers exclusively employed in passenger traffic. 
 
 But in addition to its commercial position, Kingstown has become 
 a favorite place of resort not only for persons whose pleasure in the 
 ocean is satisfied by an inspection from a steady standpoint, but also 
 and especially for those who find health and recreation upon the un- 
 stable surface of the briny wave. For all these a large and elegant 
 town has sprung up within the past half-century, its houses rising tier 
 above tier, on an inclined plane, from the edge of the water to a 
 considerable elevation ; and it is to the credit of the commissioners of 
 the port that they will not permit any lofty buildings to be erected 
 near the water's edgfe to interfere with the sea-views of the residences 
 upon the higher ground. Kingstown also possesses several large hotels 
 and yacht and boating club-houses, and is annually the scene of a grand 
 regatta, one of the leading aquatic events of the kingdom, and alternately 
 conducted by the Royal St. George's and the Royal Irish Yacht Clubs. 
 Its population, according to the census of 1871, was 22,000, while that 
 of the police district, in which it is included, amounted to 30,000. 
 
 From Kingstown we proceeded by the Bray railway, which skirts 
 
VIEW FROM KILLIXEY HILL. 
 
 71 
 
 the coast, to Dalkey. The two miles of line first constructed between 
 these places were opened in 1843 for the purpose of testing the atmos- 
 pheric principle of propulsion, which however, after an experiment of 
 over ten years, was abandoned on the extension of the road to Bray. 
 Sir John Forbes, who traversed the road in 1852, before its adaptation 
 to steam transit, found it "remarkable for its great deviation from the 
 level line, rising no less than one foot in 115 to within a few hundred 
 yards of Dalkey, and from thence to the terminus as much as one in 
 57;" and he adds that owing to the great declination it will readily 
 be understood that the trains returned to Kingstown without any aid 
 from steam or other power but their own gravity. 
 
 Arriving at the Dalkey station our first impulse was to ascend 
 Killixev Hill, which rose immediately on our right, and take a 
 bird's-eye view of the country surrounding it and the sea-coast at its 
 foot. A climb of about a mile brought us to its summit, nearly 500 
 feet above the sea level. The Hill of Killinev, raising its head as it 
 does immediately behind Kingstown, and to the south of the entrance 
 to Dublin Bay, is a fitting comrade to that of Howth on its north, 
 the pair seeming, as it were, to stand as green-clad sentinels guarding 
 the gateway to the Irish Metropolis. It rises boldly from the sea, 
 its base extending along the shore for two miles further south towards 
 Bray, while its crown is broken into three small summits, the most 
 northerly surmounted by a dismantled signal tower used as a telegraph 
 station before the electric spark was entrusted with the duties of a 
 messenger, and the loftiest by an obelisk raised in memory of the 
 Duke of Dorset, who was thrown from his horse while hunting in the 
 vicinity. It is from this latter eminence that our view is taken, but 
 the picture presents only a small portion of the scene which the 
 position commands. Facing the east and glancing to the left or to the 
 right, the spectator obtains a noble view of the sea. At his feet lies 
 the silvery shore of Killiney Bay, bending its graceful crescent line 
 until it terminates in the noble promontory of Bray Head ; southward, 
 his eye rests upon the quiet intervening vale, with the mountains, pile 
 upon pile, above it, and the greater and lesser Sugar-loaf lifting their 
 blue pinnacles over all. When he has satiated his eyes with this 
 glorious prospect, he has but to turn round, and a scene of inexpressible 
 
72 
 
 THE SEABOARD ENVIRONS OF DUBLIN. 
 
 richness, variety, and grandeur meets his eye. For the spot is more 
 commanding than that from which he has just surveyed Dublin Bay — 
 the quarries being on a lower level, and just beneath the old telegraph 
 station which o'ertops the northern peak. Looking over Kingstown 
 Harbor, he beholds, to use the language of an enthusiastic tourist, 
 "the most splendid bay in Europe, spreading for miles its vast and 
 lake-like level, adorned with all imaginable objects that can animate 
 and diversify ; the towns and shining outlets, the piers, docks, batteries, 
 and beacons, the sails of every form — the darkening curve of steam," 
 while he is within hailing distance of the neighboring Hill of Howth, 
 but can only discern the far away Armagh and Mourne mountains on 
 a very clear day. 
 
 On one part of Killiney Hill is a martello tower, and near to it, 
 among shady trees, some Druidical remains, consisting of a circle, in 
 the centre of which is a sacrificial stone, having a place hewn out to 
 receive the neck of a human being, and apart from it, and facing in a 
 contrary direction, a throne or judgment-seat. These consist of rough 
 granite blocks, which, however, are declared to bear many indications 
 of having been re-constructed at a comparatively late date, and the 
 whole has been pronounced an archaeological forgery, founded on a 
 veritable early arrangement. In the neighborhood, too, are a cromlech 
 and a landing place, whose names connect them with the ancient 
 priesthood. 
 
 Several handsome residences have been in late years erected in 
 Dalkey, and on the commanding sites in its immediate vicinity, and 
 thus have given to it, like Kingstown, the appearance of a modern 
 village. But notwithstanding this it is a place that claims a past 
 history, for it appears to have been of some importance, as early 
 as the fourteenth century, when it was an incorporated town, with 
 provost and bailies ; and in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries it "was 
 a port much used by the Dublin merchants, who found it safer to 
 have their goods landed there than allow their ships to venture into 
 the bay, and attempt the passage of the Liffey." Here are the 
 remains of three small castles, said to have been part of seven, built 
 for the protection of the early traders against pirates, who at one time 
 swarmed in the channel ; and similar remains near by at Monkstown 
 
THE MOCK KINGDOM OF DALKEY. 
 
 73 
 
 and Bullock betoken the neighborhood to have been one of importance 
 in by-gone days. 
 
 At Dalkey, a tongue of land called Sorrento Point stretches out into 
 the sea, a short distance east of the railway, having at its head a 
 terrace of fashionable residences ; and, separated from the mainland by a 
 sound iooo yards long, 300 wide, and eight fathoms deep, is Dalkey 
 Island, a conspicuous object from KilJiney Hill, as well as from the deck of 
 the steamer as the voyager approaches the entrance to Dublin Bay. This 
 island is some 25 acres in extent, about half being pasture, and contains 
 a ruined church, dedicated to St. Benedict; a well, considered efficacious in 
 diseases of the eye ; and a martello tower manned by a few artillerymen, 
 the only inhabitants. Tradition says that when Dublin was visited by 
 the great plague of 1575, the corporation and some of the principal 
 citizens retired here to escape the contagion. The memory of this event 
 was preserved until the close of the last century, by the island annually 
 becoming the scene of a mock celebration, in which many respectable 
 citizens engaged, and which was considered of sufficient importance to 
 command a report of a column in length in the Dublin daily papers. 
 But the kingdom of Dalkey was " mediatized," and the rule of a distinc- 
 tive Irish king ceased after the election of 1797, the year previous to the 
 memorable rebellion, when 20,000 persons took part in the proceedings. 
 The last monarch was, in private life, Stephen Armytage, an eminent 
 Dublin bookseller, whose shop was the resort of the literati, lawyers, and 
 legislators of the Irish metropolis, and his mock royal title was, " His 
 Facetious Majesty Stephen the First, King of Dalkey, Emperor of the 
 Muglins, Prince of Lamb Island, Duke of Lambay, Elector of Ireland's 
 Eye, Protector of the Maiden Rock, Stadtholder of the Hen and Chickens, 
 Sovereign of the Illustrious Order of the Lobster and Periwinkle, Cham- 
 pion of Cullamore, Respecter of all Men's Faith, and Defender of his own." 
 There was no disputing King Stephen's authority. He only held his 
 sovereignty for a year, resigning it when the grand annual festival of 
 electing the king took place, usually in June. The dignity, however, 
 might be re-conferred, and it was a source of natural pride to King 
 Stephen that he was always re-elected. This showed he was a beneficent 
 sovereign, and beloved by his subjects. He had his courtiers, like other 
 kings, and their titles were suited to their place in the royal household. 
 
 II.-39 
 
74 
 
 THE SEABOARD ENVIRONS OF DUBLIN. 
 
 The ministry was as follows : The Keeper of the Royal Cellar, Lord Tokay ; 
 Master of Bouquets and Groom of the Buttonhole, Lord Posey ; Purveyor 
 of Royal Sausages, Lord Bacon ; Guardian of the Mountain Dew, Count 
 Sheebeen ; Custodian of the Loaves, Lord Barm and Batch ; Chief of the 
 Meat Stall, Baron de Bceuf ; Master of Potatoes, Count Pomme de Terre. 
 
 The King, having been duly elected, at once proceeded, accompanied 
 by his court, to the ruins of the old church, when he was crowned and 
 anointed with whiskey, and the Archbishop of Dalkey preached the 
 coronation sermon, limited to five minutes. Then the Lord Chancellor of 
 Dalkey was presented with a pair of white gloves, for he had no causes 
 on his list. The Lord Keeper was entrusted with the care of the Round 
 Tower, with power to confine therein any. unruly subject. The Poet 
 Laureate then recited his coronation ode — and the last poet laureate was 
 no other than Thomas Moore, his early poetic effusions giving promise of 
 his subsequent harvest of renown. The Lord High Admiral commanded 
 the ferry-boats in which the King and his lieges crossed Dalkey Sound. 
 The court then proceeded to the Rocking Stone, placed at the south 
 entrance to Dalkey Island, and there the King created his knights. 
 Charles Incledon, the celebrated singer, was known in these Dalkey revels 
 as " Sir Charles Melody ;" Thomas Moore as the " Knight of Castalia ;" 
 and a lady who wrote some clever verses was the " Countess of Laurel." 
 The hospitable Dublin solicitor, Tom O'Meara, was one of the office- 
 holders, as the following anecdote shows : 
 
 When the Irish government, towards the end of the last century, grew 
 alarmed at the spread of French principles in Ireland, and conceiving the 
 fetes at Dalkey were coverts for hatching treason, they resolved to inquire 
 into the proceedings. The Lord Chancellor, Earl of Clare, being aware 
 that Mr. O'Meara, who was well known in the convivial circles of Dublin, 
 attended these re-unions, sent for him, and the following dialogue is 
 related to have taken place : 
 
 Lord Chancellor. — " I believe you hold an office in connection with 
 the kingdom of Dalkey, Mr. O'Meara ? " 
 
 Mr. O'Meara.— " Yes, my lord." 
 
 Lord Chancellor. — " What are you ?" 
 
 Mr. O'Meara. — " I am Duke of Muglins and Commissioner of the 
 Royal Revenue." 
 
KILLINEY BAY, BALLYBRACK AND BRAY. 
 
 75 
 
 Lord Chancellor. — "Have you any perquisites from your office?" 
 Mr. O'Meara. — " I am allowed to import ten thousand hogsheads, 
 duty free." 
 
 Lord Chancellor. — "Indeed! Hogsheads of what ?" 
 
 Mr. O'Meara. — "Salt water, my lord." 
 
 This showed the privilege was not very revolutionary.* 
 
 The line of railway after leaving Dalkey is carried for some distance 
 along a platform constructed upon the eastern side of Killiney Hill, at a 
 vast expense, and perched almost perpendicularly over the sea on the 
 margin of Killiney Bay, the lovely indentation of the ocean that obtains 
 its name from the adjoining hill, and which sweeps " in one unbroken 
 curve along its eastern base, and thence to the bold headland of Bray." 
 The village of Killiney, which is but a short run from Dalkey, possesses 
 an archaeological relic, in the shape of a ruined church. Although 
 roofless, the ruin is very perfect, and, it is said, dates as far back as 
 the foundation of Glendalough, which we shall describe in the next 
 chapter. There is a nave twelve and a half feet in breadth, and a chancel 
 nine and a half feet; and openings in the walls commanding the sea- 
 shore, which have been evidently intended to guard against surprise. 
 Half a mile further on, on the slope of the third of the Killiney Peaks, 
 is the pleasant village of Ballybrack, the " speckled town," which has 
 become a favorite resort, from its southerly aspect, affording it, even in 
 winter, a mild and genial climate, while its outlook towards Bray secures 
 to it a splendid prospect. A little beyond, we joined the direct line from 
 Dublin to Bray, and a few minutes' further ride brought us to the latter 
 village, situated seven and a half miles from Kingstown, and thirteen and 
 a half from Dublin, by the road we had traveled. 
 
 The town of Bray f is most charmingly situated just within the 
 confines of Wicklow, and is the portal through which the traveler 
 generally passes to view the scenic attractions of that most picturesque 
 
 * "The Irish Bar," by J. Roderick O'Flanagan. 
 
 t Bray is a place of great antiquity. According to Mr. Dalton, the historian of the county of Dublin, St. 
 Patrick attempted a landing here in 432, but was denied admission ; it afterward became the seat of a rural 
 bishop, but in 1152 the see was annexed to that of Dublin by Cardinal Paparo. In 1173 the town was granted 
 to Walter de Riddlesford by Strongbow, and a large portion subsequently fell into the hands of the church, 
 by which it was retained till the dissolution of the religious houses, when the part south of the river became 
 the property of the ancestors of the Earls of Meath and Pembroke. 
 
76 
 
 THE SEABOARD ENVIRONS OF DUBLIN. 
 
 county. The beautiful position of the town, its prospect, girt on one side 
 by the wide expanse of ocean and fringed on the other with the lofty 
 peaks of the Wicklow Mountains, its agreeable climate, and the readiness 
 by which it is reached by two short lines of railway from Dublin, have 
 conduced, within but a very few years, to raise it from the position of an 
 humble village to that of a fashionable marine watering place. And this 
 change is partly to be credited to the noble public spirit of William 
 Dargan, who, we repeat, gave to Ireland its first railway and its first 
 international exhibition, and who held in higher esteem the gratification 
 of benefitting his native country than the honor of a baronetcy, proffered 
 him by his sovereign. 
 
 Our picture represents the older portion of Bray, and though taken as 
 it were but yesterday, the scene has varied somewhat since the artist 
 sketched it. It is true there has been no change in the contour of the 
 amphitheatre of hills, at the foot of which the town nestles. Still, too, 
 stands, on a commanding eminence in the woods that clothe the base of 
 the Sugar Loaf, the mansion, now styled the Loretto Convent, which, not 
 long ago, was the residence of the Putland family previous to removal to 
 a more modern home close by. The venerable church, lately renovated, 
 also continues to occupy its place in the quiet church-yard where tranquilly 
 repose the dead of days long past. And the old river Bray, which separ- 
 ates the counties of Wicklow and Dublin, still pursues its lazy course 
 through the town in its pathway to the sea ; but the ancient bridge that 
 spanned it has gone, and its place is now supplied by a more modern 
 and capacious structure. 
 
 Between the sleepy old village and the ocean, some half a mile away at 
 the spectator's back, however, the enchanter's wand has been at work, and 
 shady avenues, broad esplanades, and fine terraces lined with grand hotels, 
 handsome houses, and innumerable villas, have but just sprung up as if by 
 magic, and have already shot forth for over a mile along the coast in the 
 direction of the rugged and frowning Head. A quay wall and promenade 
 have also been constructed upon the northern bank of the river from the 
 new bridge, along by the railway bridge to the sea, where it plants the 
 pedestrian upon the beautiful strand that borders the Bay of Killiney. 
 The population of Bray, which in 1851 was but 3156, had advanced to 
 6077 in 1 871, since which date it has still further increased. 
 
KILR UDDER Y HO USE AND BRA Y HEAD. 
 
 77 
 
 A jaunting car, with a loquacious though not over-communicative driver, 
 took us to Kilruddery House, the elegant Elizabethan residence of the 
 Earl of Meath, situated two miles to the south, near to Bray Head, and 
 at the foot of the little Sugar Loaf, along the side of which the grounds 
 of the mansion slope. The only thing specially noticeable within the 
 house is a wainscotted hall with carved oak ceiling ; but from the highly 
 cultivated grounds without, the eye is charmed with the grand produc- 
 tions of the Great Architect of Nature. The mansion lies secluded in a 
 hollow formed by the Sugar Loaf rising on one side and Bray Head 
 upon the other — the former we shall speak of in our visit to the Wicklow 
 Mountains, the latter was the next object of our visit. 
 
 Bray Head, at its loftiest point 800 feet high, is approached by a 
 shady but winding carriage drive, which conducts to the summit of the 
 bare and breezy headland. Here, what a glorious scene — or rather, what 
 a series of glorious scenes can be observed ! Eastward is the glassy and 
 oft-times turbulent Irish Sea, which on an extremely clear day is almost 
 constituted a lake by the appearance in the distant horizon of the far-off 
 Welsh mountains ; westward are the lofty peaks we had already discerned 
 at Bray — War Hill and the Douce in the distance, and near to us, 
 the greater and the lesser Sugar Loaf, with a • lovely valley reposing 
 at their feet ; southward is observable that leafy notch, the Glen of the 
 Downs, described in the succeeding chapter, and the rocky coast to 
 Wicklow Head ; and northward, immediately beneath us, lies the bright 
 and busy town of Bray, from which the eye is carried along the line of 
 the shining sands of Killiney Bay to the hill of that name, gemmed with 
 scores of pleasant villas, peeping through the verdure that robes its 
 granite sides. 
 
 From Bray we returned to Dublin by the direct or inland line of 
 railway, which for twelve miles passes through the picturesque valleys of 
 Shanganagh and Dundrum, to the Harcourt Street Station ; having, in 
 our passage, on our right Killiney Hill, whose western slope we found to 
 be like its eastern, the nestling place of many a happy household, and on 
 our left the Three Rock or Dublin Mountain, around whose base the 
 iron pathway winds. The most conspicuous object we noticed in this 
 short ride was Mount Anville, now a convent, but formerly the seat of 
 the late William Dargan, with its extensive and tastefully laid out 
 
78 
 
 THE SEABOARD ENVIRONS OF DUBLIN. 
 
 grounds, which contain one of the largest green-houses in the kingdom, 
 and a prospect tower from the summit of which magnificent views are 
 observable. 
 
 As the railway approaches the city it converges toward that by which 
 we had left it for Kingstown ; and between the two lines in the outskirts 
 of the metropolis lies Donnybrook, whose fair, now abolished, was perhaps 
 the greatest workshop for the production of broken heads in any part of 
 the civilized world. Donnybrook signifies " the little brook," and refers 
 to the mountain stream, the Dodder, on whose bank the suburb stands. 
 The fair lasted for eight whole days of the month of August, and there 
 can be no denying that during the week the Donnybrook sports com- 
 prised, to quote the language of a once popular ditty, any amount of 
 
 " Crowding and jumbling, 
 And leaping and tumbling, 
 And kissing and stumbling. 
 And drinking and swearing, 
 And carving and tearing, 
 And coaxing and snaring, 
 And scrambling and winning, 
 And fighting and flinging, 
 And fiddling and singing." 
 
THE GARDEN OF IRELAND. 
 
 79 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WICKLOW. 
 
 Character of the Scenery — Dundrum — Three Rock Mountain — Kilgobbin — "The Scalp" — 
 Enniskerry — Sugar Loaf Mountain — Glen of the Dargle — Poiverscourt Castle, Deerpark, and 
 Waterfall — Tinnahinch — Loughs' Bray — Douce Mountain — Lough Toy or Luggelaw — 
 Druidical Rocking Stone — Lough Dan — Roundwood — Mountains, Glens, and Military Road — 
 Glendalough, its ruins, loughs, and legends — Round Tower — St. Kevin and the infatuated 
 Kathleen — Glenmalure — Lugnaquilla — Rathdrum — Castle Howard — Meeting of the Waters — 
 Vale of Avoca — Woods of Shillelagh — Shelton Abbey — Arklow — Town of Wicklow — Rosanna 
 House and the Author of " Psyche" — Devil's Glen — Pass of Dunran — Glen of the Downs 
 
 THE county of Wicklow has justly been termed "The Garden of 
 Ireland," and certainly nowhere else in so small a compass is to be 
 found assembled such a variety of natural beauties, heightened and 
 improved by the hand of art. There, we may behold lakes of Alpine 
 character ; streams that wind through quiet dells, or roll their sparkling 
 waters down rugged precipices ; deep glens and sombre ravines, where 
 the dark shadows make twilight of the summer noon ; mountains whose 
 bare and craggy peaks seem to pierce the clouds ; romantic woods and 
 picturesque glades — with fertile fields and warm and pleasant valleys, 
 whose quiet pastoral features remind us of the pictures of the golden age. 
 The charms of this terrestrial paradise have been lauded by poets of 
 every grade — they have more than once afforded a subject for the grace- 
 ful pen of Ireland's greatest lyrist. "The Meeting of the Waters," one of 
 the earliest and sweetest of the " Irish Melodies," celebrates a delicious 
 spot in the Vale of Avoca, and the tree is still pointed out under which, 
 it is said, he composed the song — another commemorates a romantic 
 legend of Glendalough. And the charms of these scenes are considerably 
 enhanced by their proximity to the Irish capital, the nearest point of the 
 county of Wicklow being not more than ten miles from the city — in fact, 
 
80 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WICK LOW. 
 
 Dublin possesses environs of a grandeur unapproachable by those of any 
 other metropolis ; for its citizens can, within an hour after leaving their 
 own doors, find themselves by the side of gurgling waters and surrounded 
 by mountain peaks. 
 
 The Wicklow railway hugs the coast, as the phrase goes, while the . 
 beauty spots of the county are mainly inland, so it is not readily 
 available for the purposes of the tourist; and many in pursuit of the 
 picturesque consequently make Bray their headquarters, whence they dash 
 forth into various districts in day's excursions. But as the principal 
 points of interest in Wicklow can be readily witnessed in three long 
 days, by the employment of a special road conveyance, we selected that 
 medium of locomotion, and found that we not only economized time and 
 money, but secured an independence in our movements which we could 
 not otherwise have obtained. 
 
 Our route from the metropolis carried us through the suburban village 
 of Dundrum, a pleasant hamlet lying upon the direct line of railway to 
 Bray, and at the base of the Dublin Mountain, along which both road 
 and railway curve. The peculiar salubrity of its climate and its proximity 
 to Dublin, whence it is only two miles distant, have in late years attracted 
 to this place a large resident population. The Three Rock or Dublin 
 Mountain, around whose base we wound, looms over the southern portion 
 of the Irish metropolis, rising to a height of 1763 feet. The road 
 here leads past the ruined castle of Kilgobbin, said to have been 
 erected by Ghoban Saer, and to have had marvellous treasures buried 
 beneath its foundations. 
 
 Just upon entering the county of Wicklow, and ere reaching Ennis- 
 kerry, the traveler beholds before him the immense natural cleft in the 
 heart of the mountain called " The Scalp," through which the road runs 
 and, viewed at a little distance, presents the appearance of the letter V. 
 The sides of this singular defile are covered with huge masses of dis- 
 jointed granite, conveying to the mind of the passenger the not very 
 agreeable idea that they are momentarily in danger of toppling down on 
 his head. This narrow pass, evidently the result of some sudden shock 
 of nature, separates Shankhill and Rathmichael Mountains, the summit of 
 the former rising to the height of 912 feet, and that of the latter to 1103 
 feet above the level of the sea. The vista presented to the eye in the 
 
ENNISKERRY AND THE GREAT SUGAR LOAF. 
 
 81 
 
 passage through the ravine is very striking, presenting on each side 
 the stupendous overhanging rocks, and beyond, and visible in the 
 distance, the towering peak of the Great Sugar Loaf. With that 
 popular tendency of the peasantry to connect the wild and wonderful 
 in nature with superhuman agency, it is quite natural that the formation 
 of this singular chasm has been attributed to His Satanic Majesty, who, 
 it is said, upon the occasion of driving a flock of sheep from Wicklow 
 to Dublin, here found his progress impeded by a steep and rugged 
 mountain ; after all, however, but an insignificant obstacle to him, for 
 he kicked through the opposing granite, and made a smooth and level 
 road for his flock, which pathway he permitted to remain. 
 
 After passing through the Scalp the road gradually slopes downwards 
 to the pretty little village of Exxiskerrv, as we descended the hill 
 visible in the valley beneath, with its white cottages contrasting cheer- 
 fully with the bright verdure of the foliage by which it is partially 
 screened. The village is situated amid beauties, in the production of 
 which nature and art would appear to have vied for the supremacy. 
 The guide book, in a spasm of eulogy, says of it : — " This has been 
 called the ' Honeymoon Village.' Another word of description is almost 
 superfluous. The winds of heaven visit it gently, the sun's burning 
 rays are shaded, and the moonbeams steal in fretted silver light through 
 the spreading branches." It stands at the base of the Great Sugar Loaf, 
 which can be easily ascended from the village, and commands from 
 its summit a more extended and magnificent view than is obtainable 
 from any neighboring eminence, embracing within its scope the far- 
 away peaks of Wales. And we may here remark, that we cannot 
 contemplate the present name given to this and the adjoining mountain 
 without a feeling of humiliation at the custom that has prevailed 
 during the present century, both in Ireland and in America, of changing 
 the ancient names of places, often highly poetical, and always strikingly 
 descriptive, into something singularly commonplace or absurd. For 
 instance, these remarkable hills, crowned with conical summits of white 
 quartz anciently possessed, according to Mr. Monck Mason, an Irish 
 appellation which signified " The Gilt Spears," derived from their retain- 
 ing the light of the sun after the rest of the surrounding landscape 
 was involved in darkness. " Their present names," justly remarks Kohl. 
 
 II.— 40 
 
82 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WICKLOW. 
 
 " cannot have been borne by them very long, for it is only during 
 the last 300 years that it has been the practice to make sugar into the 
 conical loaves in which we now see it." 
 
 When the tourist arrives in Enniskerry he is almost as puzzled to 
 know how to proceed as was the ass in the fable, for temptation flanks 
 him on either side ; to the northeast lies the romantic glen of the 
 Dargle, while in the opposite direction and higher up the river of that 
 name are the beautiful demesnes of Powerscourt and Charleville. We 
 paid our first attention to the former, the gorge through which the 
 stream tumbles and tosses in its journey to the sea at Bray. 
 
 The Dargle — for such is the name given par excellence to the 
 glen — is a deep ravine of a mile in length, the precipitous sides of 
 which are clothed with luxuriant oaks,* through whose thick foliage 
 masses of rock occasionally protrude their rugged forms over the chasm 
 beneath, at the bottom of which the river runs. Entering the majestic 
 woods by a path cut through them and overhanging the stream, we 
 obtain at every opening in the trees views of unparalleled beauty 
 and variety, the prevailing features of which partake in a great degree 
 of the sublime. The opposite side of the glen presents one mass of 
 thick foliage rising precipitously from the brink of the river, whose 
 progress is heard, but whose bed is sunk so far below the surface of 
 the woods in which it is lost, that one might suppose, without any 
 extraordinary stretch of the imagination, it was a river in some inner 
 world, laid open by a Titanic throe that had cracked asunder the rocky 
 crust of this shallow earth — the soil and the deep-striking roots of the 
 trees terminating far above us, and looking like a black rim on the 
 enclosing precipices. When occasionally a gleam through the overhanging 
 woods reveals to us the troubled waters, they afford no silvery relief to 
 the solemn grandeur of their majestic channel, but, taking a sombre tinge 
 from the shadow of the impending precipices, boil and bubble darkly 
 over their rocky bed. 
 
 About midway down the glen, a huge mass of rock, projecting at a 
 great height over the river, has received the name of " The Lover's 
 Leap," and has legends pertaining to it, which include a jilted swain 
 
 * It is conjectured that the Dargle has acquired its name from the oaks which adorn it — Dar-GUn, 
 signifying "Oak Valley," being easily corrupted into DargU. 
 
THE DARGLE AND ITS LOVER'S LEAP. 
 
 S3 
 
 and a faithless but remorseful damsel who followed the example of 
 Sappho, by precipitating herself from the dizzy precipice. The prospect 
 from this spot is magnificent, and the most vivid powers of imagina- 
 tion must fail adequately to describe the scene of exquisite beauty 
 spread before the view. The eye comprehends every part of the deep 
 glen below, catching at intervals the river breaking over fantastic 
 fragments of rock detached from the cliffs above. To the left, the 
 glen gradually expands into an open champaign country, bounded in 
 the distance by the blue expanse of the sea ; to the right, the vales 
 and hills of Powerscourt, richly verdant and adorned with majestic 
 timber, and hemmed in by lofty and rugged mountains, form an 
 interesting and noble landscape ; while, conspicuous in the scene, is a 
 suspension bridge carrying across the chasm the pipes which convey 
 the waters of the river Vartry from the reservoir at Roundwood to 
 the capital. 
 
 Another splendid view of the Dargle is obtained from a small patch 
 of green sward at the bottom of the glen, close beside a broad pool, 
 in which the waters of the river, dammed in by a ledge of rocks, 
 sleep in unbroken tranquillity. Looking up the current, the stream is 
 seen tumbling through a rocky channel from the dark woods, which, 
 rising to a vast height on either side, exclude every other object. 
 Perched on the shoulder of a precipitous cliff are visible the thatched 
 roof and rustic pillars of a pretty little cottage called the Moss House, 
 which peeps through the foliage of the trees that grow above and 
 beneath it, and forms a singularly pleasing object in the landscape. This 
 beautiful spot is a favorite haunt for picnic parties from Dublin ; in 
 fact, it is to its proximity to that city that this glen mainly owes its 
 popularity. Here, on the smooth turf which spreads its inviting carpet 
 beside the clear stream, many a happy group may be seen in the 
 pleasant summer-time, laughing, dancing, singing, or dining al fresco, 
 with that perfect contempt of care or ceremony which so strikingly 
 distinguishes the light-hearted sons and daughters of Erin. 
 
 On the northern bank of the Dargle, the property of Viscount 
 Powerscourt, is a roadway constructed in 1821, by the peer of that 
 day, to enable George IV. to view the beauties of the glen from his 
 carriage, which, however, he failed to do through want of time. Visitors 
 
84 THE BEAUTIES OF WICKLOW. 
 
 are now only permitted to pass through the glen on foot, and usually 
 enter it at the lower end, which they first reach in their approach from 
 Bray, sending their conveyances around by the common road to meet 
 them above. A drive has also more recently been cut on the opposite 
 side, which is part of the demesne of Charleville. The river Dargle 
 unites at St. Valory, some little distance after it emerges from the glen, 
 with the Cookstown or Enniskerry river, whence the blended waters pass 
 on for a mile or two to the sea, under the name of the river Bray, 
 and through what is locally termed the Valley of Diamonds. 
 
 After retracing our steps through the glen, we proceeded to visit 
 Powerscourt Castle, passing through the gate on the hill above the 
 village of Enniskerry. The beauty and -variety of the scenery this 
 noble seat presents can scarcely be surpassed ; and it would be 
 impossible for the pen to convey an adequate idea of the numerous 
 points from which prospects of unrivalled magnificence may be obtained. 
 Perhaps none are excelled by that which is gained shortly after entering 
 the grounds. " Here," says an observant tourist, "as we approach the 
 house, the first break of scenery towards the south is inconceivably 
 grand, soft, and various. Mountains, often cultivated high towards their 
 summits, and sometimes rudely majestic in the unaided tints of nature, 
 form the impressive background at a happy distance. The undulating 
 tracts which lie between that range of mountains and the lofty ridge 
 on which the spectator is placed, comprise the rich woods and plan- 
 tations on the demesne of Charleville." And, writes another, " there 
 are few mansions in Great Britain so auspiciously situated ; hill and 
 dale, and wood and water are so skilfully blended or divided, and the 
 whole is so completely enclosed by mountains, apparently inaccessible 
 to mortal feet, as to realize the picture of the Happy Valley." Amidst 
 the romantic scene the upper Dargle pursues its devious course, gliding, 
 rippling, or foaming on its passage to the sombre, oak-clad glen. 
 
 The noble mansion of Powerscourt is seen to most picturesque 
 advantage from the eminence above the Dargle. Surrounded by mag- 
 nificent woods, and gleaming with its fine granite facade above the deep 
 and leafy valley which it dominates, it looks like the proper residence 
 of a lord of the soil. There is something very Italian, too, or rather, 
 we should say, something like the compositions of the Italian masters, 
 
TIXXAHIXCH AXD POWERSCOURT. 
 
 85 
 
 in the scenery of this valley. Tinnahinch, formerly the seat of Ireland's 
 eloquent patriot Grattan, forms such a feature in the picture as a painter 
 would introduce. The house and grounds, situated in a sylvan vale 
 near the river, were presented to the statesman and orator by the Irish 
 Parliament ; and here, it is said, he composed and continually recited 
 the eloquent speeches that have immortalized his name. 
 
 On the opposite bank of the river is Charleville, the handsome 
 mansion of Viscount Monck. The demesne, which participates in the 
 attractive features displayed in the romantic scenery of Powerscourt, is 
 very extensive and adorned with noble forest-trees. A mile and a half 
 beyond Charleville is the entrance to Lord Powerscourt's deer park, 
 about 800 acres in extent, the greater part of which is covered with 
 trees and connected with the rest of his demesne by a strip of land 
 running along the left bank of the river. 
 
 Proceeding to the latter spot, we paused previous to descending to 
 the entrance to mark the view we were informed by Mr. Frazer awaited 
 us, and which we will depict in the language employed by that writer 
 in his work : — " On the north, the plantations of the demesnes of 
 Powerscourt and Charleville form a rich foreground to the mountains 
 of Glencullen rising over them. To the west, Glencree, one of the best 
 defined of Irish glens, with its cultivated and peopled sides, is seen in 
 all its length and in all its breadth, together with its river, bearing along 
 the overflowings of the upper and lower Loughs Bray," as well as the 
 waters of the numerous temporary rills which rush down the huge, 
 unbroken sides of Kippure, and of the other mountains forming the 
 
 * The two Loughs Bray are situated under the crest of Kippure, in a lonely and mountainous district in 
 the northwestern corner of the county, where, as we have stated in a previous chapter, the Liffey takes its 
 rise. The lower lough, the larger and more remarkable, is 1225 feet above the sea, 22S feet below the upper 
 lough, and 1450 feet below the summit of Kippure. from one side of which protrudes a huge crag, dark and bare, 
 called the Eagle's Nest. This lough is 64 acres in extent, and is, says Hall, "walled in on three sides by 
 lofty and precipitous hills, and open on the fourth, at the lowest point of which its waters are poured through 
 a narrow opening into the valley of Glencree, forming the Glencree river," which stream flows into the river 
 Dargle a short distance below the Powerscourt waterfall. "The waters of Lough Bray," remarks the same 
 writer, "are colored very deeply by the peat which covers the surrounding hills, through which the water 
 permeates ; and the deep and gloomy tint is increased by the shadow into which the lake is thrown by the 
 overhanging mountain to the south and west." Amid all this rough setting appears one little gem, in the shape 
 af a pretty cottage with its surrounding grounds, presented to Sir Philip Crampton, the late Surgeon-General, 
 by the Duke of Northumberland, in token of his esteem and the benefits he had derived from his professional 
 services. 
 
86 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WICKLOW. 
 
 southern boundaries of the glen. Looking southward, we have the 
 commencement of the valley of the Dargle, remarkable for its well- 
 defined and circular outline, also as forming part of the united and 
 lofty mountains of Douce and War Hill, which sweep far around it. 
 There, the infant Dargle, having gathered the tiny tributes of the 
 hundred rills which plough the sides of the gigantic Douce, and having 
 borne them over the rocky ledges which form the natural barriers to 
 this magnificent glen, flows joyfully through it to meet the limpid 
 waters of Glencree ; and at the foot of the slope on which we stand 
 these glens with their rivers unite. The Dargle with increased volume 
 flows on through the romantic ravine which bears its name to the meet- 
 ing of the streams and glens at St. Valory, separating and beautifying as 
 it proceeds the demesnes of Powerscourt and Charleville." 
 
 The deer park of Powerscourt is rich in natural beauties. Alter 
 passing through its portal we drove beneath the shade of aged oaks 
 for a mile to its principal attraction, the Powerscourt Waterfall, 
 romantically situated at the extremity of a beautiful semicircular amphi- 
 theatre, formed by mountains wooded to their summits, and tumbling 
 over an almost perpendicular wall of ferruginous basalt 300 feet in 
 height. This picturesque cascade is supplied from a very inconsiderable 
 stream, and when unaugmented by heavy rains the volume of descending 
 water is so very small that the face of the rock is seen through the 
 thin veil of its delicate transparency.* But in winter, or when the 
 channels of the mountain have been charged by recent rains, the 
 tumultuous fury with which the thundering cataract dashes at one wild 
 bound down the frightful depth of its descent fills the beholder's mind 
 with wonder, and makes him 
 
 •' feel 
 
 A nameless grandeur swell the soul, 
 With joy that makes the senses reel, 
 Half-wishing in the flood to roll." 
 
 The profound seclusion of the spot inspires that peculiar awe with which 
 the scene never fails to impress the spectator when beheld under 
 
 * It is said, that to guard against a deficiency of water upon the occasion of the visit of George IV. to 
 Powerscourt, a tank was dog on the brow of the hill to collect a sufficient supply to insure a good flow ; but the 
 precaution was as useless as the construction of the road through the Dargle, for His Majesty did not visit the spot. 
 
DOUCE MO UX TAIN AND LUGGELAW. 
 
 >7 
 
 favorable circumstances ; while the dark masses of the contiguous woods, 
 rising in sylvan beauty to the tops of the mountains, afford a delightful 
 contrast to the white foam of the cataract and the dancing- waters of 
 
 o 
 
 the stream, sparkling in the gleams of rich sunlight that break through 
 the branches of the overarching trees. 
 
 Douce Mountain peers over the deer park, and is not difficult of 
 ascent ; but we were unable to afford the time required to plant our 
 footsteps upon its summit, which attains the height of 2384 feet, and 
 from its superior elevation commands extensive views on every side. 
 " To the south and west," says Frazer, all the high summits of 
 YVicklow are seen ; to the east, a great part of the Wicklow coast and 
 all the more elevated parts of the intermediate country ; and on the 
 north, the varied coast and country behind Dublin, with all the more 
 prominent intervening features." 
 
 After satiating our vision with the many beauties presented to it in 
 the sweet valley of the Dargle, we shaped our course to Roundwood, 
 a little more than ten miles to the south of Enniskerry, over a rugged 
 country, which was quite a contrast to the natural wealth we had 
 witnessed. Our road lay between the Sugar Loaf and Douce moun- 
 tains, and carried us up a long and steep ascent to an elevation of 
 900 feet above the level of the sea, when we gained the high table- 
 land, in the centre of which Roundwood is situated. However, when 
 within two or three miles of the latter place, we made a detour for 
 about the same distance to the right, for the purpose of visiting Lough 
 Tay, or, as it is sometimes called, Luggelaw,* on the shore of which 
 stands a small but handsome mansion, known by the latter name, 
 formerly occupied by the Latouches of Delgany, but now used as a 
 shooting-lodge by Viscount Powerscourt. The lough — encompassed on all 
 sides by mountains, some of them of the wildest, and others of the richest 
 and most pleasing character, and over 800 feet above the sea — is circular 
 in form and about half a mile in diameter, or a mile and a half in 
 circumference, with steep sides rising to a considerable height above the 
 
 * It has been conjectured that the true name Ls Lough Hela, or "The Lake of Death," derived from the 
 Hela (death) of the Danish mythology. The title must have been peculiarly appropriate to this dark lake before 
 the hand of cultivation had softened the wild horrors of the valley ; and it is not improbable that it was 
 bestowed upon it by the Danes while they possessed this part of the island, and handed down from them, 
 though the derivation is lost in the corrupted name by which it is now known. 
 
88 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WICK LOW. 
 
 surface of its deep and dark waters. In the outline of one of the 
 precipitous rocks is distinctly traced a gigantic resemblance of a human 
 face looking gloomily on the lake below. The eyebrows, broad and 
 dilating, are marked by moss and heath, and the prominent cheeks and 
 deep-sunk eyes perfectly formed by the clefts in the rock. The mouth 
 appears open, but when you retire to some distance it looks closed, 
 though without producing any alteration in the features. 
 
 Embosomed in a deep valley, which runs into the mountains at one 
 end of the lake, stands the mansion of Luggelaw, surrounded by rich 
 meadows and luxuriant plantations. High up, the valley closes with a 
 vast amphitheatre of rocks, down which pours a small but pretty waterfall, 
 forming at its foot a little stream, which, winding through the meadows, 
 mingles with the still waters of the lake. Such is the picturesque spot 
 which art, improving upon natural advantages, has formed in the midst 
 of a wild country. We can imagine no more pleasurable surprise than a 
 stranger would experience on being led to this sequestered nook without 
 any previous preparation for a scene of such Arcadian beauty. " On the 
 eastern side of the valley," says Wright, "was, formerly, one of those 
 extraordinary druidical remains called a ' rocking stone,' used by the 
 artful arch-druid for oracular purposes. A large stone was placed upon 
 the top of another, so balanced that the smallest effort would shake it, 
 and was supposed to be self-moved in the presence of a guilty person. 
 In some cases, as on the Three Rock Mountain in the county of 
 Dublin, the culprit was placed under the stone, which was made to 
 vibrate over his head and threaten death at every instant. In the year 
 1800, a party of military passing this mountain dislodged the rocking 
 stone from its pedestal, and it now lies some yards from its original 
 position, deprived, unfortunately, of its powers of motion." 
 
 It would be strange if the wild charms of Luggelaw had remained 
 uncelebrated in the minstrelsy of Ireland. The bards of former days 
 have devoted to it more than one sweet wreath of song ; and Erin's 
 modern and immortal bard has commemorated its beauties by the 
 adaptation of probably the choicest of his poetic strains in the " Irish 
 Melodies," beginning " No, not more welcome the fairy numbers," to 
 the delicious old air of " Luggelaw." Tradition says that it was here 
 that St. Kevin originally intended to found the religious establishment 
 
LOUGHS TAY AND DAN. 
 
 89 
 
 which he afterwards erected at Glendalough, and that he had actually 
 commenced his Round Tower when Kathleen discovered his retreat, 
 and the appearance of her fair face drove him from the spot. 
 
 Lough Tay is fed by a stream called the Annamoe, which takes its 
 rise on War Hill, to the north, and is joined by many mountain rills 
 ere it leaps down the cataract at the head of the lough into a deep 
 circular dell. This dell forms the head of a beautiful vale which 
 stretches for ten miles southward to Laragh, and presents a magnifi- 
 cent picture when witnessed from the high ground above Lough Tay, 
 before descending to it from Roundwood. Two miles below that lough, 
 and connected with it by the Annamoe in its progress southward, is 
 Lough Dan, 685 feet above the sea, and in its outline resembling a broad 
 river, being about a mile and three quarters in length, and but half 
 a mile in width. It, also, is embosomed among mountains, those of 
 Knocknacloghole and Scar rising on its west, and that of Slieve-Buck 
 on its east. " Environed by naked pastoral acclivities, which rise 
 gradually from the water's edge, Lough Dan," remarks Frazer, " wants 
 much of that wildness aud sternness which the precipitous cliffs give 
 to Lough Tay on the one hand, as well as of that beauty which the 
 plantations connected with Luggelaw Cottage impart to it on the 
 other.- It is, however, from its winding outline, depth of water, and 
 the extent of mountains which spring from its surface and sweep fat 
 around, a scene possessing much interest, and particularly at the upper 
 end, where it receives the infant waters of the Avonmore. There the 
 limpid rivulet, having finished its first and short course through the 
 romantic little glen which separates the mountains of Scar and Knockna- 
 cloghole, mingles its waters with the Annamoe River, and gives name 
 to the more ample stream — the carrier of many tributaries — which glides 
 down the vale of Clara to the first meeting of the waters at Avoca." 
 
 Loughs Tay and Dan are among the largest of the mountain loughs 
 of Wicklow, which are but few in number and limited in their dimen- 
 sions, their entire superficies being not more than 800 acres. Of the 
 others, the two loughs at Glendalough will be spoken of shortly, the 
 two tiny Loughs Bray have been already mentioned, and the list is 
 completed by the equally diminutive Loughs Nahanagan and Ouler, 
 which are found in the district north of Glendalough. But the four 
 
 II. — 41 
 
90 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WICKLOW. 
 
 latter are mere specks, mere tarns, occupying " deep and secluded 
 dells in the wildest and loneliest mountain recesses, and where the 
 high and, in many cases, impending cliffs which surround them not 
 only throw a dark shade over the narrow space of water, but impose 
 a deep solitude on all around." 
 
 The village of Roundwood, originally named Togha, is an agreeable 
 halting place for the weary wanderer in Wicklow, for he can here 
 obtain balmy sleep, combined with a midsummer night's dream, in 
 which rugged hills, and lovely vales, and mouldering ruins will be apt 
 to figure ; or, if the tired mortal is a disciple of Izaac Walton (for 
 Roundwood is a great rendezvous for such like) it is perhaps a 
 sportive but treacherous trout that will afford a theme for his sleeping 
 visions. Two miles from this place is the main reservoir, in which the 
 waters of the Vartry are collected and stored previous to their being 
 despatched through pipes for distribution among the denizens of the 
 city of Dublin, twenty-four miles away. It covers an area of over 
 400 acres, and presents the appearance of a considerable mountain 
 lake. Its depth is 70 feet, and its capacity is estimated to be 
 ample to supply the city and its suburbs for 200 days at a daily rate 
 of 12,000,000 gallons of water, which here attains a level of 700 feet, 
 and is carried hence, in its way to the metropolis, through a tunnel 
 two and a half miles long. The entire work cost about half a million 
 pounds sterling, the principal feature being an embankment 1600 feet 
 long, 400 wide at the base, and 30 at the top. 
 
 The work of inspection on our second day in Wicklow commenced 
 by a drive from the pleasant hamlet of Roundwood to the gloomy 
 vale of Glendalough, and its equally sombre ecclesiastical remains. The 
 road between these places is seven miles in extent, and took us, at 
 two miles south of Roundwood, past the southern end of Lough Dan, 
 and in the next three miles to Laragh, by way of the valley of 
 the Avonmore and through the village of Annamoe. Near to the 
 latter place are still to be found the ruins of a mill, into whose race 
 young Lawrence Sterne, while staying with his father at the adjoining 
 parsonage, fell while the wheel was in motion, but fortunately was 
 rescued from it unhurt. Where, dear reader, but for the helping hand 
 extended to the drowning boy would have been the inimitable Tristram 
 
LARAGH AND ITS SURROUNDINGS. 
 
 91 
 
 Shandy, with the Poor Lieutenant, and Corporal Trim, and the loves 
 of Uncle Toby and the Widow Wadman ? Near Annamoe, too, is 
 Glendalough Park, which stretches along the bank of the river, and 
 from its extent is a striking feature in the landscape ; while on the 
 left lies Castle Kevin, once the abode of the O'Tooles, the chieftains 
 who held the wilds of Wicklow, and kept the adjoining districts in an 
 almost perpetual state of turmoil until the time of Elizabeth. 
 
 Nature and the pathfinders have bestowed upon the little village of 
 Laragh the position of a geographical centre, for here several roads 
 and glens converge, and several streams conjoin their waters which, 
 united, flow placidly through dell, or slide hurriedly down cascade in 
 their progress to the ocean. The glens are Glendalough, comprising 
 its two loughs and seven churches ; Glendassan, in which are Lough 
 Nahanagan and the lead mines of Luggunure ; Glenmacanass, through 
 which the military road to Dublin is carried ; and Glenavon, embracing 
 Loughs Tay and Dan, and through which we approached the village — 
 all these, and the streams which flow through them, forming as it 
 were upper branches to the vale of Clara and the river Avonmore, 
 which trend to the southeast. The military road to Dublin, uniting at 
 Laragh with that from Roundwood, was constructed after the Rebellion 
 of 1798, to render the fastnesses of the Wicklow mountains accessible 
 to large bodies of military and police. It commences among the 
 hills some twenty miles south of Laragh, whence it runs northward, 
 considerably to the west of the road through Roundwood, and approaches 
 Dublin by way of Loughs Bray, keeping throughout the distance a 
 solitary mountain course, rising as high as 1600 feet above the sea, 
 and penetrating a district so thinly peopled that it has received the 
 name of the "uninhabited country." 
 
 From Laragh we turned our steps westward to Glendalough, or the 
 "Valley of the Two Lakes" — a spot which, if it offer fewer natural 
 beauties to the observer of nature than other portions of the county of 
 Wicklow, is possessed of more than common interest to the lover of Irish 
 antiquities. This valley is about three miles in extent, and open at the 
 eastern extremity, but enclosed on every other side by lofty and precip- 
 itous mountains. After proceeding for nearly a mile and a half we obtain 
 the first view of the once celebrated Glendalough, the site of the 
 
92 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WICKLOW. 
 
 mountain city, near the entrance to Glendassan and the confluence of 
 the streams which water the two vales — that Glendalough where religion 
 and literature flourished in former times, but which now presents to the 
 curious traveler nought save a melancholy waste, whose sombre character 
 is deepened by the mouldering relics of past greatness that lie scattered 
 through the glen. 
 
 The principal ruins form an exceedingly picturesque group, and are 
 situated near to the eastern margin of the Lower Lough. " There is 
 nothing in these buildings particularly interesting," says Mr. Otway, in his 
 entertaining Sketches, " except their extraordinary position in the midst 
 of the lonely mountains, placed at the entrance of a glen, singularly deep 
 and secluded, with its two dark lakes lying in gloom and solitariness, and 
 over which deep vale hang mountains of the most abrupt forms, in 
 whose every fissure and gorge there is a wild and romantic clothing of 
 oak, birch, and holly." It is indeed, a region where the solitary enthusiast 
 might conjure up visions of things that mortal eye had ne'er beheld ; a 
 dim valley over which the Angel of Death seems to have spread the 
 shadow of his dark wings ; a tomb where every human passion is buried, 
 and within whose gloomy precincts the sombre goddess of Melancholy 
 walks, in lonely meditation wrapt. To this dreary solitude did St. 
 Coemgan, or Kevin,* retire in the sixth century, after he had assumed the 
 cowl. Here he wrote many learned works, and founded the Abbey of 
 Glendalough, over which he presided as abbot and bishop f for many 
 
 *The beauty of the saint, when a babe, was so remarkable, that it is said an angel descended from heaven, 
 and, having kissed him, bestowed upon him the name of Coemgan or Kevin, which in the Irish language 
 
 signifies "pretty boy." 
 
 \ The see of Glendalough was resigned by St. Kevin its founder in 612 ; and in 1192 King John ordered it 
 to be united to Dublin on its next avoidance, which took place in 12 14. King John's mandate, however, was 
 disputed by the OTooles, in whose territory Glendalough stood ; and, although their lands were estranged, they 
 continued to fill the see for a long period afterwards — the last of the nominal prelates, Friar Dennis White, 
 surrendering the possession in 1497. A curious legend tells how St. Kevin obtained from the local monarch of 
 his day a grant of the land upon which he built his churches. We give it in the language of the loquacious 
 guide. ' ' The king was ould and wake in himself, and took a mighty liking to a goose, a live goose ; and in coorse 
 o' time the goose was like his master, ould and wake. So O'Toole sent for his holiness ; and his holiness went to 
 see what would the Pagan — for King O'Toole was a hathen — want wid him. ' God save ye,' says the saint. ' God 
 save ye kindly,' says the king. ' A better answer than I expected,' says the saint. ' Will ye make my goose young?' 
 says the king. ' What'll ye gi' me ? ' says the saint. ' What'll ye ax ? ' says the king. ' All I'll ax will be as much 
 of the valley as he'll fly over,' says the saint. ' Done,' says the king. So wid that, Saint Kevin stoops down, takes 
 up the goose, and flings him up, and away he goes over the lake and all around the glin ; which, in coorse, was the 
 saint's hereditary property from that day out." 
 
ANCIENT CITY OF GLENDAIO UGH. 
 
 years, and was "born to the blessings of another state" on the 3rd 
 of June, 618, at the great age of 120 years. His extraordinary piety 
 and virtue, no less than the numerous miracles wrought by him, drew, 
 as the Monasticon Hibernicum informs us, " multitudes from towns and 
 cities, from ease and affluence, from the cares and avocations of civil 
 life, and from the comforts and joys of society, to be spectators of 
 his pious acts and sharers in his merits, and with him to encounter 
 every severity of climate and condition. This influence extended even 
 to Britain, and induced St. Mochuorog to convey himself hither ; who 
 fixed his residence in a cell on the east side of Glendalough, where 
 a city soon sprang up, and a seminary was founded, from whence were 
 sent forth many saints and exemplary men, whose sanctity and learning 
 diffused around the western world that universal light of letters and 
 religion which, in the earlier ages, shone so resplendent throughout this 
 remote, and at that time tranquil isle, and were almost exclusively 
 confined to it." 
 
 Six centuries later, however, the glory of the city had. entirely 
 departed, for in the twelfth century it is described as having then lain 
 waste for forty years ; and the glen soon became, if we are to believe 
 Ware, " waste and desolate, a den and nest for thieves and robbers ;" 
 and more murders were committed in it than in any other part of 
 Ireland. Glendalough was in its time the depository of the wealth of the 
 neighboring septs, and consequently was frequently plundered by the 
 Danes, as well as by the English, after whose invasion it rapidly declined. 
 In 1309 the sept of the O'Byrnes was defeated here by Piers Gaveston, 
 who rebuilt the Castle of Kevin, and opened the pass between it and 
 Glendalough. In 1580, one of the Fitzgeralds, uniting with Lord Balt- 
 inglass and a chieftain of the O'Byrnes, occupied this valley in open 
 hostility to the Government, and from an ambush fired upon the royal 
 troops with such disastrous effect that Lord Deputy Grey was compelled 
 to retreat to Dublin, having lost several distinguished officers. 
 
 Such is the brief history of the ecclesiastical city that once adorned 
 these mountain solitudes, but of which the decaying ruins are all that 
 now remain. Even the identity of the Seven Churches, for which the 
 valley has been for centuries celebrated, and which confer a second name 
 upon the spot, cannot be exactly ascertained ; and no vestige of the 
 
94 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WICKLOW. 
 
 famous city* of Glendalough, built by St. Mochuorog, survived to the 
 present century except a small paved plot of ground of quadrangular form, 
 indicating the site of the market-place of the fallen city. No traces of 
 domestic buildings have been discovered ; but the site of a causeway, 
 extending from the ancient market-place to Hollywood, on the borders 
 of the county of Kildare, is still discernible. This laborious work of art 
 was about twelve feet in width, and was composed of blocks of roughly- 
 hewn stone set edgewise, not unlike the Roman roads that once 
 traversed England. 
 
 The stranger's attention is naturally first attracted to the cluster of 
 ruins, situated near the Lower Lough, and to the hotel that has been 
 called into existence by the natural requirements of modern explorers. 
 The group consists of the Round Tower, the Cathedral, Our Lady's 
 Church, and St. Kevin's House or Kitchen, which form a world of their 
 own, dark, silent, and motionless as the grave, fitting neighbors to the 
 lake,f whose still waters are thrown into solemn shade by the precipitous 
 and gloomy mountains which overhang them. These crumbling remains, 
 with a sacristy, a small enclosure now used as a cemetery for the 
 Roman Catholic clergy, stand in a larger and well tenanted cemetery, 
 entered by a gateway, now much dilapidated, but evidently once a 
 portal of some magnificence with outer and inner arches surmounted 
 by a tower. The other objects of interest are scattered around at 
 
 * " From what can now be discovered of the ancient city," writes Dr. Ledwich, "by its walls above, and 
 foundations below the surface of the earth, it probably extended from the Rheafert Church to the Ivy Church, on 
 both sides of the river." 
 
 \ Of this, the smaller of the two loughs, the traveler, Kohl, was informed by his characteristic Irish guide : 
 " It is also called the Lake of Serpents, your honor, or Lough Napeastia ; for into this lake it was, your honor, that 
 St. Patrick banished all the snakes of Ireland. The snakes, naturally enough, were little pleased with such' damp 
 lodgings, and one big one, in particular used often to put up its head and pray the saint to grant it a little more liberty. 
 So St. Patrick, in his good nature, drew a circle on the ground and told the serpent to consider that as its own ground. 
 Now, when they began to build the seven churches, the serpent was very angry at what it considered as an invasion 
 of its own territory ; and at night it used to come out of the water, and destroy what the work-people had built during 
 the day. At last St. Patrick prayed to God to dispense him from the promise he had made to the snake, and God 
 allowed the saint to banish the reptile into the lake again, and then the workmen got on fast enough with the building." 
 Another version of the legend states the lake to have been tenanted by only one snake, overlooked by St. Patrick when 
 he banished the reptiles ; and that St. Kevin, praying to be relieved of him, was told to proceed to the top of a neigh- 
 boring mountain before the dew was off the ground, and going thither, found the serpent asleep near an empty trunk. 
 He then by a ruse tempted the serpent to get into the trunk, and locking him up in it, carried it to the coast and threw 
 it into the sea ; and when the winds are roaring and the waves are lashing at that particular spot it is asserted the noise 
 is heard of the serpent squirming about in his prison and crying to be let out. 
 
ROUND TOWER AND RUINED CHURCHES. 
 
 9c 
 
 some little distance, and comprise Trinity Church, St. Saviour's, the 
 Church of Rheafert, Teampul-na-Skellig, and St. Kevin's Bed, the last 
 three being close to the Upper Lough. 
 
 Conspicuous above all stands the Round Tower, one of the finest 
 specimens of its kind in the country, rising to the height of no feet, 
 and having a circumference of 51 feet. The conical top, which made 
 the edifice still higher, is now wanting, having been carried off by a 
 storm in 1804. The tower has evidently been well built of granite 
 and slate intermixed, and contains the usual doorway, and four windows 
 at the summit, with two more over the entrance. 
 
 Of the ecclesiastical edifices of Glendalough, the Cathedral (now little 
 better than a heap of ruins), which owes its origin to St. Kevin, 
 claims precedence. Its erection is attributed to the early part of the 
 seventh century, and to Gobhan Saer, the architect of that period. 
 It is the smallest of the Irish cathedrals, the original structure being 
 only 55 feet long, but afterwards extended by the addition of a 
 chancel. The architecture was evidently of the rudest style and almost 
 destitute of ornament. To its west stand the ruins of the Church 
 of Our Lady, believed to have been the first erected in the lower 
 part of the valley by St. Kevin. Its only important feature is a 
 doorway in the Grecian style, six feet high, with leaning sides, 
 composed of seven stones of the thickness of the wall. The most 
 perfect of the seven churches is that which is popularly but incorrectly 
 called St. Kevin's Kitchen, shown by our artist on the right in the 
 picture of the Round Tower. Its dimensions are 22 feet by 15, and 
 its character somewhat resembles Cormac's Chapel on the Rock of 
 Cashel. It has a high pitched roof, and a curious round belfry 
 springing from the west end with a conical roof and four apertures 
 facing the cardinal points, after the style of the loftier round towers. 
 Dr. Petrie is of the opinion that this belfry together with the sacristy 
 were added to the original building shortly after the death of St. Kevin, 
 and his house converted into a church out of veneration for his 
 memory. 
 
 There is a superstition connected with the cemetery which surrounds 
 these buildings, but it is one that is also common to other places. 
 It is to the effect that any person buried here will be inevitably 
 
96 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WICKLOW. 
 
 saved at the Day of Judgment, St. Kevin having prayed that the 
 privilege might be accorded to his favorite church. This will evidently 
 account for the popularity of Glendalough as a place of sepulture, and 
 several crosses scattered about mark the graves of by-gone generations. 
 
 Trinity Church, or the Ivy Church, as it is generally called from the 
 plant by which its ruins are overgrown, lies about a quarter of a 
 mile to the eastward on the bank of the river as it flows toward 
 Laragh, and was evidently originally a very small structure, with at 
 one time a round tower attached. Near to it, on the opposite bank 
 of the river, in the demesne of Derrybawn, lie the ruins of St. Saviour's 
 or the Monastery, the most interesting in its architecture of all the 
 churches here assembled. Many beautifully . carved stones and fantastic 
 sculptures, still remaining, indicate that it was originally a highly 
 decorated building. 
 
 On the opposite or western side of the main group and romantic- 
 ally situated not far from the Upper Lough, and the Poolanass 
 Waterfall, which discharges into it the waters of Lugduff Brook, are 
 the scanty ruins of Rheafert Church, said to have been founded by 
 St. Kevin before he moved to the margin of the lower lake. It is 
 noted as the " Sepulchre of Kings," having been the burial place of 
 the O'Tooles, the ancient dynasts of the district. A tomb bore an 
 inscription in the Irish character, but it is now defaced by age, which 
 indicated it as the resting-place of a prince of that race, who died 
 in the year 810. 
 
 Even more meagre are the not far distant ruins of Teampul-na-Skellig, 
 or the Temple of the Rock or Desert, the last of what are commonly 
 called the Seven Churches of this glen, situated in a solitary nook 
 beneath the impending mountain of Lugduff, which rises to a height 
 of 2176 feet. It is related that to this small rude fabric, almost 
 inaccessible except by water, St. Kevin was wont to retire during the 
 season of Lent to devote himself to prayer and devout exercises. 
 Tradition further informs us that upon one occasion, when the holy 
 man was praying at a window in this chapel, with one hand extended 
 in a supplicating attitude, a blackbird descended and deposited her 
 eggs in his open palm ; and that the saint, moved with compassion 
 for the bird, did not withdraw his hand, but remained in the same 
 
ST. KEVIN AND THE FAIR KATHLEEN. 
 
 97 
 
 position until the creature had hatched her eggs. For this reason, 
 St. Kevin is shown in all representations of him with an outstretched 
 arm, supporting in his hand a bird's-nest. 
 
 One other object of interest in this wild and solitary glen, and from 
 the poetic inspiration it has awakened perhaps the best known, is St. 
 Kevin's Bed, a small cave capable of containing not more than three 
 persons, hollowed in the face of the perpendicular rock, and overhanging, 
 at a considerable height, the dark waters of the Upper Lough. The 
 path which conducts to the aerial couch of the solitary recluse is 
 fearfully narrow, and the stranger must be endowed with more than 
 ordinary nerve, who (though assured by the guides that there is not 
 the least danger in the attempt) can muster courage enough to traverse 
 the perilous-looking track without an involuntary shudder. The romantic 
 tradition attached to this cave, which even more than its singular 
 situation, has given it an extraordinary celebrity, has formed the subject 
 of Moore's Irish Melodv, commencing- — 
 
 " By that lake whose gloomy shore 
 Skylark never warbles o'er."* 
 
 It is related that St. Kevin, not less remarkable in his youth for his 
 exemplar}' piety than for his personal attractions, captivated the heart of 
 a beautiful and high-born maiden, named Kathleen, of whom the poet 
 
 Writes •< gij e jj ac j i ove< i hi m well and long, 
 
 Wished him hers, nor thought it wrong ; 
 Wheresoe'er the saint would fly, 
 Still he heard her light foot nigh ; 
 East or west, where'er he turned, 
 Still her eyes before him burned." 
 
 But the warm glances from Kathleen's "eyes of most unholy blue" had 
 no power to melt the young anchorite's frigid heart, and in order to be 
 
 * Two legends account for the absence of skylarks from this spot. One informs us that, there being no 
 watches in those days, the laborers who built the seven churches were called to their work each morning by the 
 skylarks, whose song told them when it was time to begin ; and so. when the holy work was completed, St. 
 Kevin declared that no lark was worthy to succeed those pious birds that had helped in the building of the 
 churches. The other is somewhat different, and declares that the men took an oath to begin with the lark and 
 lie down with the lamb ; and that the larks rose so early over the valley that the laborers were awakened 
 before they were refreshed, and many consequently died from over exertion, which so touched St. Kevin's heart 
 that he prayed no lark might sing there, and thereby saved both the lives and oaths of the rest. A more 
 satisfactory reason for their absence may probably be found in the fact that the skylark is rather averse to visiting 
 districts of so gloomy a character as that presented by this glen. 
 II.— tt 
 
98 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WICKLOW. 
 
 freed from the interruptions of her visits, he concealed himself in this 
 cave which he had formed near the base of Lugduff Mountain. 
 
 " ' Here, at last,' he calmly said, 
 ' Woman ne'er shall find my bed.' 
 Ah ! the good saint little knew 
 What that wily sex can do," 
 
 for the fond girl tracked her lover's steps to his rocky couch, and 
 
 " Even now, while calm he sleeps, 
 Kathleen o'er him leans and weeps." 
 
 The catastrophe of the story is more creditable to the saint's purity 
 than to his humanity ; for, awakening from his slumbers, and perceiving 
 a female beside his couch, he, in a moment of sudden anger, hurled her 
 from the cliff into the lake below. But no sooner had the gentle 
 Kathleen sunk into the dark waters than the saint reproached himself 
 for his cruel conduct ; and though he could not save the life of her who 
 had loved him so tenderly, he put up a prayer to heaven that no other 
 mortal might find a watery grave in that lake — a prayer that the 
 peasantry in the neighborhood firmly believe to have been granted. 
 
 In later years this lonely cave was selected as the hiding-place of 
 the outlaw from the pursuit of troops armed with weapons more substan- 
 tial, though perhaps possessed of a less penetrating power, than the 
 arrows of Cupid. At the close of the Rebellion of 1798, Captain Dwyer 
 and his band sought refuge in the county of Wicklow ; and upon one 
 occasion the Captain being hotly pursued by some Scottish High- 
 landers, secreted himself here, where from the fatigue caused by his flight, 
 he was overcome by sleep. The soldiers stole gently up to the mouth of 
 the cave, and were about to enter, when he awoke, sprung into the lake, 
 and, swimming to the opposite shore, escaped. 
 
 We cannot part from Glendalough without contemplating the peculiar 
 aspect it has presented to other eyes than our own, and the language 
 in which other travelers have perpetuated their thoughts. Kohl, the 
 German writer, says of it, " The scene was indeed wonderful, and so 
 peculiar in its kind, that I nowhere remember to have seen anything like 
 it." And the poetic fancy of Caesar Otway dwelt with peculiar pleasure 
 upon the sombre spectacle. " I would ponder," he writes, " on such a 
 spot as this at Glendalough, surrounded as it is with mighty mountains, 
 
GLENMALURE AND ITS SCENERY. 
 
 99 
 
 dark winding glens ; all its lakes, streams, rocks, and waterfalls, in keeping 
 and accordant association with a place of ruins — ruins that testify of 
 altars, and of a priesthood overthrown — a worship made desolate — a 
 people 'scattered and peeled,' where the long continuous shadow of the 
 lofty and slender round tower moves slowly from morn to eve over 
 wasted churches, scattered yew-trees, and the tombs, now undistinguish- 
 able, of bishops, abbots, and anchorites, walking its round as time-sentinel, 
 and telling forth to the Ancient of Days how many suns have run their 
 diurnal and annual course since these holy men had descended to their 
 graves." 
 
 Quitting the solitary and awe-inspiring Glendalough, we directed our 
 course to the Head of Glenmalure, or the " Glen of much Ore." 
 Our route took us from Laragh to the old barrack of Drumgoff, for 
 nearly six miles along the most interesting portion of the military road, 
 which is here carried across the base of the mountains, separating the 
 Yale of Clara, through which the River Avonmore is continued, from 
 Glenmalure, the sublime valley, through which the Avonbeg winds for 
 several miles ere it joins the Avonmore, at the " Meeting of the Waters." 
 As we ascended the road beyond Laragh, we obtained several charming 
 views of the latter, as it pursued its serpentine course between beautifully 
 wooded banks, through the sylvan Vale of Clara ; and then, attaining the 
 highest part of the road, 913 feet above the sea, we were enabled to 
 command an extensive view southward of numerous mountains, and 
 northward of the country through which we had passed, from the 
 gloomy shades of Glendalough to the burnished peaks of the Sugar Loaf 
 Mountains. Drumgoff is situated about midway up Glenmalure, at the 
 point where the valley contracts and partakes of the character of the 
 glen. The journey hither to the head is along a rugged mountain road, 
 past some abandoned lead mines, and presents a succession of magnificent 
 mountain pictures. " There is no glen in Wicklow," remarks Frazer, 
 "comparable with this portion of Glenmalure. In none of the other 
 glens do the mountains assume such well-defined outlines, and at the 
 same time attain to such elevations ; nowhere is the prevailing character 
 of the place less disturbed by the traces of cultivation, the attempts at 
 improvement, and other unaccording circumstances ; nowhere is the repose 
 so profound, and the scenery so striking ; nowhere do we appear to 
 
100 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WICKLOW. 
 
 be so embosomed in mountains ; nor do we remember any other com- 
 bination of natural objects in the glen scenery of the district so capable 
 of awakening emotions of awe and sublimity." Our picture represents a 
 scene near the head of this glen, where the Avonbeg, after originating 
 in some mountain rills a little higher up, casts its still infant stream 
 over a ledge of rocks called the Ess-fall. Lugnaquilla, the loftiest of 
 the peaks which rise above Glenmalure, is the highest mountain in 
 Wicklow, being 3039 feet above the sea, and commands from its summit 
 views of the whole or portions of the counties of Wicklow, Wexford, 
 Carlow, Kilkenny, Tipperary, Kildare, Meath, and West Meath. In its 
 historical associations, Glenmalure was the " asylum and strong fastness 
 of Feagh Mac Hugh O'Brien, or O'Byrn of Ballinacor ; upon whom 
 Spenser recommended Queen Elizabeth to expend both men and money, 
 in endeavoring to hem him in by a circuitous disposition of troops ;" 
 and it was the scene of many bloody encounters in the Rebellion of 
 1798. 
 
 The lower portion of Glenmalure lying between Drumgoff and Rath- 
 drum is extremely pleasing, for here the valley expands, the hills slope 
 gently away, and being wooded down to the banks of the river, the 
 features of the landscape are not so wild and rugged as in the upper 
 part of the glen. The village of Rathdrum is romantically placed on 
 high ground overlooking the Avonmore some distance above its junction 
 with the Avonbeg, and which here runs through a wooded ravine. It 
 forms part of the estate of Earl Fitzwilliam, the principal landed propri- 
 etor in the county of Wicklow, whose possessions include a large copse- 
 wood three or four miles in length, and a mile in breadth, extending up 
 the Vale of Clara, and clothing the left bank of the Avonmore for some 
 distance with a garb of emerald hue. Rathdrum is a station upon the 
 Dublin, Wicklow and Wexford Railway, the line approaching it from the 
 town of Wicklow on the northeast, and in its further progress following 
 the course of the river to Arklow. 
 
 At the point where Glenmalure unites with the Vale of Clara to form 
 in their union the Vale of Avoca, the most striking object in the land- 
 scape is Castle Howard, picturesquely perched on the brow of a lotty 
 eminence, apparently upheld by the tops of the trees, for from the river's 
 brink to the stately building it is one mass of luxuriant foliage. 
 
THE MEETING OF THE WATERS. 
 
 101 
 
 Approaching by a bridge, which crosses the Avonmore a little above 
 its junction with the Avonbeg, the road passes through a castellated 
 gateway and over an ascending wooded plane to the mansion, which from 
 its altitude, standing as it does 200 feet above the river, commands 
 magnificent views. The structure in itself, however, has no pretensions 
 to extent or magnificence. Near to it rises, to a height of 816 feet, 
 the bare ridge of Cronebane, surmounted by the " Mottha Stone," 
 fourteen feet by ten and ten feet high, supposed by antiquaries to have 
 been a druidical altar, but locally known as the hurling stone of Finn 
 Macoul. The view presented from this height is remarkably interesting, 
 and embraces the richly wooded vales of Avoca, Clara, and the Avonbeg, 
 the wilds of Glenmalure and Glendalough, and the cloud-capped heights 
 which stretch from Lugnaquilla to Kippure, the mountain birthplaces of 
 the streams which mingle their waters near its base. 
 
 The prominent claim that Castle Howard presents to the aesthetic 
 sight-seer is, however, one that more closely appeals to his poetic rather 
 than to his pictorial fancy, for its elevated position bestows upon it a 
 delightful view of The Meeting of the Waters, that, coupled with the 
 vale through which they harmoniously pass, formed a potent inspiration 
 to the early muse of Ireland's most honored poet. Truly, nature has 
 here scattered her charms with a liberal hand : waving woods, clear 
 waters, and verdant shores, combine to render the picture one of surpass- 
 ing softness and beautiful tranquillity. " It is not a scene," says an 
 observant writer, "which a poet or painter would visit if he wished to 
 elevate his imagination by sublime views of nature, or by images of 
 terror ; but if he desired to represent the calm repose of peace and love, 
 he would choose this glen as their place of residence." No language can 
 perhaps adequately convey to the reader a more pleasing idea of the 
 serene beauty of this enchanting valley than that presented in Moore's 
 elegant lyric, commencing — 
 
 " There is not in the wide world a valley so sweet 
 As that vale in whose bosom the bright waters meet ; 
 O, the last rays of feeling and life must depart 
 Ere the bloom of that valley shall fade from my heart." 
 
 But it must be admitted that in the poet's case the enchantment was 
 considerably heightened by the companionship of kind friends, whose 
 
102 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WICKLOW. 
 
 presence added zest to the contemplation of the scene. Indeed he 
 confesses as much in his concluding stanza — 
 
 " Sweet Vale of Avoca ! how calm could I rest 
 In thy bosom of shade, with the friends I love best, 
 Where the storms that we feel in this cold world should cease, 
 And our hearts, like thy waters, be mingled in peace." 
 
 The appellation of " Meeting of the Waters," however, is given to two 
 distinct parts of the river — one, distinguished as the " first meeting," 
 to the point already named, where the waters of the Avonmore and the 
 Avonbeg (the greater and lesser Avon) unite and thenceforward constitute 
 the Avoca River ; the other, known as the " second meeting," to a spot 
 declared by some to be the most beautiful of the two, five miles further 
 down the stream, at W ooden Bridge (a handsome stone erection, however, 
 belies its name), where the Aughrim and the Gold Mines rivers enter 
 the Avoca. For many years a diversity of opinion existed as to which 
 of these was the scene of the poet's verses ; and the matter was only 
 settled upon the publication of his life and correspondence, when it was 
 discovered without doubt that the upper confluence is entitled to the 
 honor. 
 
 But the scene has been vastly marred since the poet visited this 
 romantic spot in 1807, for the sylvan charm and beauty of the vale has 
 been considerably depreciated by the construction of the railway through 
 it, and the operations of the miners who delve for copper in the bowels 
 of the adjacent mountains ; while the once limpid stream is now sadly 
 discolored by the washings of sulphur and copper ore. Alas ! such is the 
 penalty that the demands of commerce and the needs of mankind exact 
 from those picturesque regions of the earth that hold precious treasures 
 within their embrace. Bountifully indeed has nature lavished her gifts 
 upon the glens and mountains of Wicklow, for she has not only given 
 beauty to its hills and valleys, but has enriched the bosom of the earth 
 with mineral wealth. Towards the close of the last century, a quantity 
 of native gold, in lumps and grains, was picked up hy the peasantry in 
 a stream that descends from the Croghan Mountains, which lie a little 
 to the southward of Wooden Bridge on the Wexford border, and excited 
 the most extravagant hopes respecting the existence of a mine of the 
 precious metal. Government in consequence established works on the 
 
THE VALE OF AVOCA. 
 
 103 
 
 mountain-streams, and sunk mines for the purpose of obtaining the gold, 
 but with such little success that they were induced, after some time, to 
 abandon the enterprise ; for, curious to relate, although the quantity of 
 gold collected in this vicinity from August 24 to October 15, 1796, when 
 government took possession of the prize, was no less than 2666 ounces, 
 sold on the spot for ^10,000 of the Irish currency of the time, the 
 produce of the mines while under government control up to the 
 Rebellion in 1798 was but ,£3,500. The mines, then abandoned, were 
 partially resumed with scant succcess in 1800, since which latter date but 
 little gold has been discovered in the vicinity.* 
 
 From the union of the Avonmore and Avonbeg, the river pursues its 
 devious course to the sea through a fertile valley, whose mountainous 
 sides are thrown into an endless variety of lovely pictures by the irregu- 
 larity of their positions. These mountainous ridges are covered with the 
 thick foliage of the oak, and are richly pictorial in heaths, furze, and 
 other upland vegetation. Further onward the vale gradually expands into 
 broad and verdant slopes, dotted at intervals with white cottages, between 
 which the river glides gently towards the sea, whose blue waters make a 
 noble boundary to a combination of the grandest and softest scenery 
 which nature has ever produced. The spectator, however, turns from the 
 scene with one feeling of regret — a feeling to which the traveler Kohl 
 has given expression in these words : " After all, the greatest fault of the 
 Vale of Avoca is that it is so short. How gladly would the eye feast 
 on more of those beautiful meadows, those bold crags, those ivy-mantled 
 oaks ! " 
 
 At Wooden Bridge the Avoca trends to the southeast, which direction 
 it takes for four miles, when it enters the sea at Arklow. From the 
 same point the railway throws off a branch in the opposite direction 
 up the valley of the Aughrim, to Tinnahely, a small town belonging to 
 Earl Fitzwilliam, whose seat of Coolattin is in the neighborhood, and 
 terminates, sixteen and a half miles from the junction, at Shillelagh, 
 
 * It is a fact beyond controversy, from the precious relics constructed of gold that have often been dug up, 
 that the metal must have been obtained in considerable quantities by the ancient Irish. The discovery in the 
 stream descending from the Croghan Mountains here referred to, was originally made by a schoolmaster, who for 
 some years kept the secret to himself. His sudden rise into a position of comparative wealth sorely puzzled 
 his neighbors, who attributed his repeated wanderings along the banks of the stream, to the actions of a 
 diseased mind. 
 
104 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WICK LOW. 
 
 once famous as a fine forest of oak, the greater portion of which was 
 cut clown in 1693, to supply fuel for ironworks of that period.* 
 
 Beautifully situated between Wooden Bridge and Arklow, on the 
 northern bank of the Avoca, Shelton Abbey, the seat of the Earl of 
 Wicklow, stands at the base of a range of hills which rise gently around 
 it, and are luxuriantly clothed with oak and birch-wood. The Gothic 
 mansion is of considerable antiquity, and has been constructed in the 
 style of an ancient abbey, changed after the Reformation to resemble a 
 baronial residence. -The picturesque character of the edifice has a fine 
 effect, and, with the surrounding scenery, forms one of the most charming 
 landscapes of which this delightful county can boast. The demesne 
 stretches for a considerable distance along the bank of the river, and is 
 thickly studded with beech and chestnut trees, some of which have 
 attained an unusually noble growth. On the southern bank of the river, 
 nearly opposite to Shelton, is Glenart Castle, belonging to the Earl of 
 Carysfort, girt by venerable woods, which extend almost to Arklow. 
 
 Arklow is a town of 5000 inhabitants situated on a hill overlooking 
 the sea, near the southeastern corner of the county. It has long been a 
 busy fishing town,f and of late years has acquired a considerable coasting 
 trade, owing to its being the port whence the copper and lead ore found 
 
 * Ireland was once celebrated for her oak woods, and, according to the authority of Spenser, the county of 
 Wicklow, so recently as the reign of Elizabeth, was greatly encumbered with a redundance thereof. Those of 
 Shillelagh (a barony so called) conferred the universally known appellation on the redoubtable cudgel of the Irish 
 peasant, the toughness of which can only be equalled by the heads brought into contact with it in the little 
 "scrimmages" that occur at fairs, patterns, and merry-makings. These woods supplied the architect of West- 
 minster Hall with the oak timber of which the roof of that noble and venerable edifice was constructed. But 
 the glories of Shillelah are departed ; a few straggling trees are all that now remain to perpetuate the wooded pride of 
 that famous district. 
 
 \ Arklow is one of the most important herring and oyster fisheries on the coast of Ireland, the industry giving 
 employment to one-half the inhabitants and between three and four hundred boats. Like the Claddagh men of 
 Galway, the fishermen of Arklow are a distinct race from the other inhabitants. They will allow no persons but 
 those engaged in the fishery to live in the quarter of the town they have appropriated to themselves ; and being wholly 
 devoted to their own particular pursuits, they hold but little intercourse with their neighbors ; neither will they, 
 even when reduced to absolute distress, employ themselves in any occupations not connected with their favorite 
 tlement. Their lives afford an incessant variety, which seems the zest of their existence. They endure all the 
 hardships and privations of a seafaring life with astonishing patience and resolution ; but as soon as the cause which 
 urges them to exertion is removed, they relapse into indolence, and remain sitting at home by the fireside for days 
 together, in the full enjoyment of the pleasure of " doing nothing at all." Sometimes they have money in abund- 
 ance, at others they are suffering under the bitterest effects of imprudence and poverty. But probably in these 
 respects they differ little from the same class of men all over the world ; and both their defects and good qualities, it 
 is likely, may be traced in all cases to the same cause — a life of chance and adventure. 
 
THE TOWN OF ARK LOW. 
 
 105 
 
 in the valley of Avoca, and carried thither by tramway, is forwarded to 
 Swansea, for smelting. It cannot, however, occupy a prominent posi- 
 tion as a port, in consequence of a sand bar impeding the entrance of 
 large vessels into the harbor. The town, under the name of Arclogh, 
 was included under those grants of territory for which Henry II. caused 
 service to be done at Wexford. Its only relic of antiquity adjoins the 
 barracks, and is an old ivy-grown tower, the remains of the Castle built 
 by one of the Ormond family, who once held large possessions in the 
 county. In 1 33 1 it was taken from the English by the O'Tooles, who, 
 however, were shortly after driven from it by Lord Birmingham. Subse- 
 quently the Irish once more became its masters, but were again expelled 
 by the English ; and then in 1641 the Irish, for a third time, surprised 
 the castle, put the garrison to the sword, and kept possession of it till 
 1649, when it was captured by Oliver Cromwell, who dismantled it, and 
 reduced it to a heap of ruins. The remains of a monastery, founded in 
 the thirteenth century, by Theobald Fitzwalter, Lord Butler of Ireland, 
 in the reign of Henry II., were visible in the rear of the town at the 
 close of the last century, but they have now wholly disappeared. On 
 June 10, 1798, Arklow was the scene of a severe encounter between the 
 royal troops under General Needham and a large body of Irish led by 
 a priest named Michael Murphy. 
 
 From Arklow the railway proceeds in a southwesterly direction to 
 Wexford, passing through the ancient ecclesiastical city of Ferns* and 
 the town of Enniscorthy. We were, however, unable to visit these 
 places, as it was necessary to return by our conveyance to Dublin, along 
 a road equidistant from the railway and the route we had already 
 traversed, in order that we might visit a couple of the beauty spots ot 
 the county that we had yet to see ; and to this we devoted the third 
 and last day of our sojourn within its borders. Leaving Arklow by the 
 
 * Though now a decayed and insignificant place, Ferns was once the capital of the Kingdom of Leinster, and its 
 archiepiscopal see, the latter being founded in 598 by either St. Mogue or St. Edan. The Protestant bishopric was 
 enlarged in 1600 by the addition of Leighlin, and the united see was annexed to Ossory in 1835. In the Roman 
 Catholic Church, Ferns remains a distinct diocese with the episcopal residence at Wexford. The cathedral is a com- 
 paratively modern building, erected on the site of an old church, supposed to have been that of St. Edan. King 
 John, who when Earl of Morton, built the castle offered the bishopric to Gerald Barri (Giraldus Cambrensis), but the 
 honor was declined by that egotistical and ambitious ecclesiastic. The old cathedral town of Leighlin lies near 
 Bagnalstown, in the county of Kilkenny ; its see was founded by St. Laserian in 632, and, as already stated, the 
 Protestant diocese was united to Ferns in 1600. 
 II. — 43 
 
106 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WICKLOW. 
 
 long narrow bridge which crosses the Avoca, we proceeded to the town 
 of Wicklow, 15 miles distant, by the road, which is much straighter than 
 the railway, and some five miles shorter, but contained little to interest 
 eyes that had been almost surfeited with natural beauties. 
 
 The county town of Wicklow is a place of about 3500 inhabitants, 
 pleasantly situated in a semi-circle on the slope of a hill, the base of 
 which is washed by the sea. The town itself is not particularly interest- 
 ing, but there are pleasant walks from it to Bride's and Wicklow Heads, 
 each of which is surmounted by a lighthouse. Its original Irish name 
 was Cill-mantain, or the church of St. Mantan, but its present name is 
 supposed to come from " Wigginge Lough," the Lake of Ships, from 
 having been one of the earliest maritime- stations of the Danes. The 
 tower of Black Castle, situated on a promontory, forms all that is left of 
 a fortress originally built by Maurice Fitzgerald in the twelfth century, 
 but being destroyed, was rebuilt in 1375 by William Fitzwilliam, governor 
 of the district. Early in the sixteenth century it fell into the hands 
 of the Byrnes, who surrendered it to Henry VIII. in 1543, and was 
 afterwards in 1641, unsuccessfully invested by Luke O'Toole. 
 
 The town stands at the outlet of a long narrow creek called the 
 Broad Lough, which forms the egress for the waters of the Vartry, and 
 is bordered by an extensive salt marsh, called the Murrough. It also 
 possesses a small harbor which has recently been enlarged ; but the bar 
 off the coast is an insuperable obstacle to its becoming a flourishing sea- 
 port. In the construction of the railway between Wicklow and Bray, 
 many engineering difficulties have been overcome, the line at many points 
 being cut through the rocks which overhang the sea. Travelers, however, 
 who desire to visit the Devil's Glen and the Glen of the Downs, which 
 lie between those towns, but at some little distance from the coast, find 
 it best to do so by the common road, and the employment of a motor 
 that is neither so noisy nor so swift as the iron steed. 
 
 Bent upon seeing these two places we now proceeded upon this latter 
 route, and a drive of three miles through a rich valley brought us to a 
 charming country hotel at Newrath Bridge on the Vartry, near to which 
 is Rosanna House, formerly the home of Mrs. Tighe, the amiable and 
 highly gifted author of " Psyche," one of the most graceful poems in the 
 language. The hotel has the adjunct of a fine garden, and "combines 
 
THE DEVIL'S GLEN. 
 
 107 
 
 all the comforts of an inn with the quiet of a private house in the 
 country ; " and perhaps it is owing to the additional charm of its vicinage 
 to the former residence of the author of " Pysche " that, to employ 
 the language of Sir John Forbes, " it is said to be a favorite resort with 
 those whom Psyche's lord has just delivered into the hands of Hymen." 
 That eminent physician saw some indications of this fact in the poetical 
 effusions contained in the well-filled album of the hotel ; and could not 
 deny that the selection of the locality seemed appropriate. 
 
 We then proceeded a couple of miles higher up the Vartry to the 
 Devil's Glen, a wild ravine of a mile and a half in length, and a 
 combination of rock, wood, and water, sufficiently beautiful to entitle the 
 spot to have been named with greater propriety the Glen of the Gods. 
 One side of the dell belongs to the estate of Glenmore, the other to the 
 demesne of Ballycurry ; and at its head the river Vartry tumbles over a 
 ledge of rock, down one hundred feet, forming a beautiful cascade, and 
 thence rushes through the glen in a succession of rapids. But the volume 
 of the stream has been much reduced since the formation of the Round- 
 wood reservoir, a mile above the fall, and the diverting of a considerable 
 portion of its waters to the needs of the citizens of Dublin. The Devil's 
 Glen possesses almost the same characteristics as the Dargle and the 
 Glen of the Downs, to which latter we next proceeded. It was, however, 
 to our view, more noble, and more beautiful, for the right bank of the 
 ravine rises four hundred feet, and its craggy walls protrude in many 
 places through the green foliage with which it is lined. It was, too, of a 
 more sombre character, and we know of no spot better suited for the 
 indulgence of deep meditation than this solitary and secluded glen. The 
 bleakness of the country beyond also gives to it an air of wildness, 
 for the view from above its lofty side embraces the chain of the Wicklow 
 mountains on the west from Lugnaquilla to Douce and Kippure. To 
 the critical author of " Vanity Fair " this rocky dell was a perfect world 
 of enchantment, for he tells us that he found it "a delightful wild walk, 
 and where a Methuselah of a landscape-painter might find studies for all 
 his life long. All sorts of foliage and color, all sorts of delightful caprices 
 of light and shadow — the river tumbling and frothing amidst the boulders 
 — ' raucum per Icevia murmur saxa ct'ens,' and a chorus of 150,000 
 birds (there might be more), hopping, twittering, singing under the clear 
 
108 
 
 THE BEAUTIES OF WJCKLOW. 
 
 cloudless Sabbath scene, make this walk one of the most delightful that 
 can be taken." And, visiting the spot on a Sunday, he further filled in 
 his verbal picture with similes applied to act as palliatives to his con- 
 science for absence from a place of worship; for, "here," he adds, "was 
 a long aisle, arched gothically overhead, in a much better taste than is 
 seen in some of those dismal new churches ; and, by way of painted glass, 
 the sun lighting up multitudes of various colored leaves, and the birds 
 for choristers, and the river by way of organ, and in stones enough to 
 make a whole library of sermons. No man can walk in such a place 
 without feeling grateful, and grave, and humble ; and without thanking 
 heaven for it as he comes away." It was in the Devil's Glen that the 
 redoubtable General Holt secreted himself during the preparations for the 
 Rebellion of 1798; and at the close of the insurrection it became the 
 hiding place of the scattered insurgents, who were finally expelled by 
 setting fire to the woods, blackened stumps long marking the scene of 
 the conflagration. 
 
 It is nearly a dozen miles from the Devil's Glen to the Glen of the 
 Downs ; and in proceeding to the latter we turned off from the main road 
 to ride through the pass of Dunran which runs near and parallel to it. 
 This latter is a narrow ravine stretching for two miles along the base of 
 Carrick-na-muck ; and, though not to be compared with the Devil's Glen, 
 the Dargle, or the Glen of the Downs, it is nevertheless one of the 
 gems which enrich the eastern part of the county of Wicklow ; and while 
 it assimilates with the general character of the magnificent scenery of the 
 district, possesses sufficient individual attractions to amply compensate for 
 a slight deviation from the direct course. As we journeyed onwards we 
 passed through Newtownmountkennedy, a small town situated in the 
 midst of charming scenery, and surrounded by many handsome country 
 seats ; and previously to entering the Glen of the Downs, through which 
 the public road runs, we passed a branch road to the east that leads to 
 Delgany, a pretty village on the sea coast, containing many summer resi- 
 dences belonging to the citizens of Dublin. 
 
 The Glen of the Downs receives its name from running along 
 the base of the Downs mountain, which attains to an elevation of 1232 
 feet, and adjoins the Sugar Loaf. It is a mile and a half in length, but, 
 having an average breadth of only 150 feet and sides rising boldly to 
 
THE GLEX OE THE DOWNS. 
 
 109 
 
 the height of 300 feet, it partakes more of the character of a ravine 
 than of a glen. These precipitous walls are clothed in many parts with 
 oak. ash, and evergreen shrubs, and at times approach so near as barely 
 to leave room for the narrow road and the small bright stream that 
 glides with a devious course through this romantic pass, which presents 
 at every step a constant succession of new charms. High upon the 
 wooded hill, to the right, as we proceed towards Bray, stands a 
 banqueting-house and a romantic cottage, so delightfully situated as to 
 impart an air of poetry to the whole landscape. These tasteful accessories 
 to the beauty of the scene were constructed by the Latouche family, 
 through whose extensive and finely-wooded demesne of Bellevue this 
 enchanting glen runs. From an octagonal room in the banqueting-house, 
 the best view of the surrounding country is obtained; the glen far 
 beneath, with the many-tinted sides of the rock)- steeps by which it is 
 overhung, rich in native woods and abundant plantations, and the sublime 
 galaxy of neighboring mountains, amongst which the dazzlingly white 
 peaks of the two Sugar-Loaf hills tower conspicuously — all combine to 
 present a scene of luxurious softness, relieved by one of grandeur and 
 magnificence. 
 
 At the northern outlet of the Glen of the Downs we were but five 
 miles from Bray, the road thither leading through the valley which 
 divides the two Sugar-Loaf Mountains. As we neared the town we passed 
 through the grounds of Hollybrook, a favorite show-place for visitors 
 and once the residence of Robin Adair, the subject of the well-known 
 sonor written to the Irish air of " Aileen Aroon." The Tudor mansion 
 
 o 
 
 replaced one built in the seventh century, and is surrounded by aged 
 shrubs and evergreens. After crossing the bridge at Bray, we were once 
 more in the count)* of Dublin, and rattling on to the metropolis, through 
 a district already described- 
 
110 
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE BOYNE. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE BOYNE. 
 
 Historic Importance of the River — Glasnevin and its Celebrities — Trim and its Ancient Castle — 
 Newtown Trim and its ecclesiastical ruins — Bective Abbey — Hill of Tara and its historic 
 glories — Beauty of the river s banks — Holy Wells — Patterns and the cause of their decline — 
 Athlutnney Castle — Navan — Kells and St. Columbkille — Hill of Telton and its ancient fair — 
 Strange Matrimonial Custom — Church and Bound Tower of Donaghmore — Antiquities at 
 Slane — St. Patrick's Defiaiice — Brugh-na-Boinne, the Royal Cemetery — Mound at New 
 Grange — Battle of the Boyne — Drogheda and its associations — Mellifont and Monasterboice. 
 
 PROBABLY no stream in Ireland can lay claim to having been the 
 theatre of more important historic incidents than the Boyne ; for not 
 far from its banks Tara's regal hill uplifts its honored head now clad with 
 verdant sward, but in the dim past crowned with innumerable glories of 
 princely pomp renowned in bardic story ; while at its very brink was 
 fought that memorable battle, called by its name, which gave the final 
 blow to the hopes of the last sovereign of the line of Stuart. Desirous, 
 therefore, of taking in as much as we possibly could of the stream in our 
 progress to the north, we proceeded from Dublin by 30 miles of railway 
 to Trim, branching off from the main line of the Midland Great Western, 
 about half a dozen miles after it leaves the Broadstone station. Steaming 
 then out of the terminus, our attention was almost immediately attracted 
 by the pleasant suburb of Glasnevin, where, as we have already stated, 
 the Royal Dublin Society has its beautiful Botanical Gardens. The 
 grounds were formerly the property of the poet Tickell, who accompanied 
 Addison to Ireland when the latter became secretary to Lord Sunderland. 
 This village, indeed, has in its time been greatly honored by literary 
 talent, for in or near it, as we have also previously mentioned, likewise 
 resided Parnell, Swift, and Steele ; while hard by, at Delville, lived Dr. 
 Delaney, whom Stella visited so as to be near her eccentric admirer. At 
 
GLASNEVJN AND ITS CEMETERY. 
 
 Ill 
 
 Glasnevin, too, is the principal metropolitan cemetery, situated on a plain, 
 but laid out with considerable taste. Conspicuous from every point is 
 O'Connell's monument — a granite round tower, 170 feet in height, sur- 
 mounted by a cross eight feet high, weighing, it is said, about two tons — 
 and containing in the crypt at its base, the mortal remains of the 
 liberator. Near to it is the simple but solid tomb of William Dargan, 
 to whose generosity we have more than once shown Ireland to be greatly 
 indebted ; and in another part of the cemetery the more remarkable one 
 of John Philpot Curran, constructed of Irish granite, and an exact fac- 
 simile of the monument of Scipio Barbatiens. 
 
 Trim {Ath-trium, the Pass or Ford of the Elder Trees), is the county 
 town of Meath, and lies upon the Boyne about midway in its passage 
 from its source to the sea. The only places of import found upon the 
 upper half of the liver have been described in the last chapter of the 
 previous volume. We shall therefore now take up the story of the stream 
 at this point, and follow it to its outlet at Drogheda, independent of the 
 railway, which does not keep sufficiently near to its bank for our pur- 
 pose. The ruined buildings in and around Trim mark it as a place of 
 great antiquity. It was early a small ecclesiastical see, St. Loman, 
 nephew of St. Patrick, being reputed its first bishop ; but for the past 
 700 years it has been the seat of the bishopric of Meath.* The history 
 of Trim, during its palmy days, like that of many other Irish towns, is a 
 succession of burnings and sackings, and may be said to comprise the 
 period between 1108, when it is stated to have been taken by the Irish 
 chieftain, Connor O'Melaghlin, and 1649, when it surrendered to Oliver 
 Cromwell. It was the castellated home of the DeLacys, the Anglo-Nor- 
 mans, upon whom Henry II. bestowed the largest share of the kingdom 
 of the O'Melaghlins, monarchs of Meath — formerly one of the five prov- 
 inces into which Ireland was divided ; it was the scene of a gay court 
 held by Richard Earl of Ulster, in the reign of Edward II., and the place 
 of imprisonment by Richard I., of Humphrey of Gloucester, and of Henry 
 of Lancaster, afterwards Henry V. ; and within it several successive Parlia- 
 ments were held, at one of which a mint was established. Dropping 
 
 * This bishopric is composed of several minor sees, which were anciently distinct. The most important appears 
 to have been Clonard, founded by St. Finian in 520. Eugene was the first prelate who assumed the title of Bishop 
 of Meath in 1 174; and the see was removed to Newtown Trim early in the following century. 
 
112 
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE BOYNE. 
 
 down to a century ago, the old city lays claim to having been for a time 
 the residence of the great Duke of Wellington, who not only took an 
 active part in its public affairs, but represented it in the Irish parliament ; 
 and a lofty pillar, crowned by his statue, has been raised in his honor 
 near the house in which he dwelt. 
 
 The leading archaeological features in Trim, to quote from Sir 
 William R. W. Wilde's " Beauties of the Boyne," are, " the grey massive 
 towers of King John's Castle, with its outward walls and barbican — the 
 gates and towers and bastion — the fosse, moat, and chapel — the Sheep- 
 gate and portions of the town wall — and above all, the tall, commanding 
 form of the Yellow Steeple, which seems the guardian genius of the sur- 
 rounding ruins." It is presumed that this steeple was originally used as 
 a signal and watch-tower, and that it occupies the site of the Abbey of 
 St. Mary, founded in 432 by St. Patrick. It is 125 feet in height, 
 divided into five stages, and is attributed to the Anglo-Norman period, 
 while the demolition of a part of its walls has been assigned to the 
 cannon of Oliver Cromwell. The Sheepgate is a round-headed arch, in 
 the ruined town wall near the steeple, and with another, the Watergate, 
 constitutes all that is left of the ancient entrances. King John's Castle, 
 so called because he once lodged in it, was originally built by Hugh 
 DeLacy in 11 73, but shortly after burnt by Hugh Tyrrel, in whose charge 
 it was left, upon his being unable to withstand the attack of Roderic 
 O'Connor, King of Connaught. Its rebuilding has been attributed to 
 Richard Pipard, who, however, Camden asserts lived previous to the 
 DeLacys becoming possessed of Meath. The ruins, some parts of which 
 are in excellent preservation, cover an area of two acres, and from their 
 elevated site on the banks of the Boyne, form very striking objects. 
 They indicate a fortress unequalled for extent in the country, and com- 
 prise a lofty keep 80 feet high, flanked with many rectangular and circu- 
 lar towers, with barbican, portcullis, and surrounding moat, into which 
 latter the waters of the Boyne could be admitted at pleasure. Trim also 
 once possessed two other castles, and still retains scanty remains of a 
 Dominican Black Friary, but no traces are left of the Grey Friary of 
 Observantines founded there, nor of its Round Tower, the burning of 
 which in 1108 by Connor O'Melaghlin, and in 1127 by Connor Feargal 
 O'Loughlin, is recorded. The parish church is an ancient edifice with a 
 
NEWTOWN TRIM AND ITS RUINS. 
 
 113 
 
 steeple, of the date of 1449, erected by Richard, Duke of York. There 
 are also the usual county buildings appertaining to an assize town.* 
 
 The river, after passing Trim, winds for between two and three miles 
 through broad green lawns to Newtown Trim, where are to be found the 
 extensive remains of the monastery and the ancient Cathedral of St. Peter 
 and St. Paul, one of the earliest and most elegant specimens of light 
 pointed Gothic in the kingdom, mantled with ivies centuries old but still 
 of the freshest green. This cathedral was founded in 1206, by Simon de 
 Rochfort, the first Englishman who became Bishop of Meath, and who 
 removed its see hither from Clonard, 15 miles higher up the river, the 
 cathedral city of his Irish predecessors. There are, too, a little lower 
 down the river at the bridge, some castellated ruins, including a large 
 rectangular keep, and the remains of St. John's Friary. 
 
 Passing further down the island-dotted stream, which now quickens 
 its course between banks more elevated and broken than before, it runs 
 in succession by Scurloughstown Castle, an Anglo-Norman fortress of 
 1 1 80, whose massive sides were cracked by Cromwell's cannon balls ; 
 by the scanty remains of Trubley Castle, where it is said Cromwell 
 took a night's rest ; and, at five miles from Trim, by the noble ruins 
 of Bective Abbey, founded in 1146 by Murchard O'Melaghlin, King of 
 Meath, and of which sufficient is left to indicate the mixed monastic 
 and military character of the institution. 
 
 Five miles to the right of Bective Abbey lies that renowned eminence 
 on whose brow, more than thirteen centuries ago, beat the warm heart 
 of Ireland, whose pulsations were felt in every corner of the land — the 
 famous " Hill of Tara," f celebrated by ancient bards and historians 
 
 * Two miles south of Trim is the parish church of Laracor, the second benifice of the immortal author of 
 " Gulliver." The glebe-house in which he dwelt has passed away, and the residence of " Stella" and Mrs. Dingley 
 is now unknown, though the latter is asserted to have been about a mile nearer Trim. A modern church has 
 replaced that in which Swift officiated, with " dearly beloved Roger" as a clerk, to a flock of about a dozen. 
 
 \ According to Wright the original name of the hill was Liathdruim, " the Gray Eminence," upon which, 
 Keating says, Thea, the wife of Heremon, the first monarch of Ireland, ordered a palace to be built for herself, 
 whence it was called Temor, the House of Thea. Dinn Seauchers, an ancient Irish topography, asserts on the 
 contrary that the etymon of Temor is " the House of Music" (from Teadh, a musical chord, and Mur, a house), 
 and it was so called, adds that valuable MS., "from its celebrity for melody above all places in the world." 
 We are still otherwise informed that the word denotes "a pleasant and agreeable place with a covered or shaded 
 walk upon a hill for a convenient prospect," and accordingly some tourists describe this hill as a miniature 
 resemblance of Mount Tabor. 
 II.— M 
 
114 
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE BOYNE. 
 
 for its Teaghmor, or " Great House," where, down to the middle of 
 the sixth century, triennial parliaments of the kingdom were held ; for 
 its sumptuous palace, the residence of a long and illustrious line of 
 monarchs ; and for its college of learned men, where the arts and 
 sciences were cultivated and taught. " Aroused by the enthusiasm which 
 the very names inspire," writes Sir William R. Wilde, " we might 
 describe at length the royal residences which once crowned this sacred 
 spot, and still point out the foundations of these very structures. We 
 might recount the monarchs who reigned here, Belgic, Scotic, and 
 Milesian, from the days of Slaigne and Dagda through the royal line 
 of Temur to the subversion of Paganism and the introduction of 
 Christianity into Ireland. We might describe the great Feis Team/track, 
 or assembly of the chieftains ; and while we hold not with superstitious 
 reverence by all the bardic tales and poetic legends handed down to 
 us for some fifteen centuries — except so far as they accord with common 
 sense, or are borne out by collateral evidence — we could point with 
 pride to the just and wise laws which emanated from the house of 
 Ollamh Fodhla ; we could tell of Con, the warrior of the hundred 
 battles ; of the Druid famed for sorcery ; the Brehon, wise in judgments ; 
 the Bard who chronicled in wild and imaginative song the half fabulous 
 events of a semi-barbarous age ; the Kings renowned in story — the 
 Cormacs and Nialls, and Dathis ; but now — 
 
 " ' No more to chiefs and ladies bright 
 The Harp of Tara swells ; 
 The chord alone that breaks at night 
 Its tale of ruin tells.' 
 
 " We might, by merely paraphrasing the translations of authentic 
 Irish history, occupy pages in recounting the deeds of Patrick, when he 
 converted the Irish monarch and the whole court at Tara. We might, 
 even now, preach with the sermons, and enliven modern Christianity 
 with the hymns of our patron saint. We could tell of the cursing of 
 Temur, by St. Ruadhan, and its subsequent desertion. Or again, we 
 might trace the various raths, and descant upon the wells and 
 pillar-stones which consecrate this spot. The Lia Fail, or Stone of 
 Destiny, supposed to have been removed to Scone, and from Scone 
 
THE HILL OF TAR A. 
 
 115 
 
 to Westminster,* but which is still, it appears, undoubtedly at Tara, 
 would in itself form a text for an entire chapter upon the civil history of 
 this kingdom ; while the name of St. Adamnan is a fitting proem for an 
 hour's dissertation on our early ecclesiastical writings, and the colonies 
 which sprung from this Isle of Saints, even to the far-famed Iona." 
 
 Keating, O'Halloran, and O'Flaherty, whose poetic histories abound 
 with florid descriptions of the grandeur and magnificence of the royal 
 residence of Teaghmor, have dwelt with tond delight upon the solem- 
 nities of the periodical parliaments, at which the kings of Leinster 
 Ulster, Munster. and Connaught are said to have assisted, in conjunction 
 with the toparchs, dynasts, bards or sennachies, priests, and " men of 
 learning, distinguished by their abilities in all arts and professions," in 
 framing wise ordinances for the government of the kingdom. But, alas ! 
 for the past glory of Ireland, there remain no traces now of these 
 stately palaces — not a vestige exists of the proud halls + where "chiefs 
 and ladies bright " were wont to assemble ; the voice of the bard and 
 the notes of his lyre have for ages been hushed, and, as Moore 
 touchingly sings — 
 
 " The harp that once through Tara's halls 
 The soul of music shed, 
 Now hangs as mute on Tara's walls 
 As if that soul were fled." 
 
 Unfortunately, however, not even a wall has been left on which a 
 bard's harp or antiquarian's conjecture might be hung. The remains 
 of a few circular earthen entrenchments on the summit of a lofty green 
 hill, rising from the centre of an extensive plain, are all that the most 
 curious eye can now discover of the vanished splendor of the historic 
 eminence. 
 
 It has been conjectured that the Halls ol Tara might have been 
 constructed of less durable materials than stone, with a considerable 
 degree of elegance, which would account satisfactorily for the non- 
 existence of any ruins : and when we recollect that King John, on 
 his arrival in Dublin, lodged in a palace of wattles, or wickerwork, 
 
 * Tradition also ascribes the coronation stone at Westminster to have been that upon which the kings of 
 Munster were formerly crowned upon the Rock of CasheL (See VoL I., p. 133.) 
 
 f A deep excavation, presumed to have been the site of the Teach ML-dhthuarta, or great banqueting hall, 
 Aas led to the conclusion that that apartment was 360 feet long and 40 wide, running north and south., with 
 sis entrances on each side. 
 
116 
 
 \ 
 
 THE VALLEY OE THE BOYNE. 
 
 plastered with clay, there can be no reasonable grounds for rejecting 
 the hypothesis with respect to the court of Teaghmor. Hollinshed, 
 though he disputes the accuracy of the Irish historians in their 
 description of the magnificence of this palace, admits that " the place 
 seemeth to bear the show of an ancient and famous monument ; " and 
 thus infers that some memorial of its grandeur existed in his time, 
 viz., the sixteenth century.* 
 
 Dr. Petrie is of opinion that Tara became the residence of the 
 Irish kings upon the first establishment of a monarchical government 
 under Slanige, ruler of the Firbolgs or Belgae, and that there reigned 
 136 Pagan and 6 Christian monarchs — or 142 in all — up to 565, when 
 upon the death of Dermot it was abandoned as the seat of monarchy 
 in consequence of a curse pronounced by St. Ruadhan, declaring that 
 " noe kinge or queene ever after woulde or coulde dwelle in Tarach, 
 and that it shoulde be wast for ever without courte or palasse." The 
 last of its great national assemblies, however, took place in 554. Tara 
 was subsequently, in 980, the scene of a signal defeat sustained by the 
 Danes, and the rallying place of Roderic, the last native king, previous to 
 attacking the English in Dublin. Here, too, in 1589, O'Niall assembled 
 his troops after laying waste the surrounding country ; and in 1798 it 
 witnessed an encounter between some troops and insurgents, and became 
 the burial place of several of the latter on what is now known as 
 " Croppy Hill ; " and finally, on the first of August, 1843, O'Connell 
 selected Tara as the place for one of his monster Repeal meetings. 
 
 Returning to the Boyne, and following its course from Bective to 
 Navan, a distance of over half a dozen miles, the stream flows in a 
 
 * Alfred, King of the Northumbrian Saxons, who, according to Bede, retired to Ireland to avoid the perse- 
 cution of his brother, about the year 685, devoted himself while in exile to study, and composed a poem in the 
 Irish language, describing what he had observed in various parts of Ireland. Speaking of the palace of 
 Teaghmor, he says : — 
 
 " I found in the great fortress of Meath, 
 Valor, hospitality, and truth ; 
 Bravery, purity, and mirth — 
 The protection of all Ireland." 
 
 It must be considered that this was written more than a hundred years after Tara had ceased to be the 
 residence of the Irish sovereigns ; and it may here be added that during its zenith so sacred was the place held 
 that not even a monarch could reside there if he had a personal blemish, in proof of which it is recorded that 
 Cormac, the Great King, held his court at Tara until his eye was destroyed by Aengus, when he was obliged 
 to remove to Ceanannus or Kells. 
 
T 
 
 HOLY WELLS AND PATRONS. 117 
 
 northerly direction through a highly-cultivated district, having its banks 
 adorned with some ancient Norman military and ecclesiastical ruins, and 
 man\- beautiful country seats, principal among which latter is that ol 
 Ardsallagh House, the modern Elizabethan seat of the Duke of Bedford. 
 Within the immediate vicinity of the mansion, and but a few paces 
 from the river, is the Holy Well of St. Bridget, with its pure waters 
 bubbling up amid beautiful foliage, but under an incongruous modern 
 arch sadly out of harmony with the old carved head of St. Bridget, 
 with its plaited hair and prim formal features, the very impersonation 
 of a mother abbess. 
 
 There are many holy wells bordering the Boyne, especially near its 
 source, and pouring their waters into it through its tributary streams 
 — the river itself being generally believed to have its origin in Trinity 
 Well, near the Hill of Carbury. We mentioned this latter well at the 
 close of our last volume, and will briefly allude to the others now. 
 Between Trinity Well and Clonard are those of Tober-Crogh-neeve, or 
 the Holy Cross, once highly venerated, but now neglected ; Toberaulin, 
 the Beautiful or Lady Well, a fountain dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, 
 memorable in days gone by, and, like Trinity Well, from time immemo- 
 rial the scene of a celebrated fair and Pattern ; as well as Tobercro, 
 Carbury Well, and Tobernakill — six crystal fountains for the baptism of 
 the infant Boyne. Then, in its course, it is successively succored by the 
 waters of Tober Finn on the royal Hill of Tara ; by this Well of 
 St. Bridget ; and lower down by Tober Padraig, a blessed well dedicated 
 to the patron saint ; while the Well of St. Kieran, near Kells, forwards 
 its contribution through the Blackwater. " Thus," says Wilde, " the river 
 is doubly consecrated, not only by the ruins of sacred edifices which 
 cluster upon its banks, but through the waters which flow into it from 
 so many hallowed springs." 
 
 These hallowed springs, like the other holy wells of Ireland, were in 
 days gone by — most, if not all of them — the scenes of Patrons (commonly 
 called Patterns), so named from being celebrated upon the festival day 
 of the respective saints to whom the wells are dedicated. But the days 
 of rounds and penance, of vows and votive offerings, of charm and 
 miracle, of pilgrim and boccagh, of fun and frolic, faction-fight and 
 whiskey — the usual attendants of the celebrations — are past and gone, 
 
118 
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE BOYNE. 
 
 except in some few places where they are still carried on in a mitigated 
 degree. The character of these festivals, and the causes which led to 
 their suppression, have been given in the previous volume (page 63), 
 and it is therefore unnecessary to repeat the story here. We illustrate 
 the subject, however, by a Scene at a Patron — sketched by Mr. 
 Bartlett — in the mountain region of Connemara, on the top of a plane, 
 between Maamturc and the neighboring height, at an elevation of 1200 
 feet. Nearly every holy well — and in Ireland their name is legion — 
 has some strange traditionary story connected with it, like that told of 
 Trinity Well, near the end of the last volume ; and a book of no mean 
 dimensions might be filled with notices of their hallowed waters, and 
 the medicinal properties and mythic tales that pertain to them. 
 
 Immediately before reaching Navan the river sweeps round an 
 eminence surmounted by the picturesque ivy-covered ruins of the ancient 
 castle and the more modern mansion of Athlumney, from which Sir 
 William Somerville, Bart., Chief Secretary in Ireland from 1847 to 1852, 
 took the title of Lord Athlumney. It is said of Sir Launcelot Dowdall, 
 who owned the estate at the time of the battle of the Boyne, that upon 
 learning the result of the contest he set fire to the castle in order to 
 prevent its occupation by the Prince of Orange. Navan, originally 
 known as Nuachongbhail, was the first borough established in this part 
 of the country by the English, and was once protected by a wall ; 
 yet now, though a place of 4000 inhabitants, it possesses little of interest 
 to detain the tourist. 
 
 Far more interesting — especially to the antiquarian — is Kells, a town 
 of about the same size, pleasantly situated ten miles northwest by rail 
 and near to the Blackwater — a tributary of the Boyne — which has its 
 source some miles higher up in Lough Ramor, and falls into the Boyne 
 at Navan. This place is believed to owe its origin to King Fiacha 
 Finnailches a few years prior to the Christian era, and, as Ceanannus, 
 was in 550 the residence of St. Columb, who founded in it a monastery, 
 of which, however, no traces remain. In the town, however, is still to 
 be seen the Saint's house, a high-roofed building of the same class as 
 that of Saint Kevin's at Glendalough, having in one compartment a flat 
 stone six feet long by one foot thick, said to have been the ecclesiastic's 
 penitential bed. St. Columb, Columbkille, or Columba, was born in 
 
KELLS AND ST. COLUMB. 
 
 119 
 
 Ireland in the year 521 of a royal race, being a lineal descendant in 
 the fourth generation from Niall of the Nine Hostages. He is said to 
 have founded 300 monasteries in Ireland, after which he proceeded to 
 Britain, where he obtained a grant of the Island of Iona on the west 
 of Scotland, and established those religious edifices for the ruins of which 
 the island is now chiefly interesting. Kells also lays claim to several 
 ancient crosses — the principal being in the market place opposite to 
 where once stood a castle, erected in 1 1 78 by Walter DeLacy. Lord 
 of Meath — and a Round Tower 90 feet high, with conical summit and 
 the usual four windows near the top, and doorway ten feet above the 
 ground ; as well as to an ancient square bell tower surmounted by a 
 spire and standing apart from the modern church. The history of 
 Kells is no exception to that of Irish towns of like character, and 
 exhibits the place as having sustained great losses at the hands of the 
 native Irish, Norwegian, and Danish freebooters, its two greatest 
 catastrophes being the destruction of the abbey in 1019 by Sitric, 
 and the burning of the town by Edward Bruce in 1 3 1 5. That the 
 place in the past was as noted for its learning as for its sanctity is 
 proven in the illuminated Book of Kells, now in the library of Trinity 
 College, Dublin, which gives a notable view of ancient national pecu- 
 liarities, and is a remarkable example of elaborate ornamentation. 
 Adjoining Kells is the Hill of Lloyd, 422 feet high, surmounted by a 
 pillar upwards of 100 feet in height, erected by the first Earl of 
 Bective, and presenting from its summit an extensive view of the 
 valleys of the Blackwater and the Boyne and the adjacent country. 
 
 Midway between Kells and Navan stands the green Hill of Telton, 
 rising gradually from the margin of the Blackwater to a height of 
 about 300 feet. It is one of the most celebrated spots in Ireland, and 
 perhaps, next to Tara, the most ancient and notable. It was the site 
 of the palace of Tailtean (whence the name), one of the four royal 
 residences in Ireland, and for many centuries the scene of a great 
 fair established in the year of the world 3370, in the reign of Lugh 
 Lamhfada, in remembrance of his foster mother, Tailte, the daughter 
 of Maghmor, King of Spain, and the wife of Eochaidh, son of Ere, 
 the last king of the Firbolgs. This fair, which continued until the 
 time of Roderic O'Connor, the last king of Ireland, was held annually 
 
120 
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE BOYNE. 
 
 on the first of August, that month thereby obtaining in the Irish 
 language the name of Lugh-nasadh, or Lughs fair ; and its principal 
 observances consisted of boxing, wrestling, chariot racing, theatrical 
 exhibitions, sham battles, and aquatic contests upon artificial lakes. Its 
 most remarkable ceremony, however, was of a matrimonial character, 
 and consisted of an exhibition of marriageable young men and maidens, 
 who, after being given an opportunity of inspecting one another at a safe 
 distance, were marched on either side of a high wall having a door 
 with a small aperture, through which latter each young lady in turn 
 passed her middle finger for the approval of the young men on the 
 other side, and if any admired and laid hold of it the owner became 
 his bride. As the prizes drawn in this lottery were naturally in some 
 cases worse than blanks, it was fortunate for the contracting parties that 
 they were enabled on the succeeding fair day to publicly turn their 
 backs upon each other and enter anew into the hazardous pursuit of 
 happiness, which gave a " Telton marriage " a proverbial significance not 
 yet obsolete in Meath. An irregularity of surface is all that is left to 
 mark the site of the ancient city ; and, like the neighboring Hill of 
 Tara, the most attractive feature that the height of Telton presents to 
 the eye of the stranger is the magnificent prospect it commands. 
 
 Following the course of the Boyne from Navan for a mile and a 
 half, the Round Tower and Church of Donaghmore is reached. The 
 name comes from Domnagh Mor, or Great Church, that founded here 
 having been in early Christian days much venerated, owing to the 
 sanctity of St. Cassanus, to whose care the original edifice was confided 
 by St. Patrick. The present ruined structure, however, is of later date, 
 having been erected in the thirteenth century by the Anglo-Norman 
 settlers. The Round Tower resembles that at Kells, and is 100 feet 
 in height, and 66 in circumference at the base ; but the summit has 
 been repaired and does not now possess the conical top nor the upper 
 windows so peculiar to these towers. The doorway is 12 feet above 
 the ground, and has on its keystone a sculptured figure of the 
 Saviour crucified, which Dr. Petrie — who attributes the tower to the 
 ninth or tenth century — considers to be a decided proof of its Christian 
 origin, while others, believers in the Pagan theory, assert the doorway 
 to be an afterwork. 
 
FROM XAVAX TO SLAXE. 
 
 121 
 
 The river Boyne descends several rapids between Xavan and its 
 mouth, and is intercepted by many weirs ; but it is rendered navigable by 
 means of some short lateral canals, as far up as the former place. The 
 stream is considered by Sir William R. Wilde to strongly resemble the 
 Dutch canals in some of these parts ; while at Dunmoe, three miles 
 below Xavan, he savs, " the true beauties of the Bovne. its real Rhine- 
 like characters, commence, and crowd upon us for the next few miles of 
 its course. High beetling crags, crowned by feudal halls and ruined 
 chapels — steep, precipitous banks, covered with the noblest monarchs of 
 the forest — dells, consecrated to the moonlight dance of sprites and elfins, 
 and rocks, memorable for their tales of love, and legends of the olden 
 time, catch the eve at even- turn." Dunmoe is an Ansflo-Xorman 
 fortress of the sixteenth century, that commanded a ford of the river, 
 and was subjected to many hard knocks from opposing forces during the 
 troublous times of that and the succeeding century. It is now but a heap 
 of ruins. Three miles lower down is the ivy-clad Castle Dexter, whose 
 crumbling walls, indicative of the times of feudal rule and massive 
 defensive architecture, strikingly contrast with the peaceful characteristics 
 of its light domestic neighbor of more modern date, Beauparc House, on 
 the opposite side of the river, embowered in a leafy forest of tall pines, 
 sycamores, oaks, and elms. 
 
 Two miles further on is the pretty little town of Slane. Fearta-fear- 
 feig. the residence and burial place of King Slanius, having, on its high 
 river bank. Slane Castle, the modern residence of the Marquis of 
 Conyngham. On a hill, overlooking the town, are the ruins of the 
 church and monastery, commanding a magnificent prospect of the whole 
 course of the Boyne (which here forms a bend) from Trim to Drogheda, 
 with the classic Hill of Tara. and the mounds that mark the burial place 
 of the kin^s. The remains of the church or abbev consist mainly of a 
 noble tower, which must have formed part of the edifice as restored by 
 Sir Christopher Fleming in 15 12. The first religious establishments must 
 have been erected at an early date, as it is recorded that in 948 the 
 cloictfuack or Round Tower of Slane was burned by the Danes, together 
 with the crozier and the bells ; and that in the seventh century, 
 Dagobert, King of Austrasia (part of France) was educated at this place 
 in an establishment of canons regular. On the shore of the river lie the 
 n-ts 
 
122 
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE BOYNE. 
 
 ruins of the hermitage of St. Ere, the first Bishop of Slane, said to have 
 been consecrated by St. Patrick, and whose piety is asserted to have 
 been so great that " his custom was to remain immersed in the Boinn up 
 to his two armpits from morning till evening, having his Psalter before 
 him on the strand, and constantly engaged in prayer." * 
 
 The district extending for over three miles along the left bank of 
 the Boyne, commencing a mile and a half below Slane, and occupying 
 a space of about a mile in breadth was the Brugh-na-Boinne, the 
 Royal Cemetery of the Boyne, the great burying ground of the Kings 
 of Tara, which Wilde says, consists of " a series of raised mounds, 
 raths, forts, caves, circles, and pillar stones, bearing all the evidence 
 of ancient Pagan sepulchral monuments, which, there can now be little 
 doubt, was the Irish Memphis, or city of tombs." And, he adds, 
 it contains within its area " no less than 17 sepulchral barrows ; some 
 of these, the smaller ones, situated in the green pasture lands which 
 form the immediate valley of the Boyne, while the three of greatest 
 magnitude (Dowth, Knowth, and New Grange) are placed on the 
 summit of the ridge which bounds the valley on the left bank, making 
 upwards of 20 in all, including the remains at Cloghalea, and the 
 great moat in which the fortress of Drogheda now stands, and known 
 in the annals as the mound of the grave of the wife of Gobhan." f 
 
 * It is stated that the first remarkable conversions made by St. Patrick in Ireland were at Slane, 
 at Easter, 433. On the Thursday previous, we read, as abridged by Dr. Lanigan, from the Lives of 
 the Saints : " Having got a tent pitched there, he made preparations for celebrating the festival of 
 Easter, and accordingly lighted the paschal fire about nightfall. It happened that, at this very time, 
 the King Loeghaire and the assembled princes were celebrating a religious festival, of which fire worship 
 fotmed a part. There was a standing law that, at the time of this festival, no fire should be kindled 
 for a considerable distance all around until after a great fire should be lighted in the royal palace of 
 Temorah, or Tara. St. Patrick's fire was, however, lighted before that of the palace, and, being seen 
 from the heights of Tara, excited great astonishment. On the king's inquiring what could be the cause 
 of it, and who could thus dare to infringe the law, the magi told him that it was necessary to have 
 that fire extinguished immediately, whereas, if allowed to remain, it would get the better of their fires, 
 and bring about the downfall of his kingdom. Loeghaire, enraged and troubled on getting this informa- 
 tion, set out for Slane with a considerable number of followers, and one or two of the principal magi, 
 for the purpose of exterminating thoee violators of the law. When arrived within some distance from 
 where the tent was they sat down, and St. Patrick was sent for, with an order to appear before the 
 king, and give an account of his conduct. It was arranged that no one should show him any mark of 
 respect, or rise up to receive him ; but, on his presenting himself before them, Horc, son of Dego, 
 disobeyed the injunction, and, standing up, saluted him, and, receiving the saint's blessing, became a 
 believer." The subsequent preachings of St. Patrick at Tara are set forth in the Lives of the Saints. 
 
 \ An ancient Irish MS., translated by Dr. Petrie, relates that " Cormac, King of Tara, having come 
 to his death by the bone of a salmon sticking in his throat, desired his people not to bury him at 
 Brugh (because it was a cemetery of idolaters), but at Ros-na-righ, with his face to the east. His 
 servants, however, came to the resolution to bury him at Brugh, but the Boyne swelled up three 
 times so that they could not cross." 
 
TUMULI AT BR U GH-NA-BOTNNE. 
 
 123 
 
 It is recorded in the " Four Masters " that some of these mounds 
 were plundered, in 860, by the Danes, of the valuable treasures and 
 human remains that were buried in them, which will probably account 
 for little being found beyond bare walls at New Grange and Dowth, 
 the two of the three gigantic mausoleums that have been explored. 
 The first and most important research was that made at the former 
 in 1699, resulting from the removal of some stones at the bottom of 
 the mound for the purpose of repairing the road, when a rudely- 
 carved stone was disclosed, and excavations made which led to the 
 discovery of internal passages and chambers, and stone basins, and 
 many mementoes of the past in the shape of rude carvings. Some 
 few articles of treasure have since been dug up, and a few Roman 
 coins, which indicate the formation of the tumuli to have been of 
 a date shortly anterior to 400 A.D. The dimensions of this, the 
 largest of the mounds, are, according to Fergusson, 210 by 315 feet 
 in diameter at the junction with the natural hill on which it stands, 
 and 70 feet in height made up of 14 feet for the slope of the hill 
 to the floor of the central chamber, and 56 feet above it, with the 
 angle of external slope apparently about 35 degrees, and the platform 
 on the summit 120 feet across. The passage to the interior is 58 
 feet long, and in some parts so low and narrow as to be difficult of 
 access. The central chamber is an irregular circle, of beehive shape, 
 of about 22 feet in diameter, and 20 feet in height, and has recesses 
 on each side and opposite the entrance for the reception of stone 
 urns, or bowls. These recesses, with the entrance, make the ground 
 plan cruciform in shape. Both the passage and chamber are constructed 
 of stones of immense size, some of which have evidently been 
 brought from a distance. A circle of enormous detached blocks of 
 stone, some of which still remain, appears to have originally stood 
 ten yards apart, at a distance of a few yards from the margin of the 
 mound. It is impossible now to learn to what uses this extraordinary 
 structure was devoted by its pagan builders ; but it is conjectured 
 that it was employed by the druids either as a place for the 
 celebration of their mysterious rites, or for human sacrifice, or, perhaps, 
 for sepulture. The base of this mound occupies an area of about 
 an acre, and the three larger tumuli are about a mile apart. 
 
124 
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE BOYNE. 
 
 As the Boyne approaches Drogheda its valley becomes quite beautiful, 
 and its banks, though in some places precipitous, are adorned with leafy 
 woodlands and stately residences. Not far from the confluence of the 
 Mattock and the Boyne, near Oldbridge, and about a mile from Drog- 
 heda, is the scene of that momentous conflict of July ist, 1690, to which 
 the latter and larger stream has given a name, and of which an obelisk 
 marks the particular point where the strife proved to be the hottest. 
 It is not our desire to fight the battle over again in these pages. 
 Moore has told us that — 
 
 " As vanquished Erin wept beside 
 The Boyne's ill-fated river, 
 She saw where Discord, in the tide, 
 Had dropped his loaded quiver." 
 
 But, notwithstanding the conclusions of the poet, it is to be hoped that 
 the time is at hand when the " venomed darts " may be allowed to lie 
 buried under the waters of the stream, and the demon of strife be no 
 longer permitted to dive into them, and bring " triumphant, from beneath, 
 his shafts of desolation ; " and that the bitter animosities of party spirit 
 be supplanted by nobler feelings of fraternal peace and good-will. 
 
 East of its confluence with the Mattock, the Boyne is bordered on 
 the north by Louth, the smallest of the Irish counties, if we may except 
 the town and territory of Drogheda, which constitute under the charter 
 of Henry IV. a separate county, situate between Louth and Meath, but 
 quite distinct from both. This town lies upon both banks of the Boyne, 
 with the main portion on the north, at about four miles from its mouth. 
 It possesses a good harbor, which has been so much improved of 
 late that, coupled with its position directly opposite Liverpool, the 
 result has been a great increase in the commerce of the port. 
 Drogheda lies 32 miles north of Dublin by the railway, which crosses 
 its harbor upon an extremely handsome and lofty viaduct and lattice 
 bridge designed by Sir John McNeill, C. E. 
 
 Drogheda {Droched-atha, the " Bridge of the Ford") is a place of 
 ecclesiastical antiquity, its ruined abbey of St. Mary D'Urso having 
 been, it is believed, founded by St. Patrick, and later the temporary 
 residence of St. Columb ; while the town filled an important place in 
 political history from 1220, when Henry III. retained it in his own 
 
THE TOWN OF DROGHEDA. 
 
 125 
 
 possession, with the castle, in the renewed grant of Meath made to 
 Walter DeLacy, down to the eventful battle of the Boyne, the last 
 conflict in which British sovereigns confronted each other in the 
 field. The leading events occurring between these were the holding 
 in it of several parliaments, its successful defense in 1641 against Sir 
 Phelim O'Neill under Sir Henry Tichborne and Lord Moore, and 
 again for a time in 1649, under Sir Arthur Aston, against Cromwell, 
 who here commenced his bloody career in Ireland, and eventually took 
 the place by storm, committing atrocities of the most inhuman and 
 ferocious character upon its brave defenders. 
 
 The walls of the town, portions of which still remain, were about one 
 and a half miles in circumference, and entered by ten gates, of which 
 two, with protecting towers, still remain in whole or in part. In 
 addition to this, and the ruins of the abbey, the remnants of 
 antiquity consist of the fine Magdalene steeple of the Dominican or 
 Monastery of Preaching Friars, founded in 1224 by an archbishop of 
 Armagh, and the place where in 1394 Richard II. received the sub- 
 mission of O'Neill, Prince of Ulster, and his subordinate chieftains ; 
 the Tholsel, surmounted by a cupola ; St. Mary's church, formerly 
 devoted to the use of the Carmelites ; and the mount, now crowned 
 by a martello tower commanding the town, formerly the grave of the 
 wife of Gobhan, the smith, and recorded to have been robbed by the 
 Danes of its contents in the ninth century. The borough returns 
 one member to the British Parliament, and at the last census (1871) 
 contained a population of 14,389. 
 
 It is an interesting drive from Drogheda to Mellifont and Monas- 
 terboice, the former on the banks of the Mattock, and the latter two 
 miles to its northeast, and five from the town, for the two places 
 abound in important archaeological remains, consisting of ancient 
 churches, magnificent sculptured crosses, a Round Tower, and an 
 octagon church, or baptistry. At Mellifont, in 1142, was founded the 
 first Cistercian monastery ever established in Ireland, and in 1 1 5 7 was 
 held a synod, at which the King of Ullidia, the Prince of Breffni, 
 and the Prince of Orgiel assisted. Its remains consist of portions of 
 a singular octagon baptistry, of St. Bernard's Chapel, and of some 
 dungeons, in one of which is said to have closed her career 
 
126 
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE BOYNE. 
 
 Dervorgoil, " whose abduction by Dermod MacMorrough, King of 
 Leinster, led to the introduction into Ireland of the English under 
 Strongbow." Monasterboice derives its name from St. Buithe, the son of 
 Bronnagh, who founded a religious establishment there about the end of 
 the fifth century, and now presents the ruins of two churches, the later 
 of which evidently dates from the thirteenth century, three crosses, and a 
 Round Tower. Two of the crosses are considered to be the finest 
 specimens of the kind in Ireland, the largest being 27 feet high, and 
 composed of three stones, of which that constituting the shaft is 
 highly sculptured. Kohl, upon noticing that one of its compartments 
 represented " a couple of harpers in Paradise," arrived at the conclu- 
 sion that " no Irishman of the olden time would have thought 
 Paradise complete without his beloved national instrument." An 
 inscription at the base of this cross attributes its erection to Muire- 
 dach, King of Ireland, supposed to be the last of the two of that 
 name, who died in 924. The leading feature of Monasterboice, 
 however, is the Round Tower, 51 feet in circumference at the base, 
 and gradually diminishing to its present summit, 90 feet in height, 
 its original apex having been destroyed by lightning. It has a 
 doorway six feet from the ground. Many of the abbots of the 
 monastery established here were highly distinguished, and made their 
 names famous in Irish history. Most celebrated amongst them was 
 Flann, who died in 1056, and was the last great authority in matters 
 connected with early Irish history, poetry and eloquence. Many Irish 
 poems are ascribed to him, but his most notable work is his 
 Synchronisms of the Irish kings, the Oriental and Roman emperors, 
 the provincial and national rulers of Ireland, and the Scottish kings 
 of Irish descent. 
 
DUNDALK AND EDWARD BRUCE. 127 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 THE MOURNE MOUNTAINS AND ARMAGH. 
 
 Dunleer and its Sovereign — Dundalk and the last King of Ireland — Greenore and Grcencastle — 
 Carlingford — Magnificent Scenery — Monument to General Ross — Carlingford Bay — Beauti- 
 ful Ross- Trevor — Slieve Ban and Cloughmore — Kingdom of Mourne — Kilkeel — Slieve 
 Donard — Newcastle — Dundrum — Downpatrick, the last resting place of the patron saint — 
 Mountain seats and villages — Rathfriland — Warrenpoi?it — Narrow Water Castle — Newry and 
 its associations — Armagh and its ecclesiastical renown — The modern archiepiscopal city — Porta- 
 down, Lurgan, and Lismore — Approach to Belfast. 
 
 THOUGH the railway between Drogheda and Dundalk passes for 22 
 miles through a well-cultivated but unpicturesque country, it presents 
 distant views of the Mourne mountains and the hilly district around 
 Carlingford Bay, whither we were next bound. On our way we had a 
 glimpse of the little town of Dunleer, only noticeable for its having 
 possessed the privilege granted by Charles II. of electing a sovereign, the 
 title once applied to the chief magistrate of many Irish corporate towns, 
 but of which honor it has not availed itself since 181 1. 
 
 Dundalk, Dun-dealgan, lies in the northern part of the county of 
 Louth, * of which it is the principal town, and a thriving modern place 
 at the head of a magnificent bay. Still it possesses an important 
 past history, for near it is the last place in Ireland where a 
 king was crowned. The occasion was the conferring, in 1 3 1 5, of 
 the royal dignity upon Edward Bruce after he arrived with his 
 followers upon the invitation of the Irish to aid in the acquisition of 
 that independence which his brother Robert had obtained for Scotland 
 
 * The deserted little town of Louth, from which the county obtains its name, lies half a dozen miles 
 southwest of Dundalk. It was, however, once the seat of a celebrated ecclesiastical establishment founded 
 by St. Patrick, wherein 100 bishops and 300 presbyters were educated. Extensive remains of the ancient 
 abbey occupy the site of the original monastery. 
 
128 
 
 THE MOURNE MOUNTAINS AND ARMAGH. 
 
 at Bannockburn. Edward Bruce had, however, to storm and burn 
 Dundalk before he could enter it, and, after residing in it for two 
 years and fighting his way into other parts of Ireland, fell, in 131 8, 
 on the hill of Foighard, near the town, in an engagement with the 
 English. Dundalk was held for a time, in 1649, by Monk, for 
 Charles I., but surrendered to Cromwell ; and, in 1689, for James II., 
 but was taken without resistance by Schomberg. Of the fortifications 
 built in the reign of Henry IV. there are but few remains. It 
 possesses, however, an old, ivy-covered parish church, and a very 
 handsome, modern Roman Catholic Cathedral, erected after the style 
 of King's College Chapel, Cambridge, and forming the metropolitan 
 church of the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Armagh, who resides in 
 Dundalk. Its population, in 1871, was 10,360, and it returns one 
 member to the British Parliament. 
 
 At Dundalk there is a fork in the Great Northern Railway, the 
 trunk line continuing northwardly through Newry to Belfast, while the 
 branch trends northwesterly to Enniskillen and Londonderry. As our 
 route, however, included Carlingford Bay, or Lough, and the Mourne 
 Mountains, we took a diverging short eastern line to Greenore, near 
 the mouth of the bay, between which and Holyhead there is a daily 
 line of steam packets. Greenore, but 14 miles from Dundalk, is a 
 modern steam packet station, with a spacious quay, to which it is 
 proposed to add a dock of considerable size, and accessible at all 
 states of the tide. A ferry carries passengers across the mouth of 
 the bay to Greencastle, at the northern end of a small peninsula that 
 juts out into the lough, and evidently once a place of strategetic 
 importance, as the remains of an Anglo-Norman fortress amply testify. 
 Traveling upon a railway skirting the southwestern shore of the bay, 
 and connecting Greenore pier with Newry and the north of Ireland, 
 we were very soon dropped at the town of Carlingford which has 
 given its name not only to the inlet whereon it stands, but to some 
 highly-approved members of the oyster family which, after being caught 
 and fattened in their beds in the bay, travel to all parts of the United 
 Kingdom to be tucked in. But, aesthetic reader, tempting as these 
 luscious bivalves may be, you could hardly touch them upon your 
 arrival until you had fully feasted upon the spectacle nature presents 
 
SCENERY AROUND CARLINGFORD. 
 
 129 
 
 to you at this spot, for, perchance it were a balmy summer evening, 
 you would ascend the Carlingford Mountain, Slieve Foy, rising to the 
 height of 1935 feet on the west of the town, and then, seated upon 
 one of its castellated cliffs, to employ the language of the Rev. 
 Caesar Otway, " looking westward and northward you would enjoy a 
 prospect which, if you pretended to taste, would cause you to cry 
 out ' Magnificent ! ' but if you really possessed it, would make you 
 hold your tongue and be all eyes. Under you the noble, land-locked 
 bay ; before you — and a few miles across the water, a distance which, 
 owing to the translucency of the atmosphere peculiar to the western 
 wind, is only calculated to make objects more softly picturesque — yes, 
 before you is the loveliest village in Ireland — Ross-Trevor; its cottages 
 embosomed in trees, its sunlit villas, its pretty church, and its obelisk,* 
 (or Monument to General Ross). Then above the village, the wood- 
 covered hills, swelling upwards until the green slopes mingle in the 
 dark gorges of the Mourne Mountains, over which Slieve Donard rises 
 as lord of the range, in pyramidal majesty. The westering sun is 
 gilding its crest ; a feathery cloud, all on fire with the sun's rays, has 
 rested on its topmost peak and turbaned it with glory. Eastward, the 
 mountain passes of shade are flung upon the sleeping sea. O, for such 
 a splendid scene, happy season, and felicitous atmosphere ! It would 
 almost be well to be a Carlingford fisherman, or even a Carlingford 
 oyster, provided that, as an oyster, one could see through the sea and 
 be susceptible of the picturesque, without the consciousness of being 
 liable to be dredged for and gobbled up by voracious Dublinians." 
 We might extend the canvas further to the west and to the south- 
 west, and cover it by the mountains of Louth and Armagh and the 
 cultivated lands that form their footstools ; but we fear that if we 
 were to do so we should satiate and weary the mind's eye, and so 
 desist. 
 
 The little town of Carlingford is romantically situated on a nook of 
 the bay, and though now containing but from 700 to 800 souls, was 
 
 * The obelisk or monument stands near the borders of the bay, a short distance from Ross -Trevor, and is 
 a lofty pillar of cut granite, upon a pedestal of the same material, raised upon a number of steps. It was 
 erected in 1826 to the memory of Major General Robert Ross, who fought in the Peninsular and second 
 American wars, and fell at Baltimore, Maryland, in 1814. Other memorials to the same gallant officer are 
 erected in the church at Ross-Trevor, in St. Paul's Cathedral, and over his grave at Halifax, Nova Scotia. 
 11—46 
 
130 
 
 THE MO URN E MOUNTAINS AND ARMAGH. 
 
 a place of such note during and subsequent to the Anglo-Norman 
 invasion, that it received charters from Edward II., Henry IV., Henry 
 VII., Elizabeth, James I., and James II. Its first claim, however, is 
 that of being the place at which St. Patrick landed in 432, when he 
 arrived to uproot paganism in Ireland.* All that now remains of its 
 ancient grandeur is the -ruined castle of King John, erected on a rocky 
 height in 1210 by De Courcy and around which the town grew; the 
 crumbling walls of a Dominican monastery and church, of mixed eccle- 
 siastical and military character, erected in 1305 by Richard de Burgh, 
 Earl of Ulster; the Tholsel ; part of the old walls; and a couple of 
 square towers, probably the remnants of fortified houses, of which the 
 town is said to have possessed 32 in its palmy days, necessary for its 
 protection as a border town of the Pale. 
 
 At Omeath, the next station, about five miles further on and near 
 to the boundary line of Louth and Armagh, a ferry conveyed us across 
 the bay to Warrenpoint upon the opposite shore, in County Down, 
 where we entered the province of Ulster. And here we may state 
 that Carlingford Bay, whose head we now attained, is a land-locked 
 arm of the sea, extending inland for nine miles, with a width vary- 
 ing from one and a half to three and a half miles, and a favorite 
 haven of refuge for coasting mariners during stormy weather. Leaving 
 
 * Opinions differ as to the birthplace of Ireland's Apostle, notwithstanding that his own confession gives 
 it as Armorica, a district of Gaul, and near to the spot where now stands Boulogne-sur-mer. The year of 
 his birth is generally conceded to be A. D. 387. The Irish monarch, Nial of the Nine Hostages, after 
 ravaging the coasts of Britain, extended his conquests to those of Gaul, where he made St. Patrick a 
 captive at the age of 16. He was transported to Ireland, landed near Dundrum, and sold into slavery, 
 and for six years tended the sheep of a man named Milcho, after which he escaped to the coast where 
 he was received on board of a merchant vessel and conveyed home. He then resorted to the college of 
 St. Martin, near Tours, where he was educated for the priesthood. His mind soon became impressed 
 with the condition of Ireland, at that time buried in the darkest paganism, ana through the influence of 
 a dream determined upon its conversion. He was, however, unable to carry out his design until past the 
 age of forty, when Pope Celestine sent him as bishop to Ireland ; and, tarrying for a time in Britain, 
 he arrived at the scene of his labors, according to the Irish annals, in the first year of the pontificate 
 ot Sixtus III. He at first attempted to land near the harbor of Dublin, and, upon being repulsed there, 
 and at other places in Leinster, he eventually proceeded to and landed at Carlingford. He soon after 
 directed his steps towards Tara, where the princes and states of the kingdom assembled, for the purpose 
 of celebrating the Christian festival of Easter ; and made his first important conversion at Slane, as described 
 in the last chapter. Though his missionary labors carried him to all parts of Ireland, he passed the 
 greater part of his time between Armagh and his favorite retreat at Sabhul, in the barony of Lecale, the spot 
 that had witnessed the first dawning of his apostolic career, and where he died, March 17th, A. D. 465, 
 at the age of 78. 
 
BEAUTIFUL ROSS-TREVOR, 
 
 131 
 
 Warrenpoint for a future day, we seated ourselves in a tram car, which 
 took us down the bay's side for two or three miles and past a lovely 
 valley, rejoicing in the name of Arno, and the Ross Monument, to the 
 delightful watering place of Ross -Trevor, "beautiful Ross -Trevor" — the 
 Montpellier of Ireland, screened from the icy northern blasts by its 
 mountain background. It contains about 300 pleasant houses for the 
 accommodation of guests, who flock hither from various parts of Ulster 
 and Leinster to while away the livelong summer day, and enjoy a 
 refreshing bathe in the briny waters of the lough ; while a sail upon 
 it, to employ the language of an enthusiastic writer, " is inexpressibly 
 charming — combining, in infinite perfection, every element of beauty, if 
 not of actual sublimity, in marine and pastoral scenery." The ivy-covered 
 ruins of an old church is the sole remnant of antiquity, for the dilap- 
 idated walls of the massive castle of the bold Rory McGennis have 
 in late years all but disappeared. To this chieftain, who was a kins- 
 man of one of the lords of Iveagh, and formerly owned this region, 
 Ross -Trevor owes its first name of Castle Roe or Rory. In Elizabeth's 
 time, however, it passed into the hands of Sir Marmaduke Whitchurch, 
 who re-christened it Rose-Trevor, on the eve of the marriage of his 
 daughter Rose to young Edward Trevor, afterwards Baron of Dungannon ; 
 and subsequently, becoming the property of a Lord Mayor of Dublin, 
 named Ross, members of whose family represented Newry and Carling- 
 ford for several years in the Irish Parliament, it was known for a time 
 as Rostrevor, previous to receiving its present name. 
 
 Ross -Trevor Pier and quay are situated a few minutes' walk further 
 down the bay. It is most likely, however, that the old landing place, 
 as depicted by Mr. Bartlett in our engraving, will have been removed 
 and a new pier erected before this w r ork has passed through the printer's 
 hands, as improvements are projected which will add to the attractions of the 
 district, and create a new watering place at the door of the old favorite. 
 Extensive and delightful views are obtained from the summit of the 
 neighboring Slieve Ban, 2796 feet above the sea level, and from Clough- 
 more, standing upon one of its shoulders, and about which latter hover 
 traditions of druids and giants of days gone by. 
 
 From Ross -Trevor we made an excursion into the "Kingdom of 
 Mourne," visited one or two places on the sea-coast, and returned by a 
 
132 
 
 THE MO URN E MOUNTAINS AND ARMAGH. 
 
 road that led us through the heart of the mountains. The little 
 dominion was anciently known as Borcha or Borche, and its kings, who 
 frequently figured in the early history of Ireland, resided at Greencastle. 
 It covered an area of about fourteen miles by six, and included a 
 considerable part of the mountain range ; and, until a late period, 
 retained the attributes of a kingdom, being governed by a seneschal, a 
 court baron, and court leet, which made their own laws by authority of 
 royal patent. Its spiritual authority, however, was vested in the lord 
 abbot (the Earl of Kilmorey), who appointed a vicar as head of the 
 exempt jurisdiction of Newry and Mourne, whose court had all the 
 powers of an ecclesiastical and probate court. A mountain road of about 
 ten miles in length, the latter half of which- carried us across the little 
 kingdom in question, took us past Mourne Park, the Irish seat of the 
 Earl of Kilmorey, to Kilkeel, a thriving little town upon the sea-coast 
 rapidly blossoming into a pleasant sea-bathing resort. 
 
 The next dozen miles took us over the narrow strip of land which 
 lies between the mountain range and the sea-coast to Newcastle. The 
 road ran along the base of Spence's Mountain, 1529 feet high, and 
 Crossone, 1777 feet high; presented to our view the peaks of others; and 
 carried us in some parts a hundred feet above the sea, where its margin 
 was " indented with yawning caverns, so terrifically lashed by the 
 tremendous waves as to impart to the coast a character of extraordinary 
 sublimity." Newcastle is planted at the very foot of Slieve Donard,* the 
 monarch of the Mourne Mountains, towering over it 2796 feet. In late 
 years it has become very attractive as a watering place, and possesses in 
 addition to its sea-bathing facilities a rather celebrated spa. The castle, 
 whence it was named, was removed not many years ago, having been built 
 in the reign of Elizabeth by Felix M'Gennis, one of the lords of Iveagh, 
 and forfeited after the rebellion in 1641. The view from the summit of 
 Slieve Donard is declared to be wild, beautiful and grand, and extends 
 over the entire Mourne range, which covers an area of fourteen miles by 
 eleven. The ascent occupies three or four hours, and the descent an 
 equal amount of time — more than we could well spare — so we had to 
 pass on without planting our feet upon the loftiest sod in the northeast 
 
 * St. Donard, a disciple of St. Patrick, is said to have spent the life of a hermit on this mountain, and 
 built a cell or oratory, on the top of it, towards the close of the fifth century. 
 
THE COAST OE DOWN. 
 
 133 
 
 of Ireland. The adjoining height, Slieve Snavan, is popularly known 
 as the creeping mountain, because it can only be climbed in a creeping 
 posture. 
 
 Newcastle is connected with Belfast by a railway which passes through 
 the little town of Dundrum and the cathedral city of Downpatrick, of 
 which two places we may here append a few particulars. As far as 
 Dundrum the line for four miles skirts the bay of the same name, where 
 it will be remembered that in 1847, tne " Great Britain," for many years 
 afterwards a lucky Australian steamship, had the bad fortune to go 
 ashore and remain imbedded in the sand for several months. Dundrum 
 is said to be the place at which St. Patrick landed when first brought to 
 Ireland as a captive, being then a youth of 16. Its only relic of antiquity 
 consists of the ruins of a castle built by De Courcy for the Knights 
 Templars, who held it till the abolition of the order in 1 3 1 3. Downpatrick 
 is situated upon the river Ouoile, shortly before it enters Lough Strang- 
 ford, an island-studded inlet of the sea. It is stated to be the most 
 ancient place in Ulster, and the residence of the native Kings of Ullidia. 
 When the Anglo-Normans took possession of the city in 11 77, it was the 
 residence of Mac Dunleve, Prince of Ullagh, who retreated before the 
 forces of Sir John De Courcy. The see* was established by St. Patrick, 
 who founded a monastery in whose precincts not only he, but St. Bridget, 
 and St. Columb were buried. The cathedral, standing upon a hill, was 
 built on the ruins of one that had been destroyed by the Danes, by 
 Malachy O'Morgair, Bishop of Down, in 1140. It was afterwards burnt 
 by Edward Bruce and by Lord Deputy Gray, in 1538, and then allowed 
 to remain in ruins until 1 790, when the present structure, consisting of 
 nave, choir, and aisles, with a fine western tower, was erected, the church 
 at Lisburn doing duty as the cathedral in the meantime. A Round 
 Tower. 66 feet high, formerly stood about 40 feet from the cathedral, but 
 was removed under the apprehension that it might fall and damage the 
 sacred edifice. The city is the county town of Down, has a population of 
 
 * The diocese of Down was united to that of Connor at an early period, bnt they were separated in 1137, and 
 reunited by the Pope in 1441. The site of the ancient bishopric of Connor lies a few miles north of Antrim. Aengus 
 Mac Nisse, a pupil of St. Patrick, about 500, erected a church there, became its first bishop, and was buried in it in 5 14. 
 In the Protestant Episcopal Church the see of Dromore was added to Down and Connor during Jeremy Taylor's 
 episcopacy m 1661, and permanently united to it in 1S42 In the Roman Catholic Church Dromore remains a 
 distinct see with the bishop residing at Newry, while the seat of that of Down and Connor is at Belfast. 
 
134 
 
 THE MOURNE MOUNTAINS AND ARMAGH. 
 
 nearly 4000 inhabitants, and returns a member to the British Parliament. 
 Not far from the city is the Struel Well, formerly a favorite station 
 resorted to by pilgrims desirous of partaking of the benefits which were 
 presumed to attend the miraculous flowing of its waters on the Vigil of 
 St. John. 
 
 In our return to Ross -Trevor from Newcastle, we took the inland 
 and shorter route which led us through the passes between the mountains, 
 and along by some picturesque and thriving villages ; we can, however, 
 only find space for a brief mention of what we saw. The first object of 
 interest was Tollymore Park, the tasteful demesne of the Earl of Roden, 
 adjoining the pretty village of Bryansford. One of the puzzling Round 
 Towers was wont to raise its lofty head a mile from this place, but some 
 years ago became so shaky in its foundations, that it was blown down 
 by a violent gale ; when, strange to say, it lay prostrate upon the ground, 
 "without breaking to pieces, so wonderfully hard and binding was its 
 cement." We next passed through the prosperous little town of Castle- 
 wellan, and by the demesne of the Earl of Annesley, whence to the 
 village of Rathfriland, we drove for ten miles with charming pictures 
 continually presenting themselves in every direction, giving new aspects 
 of the Mourne Mountains and a near view of the waters of Lough 
 Island Reavy, by whose margin we sped along. Rathfriland, where we 
 found ourselves at the back of Slieve Donard and its tall brothers, is a 
 compact mountain village at the top of a steep hill, evidently once a 
 powerful military post, protected by a fortress of the M'Gennises, 
 dismantled after the rebellion of 1641, and with its materials now almost 
 entirely used up in the construction of more peaceful dwellings. A run 
 of three miles down hill now brought us to Hilltown, a nest of houses 
 huddled together under the protecting wing of Eagle Mountain, 2084 feet 
 high, upon whose craggy summit the royal bird erects its eyrie, and 
 nurtures its feathery brood. And then, alternately toiling up hill and 
 rolling down, we at last gain a ridge from whence we have a view of 
 Carlingford Lough — to be speedily lost, however, as we dive down into a 
 valley, but regained in an enlarged form as we obtain the next eminence, 
 with below us the cottages and villas of "beautiful Ross-Trevor." 
 
 Warrenpoint, so called from a rabbit-warren having occupied its site, 
 is quite a modern town, situated six miles from Newry, of which it is the 
 
port (only small vessels being enabled to reach the latter by means of 
 a canal, which *»xti»n<lg as far as Lough Xeagfa) ; and its shipping trade 
 includes regular steam communication with Liverpool and Glasgow. 
 It has a busy resident population of about 2000, which number is trebled 
 in summer by the influx of occupants for the many pretty houses that 
 extend along the margin of the bay in the direction of Ross-Trevor, 
 drawn thither by the magnificence of die scenery and the advantages *>f 
 a genial climate and sea bathing. Warrenpoint is further united with 
 Newrv by railway, and by the older connecting links of road and river. 
 A mile from the former town there is a sudden narrowing of the river, 
 which, though shallow, is, above and below, of considerable width, and 
 the obstructing rock is crowned by the ruins of Narrow Water Castle. 
 Here, in 12 12, Hugh DeLacy erected a fortress to protect the ferry, 
 which, however, was destroyed in 1641, and rebuilt by the Duke of 
 Ormonde in 1663. The castle, whose ruins still remain, consisted of 
 one square battlemented tower, and its rocky bed was formerly insulated, 
 die tide flowing around. This remnant of an age when streams and 
 mountain passes were guarded by frowning turrets had the misfortune 
 some years ago to be turned into a salt factory, but it is pleasant 
 to feel that it is kept in good preservation by its present owner 
 and is allowed to remain a picturesque object in an undisputed 
 picturesque district. But the history of Marrow Water carries us beyond 
 the date of the erection of the castle, to the time of the landing of 
 the Danes in Ireland, at the close of the eighth century, when it is 
 said that they formed on the rock it now occupies a station whence 
 tiev ~2jriz.L:zr circles :: z'.-zzt- :~r t.sz-tz':Bl',\ 
 
 the religious establishments of the district. 
 
 Xewry (iYa jar, "the yew tree") is situated upon both banks of 
 the Clanrye, at a point where it separates the counties of Down and 
 Armagh, and is spanned by four stone bridges; the original town, 
 however, was confined to the Down side of the stream. It is a clean, 
 well-built town, enjoying not only a good commercial trade, but attract- 
 ing large numbers of tourists in consequence of its contiguity to 
 die mountain region we have just described. Newry was, in remote 
 times, a place of great importance, owing to its position in the pass 
 between die Slieve Donard or Mourne Mountains on the east and the 
 
136 
 
 THE MO URN E MOUNTAINS AND ARMAGH. 
 
 Slieve Gullion range on the west. It is recorded in the annals of the 
 " Four Masters " to have contained a monastery, in the grounds of which 
 was a yew tree planted by St. Patrick ; while an abbey, dedicated to 
 St. Patrick and St. Mary, is also said to have been founded in it in 
 IT 57 by Maurice M'Laughlin, King of Ireland, but destroyed by fire 
 five years later, and the charter of which is said to be extant. Placed 
 for a time upon the confines of the Pale, it naturally became, after 
 the English invasion, the theatre of many subjugations, feuds, and 
 incursions. A castle, built by John De Courcy to guard the pass, was 
 destroyed in 1318 by Edward Bruce, and rebuilt in 1480; and afterwards 
 restored by Marshal Bagnall, but in its turn burnt along with the town 
 in 1689 by the Duke of Berwick. Newry, however, now possesses 
 very few places of antiquity, though St. Patrick's, built as a substitute 
 for the abbey, is said to have been the first professedly Protestant 
 church erected in Ireland, and still possesses a part of the tower, with 
 the arms of the founder, Sir Nicholas Bagnall, "Marshal of Ireland," 
 1578, who, in his time, besides restoring the castle, rebuilt the town, 
 and surrounded it by walls. The parish church, St. Mary's, is an 
 elegant Gothic edifice, built early in the present century, and having a 
 handsome tower and spire, 190 feet in height. The cathedral of the 
 Roman Catholic bishop of Dromore,* also called St. Patrick's, is an 
 equally beautiful Gothic structure, from designs by Thomas J. Duff, 
 the architect of the Metropolitan Cathedral at Dundalk ; and the same 
 denomination also possess a church dedicated to St. Mary, and two 
 convents. The Presbyterians, who built their first church in Newry in 
 1650, possess now no less than four exceedingly handsome places of 
 worship. It is little more than a century since the spirit of com- 
 mercial enterprise invaded the town ; and during the last forty years, 
 while many places in Ireland have decreased in population, Newry has 
 more than held its own. It numbered 13,364 inhabitants in 1871, and 
 returns one member to the British Parliament. 
 
 It is four miles from Newry to the main line of the Great Northern 
 
 * The ancient city of Dromore lies about 20 miles northeast of Newry. Its see was founded in 510 
 by St. Colman. It was from early ages the seat of an abbey, which eventually became the cathedral of 
 the Protestant bishopric, until it fell into ruins, when a new church was built on its site by Jeremy Taylor 
 who, with Dr. Percy, were its most eminent prelates. The Protestant diocese was annexed to that of 
 Down and Connor, under Jeremy Taylor, in 1661, and permanently united to it in 1842. 
 
THE CITY OF ARMAGH. 
 
 137 
 
 Railway, which is crossed at Goragh Wood by the line connecting 
 that town with Armagh. We now traveled over the latter, as we desired 
 to visit the ancient archiepiscopal city, and thus made a detour so as to 
 take it in on our way to Belfast, but found nothing along the twenty 
 miles of road that demands special note. 
 
 Armagh is conspicuously situated upon the ancient Druimsailech, the 
 hill of Sallows, and is said to derive its name of Ardmagh either from 
 Macha, the only queen of Ireland, or from Eamhuin Macha, the seat of 
 the kings of Ulster, who made it their capital for the 600 years prior 
 to the year 332. St. Patrick, having obtained a grant of the hill from 
 Daire, an Irish prince, founded the ecclesiastical city * in 445, and erected 
 a cathedral and several religious houses ; and previous to the incursion 
 of the Danes it became famous for its schools of learning. But after 
 the arrival of the Northmen in the ninth century, the city suffered 
 severely for a long lapse of years, during which it was many times 
 rebuilt and destroyed. Its latest and most complete demolition, however, 
 was the act, in 1566, of the native chieftain Shane O'Neill, who was 
 excommunicated for his sacrilege by Archbishop Loftus. Consequently 
 there is no vestige left of ancient churches and religious edifices, or of 
 the sepulchre of Brian Boiromhe, who was interred here ; and the 
 beautiful Armagh of to-day is a comparatively modern city, owing many 
 of its institutions to the liberality of' its Protestant primates, among 
 whom may be specially named Archbishops Ussher, Hoodley, Robinson, 
 and Lord John G. Beresford. To the latter it is indebted for the 
 restoration of the cathedral, and to Archbishop Robinson, who is par 
 excellence the founder of the modern city, for the erection of the archi- 
 episcopal residence, the public library, and the observatory. The city is 
 picturesquely situated upon a hill, the summit of which is crowned by 
 the venerable cathedral, while the Roman Catholic cathedral occupies a 
 prominent position. The first of these, which in its original construction 
 
 * Gelasius, bishop in 1136, became first archbishop of Armagh and took the title of " Primate of all Ireland" 
 in 1 152, previous to which date the kingdom was under the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Archbishop of Canter- 
 bury. In accordance with the Church Temporalities Act of 1833, Tuam ceased to be a Protestant metropolitan see 
 in 1839, and the dioceses under its jurisdiction became subject to the Archbishop of Armagh. In the Roman 
 Catholic Church, however, the two provinces remain distinct. The Protestant bishopric of Clogher was united to 
 the see of Armagh in 1850 ; but in the Catholic Church the diocese of Clogher continues separate, with the 
 residence of its bishop at Monaghan. Clogher, the Regia of Ptolemy, about 25 miles west of Armagh, was 
 erected into a bishopric in 493 by St. Macartin, and now possesses a plain cathedral, nearly rebuilt in the last century. 
 11—17 
 
138 
 
 THE MOURNE MOUNTAINS AND ARMAGH. 
 
 dates back to 1268, since which time it has been twice or thrice burnt, is 
 cruciform in shape, and consists of nave, aisles, choir and transepts, with 
 a massive low tower, which was surmounted by a spire previous to the 
 restoration. Its interior contains some handsome monuments by Roubillac, 
 Chantrey, and others. The Roman Catholic cathedral is an elegant dec- 
 orated edifice, whose prelate resides, as previously stated, at Dundalk. 
 The Archbishop of Armagh is "Primate of all Ireland," and that of 
 Dublin, " Primate of Ireland," The causes which led to this distinction 
 are given on page 9 of this volume. The Protestant archiepiscopal palace 
 is situated more than a mile from the city, in beautiful grounds, which 
 contain an obelisk, commanding fine views. Outside the city, also, are the 
 observatory and the Navan Fort, asserted -to be the site of Emania, the 
 ancient regal abode, erected anno mundi 3603. Armagh is a remarkably 
 well-built town of about 8000 inhabitants, returning one member to Parli- 
 ament ; while its neighborhood is noted for the production of holland or 
 brown linen, which gives occupation to an industrious community. 
 
 The 35 miles of road between Armagh and Belfast passes through 
 a well-cultivated agricultural country, and towns lively with the noise 
 of the weaver's shuttle. The first important station was that of Porta- 
 down, where we again joined the Great Northern Railway, which here 
 sends off another line to Londonderry. From this junction, to Lurgan, 
 and on to Lisburn, in the county of Antrim, our route, carried us some 
 little distance from the southeastern shore of Lough Neagh, about 
 which we have something to say in the next chapter. These towns have 
 busy populations of about 10,000 each, Lisburn being a Parliamentary 
 borough, sending one member to the British House of Commons, and 
 possessing a cathedral, with a handsome octagonal spire, once the diocesan 
 church of Dromore, and, as already mentioned, for some time of Down 
 and Connor also. It contains a monument to the pious bishop, Jeremy 
 Taylor, who in 1661 was placed over the see of Down and Connor, and 
 soon after that of Dromore likewise. It is but eight miles from Lisburn 
 to Belfast, the railway between the two running to the right of a range 
 of chalk hills, which rise at Mt. Divis to a height of 1567 feet as the 
 northern capital is approached, and add very much to its picturesqueness. 
 
CAVE HILL AND BELFAST LOUGH. 
 
 139 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 BELFAST AND THE ANTRIM COAST. 
 
 View from Cave Hill — Early history and modern growth of Belfast — Docks and Shipping — 
 Linen Trade — Public, religious and educational edifices — Eminent citizens — Commerce of 
 Belfast — Giant's Ring — Belfast Lough — Antrim and its Round Tower — Shane's Castle — 
 Lough Neagh — Carrickfergus and its Castle — Bangor — Donaghadee — Island Magee — Larne 
 — Castle of Olderfleet — Glenarm and the race which won it — Nachore Hill and Garron 
 Point — Glenariff and Red Bay — Cushendall and Cushendun — Tor Head — Glendun — Fair 
 Head and its basaltic columns — Bally castle and its coal mines — Antrim Coast Road. 
 
 THE prosperous northern metropolis of the kingdom occupies a sort ot 
 middle place in Irish annals, its only historical associations ot 
 importance being nearly exclusively confined to the period between the 
 Anglo-Norman and Cromwellian invasions. The flourishing commercial 
 emporium of to-day is a place of recent growth, whose germ may be 
 almost said to have been planted within the present century ; and its 
 development must be attributed in some measure to its favored position, 
 for it is sheltered on the west by a chain of lofty hills, and stands on 
 the margin of a fine arm of the sea — the one securing to it a genial 
 climate, and the other opening to its portals the whole world of 
 commerce. The barrier to the Borean blasts is the mountain range at 
 whose base we had traveled from Lisburn ; and it has placed one of its 
 loftiest peaks, Cave Hill,* rising to 1 1 88 feet, as sentry over the busy 
 town, with its wide and regular streets. Its heights present a compre- 
 hensive view of Belfast Lough, and a panorama of its southern shore, 
 the northern boundary of County Down ; with beyond, Strangford Lough, 
 
 * Cave Hill, about two miles northwest of Belfast, obtains its name from three natural caves, formed in 
 the perpendicular face of the basaltic rock. The two lowest are respectively 10 and 21 feet long, and the 
 uppermost, which is nearly inaccessible, much larger. Upon its summit is an earthwork known as the Fort of 
 Mac Art, from its having been one of the last strongholds of Brian Mac Art (O'Neill), who, with his sept, was 
 exterminated by Deputy Mountjoy in the reign of Elizabeth. 
 
140 
 
 BELFAST AND THE ANTRIM COAST. 
 
 with its many islands penetrating the land ; and, in clear weather, 
 glimpses of the far-off Scottish coast. 
 
 Belfast was known to the early Irish as Beal na farsad, signifying 
 " the mouth of the ford ; " and its site was the scene, in 665, of a battle 
 between the Picts and Ulidians. When in the twelfth century Henry II. 
 bestowed upon De Courcy the province of Ulster, regardless of the fact 
 that he did not own a foot of territory in it, the beneficiary made 
 haste to secure its possession ; and in time, the ford with its few 
 fishermen's huts beheld more substantial residences and an embryo city, 
 whose earliest despoiler seems to have been Edward Bruce, who in 131 5 
 completely sacked it. It is recorded to have possessed in 1333 a castle, 
 held by William de Burgo, Earl of Ulster, and afterwards destroyed, 
 rebuilt, and held by the Irish during their opposition to English aggres- 
 sion, but wrested from the O'Neills in 1597. The town, with its castle, 
 was presented to Sir Arthur Chichester, ancestor of the present Marquis 
 of Donegal, and granted Parliamentary privileges in 1612-13 by James I. 
 After this it was for a time held by Monroe, one of Cromwell's officers, 
 and in 1708 the castle was accidentally destroyed by fire, and never 
 rebuilt. From the time of its incorporation in 161 3, Belfast seems to have 
 made steady, though for a long time very slow, progress in commercial 
 prosperity, as in 1660 it only contained six streets. It had, however, 
 before this, in 1637, introduced the growth of flax and the manufacture of 
 linen; and by 1725 had entered with vigor into the trade, as we read that 
 in that year machinery was introduced into the operations of washing and 
 beetling. The manufacture of cotton was added in 1777, and in 1829 
 the Messrs. Mulholland established the first flax spinning factory in the 
 town. The increase in the population of Belfast has been very marked 
 and rapid since the commencement of the present century, when it num- 
 bered about 20,000. Nearly four score years later (in 1879) its population 
 was estimated at over 200,000, an advance of ten fold. The steady 
 progress to its present magnitude is exhibited in the census returns, 
 which give for 1821 a population of 37,000; for 1851, one of 100,301 ; 
 and for 1871, one of 174,394. Previous to the union in 1801, Belfast 
 returned two members to the Irish Parliament, in lieu of which it was 
 allowed to send only one to the British Parliament, but its rapid increase 
 enabled it to command a second member in the reform bill of 1832. 
 
 1 
 
DOCKS AND COMMERCE OE BELFAST. 
 
 141 
 
 The town stands upon both sides of the River Lagan, its parts being 
 united by four bridges, of which the handsomest and nearest the lough 
 is the Qtceeris, comprising five granite arches of 50 feet span, and 
 occupying the site of the Long Bridge, of 840 feet and 21 arches, 
 originally constructed in 1682. Next in order come a new iron railway 
 bridge, the Albert, and the Ormean Bridge, the latter opened in 1863. 
 Belfast being essentially a commercial town, it is proper that we should 
 first devote our attention to those institutions that are most intimately 
 connected with its trade. The harbor, which was originally a mere 
 creek, has, under the wise administration of its commissioners, become 
 one of the finest in the kingdom. The hills already mentioned, 
 sheltering the bay from the north and west winds, make it a safe 
 anchorage, though in some places interrupted by sandbanks. It was 
 necessary, however, to anchor large vessels in the pool of Garmoyle, 
 four miles from the town, previous to 1840, when a cut was made 
 through which vessels drawing 20 feet of water could pass at spring 
 tides. Steamers and other craft being thus enabled to approach the 
 town, the result has been a quadrupling of its tonnage. Additional 
 improvements made in the harbor during the last 40 years have indeed 
 been very considerable, and the reclamation of land for further dock 
 accommodation steadily progresses. The quays extend continuously from 
 the Queen's Bridge for about a mile. They are lined with six tidal 
 docks, viz., the Prince's and the Clarendon, the Hamilton Graving Dock 
 and the Abercom Basin, the Spencer and the Dufferin docks, with a tidal 
 basin at the entrance of the Spencer Dock. The harbor commissioners 
 occupy a superb building of cut granite, in the Italian style, surmounted 
 by an elegant clock-tower, facing Clarendon Dock. Ship building, 
 originally introduced into Belfast in 1 79 1 , is now carried on extensively. 
 One establishment on the Queen's Island for the construction of iron 
 ships employs 2000 men, and has produced some of the finest steamers 
 and sailing ships afloat. 
 
 The Linen Hall, a low, quadrangular brick building, occupying 
 the centre of Donegal Square, is undoubtedly the parent commercial 
 institution of Belfast. It was erected in 1 7 1 5 upon ground granted by 
 the then Earl of Donegal for the conduct of the linen business of 
 Ulster, instead of having it transacted, as was wont, by agents in 
 
142 
 
 BELFAST AND THE ANTRIM COAST. 
 
 Dublin. The numerous Flax Mills and Linen Warehouses, observable 
 in all parts of the town, soon convince a stranger of the present 
 magnitude of the staple trade, and at nightfall, in winter, attract the 
 eye by the brilliancy of the light shining through their myriads of 
 windows. The York Street Spinning Company, successor to the Mul- 
 hollands, is one of the most extensive establishments of the kind in 
 the kingdom, employing nearly 3000 hands, and indirectly some 20,000 
 more ; and having generally ,£100,000 worth of flax undergoing trans- 
 formation. The success of the linen trade in Ireland is really a 
 striking illustration of the benefits that a country may sometimes derive 
 from the enactment of illiberal and prohibitory laws, for it received its 
 first decided impulse through the unjust policy of England. McCulloch 
 tells us that in 1698 both houses of Parliament addressed William III., 
 representing that the progress of the woolen manufacture of Ireland 
 was such as to prejudice that of England, and that it would be for 
 the public advantage were the former discouraged and the linen man- 
 ufacture (which had then obtained some foothold in the kingdom) 
 established in its stead ; and his majesty replied that he would do all 
 in his power to discourage the woolen and encourage the linen man- 
 ufacture in Ireland, and thus promote the trade of England. Laudable 
 exertions, it is pleasant to know, have been made in late years, with 
 marked success, to encourage and improve the cultivation of flax in 
 Ireland, not alone as a staple for consumption in its home factories, 
 but as an article of exportation for manipulation in the factories of 
 other lands. Thus the linen trade of Ireland gives occupation not 
 only to a large manufacturing, but to an almost equally large agricul- 
 tural population ; while thousands of acres of land are profitably 
 employed in the growth of flax and the operations of bleaching, and 
 the manufacturer is made independent of foreign aid for the supply of 
 his raw material. 
 
 Other structures connected with commerce are the Custom Hotise and 
 Post Office at the foot of High Street, erected in 1857 in the Palladian 
 style, presenting a beautiful river front and affording accommodation for 
 the various governmental services ; and the Commercial Buildings in 
 Waring Street, having an Ionic facade, and comprising a spacious 
 assembly hall, reading room, etc. But the most elaborate and elegant 
 
THE CHURCHES OF BELFAST. 
 
 143 
 
 buildings belonging to this class are some of the banks. Indeed, the 
 Ulster Bank in Waring Street is one of the handsomest edifices in the 
 borough, having an imposing red sandstone front, with 12 Doric columns 
 below and 16 above, and a dome whose windows contain stained glass 
 portraits of eminent men ; while the Belfast Bank, at the corner of 
 Waring and Donegal Streets, presents an elegant exterior of mixed 
 Doric and Corinthian styles ; and the Provincial Bank, in Hercules 
 Place, is a handsome Venetian structure of white stone. 
 
 In a religious point of view two-thirds of the people of Belfast are 
 Protestant and one-third Catholic ; while about half of the first belong 
 to the Presbyterian faith, which plainly indicates the Scotch origin of 
 a great number of its inhabitants. It has no ancient ecclesiastical 
 edifice to present to the eye — a connecting link between early and 
 modern Christianity — for the greater part of its churches are of recent 
 structure. Among its older places of worship are St. Anns Parish 
 Church, in Donegal Street, built of red brick with stone portico and 
 lofty tower in 1776 by the Earl of Donegal, and St. Georges, in High 
 Street, opened in 18 19, with a Corinthian portico transferred from 
 Ballyscullion House, the seat of the Earl of Bristol when Bishop of 
 Derry. Among its recent churches the most interesting are the 
 Presbyterian Church, in Rosemary Street, with a handsome portico of 
 ten Doric columns approached by a flight of 20 steps ; the Presbyterian 
 Church, in May Street, and another in Fisherwick Place in the Ionic 
 style ; St. Enoch's, in Carlisle Circus ; St. James' in Antrim Road ; 
 St. Thomas', in Lisburn Road ; and the Methodist Memorial Church, 
 in Carlisle Circus, which latter is said to be one of the most mag- 
 nificent structures belonging to the Methodist body in the United 
 Kingdom. But it is impossible to designate all the churches worthy 
 of note in Belfast belonging to the three leading Protestant denomi- 
 nations, of which the Church of Ireland has 21, the Presbyterian 
 Church 31, and the Methodists 19, while there are in addition 19 
 places of worship belonging to United Presbyterians, Reformed Presby- 
 terians, and other sects. The predominance of Presbyterian churches 
 will be accounted for when it it is stated that Belfast possesses many 
 wealthy Presbyterian families, and is the place where the general 
 assembly of the Irish Presbyterian Church usually meets, and whence 
 
144 
 
 BELFAST AND THE ANTRIM COAST. 
 
 its periodicals and other publications issue. Belfast is the residence of 
 the Roman Catholic Bishop of Down and Connor, whose Cathedral — 
 dedicated to St. Malachy — is an elegant structure in Upper Alfred 
 Street, but is surpassed in architectural magnificence by St. Patrick's, 
 at the top of Donegal Street. The total number of Roman Catholic 
 churches is six. 
 
 Belfast is well supplied with educational and literary institutions, the 
 principal being Queens College, one of the trio constituting the Queen's 
 University, established in Ireland in 1849, °f which we have already 
 mentioned those at Cork and Galway. In describing the college at 
 Cork we entered into the particulars of the principles upon which they 
 are founded ; it is therefore only necessary for us here to state that the 
 college at Belfast outranks the others, both in the number and distinc- 
 tion of its graduates. The collegiate buildings, designed by Sir Charles 
 Lanyon, and situated in the southern suburbs near the Botanical 
 Gardens, are constructed in the Tudor style of red brick with stone 
 facings, and have a tower 100 feet high, surmounting the main entrance. 
 The entire length of the edifice, comprising a centre and two wings, is 
 600 feet. The parent educational institution of the borough, however, 
 is the Belfast Academy, in Donegal Street, founded in 1786, on the 
 principle of the Scotch universities, with distinct higher or collegiate, and 
 lower or school departments. But political excitement caused the 
 abandonment of its collegiate department, and led to the establishment, 
 in 1807, when that excitement had subsided, of the Royal Belfast 
 Academical Institution, in College Square ; which latter, in 18 10, on the 
 completion of its buildings at a cost of ,£30,000 raised by subscription, 
 obtained a Parliamentary grant, continued annually until the opening of 
 the Queen's College in 1849. The government School of Art is now 
 held within its walls. The other leading educational institutions consist 
 of St. Malachy s Diocesan College near the junction of Antrim and Crumlin 
 Roads, for Roman Catholic boys, and Convent Schools for girls, all with 
 boarding accommodation ; the Methodist College, in University Road, 
 erected in 1868 at a cost of ,£30,000, with an endowment of ,£25,000 from 
 voluntary contributions ; and the Presbyterian Theological College, erected 
 in 1853 for the education of students for the ministry. Among other 
 instructive establishments, we may specially mention the Belfast Museum, 
 
PUBLIC EDIFICES OF BELFAST. 
 
 145 
 
 in College Square, in connection with the Belfast Natural History 
 and Philosophical Society, and containing a good collection of Irish 
 antiquities; and the Botanic Gardens, established 1830, which contain 
 a handsome conservatory, and are characterized by an excellent 
 collection of native plants. 
 
 Of the county, municipal and other public buildings, the principal 
 is the Court Ho?ise, in Crumlin Road, opened in 1850, when Belfast 
 succeeded Carrickfergus as the county town of Antrim. It was 
 designed by Sir Charles Lanyon, and its front, approached by a 
 grand flight of steps, comprises a fine Corinthian portico supporting 
 a pediment crowned by an allegorical figure of Justice, by Kirke, a 
 Dublin artist. The Municipal Buildings, in Victoria Street, are also 
 modern, having been erected in 1871, and form an attractive pile of 
 brick and red sandstone. The Ulster Hall, in Bedford Street, erected 
 in 1862, is a concert and assembly room, capable of holding 4000 
 persons. It has a Corinthian portico of six columns, and possesses 
 a fine organ. The Belfast Miisic Hall, in May Street, erected in 
 1839, is a somewhat ponderous Doric building. The Theatre Royal, 
 in Arthur Street, has been recently rebuilt, and is now one of the 
 finest dramatic establishments in the kingdom. 
 
 Belfast cannot boast of many commemorative records in the shape 
 of sculptured stone. It has, however, cause to be proud of the 
 Albert Memorial and Clock Tower, at the foot of High Street, 147 
 feet high and erected in 1870 by public subscription. It is in the 
 Venetian-Gothic style, with a statue of the Prince in a niche in the 
 shaft. In College Square there is a statue of the Rev. Henry 
 Cooke, D. D., replacing a bronze statue of the late Earl of Belfast, 
 removed to the Municipal Buildings. Belfast however, modern as it 
 is, can boast of many eminent sons and residents, whose counterfeit 
 representations will no doubt, in coming time, be found to supply 
 fitting adornments for its streets and squares. Among these may 
 be named in literature, James Sheridan Knowles, the dramatist, in 
 early life a teacher in its academy, and the Rev. T. D. Hincks, the 
 orientalist ; and in law and politics, Lord Cairns, ex-Lord Chancellor of 
 England, Sir Joseph Xapier, and Lord O'Hagan, ex-Lord Chancellors 
 of Ireland, and Sir James Emerson Tennant. It would, we think, be 
 11— « 
 
146 
 
 BELFAST AND THE ANTRIM COAST. 
 
 unjust to the fair women of Belfast to omit some mention of them 
 from this personal paragraph, and we are sure we cannot introduce 
 them in a pleasanter manner than by mentioning how they appeared 
 even as far back as 1842, to so critical an eye as that possessed by 
 the genial Thackeray, who in sketching his impressions of the place 
 says : " I never saw a town where so many women are to be met — 
 so many and so pretty — with and without bonnets, with good figures, 
 in neat homely shawls and dresses. The grisettes of Belfast are 
 among the handsomest ornaments of it ; and as good, no doubt, and 
 irreproachable in morals as their sisters in the rest of Ireland." Now 
 as the author of "Vanity Fair" had something of the same kind to 
 say about the Limerick lasses, it may be satisfactory for us to note 
 here that he did not come in contact with the Blarney Stone, during 
 his short sojourn in its vicinity. We may venture, however, on our 
 own behalf, the opinion that while his pictures may have been true 
 to the life at the time they were taken, if he were to reproduce 
 them now he would be even more exuberant in his description. 
 
 It is interesting to record that while no printing press was set up in 
 the town till 1696 (a much later date than that at which printing was 
 introduced into barbarous Russia), still, the first bible printed in 
 Ireland was issued in 1704 from the office of Messrs. Blow & Neill, 
 of Belfast; and that it is the place in which the oldest Irish periodical, 
 the "Weekly Magazine," was originally established. "The Belfast 
 News Letter," now a daily paper, dates back as far as 1737, when 
 it was the first newspaper printed in Ulster, and the third established 
 in the kingdom. There are at present some half a dozen daily and 
 several weekly newspapers. 
 
 Though the manufacture of linen is the chief staple of the place, 
 and, with the subsidiary trades connected with it, employs the greatest 
 number of its laboring population, Belfast has many other factories, very 
 diverse in character. Among these are ship-building, already mentioned, 
 iron-foundries, boot and shoe factories, chemical works, distilleries, 
 breweries, flour mills, tanneries, saw-mills, agricultural implement works, 
 and many other industries. It has also an important export trade 
 in provisions. In fact, Belfast is not only a great manufacturing 
 centre, but its own shipping port, and may be said to be proportionately 
 
THE GIANT'S RING. 
 
 147 
 
 to Ireland, what Manchester and Liverpool conjointly are to England. 
 There is daily communication by steamboat with Glasgow, Liverpool, 
 Fleetwood, and Barrow-in-Furness, and at stated intervals with London- 
 derry Dublin, Ardrossan, Bristol and London, while several lines of 
 railway connect it in turn with all parts of Ireland. 
 
 During our sojourn at Belfast we drove out some five miles in the 
 direction we had traveled toward the town to see the Giant's Ring, 
 which lies in the course of the river Lagan, whose watershed is on 
 the northern slope of the Mourne Mountains. This extraordinary work 
 of antiquity, one of the most interesting to be found in Ireland, is 
 situated in the charming neighborhood of Ballvlesson. It consists of 
 a vast and richly verdant circular mound, a third of a mile in circum- 
 ference and about 80 feet in breadth at its base, and so high, some- 
 where about 40 feet, as to render the sky the only visual object to 
 any person standing within its enclosure, though it is romantically 
 situated on a gently sloping eminence. A large cromlech or stone 
 altar stands within the circle of the ring, and palpably indicates the 
 druidical origin of the entire work. 
 
 The railwav from Belfast to Carrickfergus runs beneath the over- 
 han^ine brow of Cave Hill, and skirts the northwestern shore of Belfast 
 Lough, passing many beautiful suburban residences, and through Green- 
 castle, with its ruined Anglo-Xorman fortress of the Burghs. Earls of 
 Ulster and Lords of Connaught. Our arrangements were to take the 
 ancient port and proceed along by the rugged Antrim coast to the 
 Giant's Causeway. However, before doing this, we decided upon seeing 
 Antrim and Lough Neagh, and so had to take the Londonderry line, 
 which branches off to the west from the road to Carrickfergus, at 
 somewhat over half way. As we rolled along bv the margin of Belfast 
 Lough we had an opportunity of witnessing the white-winged messengers 
 of commerce flitting over its surface, and the panting steamboats plough- 
 ing its waters heedless of the direction of the wind ; while we had a 
 glimpse at the marine villas of the Belfast folk in the pleasant little 
 watering places of Sydenham and Hollywood, on the opposite shore. 
 The lough, known as Carrickfergus Bay before the old county town 
 was supplanted by Belfast, is twelve miles long by five miles broad at 
 its mouth, its widest part, whence it gradually diminishes as it penetrates 
 
148 
 
 BELFAST AND THE ANTRIM COAST. 
 
 the land. It is the principal harbor in the north of Ireland, and has 
 the advantage of being almost entirely free from rocks, having but one 
 dangerous reef on its northern side, covered at high water, and from 
 its shape, called the Briggs or tombs. It was in this bay that Paul 
 Jones appeared in 1778, and, after a bloody engagement captured the 
 British sloop of war Drake. The lough is the rendezvous of the Royal 
 Ulster Yacht Club, established in 1864. The Club has a good fleet of 
 yachts, with, for its commodore, Lord Dufferin, who, in early life, wrote 
 "Letters from High Latitudes," describing a yacht cruise to Iceland, 
 and has since distinguished himself by his able administration of the 
 affairs of the Dominion of Canada. 
 
 The road to Antrim passes Castle Upton, 16 miles from Belfast, 
 the seat of Viscount Templetown, erected about 1600 on the site of a 
 preceptory of the Knights Templars, of which there are slight remains ; 
 and near to some druidical stones, known as Cairn Grange, which 
 literally means "heap of the sun." The little town of Antrim, though 
 21 miles from Belfast by rail, is only two-thirds that distance by road. 
 It contains about 2000 inhabitants, and was originally the assize town 
 of the county to which it has given a name. It is situated on the Six 
 Mile Water, near to its influx into a bay of Lough Neagh, and was 
 anciently called Entrim or Entrumnia, "the habitation on the waters." 
 It is a clean town, having for its only remnant of antiquity an Episcopal 
 church, erected in 1720 upon the site of one built in 1596, and 
 destroyed by fire in 1649. But in the vicinity is a very perfect Round 
 Tower of rough stone, 93 feet high and 53 feet in circumference ; 
 and surmounted by a cap replacing in fac-simile the original shattered 
 by lightning in 1822, the broken pieces of which are preserved. 
 This Round Tower, » however, is unaccompanied by any ecclesiastical 
 remains, the general adjunct to these structures. To the south of the 
 town, and extending for two miles along the shore of the lough, is 
 Antrim Castle, the spacious baronial mansion of Viscount Massareene, 
 with its Louis Ouinze gardens, and wooded demesne. Shane's Castle, 
 the ancient seat of the O'Neills, one of the most powerful of the 
 Irish septs, is situated upon a promontory within Lord O'Neill's leafy 
 park, which extends for three miles along the margin of the lake to 
 the westward. The castle, which derives its name of Shane, Celtic 
 
LOUGH NEAGH AND ITS ISLANDS. 
 
 149 
 
 for John, from the O'Neill of Elizabeth's time,* was destroyed by fire 
 in 1816, when a comparatively modern building, while some additions 
 were being made, and is now reduced to a pile of ruined towers and 
 turrets, from the tops of which an extensive view of Lough Neagh is 
 obtained. 
 
 This lake is the largest in the British Isles, and is only exceeded in 
 size in Europe by the lake of Geneva, and by the lakes of Lodoga 
 in Russia and Vener in Sweden. It is formed by the confluence of 
 the Blackwater, the Upper Bann, and five other rivers, and has for 
 its only outlet the Lower Bann, which enters the ocean between 
 Lough Foyle and the Giant's Causeway. It is about 20 miles long 
 and 12 miles broad, covers an area of 154 square miles, is 45 feet 
 deep in the centre, 48 feet above the level of the ocean at low 
 water, and lies within the limits of five counties. Though a fine 
 sheet of water, it presents little of the picturesque, owing to the 
 absence of mountains near its borders, though its aspect is exceed- 
 ingly pleasant in the immediate vicinity of Antrim. Near to the latter 
 is Ram Island, or " Bonny Ram Island," as it is called in an old 
 Irish song. It is the largest of its three islets, and comprises six 
 acres belonging to the O'Neill estate, which are covered with foliage, 
 and contain the ruins of a Round Tower. On Church Island, near 
 the Armagh shore, and now used as a cemetery, are the ruins of an old 
 church and a holy well, whose overflowing in the reign of Lugaid 
 
 * This Shane treated with the Virgin Queen on equal terms in her own capital after the sept, had almost 
 overthrown English dominion in Ireland. Proud of his hereditary descent, and esteeming himself the true 
 sovereign of Ulster, he viewed as subjects and vassals, the MacGennis, MacGuire, O'Reilly, O'Hanlon, O'Cahan, 
 MacBrien, O'Hagan, O'Quin, MacKenna, MacArtane, and all the MacDonnells. He was master of an army 
 of 4000 foot, and iooo horse, and 600 soldiers constituted his body guard. Though his father, Con, had 
 submitted to Henry VIII., Shane asserted his independence, invaded the English Pale and carried the sway of 
 his race higher than any of his predecessors. Yet, desiring peace, he proceeded of his own accord to visit the 
 English court as an independent prince, accompanied by a body guard of Gallowglasses, armed with battle 
 axes and dressed in their native costume, with long curled hair descending from their uncovered heads, regard- 
 less of the law which prohibited the national Irish garb. Elizabeth received him graciously, and he returned 
 triumphantly to Ireland. There is a tradition that upon the fall of a head carved in stone upon one of the 
 walls of the ruined castle the race will become extinct. The ancient hereditary line, in fact, expired in 1856 
 upon the death of John Bruce Richard O'Neill, the third baron and viscount, created respectively in 1793 and 
 1795. The earldom of O'Neill, created in 1800, became extinct on the death of its first possessor, Charles 
 Henry St. John O'Neill, in 1841. The present peer who inherited the estates, received a new barony, and by 
 royal license assumed the name of O'Neill in lieu of his patronymic Chichester. Since the demolition of 
 the castle a portion of the outbuildings has been converted into a residence. 
 
150 
 
 BELFAST AND THE ANTRIM COAST. 
 
 Riabderg, in the first century, a legend of the lake tells us, led to its 
 formation, and has given a text to Moore's fanciful pen, in the lines :— ■ 
 
 "On Lough Neagh's banks, as the fisherman strays, 
 When the clear cold eve's declining, 
 He sees the Round Towers of other days 
 In the wave beneath him shining." 
 
 Lough Neagh is an important link in the inland navigation of northern 
 Ireland, as it is connected by canals on the one side with Newry 
 and Carlingford Bay, and with Belfast and its lough, and on the other 
 side with Lough Erne and thenceforward to the Upper Shannon and 
 to Sligo and its bay. 
 
 From the primitive, we proceeded to the second but now also obsolete 
 county town, with its most prominent feature, Carrickfergus Castle, 
 surmounting a rock and forming a most noble projection on the bay, 
 and in every view of the town becoming a very conspicuous and 
 picturesque object. This castle, erected to protect the bay, is at high 
 water washed on three sides, the southern of which forms the harbor 
 of the town. The greatest height of the rock is at its outer 
 extremity, where it is about thirty feet, shelving considerably towards 
 the land, the walls of the castle following its sinuosities all around. 
 Two towers, called from their shape " half-moons," are on the town side, 
 and have between them a fine gate-way, the only entrance, defended 
 by a straight passage with embrasures for fire-arms. There are also 
 apertures for hurling down stones and pouring melted lead, and a 
 portcullis. In the lower yard are the guard-rooms and barracks, 
 the latter built in 1802, and from the upper yard rises the most 
 conspicuous part of the fortress, the great donjon or keep of five 
 stories. The third story contained a large room known as Fergus's 
 dining-room, while the ground story was bomb-proof. In the keep 
 was also a draw-well 37 feet deep, but it has been allowed to 
 become choked up with rubbish. Since 1843 the fortress has been 
 garrisoned by artillerymen and pensioners and lately refitted with 
 modern guns. In a survey given by George Clarkson in 1567, 
 the castle was stated to have been then in great decay, and likely 
 without help and reparation to soon come to ruin. This magnificent 
 Anglo-Norman fortress was built by DeCourcy in 11 78 to protect 
 
CARRICKFERGUS AND ITS CASTLE. 
 
 151 
 
 his Ulster possessions, and is supposed to occupy the site of a 
 castle called after the chieftain who built it, Dim Sobarky or Dun 
 Sobairchia, having within a holy well blessed by St. Patrick. It 
 surrendered to Edward Bruce upon his invasion, after a long and 
 stout defence by the English under Mandeville, during which the 
 latter were so reduced by famine that it is said they consumed 
 everything that would sustain life, including 30 Scotch prisoners 
 made in a sortie ; but upon Bruce's death it was once more occupied 
 by the English, and except occasional possession by the Scotch or 
 Irish during the troubles in 1641, continued with them. It however 
 was captured and held for a few days by the French under Thurot 
 in 1 760. 
 
 The town of Carrickfergus is one of the oldest in Ireland. Its 
 name is attributed to carrig, a rock, and Feargus, an Irish King, who 
 was lost in a storm off the coast, 400-300 B. C. It more likely 
 comes from Fergus MacErc, a Dalriadic chief, who flourished in the 
 year 502. Its leading historical events since the founding of a colony 
 by DeCourcy include, in addition to those already given in connection 
 with the castle, its capture and burning by Niall O'Neill in 1384; the 
 foundation of a monastery, of considerable importance, for Franciscans 
 in 1497; the slaying in 1597 of the governor and many others by some 
 Scottish troops under Sir James MacDonnell ; its environment by walls, 
 completed in 1608, of which there are slight remains, including the 
 round arched Spittal Gate, on the north; and the landing on June 14, 
 1690, of William III., upon a stone upon the quay, still preserved and 
 impressed with a foot mark. St. Nicholas Church, surmounted by a 
 spire, is a handsome cruciform structure, some of whose ancient grandeur 
 has been brought to light during its recent restoration. It contains 
 evidence under the altar of a subterranean passage which led to the 
 Franciscan monastery, of which no traces exist. Among the monuments 
 in the interior is one to the Donegal family, bearing effigies of Sir 
 Arthur Chichester, first Earl of Belfast, and his wife, and Sir John 
 Chichester, who was taken in the ambuscade at Salthole, and beheaded. 
 It is said that Sir James MacDonnell once remarked upon Sir John's 
 effigy being pointed out, "How the deil cam he to get his head again ? 
 for I am sure I ance tak it frae him." Though no longer the county 
 
152 
 
 BELFAST AND THE ANTRIM COAST. 
 
 town of Antrim, Carrickfergus now constitutes a county within itself, 
 but its assizes are held in the court-house at Belfast. Its population 
 in 1 87 1 was 4028, and it returns one member to the British Parlia- 
 ment. A considerable part of the town, known as the Scottish quarter, 
 is chiefly inhabited by persons of Scottish descent. The harbor, recently 
 improved, and having a handsome pier, erected in 1834, is one of the 
 safest roadsteads in the north of Ireland, being protected by the adjacent 
 headlands and the Copeland Islands, which latter are situated at the 
 entrance to Belfast Lough, and within a mile of Donaghadee on the 
 opposite or County Down coast. Notwithstanding that the commerce of 
 Carrickfergus has dwindled into insignificence since the establishment 
 of the port at Belfast, it continues to be a good fishing station, and 
 its oysters are celebrated. 
 
 Across the lough and not far from the promontory which marks 
 its entrance on the south, stands Bangor, between which town and 
 Belfast there is communication both by steamboat over the lough 
 and by railway running near the County Down shore. This easy access 
 has caused Bangor in late years to become a favorite summer resort 
 of Belfast people, who are annually adding to its villa population. 
 It was once the seat of an abbey founded by St. Comhgall in 
 552, of which a fragment remains, and of a school famous for its 
 learning.* It was within the dominion of the O'Neills and possesses 
 the remains of a castle. The industry of the place is embroidery 
 for ladies' attire, of which a large quantity of fine work is exported 
 It was in a little inlet close to the town called Groomsport Bay, 
 that Duke Schomberg first cast anchor in 1691. Across the 
 promontory, about five or six miles eastwardly, and facing the 
 ocean, is Donaghadee, once the chief mail-packet station for the 
 north of Ireland and now connected with Belfast by a branch 
 railway. It is the nearest port to Great Britain, being but 21 
 miles from Portpatrick in Scotland, and is the point of earliest 
 union by cable with the sister kingdoms. While a packet station, large 
 sums were expended under the direction of Sir John Rennie, C. E., by 
 
 * The seminary directed by St. Cathargus, was resorted to by students from all parts of the world, and is 
 declared to be the germ of Oxford, King Alfred having obtained his professors from Bangor when he founded 
 that university. In 818 when the place contained 3000 monks it was attacked by the Danes, who mercilessly 
 massacred the abbot and 900 monks. 
 
V 
 
CA RRICKFER GUS TO LARNE. 153 
 
 the government in the improvement of the harbor and the erection of 
 piers and a lighthouse. The neat little town has a parish church built 
 in 1641, and a population of about 2000, much increased in the summer 
 by the excellent facilities afforded to bathers. At its back rises an 
 immense rath, 140 feet high, 480 feet in circumference at the base, 
 and 219 at the summit, which latter is approached by a winding 
 pathway and commands a splendid view of Belfast Lough, the Scottish 
 coast, and the Isle of Man. 
 
 From Carrickfergus the railway continues for about 15 miles further 
 to its terminus at Larne, diverging to the eastward as far as White- 
 head, the northern entrance to Belfast Lough, where it makes an 
 angle and thence runs northwardly. On our journey we passed the 
 ruined church of Kilroot — Dean Swift's first living, soon declined on 
 account of its solitude — and at some little distance from the remains 
 of the ancient castle of the Chichesters, situated near the coast. We 
 then ran for several miles along by Island Magee, named after its 
 original possessors, a narrow promontory lying on our right, six or 
 seven miles long and two miles broad, running parallel with the 
 mainland and forming the eastern shore of Lough Larne, the latter 
 about the same length and over half the width of the peninsula. This 
 so-called island contains the Giant's Cradle, a druidical rocking-stone, 
 reported to tremulously move on the approach of a criminal, and on 
 its eastern shore some precipitous basaltic cliffs, called the Goblins, 
 rising perpendicularly to a height of 200 feet. The inhabitants are 
 of Scottish descent, retaining the peculiarities of their race ; and the 
 island has an unfortunate notoriety for witchcraft and superstition, the 
 latest trials in Ireland upon the former charge being of eight females 
 of this district in Carrickfergus, where they were confined in the pillory 
 in 171 1. We also ran by the ruined church of Templecoran, "the 
 cradle of the Presbyterian religion in Ireland, where the first congre- 
 gation was established in 1613 by the Rev. Edward Brice ; " the dell 
 of the Salthole, where, in 1597, Sir James MacDonnell captured Sir 
 John Chichester, Governor of Carrickfergus, whom he caused to be 
 beheaded at Glynn ; and as we approached Glynn, a landslip, which 
 occurred in 1834, when the coach road was carried away. 
 
 The view of Larne is very pleasing as seen from the high ground 
 
 U— 48 
 
154 
 
 BELFAST AND THE ANTRIM COAST. 
 
 down which the old coach road slopes. The town lies snugly ensconced 
 near the margin and not far from the mouth of the land-locked bay 
 to which it gives a name, and, in the hazy atmosphere, the scene 
 had quite the effect of an Italian landscape. The name is corrupted 
 from Latharna, originally that of the district of which Larne is the 
 chief town. The place has a population of about 3000, and consists 
 of an old town with narrow, ill-paved streets, and a new town with 
 a handsome long street from which others branch, composed of sub- 
 stantial stone houses, with a neat town-hall, museum, and two public 
 libraries. It has an extensive export trade in lime, which is shipped 
 from Magheramorne, about four miles to the south and further up 
 the bay. Mail steamers run daily between this port and Stranraer in 
 Scotland, during daylight, requiring only a sea passage of two 
 hours, and forming with the connecting railways easy communication 
 between the north of Ireland and Scotland and the north of 
 England. 
 
 To the north of Larne a strip of land a mile in length juts out 
 in the form of a reaping-hook, whence it is named curraan, from carran, 
 the Irish for that implement. It is a sort of natural pier, protecting 
 the entrance to Larne harbor, and has on its extremity, where there 
 is a ferry to Island Magee, the Castle of Olderfleet. Robert Bissett, 
 a Scotchman, banished from his own country for participation in the 
 murder of the Duke of Atholl, erected this fortress for the protection 
 of the neighboring district, granted to him by Henry III., but subse- 
 quently forfeited through participation in rebellion. It was granted in 
 the seventeenth century, with the rights of the ferry, to the Chichesters, 
 and became their protecting fortress on the north of the district, while 
 their castle at the junction of the promontory of Magee with the main- 
 land, guarded it on the south. The only notable historical event 
 connected with Olderfleet Castle is the landing, in 13 15, of Edward 
 Bruce, on his invasion of Ireland, at the head of 6000 men. At an 
 earlier date, however, in 1018, the bay appears to have been the scene 
 of a naval combat between the Earl of the Orkneys and the Irish 
 King, disastrous to the latter. 
 
 At Larne the pathway of the iron steed ceases, and the journey 
 along the romantic coast of Antrim has to be continued in the less 
 
TOWN AND CASTLE OF GLEN ARM. 
 
 155 
 
 rapid but, for sight-seeing more enjoyable jaunting-car. It is, however, 
 for some distance upon a remarkable road, running for over 40 statute 
 miles northwesterly to Ballycastle, and a wonderful example of engineer- 
 ing skill, about which we shall have a word to say hereafter. The 
 first half of this road, between Larne and Cushendall, is, perhaps, the 
 most interesting: seaside drive in Ireland, and exhibits to great advan- 
 tage the basaltic rocks* which constitute the distinguishing feature of 
 the coast, and the smooth sand and pebbly beach that lie at their 
 base when the surging waves retire. Our first stage to Glenarm, a 
 distance of 1 1 miles, led us near to some high and picturesque circular 
 precipices called the Sallagh Braes, and past the ruins of Cairne Castle 
 and Shaw's Castle, the latter the ancient residence of an extinct family 
 of the name it bears ; while half a dozen miles away at sea were 
 visible the Maidens, a group of dangerous reefs, against which many 
 a stout bark was wrecked ere lighthouses were placed upon them 
 in 1828. 
 
 We rounded a noble promontory into Glenarm, the church-spire first 
 breaking on the view, and the towers of the castle immediately after — 
 the whole appearance of the town with its beautiful surroundings 
 resembling the moving tableaux of theatrical scenery. We lost no 
 time in making for the castle, and, turning out of the street, came 
 directly upon a handsome bridge which crosses a small mountain stream, 
 brawling by the side of the town, and leads to a massive gateway, 
 through which and beneath a leafy avenue we approached the front of 
 the comparatively small and modern, but picturesque baronial residence 
 of the Earl of Antrim, covering the site of a fortress built by the 
 MacDonnells in 1639. The present edifice, erected in ancient cas- 
 tellated style, and furnished with modern taste and elegance, became 
 the residence of the Earls of Antrim in 1750, after the destruction of 
 their former summer abode at Ballymagarry. It occupies a commanding 
 
 * The county of Antrim, lying between Belfast Lough, Lough Neagh, the River Bann, and the ocean, 
 is covered with a great stratum of limestone, over which volcanic masses of later formation have been 
 deposited, greatly altering the shape and composition of the original stratum, and not only covering it, but 
 here and there pushing it away and scattering it in fragments around. The chalk limestone is, when found 
 on the surface, as white as snow, while the volcanic masses, which are mostly basalt, are very dark, 
 wherever exposed to the eye. Along the entire coast, which stretches for 60 miles, the chalk rocks and 
 basaltic formations are observable in the most curious, picturesque and diversified forms ; but inland the 
 whole is covered with earth and vegetation. 
 
156 
 
 BELFAST AND THE ANTRIM COAST. 
 
 position, which affords it from one front a view of the bay and 
 its enclosing promontories, and from the other a prospect of the well- 
 stocked deer park and wooded glen, which penetrate the mountains for 
 about three miles. The river, in its passage through this glen to the 
 sea, leaps down the rocks, and thus produces a charming succession 
 of pretty waterfalls. 
 
 The small town carries on a trade with the neighboring coast of 
 Scotland, whither it principally exports lime, the product of the 
 neighborhood, for the manufacture of which the district abounds with 
 kilns, and has some popularity as a marine watering-place. In the 
 churchyard are some remains of a monastery, founded in 1465 by 
 one of the Bissetts, from the marriage of whose female descendant 
 the neighboring property passed into the hands of the MacDonnells. 
 Glenarm is the only haven in the north of Ireland, between 
 Loughs Foyle and Larne ; it has deep water, and is formed by a 
 circular winding of the shore and protected on each side by lofty 
 headlands. 
 
 There is a pretty legend, embalmed in verse by Thomas D 'Arcy 
 McGee, relative to the heiress of Glenarm, and the manner in which, 
 with her " broad, broad lands," she was won by MacDonnell of the 
 Isles over his rival, MacQuillan, then Lord of Dunluce. Although, 
 we are told, her heart inclined toward the latter, her pride dictated 
 that the hand to put a ring on hers must prove its chieftainry, and 
 led her to declare — 
 
 " But not in the lists with armed hands 
 
 Must this devoir be done ; 
 Yet he who wins my broad, broad lands 
 
 Their lady may count as won. 
 Ye both were born upon the shore — 
 
 Were bred upon the sea ; 
 Now let me see you ply the oar 
 
 For the land you love — and me ' " 
 
 And she promised that the chief who could first touch the strand 
 should be the victor. So, upon a bright summer's day, under the 
 watching of the fair lady from Glenarm's lofty battlements, the gallant 
 oarsmen were marshalled prow to prow, and then bent to their task. 
 Away over the waves they sped, side by side for a time, but as they 
 
LEGEND OF GLEN ARM. 
 
 157 
 
 approached the goal MacDonnell perceived that if he trusted to his 
 prowess the prize would be lost to him, for — 
 
 " He saw his rival gain apace — 
 
 He felt the spray in his wake ; 
 He thought of her who watched the race. 
 
 More dear for her dowry sake ! 
 Then he drew his skain from out its sheath, 
 
 And lopt off his left hand ; 
 And pale and fierce as a chief in death, 
 
 He hurled it to the strand ! 
 
 " ' The chief that first can grasp the strand, 
 
 May mount at morn and ride.' 
 O, fleet is the steed which the bloody hand 
 
 Through Antrim's glens doth guide 1 
 And legend tells that the proudc ladye 
 
 Would fain have been unbanned, 
 For the chieftain who proved his chieftainry 
 
 Lorded both wife and land."* 
 
 With an easy car, a stout little horse, a good-natured driver, and 
 a bright sun, it would have been difficult not to have enjoyed our 
 drive from Glenarm to Cushendall, during which we crossed the outlets 
 of several deep and romantic glens, and observed that there was not 
 one without its waterfall. Over one or two, at the brow of the 
 precipice from which the white torrent took its first leap, we noticed 
 light bridges in the vicinage of plantations, indicating park scenery 
 on the table land above. After we had passed the pretty little 
 watering-place of Carnlough, belonging to the Londonderry family, and 
 when we had traveled nearly half way to Cushendall, we came in 
 sight of Garron Tower, a modern castellated residence erected by the 
 late Dowager - Marchioness of Londonderry upon the acclivities of 
 Nachore Hill. From the summit of the hill, which rises over a small 
 
 * Another version of this legend, one which we believe has not yet received a poetic dress, places the scene 
 at Dunluce Castle, and the possession of that fortress during the feuds of the MacQuillans and the MacDonnells 
 as the object of the strife. By that account the contestants, in the presence of the King of Scotland, agreed to 
 leave their right thereto to the issue of a row from Isla to Dunluce, and the victory fell to MacDonnell in the 
 manner narrated in the poem. A third version of the legend attaches the story to the fortunes of the O' Neils, 
 and narrates that the event occurred upon the occasion of an ancient expedition for the conquest of Ireland, 
 when the leader declared that the territory should belong to the follower who first touched the shore, when the 
 hero of the occasion became the founder of the race that supplied Ulster with kings for centuries. Hence a 
 sinister hand, gules, became the armorial ensign of the province, while two severed hands are quartered in the 
 coat of arms of Lord O'Neill. 
 
158 
 
 BELFAST AND THE ANTRIM COAST. 
 
 promontory called Garron Point to the height of 1179 ^ eet above the 
 sea, extensive prospects are to be had of the neighboring Irish coast and 
 the opposite Scottish shores, with the Atlantic waters surging in be- 
 tween. Rounding Garron Point, a singular-looking limestone rock, called 
 the Clough-i-Stookan, was seen standing isolated upon the shore. Time 
 and the action of the waves have given it the contour of a human 
 being, which has long been superstitiously regarded by the peasantry, 
 as it emits sounds like those of mariners in distress when the moaning 
 wind penetrates its many crevices. Precipitous cliffs, deep gorges and 
 ravines, and masses of fallen rock with the foliage that adorns them, 
 here supply many a pleasing picture to the passing eye. At this point 
 we came upon the curve of Red Bay, so' named from the red clay of 
 which its shores are composed. It is the most beautiful inlet on this 
 coast, and is situated at the entrance of the wild vale of Glenariff, 
 sometimes called Glen-aireamp, the Valley of Numbers, and Glen- 
 aireachaib, the Valley of Caves, up which is a waterfall enjoying the 
 musical name of Isnaleara. This vale extends into the interior of 
 the county, to which a road passes through it. The prospect to the 
 west is terminated by the lofty conical summit of Cruach-a-crue, while 
 that to ihe north is limited by the extraordinary mountain of Lurgeidan, 
 not unlike the frustum of an enormous cone of considerable altitude, 
 but whose base is disproportionately narrow, and upon whose summit 
 both Fin MacCoul and Ossian are said to have built fortresses. After 
 passing the neglected hamlet of Waterfoot, at the. mouth of the 
 Glenariff River, we reached the caves of Red Bay, excavations probably 
 formed at some remote period by the inroads of the tide, now excluded 
 by an embankment in a species of soft red sandstone. There are 
 three of tolerable magnitude — one for years appropriately converted into 
 a smith's forge, for which it certainly possesses a cyclopean propriety. 
 The ruined castle of Red Bay towered above us as we passed from 
 a lofty arch cut through the southern extremity of one of the red 
 cliffs. Here is also a cave, said once to have been used as a school. 
 The castle was built, it is supposed, by the Bissetts, from whom, as 
 we have shown, the Antrim family derive this barony. 
 
 Between the pretty villages of Cushendall and Cushendun, are to 
 be found the old ruined church and burial ground of Layd, where it 
 
THE VALLEY OF GLENDUN. 
 
 159 
 
 is traditionally reported Ossian was interred, notwithstanding that he died 
 before the foundation of Christian churches, and the entrances to the 
 interesting ravines, Glendall, Glenaan and Glendun, which, like Glenariff, 
 penetrate the mountains for several miles, and which pay their tributes 
 to the sea, the first two conjointly at Cushendall, and the last at 
 Cushendun, the prefix, Cozs-abhann, meaning the end of the river. From 
 the little bay of Cushendun to Fairhead the mountains touch the sea, 
 except at the inlet of Murlough, not even leaving space for a road, so 
 that of necessity one has been carried over the hills and across the 
 shoulder of the promontory of Fairhead, at a considerable elevation, 
 and at a distance of two or three miles from the shore. Tor Head, 
 a promontory six miles north of Cushendun, is the nearest point of 
 Ireland to Scotland, being only 12 miles distant from the Mull of 
 Cantyre, and in some old maps of Elizabeth's time it is called " the 
 Scots' warning fyre,' from the Scots who had settled in these parts 
 making- fires on it to bring over their friends to their assistance when 
 about to be assailed by the English or Irish." 
 
 The road from Cushendall to Ballycastle crosses the lower end of 
 Glendun by a fine viaduct of three arches, 80 feet high, two miles 
 above Cushendun, and winds up the hill of Carey, the principal ridge 
 lying between the two places, presenting on the ascent fine views of 
 the glens and coast beneath. " Whencesoever viewed, whether from the 
 heights overlooking it, from the top of the viaduct, or from the mid- 
 hill road on either side," Sir John Forbes considers that " this valley 
 of Glendun cannot fail to strike the traveler as a scene of no common 
 attraction ; " and adds, " while looking on its secluded barriers, its 
 quiet green pastures, its white cottages scattered about among the 
 fields, its wooded depths by the river, now hiding, now disclosing the 
 shining water, and lastly, the partial gleam of the distant sea through 
 the narrow vista of its hills — I could not help feeling that I saw before 
 me one of those pregnant scenes which so readily inspire the minds of 
 the young with some of the dearest of their waking dreams, making 
 them think and say with the youthful poet : — 
 
 " ' If there's peace to be found in the world, 
 The heart that is humble might hope for it here.' " 
 
 The higher ground attained, nothing was visible but moorland, and hill 
 
160 
 
 BELFAST AND THE ANTRIM COAST. 
 
 and dale ; but in descending the opposite slope fine views were presented 
 on the left of Knocklayd, 1695 feet high, and the glens which lie beneath 
 it, and on the right of lesser hills and other glens, and of the bold 
 promontory of Benmore, or Fairhead, five miles away, to which latter 
 we made a pedestrian excursion over a rugged path, after we had 
 recruited ourselves with a night's rest at Ballycastle. 
 
 Fairhead rises perpendicularly to the height of 636 feet above 
 the level of the sea, slightly sloping downwards toward the mainland, 
 and is the highest, boldest, and most interesting headland on the 
 Antrim coast. On approaching its summit we noticed in a hollow two 
 small lakes — Lough Dhu, the Black Lake, and Lough-na-Cranagh, the 
 Lake of the Island, the latter containing in its centre an artificial 
 island of black basaltic rock, supposed to have been constructed by 
 the Druids as a site for the performance of religious ceremonies. The 
 view from the head is most enchanting, presenting on the west the 
 line of finely variegated limestone and basaltic coast as far as Bengore 
 Head, including the beautiful promontory of Kenbane, or Whitehead, 
 majestically presenting its snow-white front to the foaming ocean, the 
 swinging-bridge and bay of Carrick-a-Rede, and Sheep Island ; in front 
 the Island of Rathlin, and to the east and south the cliffs and mountains 
 of Argyllshire in Scotland, and the jutting headlands of the Antrim coast 
 as far as Island Magee, with the pretty seaside villages reclining cosily at 
 the feet of the sombre mountains which protect them from the western 
 blasts. 
 
 The promontory is formed of a number of greenish basaltic colossal 
 pillars, many of much larger size than those at the Causeway, in some 
 instances exceeding 200 feet in length and five in breadth, and one of the 
 tallest forming a quadrangular prism 33 feet by 36 at the sides, said to be 
 the largest basaltic pillar known upon the face of the globe, exceeding in 
 diameter the pedestal of the statue of Peter the Great at St. Petersburg, 
 and considerably surpassing in length the shaft of Pompey's Pillar. At 
 the foot of this magnificent colonnade is an immense mass of rock 
 similarly formed — a wide waste of natural ruins supposed to have been 
 in the course of successive ages thrown down from their original 
 foundation, either by storms or some violent disturbance of nature. 
 Many of these massive bodies have withstood the shock of their fall, 
 
\ 
 
 F AIRHEAD AND BALLYCASTLE. 101 
 
 and lie in groups and clumps of pillars, resembling varieties of artificial 
 ruins, and forming a very novel and striking picture, the deep waters of 
 the sea rolling at their base with a full and heavy swell. 
 
 These natural ruins are approached from the summit by the descent 
 of the Fhir Leith, or the Gray Man's Path, running through a mighty 
 chasm, the entrance to which is extremely narrow ; and a column of 
 basalt, which has fallen across it, forms a sort of natural gateway, through 
 which the bold inquirer must descend, conducting to a gradually expanding 
 passage which leads to the base. The shore in the neighborhood is 
 beautifully indented with coves, produced partly by the action of the sea, 
 and partly by the wear of the mountain torrents. One of these latter 
 forms a fine fall, called the Leap, in rainy seasons an object of great 
 beauty. 
 
 The little town of Ballycastle dates back from the erection of a 
 " faire castle" in 1609, D Y Randolph, Earl of Antrim, but may almost be 
 said to owe its orio-in to a orentleman named Huorh Bovd, to whom 
 Alexander, Earl of Antrim, granted in 1736 a lease in perpetuity of the 
 neighboring coal fields;* and it was advanced in 1770 by the erection 
 of a harbor under the auspices of the Irish Parliament, to promote the 
 
 * The coal mines are situated on the shore between Ballycastle and Fairhead, the beds of the mineral 
 extending under the headland to Murlough Bay on its eastern coast. The collieries have, at different 
 periods, occupied the attention of speculators ; but a more than ordinary interest is attached to them from 
 a discovery made about 1770. Mr. Hamilton, in his " Letters on the Antrim Coast," says that at that time, 
 while the miners were pushing forward an adit towards the bed of coal in an unexplored part of the cliff, they broke 
 through the rock into a narrow passage, so much contracted and choked up with various drippings and deposits on 
 its sides and bottom, as to render it impossible for any of the workmen to enter. Two lads, therefore, crept in with 
 candles, for the purpose of exploration ; and after proceeding for a considerable time, with much labor and 
 difficulty, entered an extensive labyrinth, diverging into numerous apartments, in the mazes and windings of which 
 they were completely bewildered and lost. After many vain attempts to return, their lights were extinguished, and 
 their voices became hoarse and exhausted with frequent shouting ; and then, completely fatigued, they sat down in 
 utter despair. Meanwhile their friends, alarmed for their safety, used equal exertions to indicate their presence, but 
 in vain. At length, it occurred to one of the boys that the sound of his hammer against a stone would 
 be better heard than the sound of a human voice ; and the artifice succeeded in directing their friends to 
 their whereabouts, and they were rescued after an absence of 12 hours. This incident ultimately led to the 
 discovery of 36 chambers, all well-trimmed and dressed ; also of baskets and mining implements of a rude 
 character, and of candles with wicks formed of rags ; and later, of a globular stone hammer, which the finder, 
 Mr. Barrow, inferred was used in the coal mine before weapons of iron were invented. No tradition exists of the 
 first working of this mine ; and the peasantry, who attribute all marks of antiquity in the kingdom to the Danes or 
 the giants, assign this to the former — a conclusion in which Mr. Hamilton does not agree. One argument, however, 
 in favor of the antiquity of the collieries is derived from the fact that the castle on Rathlin Island, occupied by 
 Robert Bruce in 1306, appears to have been built with lime bumed with sea-coal, some cinders of which may still 
 be detected in the mortar, and bear a strong resemblance to Ballycastle coals. 
 II— 50 
 
162 
 
 BELFAST AND THE ANTRIM COAST. 
 
 extension of mining operations. But not only these latter, but many 
 industries which Mr. Boyd had established were eventually abandoned 
 for want of success. The town is pleasantly situated at the base of 
 Knockloyd {Cnoc-leithid, hill of breadth), from the top of which, we were 
 informed, fine views are obtainable. Close by are the ruins of the Abbey 
 of Bonamargy, supposed to have been erected in 1 509 by Somarle 
 MacDonnell, commonly called Sorely Boy or Yellow Surley, and for 
 generations the burying-place of the Antrim family. Ballycastle contains 
 about 1700 inhabitants, and is divided into two parts, upper and lower, 
 connected by an avenue of trees, the lower portion being denominated 
 "The Quay." It is the town at which persons who approach the Giant's 
 Causeway by the road along which we traveled usually rest, ere they 
 sally forth to visit those natural basaltic wonders, whither it is a two 
 hours' drive. 
 
 The magnificent road upon which we entered at Larne, terminates 
 at Ballycastle. Here, it hangs upon the mountain's edge, with the briny 
 waves lashing its other side — there, it penetrates the rock, to emerge 
 into daylight some distance beyond — at one place it spans a lovely 
 valley, and then, creeping up a mountain side, plants you amidst wild 
 and rugged scenery — further on it takes you downhill again, and places 
 before you still more enticing pictures — while all along it is an ever- 
 changing kaleidoscope of marvelous scenic effects. In fact, if the 
 engineer of the splendid coast road of Antrim, constructed in the fourth 
 decade of the century had worked with a poet and painter at his back, 
 he could not have laid out its course more agreeably to the eye and 
 the imagination. It is planned with equal skill, taste, and enterprise — 
 cliffs cut through, chasms crossed, water-courses bridged — and the result 
 is a roughly-ribbed and jagged coast, traversed by a road as smooth and 
 almost as level as a tennis-court. We were surprised at the excellence 
 of the roads all over Ireland, but at none so agreeably as this. Before 
 the construction of this new highway the only means of reaching the 
 villages upon the coast was over most difficult roads, that crossed the 
 mountains at great elevations, and were almost impassable to carriages. 
 They afforded, however, as some compensation for the labor of traveling 
 upon them, most extensive prospects of the neighboring country and the 
 Scottish and Irish coasts. 
 
KENBANE CASTLE AND RATH LIN ISLAND. 
 
 103 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE GIANT'S CAUSEWAY. 
 
 Kenbane Castle — Rathlin Island and Bruce s Castle — Carrick-a-Rede and its flying-bridge — 
 Dunseverick Castle — Bengore Head — The Giant's Caitseway and its fabulous origin — First 
 impressions deceptive — Wonderful natural phenomenon — Measurement and geometrical charac- 
 teristics — Giant's Organ, Loom, and other curious basaltic conformations — Giant's Ampitheatre 
 and Chimney Tops — The Pleaskin — Indentations of the coast — Dunkerry and Portcoon 
 Caves — Wonders of the Causeway contemplated — Dunluce Castle and its checkered history — 
 The White Rocks and the Priest's Hole — Portrush — Coleraine — Magilligan and Limavady. 
 
 THE road which extends for about 20 miles beyond Ballycastle to the 
 Giant's Causeway and the railway at Portrush is of the same 
 excellence as that by which we had thus far skirted the Antrim shore, 
 but like the last few miles bleak and hilly, yet occasionally affording 
 noble views. Two miles northwest of the first named place we came 
 upon Kenbane Castle, upon a promontory of the same name, otherwise 
 known as the White Head, from its remarkable chalk formation in the 
 midst of basalt. At present but little remains of the ancient fortress 
 except a part of the massive walls of the tower or keep, whose bold 
 and romantic position adds not a little to the effect of the scenery of the 
 remarkably rugged coast. Though tradition attributes the foundation of 
 the structure to an Irish sept, named MacHendrie, its peculiar character 
 would seem to indicate that it was originally a stronghold for the 
 protection of the English settlers. 
 
 Rathlin, Reachrainn, or Raghery Island, called Ricina by Ptolemy, 
 lies four or five miles from the coast at this point, and is a conspicuous 
 feature in all views to the seaward, which have for a background in 
 fine weather the misty tops of the highlands of Argyll. The basaltic 
 formation of the island leads to the conclusion that it was once 
 connected with the mainland, and the Rev. William Hamilton was of 
 
164 
 
 THE GIANT'S CAUSEWAY. 
 
 opinion that, standing as it does between the Irish and Scottish coasts, 
 it is perhaps the surviving fragment of a large tract of country, at some 
 period of time overwhelmed, that ages ago united Staffa and the Giant's 
 Causeway.* At Doon Point, on the southeastern side, the disposition of 
 the basaltic columns is very remarkable. The base is a natural pier or 
 mole, above which rests a collection of columns of a curved form, 
 apparently assumed in conformity with the surface on which they lie, and 
 inducing a belief that they were so molded when in a state of fusion, 
 while the whole is surmounted by a variety of differently grouped 
 columns, partaking of every position in which basalt has been discovered 
 in other places. Rathlin Island consists of 3398 acres, of which about 
 one-fourth is arable and pasture, and is of the shape of a sock, with 
 the heel pointing toward Scotland, and the toe towards Fairhead, 
 whence it is distant about three miles. The length of the leg running 
 from west to east, is over five miles, of the foot about four miles, and 
 the width about a mile. The peculiar beauty of the island consists in 
 its high surrounding cliffs, which maintain their greatest elevation of 447 
 feet at Slieve-a-carn, on the northwest coast, while they scarcely ever 
 fall below 180 feet. It is the property of a gentleman named Gage, 
 who resides among his tenantry, over whom he exercises patriarchal sway. 
 St. Columb, who founded a church in Iona in the sixth century, also 
 erected one here, probably as a half way house to his many other 
 establishments in the island of Saints. The peculiar position of Rathlin 
 led to its being subjected to the earliest assaults of the Danes, and to 
 its being so sacked alternately by the English and Scotch that in 1580 it 
 became depopulated. Robert Bruce, upon being driven out of Scotland 
 by Baliol in 1306, was for a time concealed upon the island in a castle 
 which has been given his name, and in which it is said he was taught 
 the lesson of perseverance by the toiling spider. Some slight remains 
 of the fortress are still visible near to the outer angle of the island 
 surmounting a lofty precipice separated from the mainland by a deep 
 chasm. 
 
 * It was this gentleman's "Letters concerning the Northern Coast," published in 1786, that first directed 
 public attention toward the Giant's Causeway ; and a stone over the Pleaskin, his accustomed seat while 
 surveying its beauties, has obtained the name of " Hamilton's Chair." Mr. Hamilton, in his capacity of 
 magistrate of Donegal having excited the animosity of some lawless men, was on March 22d, 1797, brutally 
 murdered by them when on a visit to a friend near Lough Swilly. 
 
CARRICK-A-REDE AND ITS FLYIXG-BRIDGE. 
 
 1C5 
 
 When we had traveled half way from Ballycastle to the Causeway 
 we pulled up at Carrick-a-Rede, an insulated rock separated from the 
 mainland by a tremendous rent, evidently the result of some terrific 
 convulsion of nature. Its name is attributed by Mr. Hamilton to 
 Carrig-a-ramhad, " the rock in the road," because it intercepts the passage 
 of the salmon along the coast ; and by Mr. Drummond to Carrig-a- 
 drockthcad, the rock of the bridge. The summit of this basaltic island is 
 on a level with the mainland with which it is connected by a bridge of 
 ropes, which spans a yawning abyss, after the manner of the rope 
 suspension bridges of the Andes in South America. The chasm is 60 
 feet wide and 84 feet deep, and the flying-bridge spanning it is formed 
 by the fastening to rings, firmly fixed to the opposite rocks, of two strong- 
 cables, upon which a boarded pathway is placed, while above and on one 
 side a third cable is stretched for a handrail. Any irregularity in 
 planting the foot upon the boards would result in a recoil that would 
 be apt to precipitate the unguarded and courageous venturer into the 
 deep chasm below. Persons, however, accustomed to walk along planks 
 may safely venture over, and the women and boys attached to the fishery 
 carry great loads across with apparent ease and the utmost contempt of 
 danger ; but timid and nervous persons should on no account hazard 
 the experiment. The chief use of this insulated rock appears to be that 
 of interrupting the salmon, who annually coast along the shore in search 
 of rivers in which to deposit their spawn. Their passage is generally 
 made close to the shore, so that Carrick-a-Rede is very opportunely 
 situated for projecting the interrupting nets. It might be asked why the 
 fishermen do not spare themselves the trouble of throwing this very 
 dangerous bridge across, and approach the island by water ; but the 
 latter is impracticable, owing to the extreme perpendicularity of the 
 basaltic cliffs on every side, except in one small bay. and that only acces- 
 sible at particular periods. Carrick-a-Rede is two and a half acres in 
 extent, and has upon it a cottage occupied by persons connected with the 
 fishery during the season ; but when that is over it is vacated and the 
 bridge of ropes removed. The scenery of the spot is not otherwise sus- 
 ceptible of change, as there is not a tree within sight, and the grass on 
 the summit is as bright in winter as in spring. The cliffs near the island 
 contain a very beautiful cave, about 30 feet in height, formed entirely of 
 
166 
 
 THE GIANT'S CAUSEWAY. 
 
 columnar basalt, of which the bases appear to have been removed, so 
 that the unsupported polygonal columns compose the cave. 
 
 Soon after leaving Carrick-a-Rede we passed through the rude little 
 hamlet of Ballintoy at the foot of the gorse-covered hill of Lannimore, 
 with the uninteresting little Sheep Island on our right, but found nothing 
 to attract our attention till we reached Dunseverick Castle, on the 
 summit of a detached and lofty rock, with a surface of about half an 
 acre, elevating its head near the centre of a small bay. Though now 
 a heap of ruins, it must have been once an impenetrable stronghold. 
 Immense masses of the cliff have been hewn away, evidently for the 
 purpose of rendering the fortress as inaccessible as possible ; and an 
 enormous basaltic rock, south of the entrance, appears to have been cut 
 of a pyramidal form, and flattened on the top, perhaps as a station for 
 a warder, or as a support for some engine of defence. This place is 
 supposed to have been the Dun-Sovarke, the fortress of Sovarke, about 
 which there are vague statements in ancient Irish history. The security 
 afforded by the detached rock, standing more than 120 feet above the 
 water, would, without doubt, cause it to be selected by the early settlers 
 as a defensible position. But of the original fortress, probably erected 
 before the introduction of Christianity into Ireland, there are no remains. 
 The castle represented by these ruins, though originally of great strength, 
 the walls being eleven feet in thickness, is evidently of an age not ante- 
 rior to the English invasion, and was most probably erected by the 
 M'Ouillans, who entered Ireland with the earliest English adventurers, 
 and was almost continuously possessed by them up to the reign of 
 Elizabeth. It is known, however, to have been held for a time by the 
 O'Cahans or O'Haras, who settled in Antrim about the thirteenth 
 century. 
 
 After passing Dunseverick Castle, the road turns away from the 
 shore, and makes nearly straight for the Causeway, leaving far on the 
 right the promontory of Bengore Head, which though more limited in 
 extent, is scarcely inferior in grandeur to that of Fairhead. We 
 looked out anxiously for the Causeway ; but even when within half a 
 mile of it, the headlands appeared more attractive than the low line 
 of shore pointed out to us by the driver ; and after inspecting Fair- 
 head, the whole of this shore line of coast might be passed by the 
 
BABBLING GUIDES AND BASALTIC WONDERS. 
 
 167 
 
 undirected traveler without suspicion of a neighborhood of wonders equal 
 to those left behind. A good hotel and a few scattered tenements, 
 but hardly enough to be collectively dignified by the name of a 
 village, constitute the only habitations at the Causeway ; but they 
 are sufficient to turn out an army of bewildering guides and babbling 
 pedlars of mineral specimens, who torment the tourist almost as much 
 as their kith and kin at Glendalough and the Lakes of Killarney. 
 These, however, assume a more intellectual bearing than their Wicklow 
 and Kerry brethren, whose sacred and legendary lore of saints and fairies 
 they utterly disdain, and in lieu thereof assume the mystified air of 
 philosophers, puffed up with a plethora of geological jargon and a 
 profound knowledge of pentagons, hexagons, and octagons. Still, they 
 are not without superstition, but it is of a marine character and of a 
 terrible nature. Having provided ourselves with as good a cicerone as 
 we could obtain, we were led down a slippery and stony road, cut in 
 the side of the hill, which concealed the object of our visit from our 
 view ; and then, rounding its shoulder, we descended to a small mound, 
 from which we obtained a birds-eye view of The Giant's Causeway.* 
 We were at too great a distance to distinguish any peculiarity in the 
 formation, except the lines of the basaltic pillars indistinctly marking 
 the face of a distant cliff, and we were naturally disappointed with the 
 first glance ; but as we descended to the shore, and approached nearer 
 around the bend of the bay, it seemed to us that the ruins of some 
 templed and gigantic city, hurled from the sky. were heaped up before 
 
 * Numerous traditions attempt to account for this wonderful natural production, but nearly all of them are 
 variations of the following story : Fingal, or Fin M'Coul, the champion giant of Ireland, felt sore at the insolent 
 boastings of Benandonner, a Scottish Goliah, who declared he would beat all comers, and taunted Fin with the 
 assurance that he would visit Ireland and give him a drubbing, were it not that he would get wet by swim- 
 ming over. This led Fin to crave permission of the Irish king that he might construct a causeway between 
 the two countries, for the dry passage of the boasting Scotchman, which of course the sovereign could not 
 refuse to so powerful a subject. Benandonner being thus left without a pretext walked over and fought the 
 Irishman, who not only won the battle, but afterwards generously invited his rival to take an Irish wife and 
 settle in the country. This kind bidding having been accepted, the causeway was no longer needed, so it was 
 sunk under the sea, except the ends on the opposite shores, which were left to prove the authenticity of the 
 story. "So much of truth probably lies at the bottom of this fable," says Kohl, "that the basaltic formations 
 on the opposite coast of Scotland, of the Giant's Causeway, and of the island of Staffa in the Hebrides, 
 are all probably of contemporaneous origin, and attributable to the same natural causes ; and it is by no means 
 unlikely that colonnades connecting these three points are continued beneath the ocean which, as they say, is 
 thus paved with basalt." 
 
168 
 
 THE GIANT'S CAUSEWAY. 
 
 us in a pile of confused architecture. The Giant's Causeway, indeed, 
 resembles nothing so much as a mass of hewn stones — -frusta of noble 
 columns — remnants of vast porticoes, cast down from a height into the 
 sea ; while the upright and regular pillars in the face of the cliff give 
 you an impression that there is a city overwhelmed and buried behind 
 them ; and the disinterred Pompeii itself was not so like as this to the 
 idea we had formed of Pompeii before visiting Italy. 
 
 Our guide piloted us to the vast projecting piers which descend from 
 the base of these mountain facades into the sea, and supply the name 
 by which this wonderful work of nature is popularly known. Sir John 
 Forbes concludes from his own preconceived views that the ordinary 
 notion of the Causeway entertained by persons previous to visiting it, 
 " is a huge and lofty rocky promontory composed of basaltic columns, 
 and stretching out, in an isolated form, into the main sea." The truth 
 however he discovered to be that " what is properly termed the Cause- 
 way, is by no means a scenic feature of this magnitude or grandeur, 
 and constitutes only a small portion of the sights usually comprehended 
 under the one generic name of the Giant's Causeway." The Causeway 
 itself, he adds, " has indeed neither grandeur nor scenic beauty ; its 
 charm and overpowering interest being derived from quite a different 
 source : while the ranges of cliffs that bound it behind and stretch along 
 the shore to the eastward of it, exhibit so wonderful a combination 
 of those twin charms, as is, I believe, hardly to be paralleled else- 
 where." 
 
 The Causeway, properly so-called, is a low, pier-like mass of columnar 
 rock, sloping gently upwards from the water, under which its outer 
 extremity is evidently submerged ; and it is from the accessible extremity 
 of this pier that Mr. Bartlett has depicted his Scene on The Giant's 
 Causeway. It is, in fact, the denuded upper surface of the lowest 
 stratum of columnar basalt, the higher strata of which only present 
 themselves to the eastward at Pleaskin, and will be noticed directly. 
 The Causeway, further remarks Sir John Forbes, " may be generally 
 described as consisting of three collateral piers or rocky ledges, one 
 higher, longer and larger, the eastern ; the others shorter and smaller ; 
 each running to a point where they disappear under the water. The 
 eastern margin of the larger pier rises up boldly from the shore so as 
 
DIMENSIONS OF THE CAUSEWAY. 
 
 169 
 
 to present a vertical columnar wall, 35 feet in height, the individual 
 columns being perfectly distinct from top to bottom. This portion goes 
 by the name of the Loom. The central pier, which is of a pyra- 
 midal configuration, rises in its central part, termed the Honeycomb, 
 to the height of 30 feet ; and the smallest or northwestern pier is still 
 lower. Towards the landside the columns are broken off, and may be 
 said to be submerged under the mass of sand and fragments of broken 
 rock heaped upon the shore. There is a very short space of flat ground 
 between the inner extremity of the Causeway and the rocky amphitheatre 
 behind it. In the face of this there are many patches of exposed 
 columnar basalt. One of these immediately behind the Causeway is 
 called the Horizontal Pillars, because the prisms project horizontally out 
 of the cliff ; and another to the eastward of the Causeway, called the 
 Giant's Organ, exhibits a fine display of vertical columns, conveying the 
 impression as if they were supports of the mountains above them." 
 
 The exact dimensions of the whole Causeway, as taken by a surveyor 
 under Sir John Forbes' direction, are as follows : 
 
 SUPERFICIAL EXTENT. 
 
 Length of Grand Causeway from N. to S. to low water mark, - 
 Breadth of Grand Causeway from E. to W., - - - 
 
 Length of Middle Causeway from N. to S., - - - - - 
 
 Breadth of Middle Causeway from E. to W., - - - - 
 
 Length of Little or Western Causeway, _____ 
 Breadth of Little or Western Causeway from E. to W., - - 
 
 Breadth of Whinstone dyke between Middle and Grand Causeway, - 
 Breadth of whole three Causeways from E. to W., - - _ 
 
 HEIGHTS. 
 
 Highest point of Grand Causeway (Looms at S. end) above low water mark, 
 Height of N. W. point of Grand Causeway, _ 
 Height of Honeycomb in Middle Causeway, - - - - 
 
 Height of Giant's Well, ------ 
 
 Highest point of Little or Western Causeway, - - — - 
 
 The acute observer, to whom we are already indebted, adds : " The 
 individual columns of the Causeway vary greatly in size as well as in 
 configuration, exhibiting every number of sides from 3 to 9, and having 
 a diameter varying from 15 to 26 inches. The great majority, however, 
 have 5, 6, or 7 sides ; a few have 4 and 8 ; and it is said that only three 
 are found with 9 sides, and only one with 3. It is hardly necessary to 
 n— si 
 
 Feet. 
 720 
 
 - 180 
 350 
 
 - 100 
 150 
 
 - 80 
 50 
 
 - 410 
 
 35 
 
 - 13 
 30 
 
 6 
 20 
 
170 
 
 THE GIANT'S CAUSEWAY. 
 
 state that the individual columns are all divided into separate portions, 
 and united together by socketed joinings, a concavity in one correspond- 
 ing to a convexity in the other. These joinings, though perfectly 
 distinct and visible, are so close and fine that they are impervious to 
 water, and do not allow the different pieces to be separated, except by 
 great force. The length of the distinct pieces or joints is very various, 
 ranging from 4 inches to 4 feet. One of the pillars of the Causeway is 
 said to have 38 joints. There is no fixed rule as to the existence of 
 either the convexity or the concavity in the individual pieces, some 
 having two convex ends, some two concave ends, and some one convex 
 and one concave. In no case is the concavity or convexity great, the 
 vertical extent of either seldom being more' than an inch, generally less. 
 There is also much variety as to the width of these concavities or 
 convexities, the outer edge of them sometimes coming quite to the outer 
 faces of the columns, sometimes keeping considerably within these. 
 Whatever be the configuration of the columns, they are almost as closely 
 joined together laterally as the individual joints are. The junction is, 
 in fact, purely linear, no open space whatever being found, so that they 
 are as perfectly water-tight in their lateral as in their vertical union. As 
 may be gathered from what has been already stated respecting the height 
 of the different piers, the general surface of the whole Causeway is 
 extremely irregular, only a very small portion of it being flat, like a 
 mosaic pavement." 
 
 All the columns constituting the three portions of the Causeway 
 almost imperceptibly lean inwards towards a central point, owing, it is 
 supposed, to their standing upon a concave depression in the upper 
 surface of ochre beds, upon which they rest. Another distinguishing 
 feature is the frequency of dykes or huge veins of basalt, cutting the 
 other strata across. Two of these are, in fact, the means of dividing the 
 Causeway into the three ranges or piers of which it is composed. In 
 the entire visible portion of the Causeway it is computed there are from 
 30,000 to 40,000 pillars, the majority being about fifteen inches in diam- 
 eter. How many more are obscured from the vision it is impossible to 
 tell, for there is no knowing how far the columns run out beneath the 
 sea, and how far they extend back into the land, which throws over them 
 a veil as impenetrable as that of ocean. " A geologist," remarks Kohl, 
 
THE GIANT'S AMPHITHEATRE. 
 
 171 
 
 "might well wish in his despair, to transform himself into a mole, in 
 order to burrow his way to the solution of these interesting problems, 
 or into a fish, to seek them beneath the ' watery floor' of the Atlantic." 
 
 Among other wonders there is also the Giant's Well (a spring of 
 pure, fresh water, forcing its way up between the joints of two of the 
 columns), the Giant's Chain, the Giant's Bag-pipes, the Giant's Gateway, 
 and, as already mentioned, the Giant's Loom and the Giant's Organ, the 
 latter a beautiful colonnade of pillars, 120 feet long, and so called from 
 its accurate resemblance to the pipes of an organ. 
 
 Passing eastward from the larger Causeway, one of the first objects 
 that strikes the eye is the Giant's Amphitheatre, which Kohl enthusiastic- 
 ally proclaims " the most beautiful amphitheatre in the world, that in 
 Rome not excepted. The form of it is so exactly half a circle that no 
 architect could have possibly made it more so, and the cliff slopes at 
 precisely the same angle all round to the centre. Round the upper part 
 runs a row of columns 80 feet high ; then comes a broad, rounded 
 projection, like an immense bench, for the accommodation of the giant 
 guests of Fin M'Coul ; then again a row of pillars 60 feet high, and then 
 again a gigantic bench, and so down to the bottom, where the water is 
 enclosed by a circle of black boulder stones, like the limits of the arena. 
 This is a scene in speaking of which no traveler need fear indulging in 
 terms of exaggeration, for all that he can say must remain far behind the 
 truth." Continuing to the eastward, the Giant's Chimney Tops are 
 observed crowning the summit of a promontory. They consist of three 
 insulated pillars, the tallest about 45 feet in height, and received their 
 present name from being, when more numerous, mistaken for the chimneys 
 of Dunluce, and cannonaded by one or more of the ships of the Spanish 
 armada immediately afterwards wrecked in the adjoining bay, hence named 
 Port-na-Spania. Still more to the east are the Priest and his Flock, the 
 Nursing Child, and the King and his Nobles, which, along with the 
 Giant's Pulpit, Ball-Alley and Granny, further on, receive their names 
 from their peculiar conformations, and are generally connected with some 
 legend or other more easily listened to than believed. 
 
 Pleaskin Cliff, to which we have already referred, is situated about 
 two miles to the east of the Causeway, in the direction of Bengore Head, 
 and is commonly asserted to be the most beautiful promontory in the 
 
172 
 
 THE GIANT'S CAUSEWAY. 
 
 world. It obtains its name from the Irish Plaisgcian, signifying "dry 
 head," referring to its elevation. The natural basaltic rock here lies imme- 
 diately under the surface. About twelve feet below the summit the rock 
 begins to assume a columnar tendency, and is formed into ranges of 
 rudely columnar basalt, in a vertical position, exhibiting the appearance 
 of a grand gallery, whose columns measure 60 feet in height. This 
 basaltic colonnade rests upon a bed of coarse, black, irregular rock, 60 
 feet thick, abounding in air-holes. Below this coarse stratum is a second 
 range of pillars, 45 to 50 feet high, more accurately columnar, and nearly 
 as accurately formed as the Causeway itself. From the base of this lower 
 tier the promontory, covered over with rock and grass, slopes down to 
 the sea for the space of 200 feet more, making in all a mass of near 
 400 feet in height. The cliff appears as though it had been painted for 
 effect in various shades of green, vermilion, red-ochre, grey, etc. — 
 its general form so beautiful, its storied pillars, tier over tier, so archi- 
 tecturally graceful — its curious and various stratifications supporting the 
 columnar ranges. Here, the dark brown amorphous basalt ; there, the 
 red-ochre, and below that again the slender but distinct lines of wood- 
 coal. In fact, all the edges of its different stratifications are tastefully 
 varied, by the hand of nature, with grasses, ferns, and rock-plants, while 
 in the various strata of which it is composed, sublimity and beauty have 
 been blended together in the most extraordinary manner. 
 
 The appearance of this part of the coast, as seen from the water, is 
 that of a precipitous rock, rising directly out of the deep sea to the 
 height already given. It is, however, penetrated by an irregular succession 
 of indentations, and thus forms a series of narrow but high promontories, 
 (alternated by narrow bay-shaped inlets each having its particular name,) 
 which slope sufficiently landward to admit of a scanty covering of 
 verdure, making a striking contrast to the rocky ramparts that 
 shoot perpendicularly out of the water. It is curious to note, too, that 
 though only two beds of columnar basalt exist at Pleaskin, one above 
 the other, still further to the east, at Portmoon, at least four are discern- 
 ible, though two are not very distinct ; and, more strange to relate, three 
 of them appear to have been broken off, and disappear on the surface 
 before reaching Pleaskin ; so that the lowest columnar stratum at 
 Portmoon becomes the uppermost of the two at Pleaskin. 
 
DUiVKERRY AND PORTCOON CAVES. 
 
 173 
 
 After we had made a thorough inspection of these geological wonders, 
 we were rowed past the Giant's Causeway to its western side, for the 
 purpose of visiting two remarkable caves caused by the washing out 
 from the surrounding strata of an intruding vein or whin-dyke. The 
 most westerly of these, called Portcoon, is accessible by either land or 
 water, but the other, Dunkerry Cave, can only be approached by water. 
 The entrance to the latter presents a very striking and grand appearance 
 of a regular pointed arch, 26 feet in breadth, and enclosed between two 
 natural walls of dark basalt ; while its interior is about 700 feet long, 
 and more than 60 feet above the surface of the water at full tide. The 
 margin has a bordering of marine plants of considerable breadth, and the 
 roof and sides are covered with green conferva, which, though slimy to 
 the touch, give a very rich and beautiful effect. Not the least curious 
 circumstance connected with a visit to this subterraneous apartment is 
 the motion of the water within. The boatmen are singularly expert in 
 entering. brins:inor the boat's head ri^ht in front of the orifice and then, 
 watching the roll of the wave, quickly ship their oars and roll in 
 majestically upon the smooth heave of the sea. The swell of the sea 
 upon this coast is at all times heavy ; and as each successive wave rolls 
 into the cave, the surface rises so slowly and awfully that a nervous 
 person would be apprehensive of a ceaseless increase in the elevation 
 of the waters until they reached the summit of the cave. Of this, 
 however, there is not the most distant cause for dread, the roof being, as 
 we have stated, at least 60 feet above hio-h-water mark. Before the 
 depth of the cave was ascertained the inhabitants of some cottages, a 
 mile removed from the shore, were wont to imagine their slumbers 
 interrupted in the winter's night by the subterranean roaring of waters. 
 
 The western or Portcoon Cave is 45 feet in height and 350 feet in 
 length. Though boats may row within 50 feet of its entire length, the 
 swell in the interior is sometimes dangerous, while its approach by land 
 is difficult and slippery ; yet the grandeur of the cave amply repays the 
 exertion required to view it. The roof and sides are composed of 
 rounded stones, locally known as "mill wheels," the largest about 25 feet 
 in diameter, embedded, as it were, in a basaltic paste, and formed of 
 concentric spheres, like an onion. The innermost recess has been com- 
 pared to the side of a Gothic cathedral ; while the walls, like those oi 
 
174 
 
 THE GIANT'S CAUSEWAY. 
 
 the other cave, are unpleasantly slimy. A genial writer remarks of a 
 visit to this cave : " When the day is fine, and the sun shining in all its 
 lustre, it is truly a grand and interesting sight. The sublime massiveness 
 of the surrounding rocks — the curious stainings and colors of the sides of 
 the roof — the musical cadence of the echoes — the dark mysteriousness of 
 its retiring recesses, contrasted with the brilliancy of all without, and the 
 slow, solemn heave of the translucent water, bearing idly on its surface 
 the purple sea-star, and revealing, fathoms deep below, multitudinous 
 vegetations covering its rocky bottom. I do not wonder that mythology 
 peopled such caverns with naiads, and goddesses, and tritons, nor did I 
 cease to expect that our communicative guide would be able to annex to 
 such a spot as this some legendary lore. At the same time, I confess 
 I did not find him in this instance quite fortunate. To be sure, he 
 told us how two bold sea-captains, by name Willoughby and Middleton, 
 not content with listening to the manifold echoes of a common musket, 
 must needs bring into this cavern a six-pounder, and how, on discharg- 
 ing it, an immense mass of the roof fell in, whereby their lives were 
 placed in imminent peril. He also told us of a piper who, one day, 
 when the tide was out, wandered into the furthest recesses, no doubt, 
 curious to ascertain, in these secret solitudes, the peculiar sound of 
 his romantic instrument. Engaged in the delights of his sweet craft, he 
 wandered on and on, none could tell whither, for he never came out ; 
 nor were there ever any tidings of him, save that while the people were 
 at prayers in the church of Ballintoy, and just as the clerk was about 
 giving out the first Psalm, the sound of bagpipes was heard under- 
 ground, and tunes were recognized rising up from beneath, which were 
 rather unsuitable to the solemnity of the place." * 
 
 The term, " the Giant's Causeway," is usually taken to express, in 
 addition to the basaltic piers themselves, the caves to the westward and 
 
 * In 1876, an enterprising Yankee "discovered" in one of these caves, the fossil remains of a monster 
 man some 13 feet from top to toe, ill-proportioned in build, and with an extra toe to his right foot ; and who 
 from a fracture in the head and cutaneous marks, showed signs of having shuffled off his mortal coil from the 
 double effect of small-pox and a fall from some adjoining cliff — the latter probably occurring while under the 
 influence of "potheen." The herculean and venerable gentleman was, of course, at once pronounced to be the 
 original giant to whom the Causeway owes its creation, and his limestone remains were exhibited as such at 
 Belfast in exchange for British shillings ; but to the deprivation of science and history, the discoverer and the 
 discovered were soon lost sight of, having doubtless departed to the mazy regions where exploded nine days' 
 wonders are entombed. 
 
THE STRANGE SCENE CONTEMPLATED. 
 
 175 
 
 the cliffs to the eastward, which latter constitute the most important 
 feature of the scene. These combined extend from Portcoon Cave to 
 Bengore Head, a distance, following the sinuosities of the shore, of three 
 and a half miles — the height above the sea ranging from 140 to 390 feet, 
 the latter that of Pleaskin. The cliffs are covered with smooth, heathy, 
 undulating land, accessible along the whole range of the summits, from 
 the higher of which most beautiful and extensive views are obtainable. 
 
 When we had completed our survey of this Causeway, and its cognate 
 columnar cliffs, and the dark and fearful caverns — alike washed and lashed 
 by the briny waters — we were in a fitting state of mind to appreciate 
 Thackeray's contemplation of the scene, and to conclude with him that, 
 " It looks like the beginning of the world somehow ; the sea looks older 
 than in other places, the hills and rocks strange, and formed differently 
 from other rocks and hills — as those vast dubious monsters were formed 
 who possessed the earth before man. The hill-tops are shattered into a 
 thousand cragged, fantastical shapes ; the water comes swelling into scores 
 of little strange creeks, or goes off with a leap, roaring into those 
 mysterious caves yonder, which penetrate, who knows how far," into our 
 common world ? The savage rocksides are painted of a hundred colors. 
 Does the sun ever shine here ? When the world was moulded and 
 fashioned out of formless chaos, this must have been the bit over — a 
 remnant of chaos!" And to ask with Forbes, "What is this? How 
 came it here ? Whence did it come ? How was it formed ? When was 
 it formed ? Of what was it formed ? What was this globe of ours at 
 the time it was formed ? What before ? What since ? Was it a mere 
 mass of inorganic matter, with its elements in repose ? — with its elements 
 in strife ? Or was it, as now, the field and theatre of beautiful life ? 
 Of life unconscious ? Of life self-conscious ? Of both ? And — most awful 
 and most bewildering thought of all — when — when was this? How long 
 ago ? Was it at the distance of inconceivable myriads of ages before 
 its present rational lord was placed upon its surface, to contemplate it. 
 to investigate it, to enjoy it ? " 
 
 Though the eye may be enchanted and amazed by a thorough 
 inspection of the wonders of this remarkable corner of Ireland, it is only 
 
 * At the time of Thackeray's visit the depths of the caves had not been ascertained, and strange stories, 
 like those we have mentioned, were related of their impenetrable extent. 
 
176 
 
 THE GIANT'S CAUSEWAY. 
 
 gratified at the expense of physical powers ; and so, after the completion 
 of our survey, we were not unready to accept the accommodation which 
 the inn afforded to ravenous humanity. We were off again, however, 
 as soon as refreshed, to visit Dunluce Castle, four or five miles further 
 on our way ; and shortly after passing through Bushmills, a little village 
 on the river Bush, that finest of ruined fortresses broke upon us, like 
 an apparition in the road. Dunluce (Dun-lios, the strong fort) stands 
 on a perpendicular and apparently insulated rock, 120 feet above the 
 sea level, the entire surface of about half an acre being so completely 
 occupied by the edifice, that the external walls are in continuation of the 
 perpendicular sides of the rock. These walls are built of columnar basalt, 
 in many instances so placed as to show their polygonal sections, and were 
 in themselves never very lofty ; but from the great area which they 
 enclosed contained a considerable number of apartments, some, evidently, 
 additions in a different style to the original structure, which was appar- 
 ently of limited dimensions. One small vaulted room is said to be 
 inhabited by a banshee, whose chief occupation, it is asserted, is sweep- 
 ing the floor ; but its cleanliness is undoubtedly attributable to the 
 fact that the wind gains admittance through an aperture at its level, 
 and permanently preserves freedom from dust. Another small room on 
 the north-east, said to have been the kitchen, actually projects over 
 the sea, owing to the rocky base having been swept away by a storm 
 during some Christmas festivities ; and consequently a peep into it 
 through its doorway presents a giddy view of the foaming waters 
 beneath. The rock on which the castle stands is not in reality insular, ' 
 as it is united at the bottom of a chasm, 30 feet wide, to the mainland, 
 by a ledge of rock a little higher than the surface of the ocean, but 
 still low enough to be swept over by the waves in turbulent 
 weather. The fortress was formerly entered by a peculiar bridge. 
 Two parallel walls, about 8 feet apart, spanned the top of this chasm, 
 and formed a foundation upon which planks were laid crosswise for 
 the admission of visitors, and removed immediately after their passage, 
 so as to prevent the entrance of the besieging force. At present but 
 one of the walls remains. It is 18 inches in thickness, and affords 
 the only pathway to the castle, over the awful rocky abyss. It hangs 
 without any support from beneath, and still, needing no power of 
 
RUINS OF DUN LUCE CASTLE. 
 
 17? 
 
 arch being solely sustained by the strength of its own cemented 
 material. The position of the other parallel wall may, however, be 
 perceived by the traces of its connection with the opposite rock. 
 The ruins of a second fortified structure stand upon the mainland close 
 to the chasm. It is said to have been erected by the Antrim family 
 at a much later period than the castle, in consequence of the fall of 
 the floor of the apartment already mentioned. The rock is undermined 
 by a subterranean chamber, which penetrates completely through from 
 the sea to the rocky basin on the land-side. This cave may be entered 
 by a small aperture at the south end, and at low water presents a consid- 
 erable flooring of large round stones, which have attained their form from 
 the action of the waves. The sides and roof partake of the basaltic 
 character of the district. When the surface of the water is unruffled, 
 this subterranean chamber possesses a very remarkable echo. 
 
 Looking to the westward from this striking and picturesque remnant 
 of feudal strength, a fine view is obtained of the " White Rocks," a 
 range of white worn cliffs over a mile long, and of Portrush and its 
 sandy beach beyond, of the cliffs of Magilligan, of the lofty mountains 
 of Innishowen, which separate Loughs Foyle and Swilly, and of an , 
 illimitable range of ocean ; while the piers and promontories of the 
 Giant's Causeway attract the eye when turned in the opposite direction. 
 
 When feudal oppression, robbery, and violence were the predominant 
 characteristics of the chieftains who held the northern coast of Ireland 
 and the opposite Scottish Highlands, no better place could have been 
 selected for a fortress than this rocky fastness. It is unknown who was 
 the original builder of Dunluce, yet its erection has been assigned by 
 some to DeCourcy, Earl of Ulster. It was, however, in the hands of 
 the English in the fifteenth century ; and, near the close of the 
 sixteenth, it was held by the MacQuillans, who were then lords of the 
 surrounding district, called the " Root." We have already said that 
 Somarle MacDonnell, or Sorely Boy, the founder, in 1509, of the abbey 
 of Bonamargy, remains of which exist at Ballycastle, is also the accred- 
 ited founder of the house of MacDonnell, Earls of Antrim. In 1580 
 one of the family visited Ireland to aid Tyrconnell against the O'Neil, 
 when he was hospitably entertained on the way by MacQuillan, the Lord 
 of Dunluce, whose neighbors he helped to subjugate ; for which assistance 
 
178 
 
 THE GIANT'S CAUSEWAY. 
 
 he was invited to winter at the castle before joining Tyrconnell, while 
 his retainers were quartered upon those of his host. MacDonnell, 
 however, took advantage of his position as a guest, and privately 
 married MacQuillan's daughter, but not before it was asserted to be high 
 time ; and from the alliance subsequently claimed possession of the 
 territory. But he soon found it necessary to flee to Rathlin Island, 
 along with his wife, upon the latter revealing a conspiracy of the Irish to 
 murder him and his followers. A war now ensued between the 
 MacDonnells and MacQuillans, lasting during the remainder of the reign 
 of Queen Elizabeth, and giving them Dunluce and the " Root " alter- 
 nately, according to their varying fortunes. The feud was terminated by 
 James I., who secured to MacDonnell the Antrim possessions, allotting 
 as compensation to MacQuillan the barony of Innishowen in Donegal. 
 But upon Sir John Chichester arriving to attend to the execution of 
 the award, he prevailed upon MacQuillan to exchange the Donegal 
 barony for some property of his own nearer Dunluce, under the plea 
 that it would be easier for the deposed lord to convey his vassals thither. 
 From these exchanges of possessions the MacDonnells have become 
 Earls of Antrim, and the Chichesters Marquises of Donegal ; but the 
 descendants of the MacQuillans, the ancient kings of this coast, are now 
 toilers among the great mass of the Irish people. Still the Earls of 
 Antrim have not held their estates without molestation, for in 1642 
 General Munroe treacherously visited Dunluce Castle, where he was not 
 only hospitably received, but offered aid in the subjugation of the 
 country ; and in return seized the Earl of Antrim, placed his other 
 castles in the hands of the Marquis of Argyle's men, and imprisoned 
 him in Carrickfergus Castle, from which he effected an escape and fled 
 to England. Again, in 1660, Randall, first Marquis of Antrim, upon 
 appearing to pay his respects to Charles II. on the Restoration, was 
 imprisoned in the Tower, and subsequently persecuted by Lord Massarene, 
 to whom his estates had been granted ; but he eventually silenced his 
 enemies, and regained his estates upon the production of a letter of 
 Charles I. authorizing him to take up arms. 
 
 The three miles of road from Dunluce to Portrush took us over the 
 White Rocks, and along by the coast at a height of some 400 feet above 
 the sea. The cliffs are here worn into fantastic shapes by the action 
 
THE WHITE ROCKS AND PORTRUSH. 
 
 179 
 
 of the waves, and, from their peculiarity of formation, have received such 
 names as the Lion's Paw, the Giant's Head, etc. The northern and part 
 of the eastern coast of Ireland, from Donegal to Dublin, presents, some 
 15 feet above tide-water, a beach or embankment, evidently a former 
 sea-level, which is more or less marked upon the Antrim shore, and 
 especially at this point, where, within a space of two miles, there are no 
 less than 27 caverns, due to the action of the waves, but now far above 
 their reach. The largest and most picturesque of these is called the 
 Priest's Hole, from its being the hiding-place, after the Rebellion, of a 
 priest who, on being discovered by the soldiers, sprang into the boiling 
 waters beneath rather than surrender. Portrush is a small but pleasant 
 sea-port and marine resort of more than a thousand inhabitants, built 
 upon a rocky basaltic peninsula of over a mile in length, having the 
 Skerries — a group of islands a short distance from the shore — to form an 
 advantageous natural breakwater to its harbor. The town contains an 
 obelisk erected in 1859 to the celebrated Dr. Adam Clarke, who once 
 ministered in its Wesleyan Chapel, and was born in the neighboring 
 marine village of Portstewart. 
 
 O 
 
 At Portrush we transferred ourselves to the branch railway which 
 carried us to the Belfast and Londonderry line at the town of Coleraine, 
 famed in lyric verse as the home of " beautiful Kitty," whose peculiar 
 mishap led to the breakage of ever}' milk pitcher in the place. Coleraine 
 (Cuil-rathain, the Corner of Ferns) is situated just within the county 
 of Londonderry, of which it is the second town in size. It lies 
 upon the river Bann, the outlet of Lough Xeagh, some 30 miles down 
 the stream and four before it enters the ocean. Its main streets radiate 
 from a square called the Diamond, having the Town Hall in the centre, 
 and its principal industries are the manufacture of a peculiar kind of fine 
 linen, and the distillation of a superior whiskey, both branded with its 
 name, which they carry in good repute to distant corners of the earth. 
 The town dates its importance to the time of James I., who granted the 
 district to the London Companies in 1613, and incorporated the borough 
 in 1614. Its earlier history informs us that it was the seat of a bishop's 
 see, founded about 540 by St. Carbrens, a disciple of St. Finian of 
 Clonard ; that it was plundered in 11 71 by the King of Down, and again 
 in 12 13 by Thomas MacUchtry. who used the stones of the abbey as 
 
180 
 
 THE GIANT'S CAUSEWAY. 
 
 the materials for a castle which he erected here ; also that a Dominican 
 Monastery was founded in it in 1244, of which, and of the castle, no 
 traces remain. Its only relic is found a mile out of the town at Mount 
 Sandel, where there is a large rath, 200 feet high, surrounded by a dry 
 fosse, said to have been raised in 1 1 97, and the site of one of 
 DeCourcy's castles. The church is a fine stone edifice, built in 1614. 
 The river is crossed by a handsome stone bridge of three arches, erected 
 about 1743 to replace a wooden structure built in 1716 and carried away 
 by a flood in 1739. The navigation being obstructed by a bar of shifting 
 sand, the principal shipping trade of the town is carried on at Portrush, 
 which is scarcely half a dozen miles distant. Two miles above the town 
 the river falls over a ledge of rocks, forming, a salmon leap 13 feet high. 
 The salmon fishery, one of the best in Ireland, is leased to a company. 
 The town has a cleanly look about it, finds employment for about 6000 
 inhabitants, and returns one member to the British Parliament. 
 
 A run of an hour and a half took us from Coleraine to London- 
 derry, the route following the western bank of the river Bann to its 
 mouth, and thence for a few miles' along the sea-coast ; after which it 
 crossed the shoulder of Magilligan Point, the eastern limit of Lough 
 Foyle, and continued along the southeastern shore of that inlet to its 
 terminus. On the way we passed Magilligan, where St. Columbkill, in 
 584, founded a monastery (of which there are some remains) that from its 
 pre-eminence obtained the title of the " throne of St. Columbkill ; " and 
 Limavady Junction, where a branch shoots off to the little town in which 
 Thackeray got so bewitched by the bright eyes of the pretty waiting- 
 maid, while the horses were being changed in the coach in which he 
 travelled, that he spilt his beer on his " whatd'yecall'ems," and chronicled 
 his disaster in the deathless verse of " Peg of Limavady." 
 
THE "MAIDEN CITY.' 
 
 181 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 LONDONDERRY AND THE NORTHWEST. 
 
 The " Maiden City " — Its early history — Londonderry and the Plantation of Ulster — The memor- 
 able siege — Ancient bastions and gates — Walker's Pillar — Cathedral and other public edifices — 
 Loughs Foyle and Swilly — Peninsula of Innishowen — Grianan Aileach — Strabane, Newton 
 Stewart and Omagh — Enniskillen — Devenish Lsland, its churches and Round Toiver — The 
 river Erne — The upper and lower loughs — Lough Derg and St. Patrick's Purgatory — 
 Fisheries of Bally shannon — Donegal town and bay — Grandeur of Donegal scenery — Sligo — 
 Hazlewood and Lough Gill — Ballina — Roserk Abbey — Abbey of Moyne — Killala— French 
 Lnvasion — Lough Conn and Mt. Nephin — Lough Cullen — Castlebar. 
 
 THE far-famed "Maiden City"* stands on the western bank of the 
 River Foyle, and occupies the sides and summit of a steep promon- 
 tory, rising to a height of 119 feet, and almost peninsulated by a noble 
 sweep of the smooth, deep river, as its waters glide majestically on 
 towards the fine estuary of the same name, where they are mingled 
 with those of the ocean. The appearance of Londonderry is very 
 picturesque, especially when viewed from the opposite bank of the river, 
 whence its edifices are observed to rise tier over tier to the crowning 
 structure of the hill, the spire of the ancient cathedral. The old bridge, 
 however, represented in our engraving, and which in its time seemed to 
 enhance the beauties of the picture, has in late years fallen a sacrifice 
 to the iconoclastic demands of progress, and given way to a more modern 
 iron structure, made to serve the double duty of carrying across the river 
 the public highway, and the Northern Counties Railway. The old 
 bridge, both a great favorite and a great curiosity, was 1068 feet long, 
 and 40 feet broad, and was one of the several constructed in Ireland at 
 the close of the last century, by Lemuel Cox, of Boston, Mass., of which 
 
 * Londonderry has obtained the sobriquet of the " Maiden City," of which the inhabitants are proud, from 
 its never having been taken in war. This, however, must refer to the period since it was fortified, as it 
 changed possessors more than once before that time. 
 
182 
 
 LONDONDERRY AND THE NORTHWEST. 
 
 we have mentioned those at Waterford and elsewhere. It was latterly 
 found inconvenient, as its slight elevation above the river required for 
 navigation the use of a draw, which, whenever opened, necessitated the 
 shutting off the flow of the gas and water carried over it into the city 
 by mains. 
 
 Derry, the name by which the city was known until early in the 
 seventeenth century, is derived either from the Celtic doire, " the place 
 of oaks," or Derry Calgach, " the oak wood of Calgach." The town 
 originated, like many other Irish cities, in the foundation by St. Columb- 
 kill, in 546, of an Augustinian abbey, whose abbot, in 1158, Flaherty 
 O'Brollaghan, was created first bishop of Derry.* In the six centuries 
 which intervened between these dates, Derry was repeatedly the prey of 
 foreign invaders and native lawless chiefs, and was several times wholly 
 or partially destroyed by fire. In 1 163 the first great church was built; 
 in 1 198 the city was taken by John DeCourcy ; in 1218 Furlough 
 Leinigh founded an abbey for Cistercian nuns; and in 131 1 Derry was 
 granted by Edward II. to Richard DeBurgh. In 1566 an English 
 garrison occupied the city and fortified it, but an explosion in the powder 
 magazine in 1568 led to its evacuation. It was, however, reoccupied in 
 1600 by Sir Henry Dowcra, who erected the adjoining fort of Culmore, 
 and pulled down the old abbey and other ecclesiastical buildings, using 
 their materials for new defences ; and in 1604 he received from James I. 
 the first charter for the city. But in 1608 Derry was again literally 
 reduced to ashes and the garrison put to the sword by Sir Cahir 
 O'Doherty.f 
 
 * The date of the establishment of the first bishopric of this district is unknown, but its first incumbents 
 were called bishops of Tyrone, and had their see at Ardsrath or Ardstraw in Donegal County, whence in 
 597 they removed to Rathlone or Maghera in Derry. In 1158 a council of bishops decreed that the town of 
 Derry should be erected into a see — which, however, had no regular succession of bishops till after 1279. In 
 1834 the Protestant diocese of Derry (it retains the ancient name) was enlarged by that of Raphoe, but the latter 
 remains a separate see in the Roman Catholic Church, with the episcopal residence at Letterkenny. Raphoe 
 lies about 16 miles to the southwest, and Letterkenny about the same to the west. The former possessed a 
 monastery established by St. Columb, which was converted into a bishopric by St. Ennan. 
 
 f It was the rebellion, in 1608, of Sir Cahir O'Doherty, the latest and bravest of the Irish chieftains, that 
 mainly led to the " plantation" of Ulster by James I. His revolt was stimulated by his being personally chastised 
 by Sir George Powlett, Vice-Provost of Derry, which he revenged by the death of his chastiser, and the 
 destruction of the city. Many Scotchmen who had settled upon the rich lands bordering Loughs Foyle and 
 Swilly, immediately after this, while the " plantation " of Ulster was in contemplation, were viewed by 
 Sir Cahir as intruders and heretics, and he aimed at their extirpation. One of his deeds was to drive off the 
 
HISTORICAL EVENTS. 
 
 183 
 
 The modern city may be said to date from 1609, when James I. 
 entered into an arrangement which resulted, in 161 3, in his granting the 
 city, under the name of Londonderry, along with the adjoining district, 
 to the " Society of the Governors and Assistants, London, of the new 
 Plantation of Ulster," * commonly called the " Irish Society," who were 
 required to fortify it. The Town Hall was erected in 1622, and the 
 cathedral was completed in 1633. On the breaking out of the rebellion 
 in 1 64 1 the city became the asylum of the Irish Protestants, who 
 successfully defended it against the Royalists in 1649. The greatest 
 historical event in the annals of Londonderry is undoubtedly the 
 
 stock, burn the homestead, and slaughter the wife and children of one Sandy Ramsey, who had been granted 
 part of the valley of the Lennan by Rory O'Donnel, Earl of Tyrconnell. The Scot, absent at the time, on 
 returning and learning his bereavement, threatened revenge, to which he was further stimulated by a reward of 
 ^500 offered for Sir Cahir's head by the Lord Deputy. He consequently secreted himself near the Hill of 
 Doune, and with his gun and dirk waited day by day for the expected appearance of his foe, who was lofty and 
 proud of bearing, and readily distinguishable by his Spanish hat and heron's plume. On Holy Thursday Sir 
 Cahir presented himself within range of Ramsey's matchlock, awaiting the arrival of a friar from the Abbey of 
 Kilmacrenan to shrive him and celebrate mass, and while chatting with his men was stricken down by a bullet 
 penetrating his forehead. His followers were instantly seized with a panic, and, imagining that the English and 
 Scotch had risen upon them, dispersed among the mountains, leaving the dead body of their chief to its fate. 
 Ramsey, finding it deserted, descended from his hiding-place, and", severing the head from the body, wrapped it 
 in his plaid and at once set off for Dublin. At night he sought rest in the cabin of Terence Gallagher, situated 
 at a ford of the river Finn ; and after supper slept with Sir Cahir's head under his own as a pillow. The Scot 
 slept sound, but Terence was up at daybreak, and noticing blood oozing from his guest's pillow concluded all 
 was not right. So, slitting the plaid and drawing out the head, he recognized features that were known to 
 every man in Tyrconnell. He knew, too, that there was a price on this very head, a price that would be to him 
 a fortune, and he was determined, if possible, to gain it. So off Terence started, and had almost crossed broad 
 Tyrone when the Scotchman awoke from his slumbers ; and the story is still told with triumph through the 
 country how the Irishman, without the treason, reaped the reward of Sir Cahir's death. 
 
 * Early in the reign of James I., a considerable part of the province of Ulster was vested in the Crown by 
 the attainder of Roman Catholic families of distinction, and a colonization of the forfeited estates was 
 then suggested to the king by the lord-treasurer, Salisbury. His majesty, conceiving the Great Companies of the 
 City of London to be the best qualified to effect so great an object, on the 28th of January, 1609, permitted an 
 agreement to be entered into between commissioners for the city and the lords of the privy council, whereby 
 the towns and liberties of Derry and Coleraine, with the "salmon and eel fisheries of the rivers Bann and 
 Foyle, and all other kind of fishing in the river Foyle, so far as the river floweth, and in the Bann to Lough 
 Neagh, should belong in perpetuity to the city ; " that the liberties of Londonderry should extend three miles 
 every way ; with numerous other privileges and conditions, included in twenty-seven articles of agreement. 
 The lands were divided into lots of 1000, 1500 and 2000 acres, the " undertakers " to reside personally, or place 
 deputies thereon ; and it was ultimately determined that they should place upon each 1000 acres, and propor- 
 tionately on the larger allotments, the "number of 24 able men, being English or Inland Scottish." In 1611 
 the order of baronets was established, to provide by the sale of that dignity a fund for the defence of the new 
 settlement. In 1613 the Society of the New Plantation of Ulster was incorporated, and from that date Derry 
 has been the property of the city of London. 
 
184 
 
 LONDONDERRY AND THE NORTHWEST. 
 
 memorable siege it withstood for 105 days (from April 20 to July 30, 
 1689) against the forces of James II., under the command of that king 
 in person, Rosen, and Hamilton, when the defenders lost 3000 men and 
 the assailants about 8000. After several ineffectual attempts to treacher- 
 ously surrender the city, Lundy, its governor, escaped the fury of the 
 garrison in the disguise of a porter, when the command was taken by 
 the Rev. George Walker, rector of Donaghmore, whose heroism and zeal 
 upheld the courage of the defenders amid the horrors of famine and 
 pestilence until succor arrived through the store-ships Mountjoy and 
 Phoenix, of Kirke's fleet, breaking through the barriers placed across the 
 Foyle. The Town Hall, burned during the siege, was rebuilt in 1692. 
 
 The walls, gates, and some of the bastions that enclosed the old city 
 are still entire. The latter, including those removed, were known during 
 the siege as the Double, bearing the gallows for the threatened hanging 
 of prisoners ; the Royal, over which the defiant red flag was unfurled ; 
 and Hangman's, Gunner's, Water, Ferry, and Coward's Bastions — the latter 
 lying most out of danger, and, it is said, never lacking defenders. The 
 original gates, four in number, some of them rebuilt during the present 
 century, are Bishop's (transformed in 1789 into a triumphal arch, in 
 honor of William III.), Shipquay, Butcher's, and Ferry gates, to which 
 New and Castle gates have been added. The walls are well preserved, 
 and form a most agreeable promenade of about a mile in circumference, 
 and it is asserted that no plea of health or convenience would be held 
 by the inhabitants sufficient to justify their demolition. Some guns, used 
 defensively during the siege, are preserved in their original localities ; 
 while others are made to serve as posts for fastening cables, protecting 
 the corners of streets, etc. One antique gun, the gift of the fishmongers 
 of London, and bearing the name of " Roaring Meg," was distinguishable 
 during the siege by the loudness of its report ; another, bearing the date 
 1642, and the arms and motto of the Salters' Company, was dug up in 
 1866, during some excavations. The bastions have been transformed into 
 pleasant little gardens; and from one, which bore the hottest fire of the 
 enemy, rises Walker's Pillar, inaugurated in 1828, and visible far up 
 and down the Foyle. It is a Doric column, 80 feet in height, surmounted 
 by a statue nine feet high, representing the heroic clergyman, says 
 Macaulay, " as when, in the last and most terrible emergency, his 
 
THE CATHEDRAL AND PUBLIC BUILDINGS. 
 
 185 
 
 eloquence roused the fainting courage of his brethren. In one hand 
 he grasps a Bible ; the other, pointing down the river, seems to direct 
 the eyes of his famished audience to the English topmasts in the 
 distant bay." The view over the Foyle, and the country beyond, from 
 this bastion, is exceedingly fine. In the middle of the city is a 
 square called the Diamond, containing the Corporation Hall in its centre, 
 from which the streets, some of them very steep, radiate at right angles, 
 after the ancient Roman style, to the four original gates. However, 
 more than half the inhabitants reside in modern residences that have 
 sprung up outside the old mural barriers. 
 
 The most prominent edifice within the old city is the Cathedral, 
 dedicated to St. Columb, in the pointed style, and comprising a nave 
 and two aisles, with octagon turrets surrounding a conical spire. The 
 interior contains a tablet commemorative of its erection, in 1633 ; 
 and, to again quote Macaulay, "is filled with relics and trophies. In 
 the vestibule is a huge shell, one of many hundreds of shells which 
 were thrown into the city. Over the altar are still seen the French 
 flagstaves taken by the garrison in a desperate sally ; the white ensigns 
 of the house of Bourbon have long been dust, but their place has 
 been supplied by new banners, the work of the fairest hands of 
 Ulster." The tower from its elevation presents an extensive view of 
 the entire city, with Lough Foyle, backed up by the Innishowen 
 Mountains on the north, and the adjacent country in the other direc- 
 tions of the compass. The Episcopal Palace occupies the site of the 
 Augustinian Convent. 
 
 The other public buildings worthy of notice are the new Roman 
 Catholic Cathedral, on the south side of the city ; the Appre?itice Boys' 
 Memorial Hall, erected in 1876 by public subscription in memory of the 
 13 historic apprentices who, December 7th, 1688, closed the gates against 
 Lord Antrim's troops previous to the siege ; the Cotirt House ; District 
 Lunatic Asylum; the Foyle College ; and, about a mile from the town, the 
 Magee College for Presbyterian divinity students, a handsome building 
 erected from a bequest of ,£20,000 by Mrs. Magee, of Dublin. To meet 
 the demands of commerce, a new line of Quays and a new Graving Dock 
 have lately been constructed at an expense of ,£80,000. A large colonial 
 and coasting trade is carried on from the port, whence steamers ply 
 n— 63 
 
186 
 
 LONDONDERRY AND THE NORTHWEST. 
 
 regularly to Belfast, Glasgow, Liverpool and Morecambe, the latter in 
 connection with the Midland Railway of England. The town has 
 lately become noted for the making of shirts, which gives employment 
 to a large number of women in and around it. Its other industries 
 consist of bacon-curing, brewing, distilling, iron and brass founding, 
 tanning, etc. " The population of the city in 1871 consisted of 25,242 
 inhabitants, and it returns one member to the British Parliament. 
 Londonderry gives the title of marquis to the house of Stewart, and 
 was the birth place in 1678 of George Farquhar, the dramatist. 
 
 Lough Foyle, which forms the harbor of Londonderry, is a land- 
 bound inlet 15 miles long and 10 broad, connected with the Atlantic 
 by a narrow strait at the northeast. It affords excellent anchorage, 
 but has extensive sandbanks on each side, and a large island known as 
 Shell Island in the middle. The river Foyle is an estuary as far inland 
 as Strabane, and has its mouth defended by Culmore Fort, erected in 
 1600, and restored in 1824. 
 
 Lough Foyle is separated from Lough Swilly, a noble estuary on its 
 west penetrating the land for 30 miles by the peninsula of Innishowen, 
 having near its centre the mountain of Slieve Snaght, 2019 feet high, 
 and at its northern extremity Malin Head, the most northerly headland 
 of the kingdom. On the Lough Foyle shore of this peninsula, and 
 near to the entrance, and 19 miles from Londonderry, are Moville, a 
 marine watering place, and Greencastle, with its old fortress erected in 
 1305 by Richard Burke, the Red Earl of Ulster, to hold the O'Neils 
 and O'Donnells in subjection, and a modern fort that commands the 
 passage. The names of these two places are familiar to the readers of 
 telegraphic reports, as it is at them that the Montreal and Liverpool, 
 and New York and Glasgow steam-packets land and receive their Irish 
 passengers and telegraphic communications. A railway traverses the 
 southern portion of Innishowen from Londonderry to the eastern shore 
 of Lough Swilly, connecting with a steam ferry. The peninsula lies 
 within the county of Donegal, and is noted for its potheen. In the days 
 of yore it was the stronghold of Kinel Owen, the descendants of Owen, 
 son of Nial, of the nine hostages, who were dispossessed about the 
 fifteenth century by the O'Dohertys, descendants of Connell Gulban. 
 Along the line of the railway, at about five miles from Londonderry, 
 
VICINITY OF THE CITY. 
 
 187 
 
 are the ruins of the Grianan Aileach, a cyclopean fort surmounting a 
 hill 800 feet high, and affording fine views of Loughs Foyle and Swilly, 
 and on the west the Donegal Mountains. Though the name has sug- 
 gested that this was once a temple of the sun, it is concluded to have 
 been the palace of the northern Irish kings previous to the twelfth 
 century. A circular wall, varying from ten to 16 feet in thickness, 
 encloses an area of 82 feet in diameter ; and the number of stones that 
 have fallen off, so as to form around a sloping glacis of 10 or 12 feet in 
 breadth, indicate that it was originally of considerable height. Within are 
 the remains of a small oblong building, evidently of later date, supposed 
 to have been a chapel. Another noble antiquity is St. Columb's stone, 
 bearing the rude impress of two feet, found on the Greencastle road, a 
 mile from Londonderry, and said to have been one of the inauguration 
 stones of the ancient chiefs of the district. 
 
 From Londonderry we proceeded to Enniskillen, on the southeastern 
 corner of Lough Erne, along 60 miles of the railway, which continues 
 on to Dundalk and Dublin. The first 15 miles took us to the thriving 
 linen manufacturing town of Strabane, up the valley of the Foyle, which 
 stately stream for a greater part of the distance forms the dividing line 
 between the counties of Donegal on the west, and Londonderry succeeded 
 by Tyrone on the east. It is at Strabane that the river assumes the 
 name of Foyle upon receiving the joint waters of the Mourne and the 
 Finn. Another run of twenty miles up the valleys of the Mourne and 
 Struel, amid pleasant mountain and river scenery carried us to Omagh, 
 the county town of Tyrone, passing about half way Newtown Stewart, 
 pleasantly resting between Bessy Bell and Mary Gray, two green-clad 
 mountains that raise their heads to the right and left, and having in 
 close proximity Baron's Court, the princely demesne of the Duke of 
 Abercorn. Omagh, the county town of Tyrone, possesses a handsome 
 court house, and could once boast of a castle that was demolished in 
 the war of 1509, and was afterwards restored and subsequently captured 
 in 1641 by Sir Phelim O'Neill. At this point the waters of the 
 Drumragh and Camowen Rivers unite and form the Struel, which in its 
 turn unites with other streams below Newtown Stewart to form the 
 Mourne ; and the railway shoots off a branch to Portadown, where it 
 joins the line between Belfast and Dublin. The remainder of the journey 
 
188 
 
 LONDONDERRY AND THE NORTHWEST. 
 
 to Enniskillen possesses little of interest to the traveler. We may 
 mention, however, that the line passes through Dromore, which suffered 
 considerably during the insurrection of 1641, and claims to have once 
 possessed a monastery founded by St. Patrick for the first woman who 
 received the veil at his hands. 
 
 Enniskillen (Irish Inisceithlean), the county town of Fermanagh, 
 though a place of 5000 inhabitants, mainly consists of one long street, 
 and is beautifully situated, with a church spire as a central figure, upon 
 an island of 62 acres lying in the river connecting the Upper and Lower 
 Loughs Erne, and near to its entrance into the latter. Part of the town, 
 however, is built upon the mainland, and connected with the rest by 
 bridges. Occupying a position in the chief pass between Ulster and 
 Connaught, Enniskillen has ever been a point of importance, and at the 
 beginning of the reign of James I. it was a stronghold of the Maguires, 
 of Fermanagh. But in 161 2 it was granted by that sovereign to William 
 Cole, ancestor to the Earl of Enniskillen, to whom the principal part of 
 the town still belongs. It is even now a strong military station, as there 
 is a fort at each end of the town, and extensive barracks occupy the 
 site of the castle, of which some remains still exist. The place, however, 
 derives its modern notoriety from its stand against the forces of King 
 James II. in the revolution of 1688, in which it was second only to 
 Londonderry. The sixth regiment of Dragoons was raised in the town, 
 and popularly bears its name. A column, 100 feet high, erected in honor 
 and surmounted by a statue of the late General Sir Lowry Cole, of 
 Peninsular fame, stands on an eminence overlooking the town, and affords 
 extensive views of the surrounding country. The borough contains a 
 court house and other county buildings, and returns one member to the 
 British Parliament. 
 
 The environs of Enniskillen are very interesting, as well from the 
 naturally rich and broken character of the country as from its signs 
 of improvement. Two miles from the town, in the entrance to the 
 Lower Lough Erne, stands Devenish Island, (Irish Daim-hinis), about 
 70 acres in extent, and containing the ruins of an abbey,* another 
 
 * The religious institutions on Devenish were founded by Lasrean, otherwise known as St. Molaisse, 
 native of Carbery, near Sligo, and educated at Clonard, whence he removed to Devenish at an early 
 e. He is supposed to have been at one time Bishop of Clogher, and to have died either in 563 or 570. 
 
ENVIRONS OF ENNISKI LLEN. 
 
 189 
 
 church, and a Round Tower, declared to be the most perfect in the 
 kingdom. Of the monastic remains, the upper church, situated on the 
 most elevated part of the island, is the best preserved, and consists 
 of the tower and the north wall of the choir. The basement story 
 of the tower is groined, and in the ceiling are two apertures, through 
 which bell-ropes were formerly passed. A small pointed doorway 
 leads to a spiral staircase, by which the battlements of the tower 
 are reached. The masonry — sculpture it might almost be called — is 
 very remarkable ; the angles of the architraves being delicately fluted, 
 and finished equally at top as at bottom, produce an effect both 
 light and graceful. The nunnery, or lower church, is evidently of a 
 more ancient date than the priory, and presents but very scanty 
 remains. The Round Tower is 70 feet high and remarkable for the 
 perfection of its masonry. In addition to the usual four orifices facing 
 the cardinal points near the summit, it has on the northeast side three 
 windows — square, triangular, and round; the latter, which is 12 feet 
 from the ground, and approached by three rude steps, was evidently 
 intended as the entrance. Beneath the conical apex appears the 
 unusual decoration of a richly designed cornice, with a human head 
 sculptured on the keystone of each of the upper windows. The odor 
 of sanctity that hovers over Devenish has caused it to remain, like 
 many similar spots, a favorite place of interment. 
 
 Picturesquely situated at Portora, on the main shore opposite 
 Devenish, is the Royal School, considered the Irish Rugby, erected in 
 1777, to accommodate the scholars of the establishment founded in 
 1626, by Charles I. On the southern margin of the lake, some miles 
 to the west, are the ruins of Tully Castle, the fortified mansion of a 
 Scotch family named Hume, who settled there in the reign of Eliza- 
 beth, and the scene, in the Rebellion of 1641, of a frightful massacre, 
 when the whole of the inmates, 60 in number, were killed by Rory, 
 brother of Lord Maguire. Within easy drive ot the town are the 
 charming estates of Castle Coole, seat of the Earl of Belmore, with 
 its fine Grecian mansion, erected by Wyatt, at an expense of ,£200,000 ; 
 Florence Court, the seat of the Earl of Enniskillen, seven miles to 
 the southwest, an imposing mansion, containing some valuable paintings 
 and a fine geological museum, within an extensive wooded demesne. 
 
190 
 
 LONDONDERRY AND THE NORTHWEST. 
 
 in which there are some curious limestone formations, the principal 
 being " the Marble Arch," and a subterranean passage through which 
 flows the river Claddagh ; and Ely Lodge on the shore of Lough 
 Erne, the residence of the Marquis of Ely. 
 
 Lough Erne is fed by the river of the same name, which rises in 
 Lough Gowna, in Longford County, and after a devious course of 
 some miles, expands into Lough Oughter, whence it emerges a 
 broader stream, and takes an erratic course northwardly, until it reaches 
 " that extraordinary maze of waters which compose the head of Upper 
 Lough Erne." At this point, on the head of a narrow promontory, 
 stands the fine modern Crum Castle, the charming, embattled seat of 
 the Earl of Erne, having within its pleasure grounds the ruins of 
 the ancient castle with its walled enclosures, which, in 1689, was con- 
 stituted a frontier garrison of Enniskillen, and withstood a siege of 
 Lord Mountcashel. From a mile or so above Crum Castle, where 
 the expansion of the river commences, to the lower end of the upper 
 lough, a distance of about ten miles, the stream which there trends to 
 the west is in fact nothing more than a very broad river, margined 
 by an endless number of creeks, nooks, and bays, and studded by 
 about 90 pretty islets. The Erne, after passing through this labyrinth, 
 once more contracts its banks, passes on for half a score miles in 
 the simple river form, and, after embracing Enniskillen, enters the 
 larger lake. The valley through which this river runs, lies between 
 hills, some of which rise abruptly, while others slope gently to the 
 water, all more or less adorned with the richest verdure and most 
 luxuriant woods. 
 
 Lough Erne proper, termed the " Windermere of Ireland," stretches 
 from Enniskillen to Rosscor Island, a distance of 20 miles, and varies 
 from two to five miles in breadth. It contains 28,000 statute acres, and 
 embraces 109 islets, many insignificant, but some from 10 to 150 acres 
 in size, while Boa Island, near the northern bank, comprises 1300 
 acres. The shores of the lake are on the northern side gently un- 
 dulating, but on the southern rise to bold and highly picturesque 
 acclivities ; at the lower end, however, both shores are flat and boggy. 
 The lough, from its delightful islands and pleasant winding shores, 
 clad with verdure, and adorned with many a beautiful residence, is a 
 
THE LOWER LOUGH ERNE. 
 
 191 
 
 truly magnificent spectacle that can undoubtedly claim a high rank 
 among the lake scenery of Ireland. Mr. Inglis confidently asserts 
 that " lower Lough Erne, take it all in all, is the most beautiful lake 
 in the three kingdoms ; and but for the majestic Alpine outline that 
 bounds the horizon on the upper part of Lake Leman, Lake Leman 
 itself could not contend in beauty with this little-visited lake in the 
 county of Fermanagh." At Rosscor, the Erne reassumes the river 
 character, and nearly four miles lower down, at Belleek, precipitates 
 its waters over a ledge of limestone, forming a fall of 14 feet. 
 Thence it rushes to Ballvshannon along a rugged bed for between 
 four and five miles, in which its waters fall by a succession of rapids 
 140 feet, and finally tumble 30 feet at low, and 10 at high tide, over 
 a series of shelving rocks, known as the Salmon's Leap, to mingle 
 with the salt waters of Donegal Bay — the latter cascade forming, from 
 its volume, the most effective of the Irish waterfalls. 
 
 Communication between Enniskillen and Ballvshannon is carried on 
 by a railway branching off from that by which we approached the former 
 place, and running westward north of the lough, and within the northern 
 limits of Fermanagh ; passing Pettigoe * and Belleek. at which latter it 
 enters Donegal County : and by water through the lough as far as 
 Belleek, where connection is made with the railway. The five miles of 
 rapids between Belleek and Ballvshannon are declared to constitute 
 " decidedly the best fisherman's river in Ireland, and can be equaled 
 but by few anywhere." The Rev. Henry Xewland, in his work on 
 
 * Though Pettigoe is bat an insignificant place, it is daring the summer months visited by thousands of 
 devotees on their way to Lough Derg. situated a few miles to its north within the county of Donegal and 
 amidst moon tains of the most desolate character. This dreary lake is six miles long and four broad, and 
 contains several rocky «l«w1g_ the largest of which, Station Island, half a mile from the shore, is the resort 
 of pilgrims for the purpose of doing penance in St. Patrick's Purgatory. This island, though less than an acre 
 in extent, is covered with modem chapels and houses for penitents, and contains several stone walls from one 
 to two feet in height, caiiei the Seven Satuts' Peuttentiui Bets, artuntt — h::h penitent; trass cn their rare 
 knees npon hard and pointed rocks, while repeating prayers. The period during which offences can be thns 
 "P"^ is declared to be in each year between June 1st and August 15th ; and in spite of the prohibitory 
 edicts of several of the popes, and the orders of the Irish privy council in former days for its sup pre ssi on, 
 the practice is still main rained, and thousands annually flock to the island, though the p ath w ay s to Lough 
 Derg are almost impassable, no road, it is said, being constructed, lest the devotions of the pilgrims should be 
 interrupted by the presence of too many heretics. The original St. Patrick's Purgatory, to which pilgrims 
 restr.ei in rent rte age;, —as. hfxsvsr. not tn this tut tn Saint; I;lani tn — h:th are tue remnants ct a 
 priory, and a cavern into which persons were lowered after preparing themselves by long vigils, fasts and 
 prayers, until 1630. when it was closed by order of the Lords Justices. 
 
192 
 
 LONDONDERRY AND THE NORTHWEST. 
 
 angling in the Erne, considers the number of fish contained in this 
 short space inconceivable ; and these, he adds, consist of " salmon, eels, 
 trout, pike, perch, but none of them, excepting the two former, valued or 
 preserved. These, however, are sources of great profit. These fish — the 
 salmon and the eel — equally affect both the sea and the fresh water, 
 with this singular difference — the salmon enters the fresh water to spawn, 
 the eel descends to the sea for the same purpose. The salmon returns 
 annually, the eel never. The salmon fry, five inches in length, descend 
 to the sea in spring; the eel come up in autumn, when about the 
 size of knitting needles. The salmon are taken as they ascend ; the 
 eel as they descend. The salmon never moves by night, and the eel 
 never moves by day. On an average season, about a hundred tons 
 of salmon are taken and sixty of eels ; and as the fishing part of the 
 river is certainly not more than five miles in length, a consideration 
 of this, compared with the weight taken, will give some idea of the 
 numbers it contains." The salmon that drop down in August and 
 September return again up the same river in the months of spring, 
 and this can only be accomplished by an ascent of the fall at Bally- 
 shannon. 
 
 Ballyshannon, {Bel-atha-Seanaigh, " the Mouth of Shanagh's Ford "), 
 presents a finer appearance externally than internally, as it is princi- 
 pally seated upon a steep hill, with its two parts connected by a 
 bridge of 16 arches, crossing the stream a few hundred yards above 
 the celebrated falls. The trade of the town (which has a population of 
 over 3000), is principally with the surrounding country, and the place 
 has been much improved by Col. Conolly, the late owner of the soil ; 
 but its export trade is small in consequence of a dangerous bar at the 
 mouth of the river and the exposure of the harbor to the westerly 
 winds. Its ancient castle, of which there are scanty remains, witnessed, 
 in 1597, the disastrous repulse of the English under Sir Conyers Clifford, 
 after they had besieged it for five days. There are in the immediate 
 neighborhood no less than 14 Danish raths, and over three miles to 
 the northwest, ruins of Kilbarrow Castle, once a fortress of the O'Clerys, 
 renowned for their erudition, and one of them, Michael, the chief of the 
 Four Masters. Ballyshannon stands in the southeastern corner of 
 Donegal Bay, a wide inlet of the Atlantic Ocean, penetrating the land 
 
THE COUNTY OF DONEGAL. 
 
 193 
 
 for about 20 miles, and having the town of Donegal,* nearly 14 miles 
 north of Ballyshannon, in its northeastern corner. 
 
 The county of Donegal extends far away to the north of this bay, 
 and northeast to Lough Fovle. It is in the extreme northwest of 
 Ireland, is girt on three-fourths of its circumference by the Atlantic and 
 salt water inlets, and presents a succession of mountains, down every 
 one of which rushes some rapid stream, feeding a lake in the valley, 
 that sends its overflow journeying on to the ocean. Its extensive 
 wastes give to it in many parts a barren aspect ; but it possesses so 
 many scenes of surpassing grandeur, both in its highlands and along 
 its bay-fringed shores.T that the county must some day become a 
 tramping ground for the tourist in search of new sights, or of a new 
 stock of oxygen wherewith to restore impaired mental or physical 
 powers. Before, however, it can become an attractive resort, it will 
 
 * Donegal (Dun-tia-Galt), the small county town, is situated at the mouth of the Esk, and has for 
 its principal object of interest the ruined castle of the O'Donnells, who are descended from Connell, the 
 son of Nial, of the Nine Hostages, a monarch of Ireland. Donegal means the land of Connell, and has 
 for its Celtic equivalent Tyrconnell. James I. conferred the title of Earl of Tyrconnell and Barcn Donegal 
 on Rory O'Donnell, one of this race ; but it was lost to the family from the want of male issue. In 
 15S7, Hugh Roe O'Donnell held the castle and defied the English Government, who were unable to send 
 a sufficient force against him, and so artfully despatched to the coast a wine-laden vessel, whose hospitalities 
 were offered by the captain to the chief. These he rashly accepted, and while drunk was bound and 
 carried to Dublin Castle, but escaped from it four years later. Donegal Castle overlooks the Esk, and 
 is a fine, turreted Elizabethan structure of mixed domestic and defensive character, belonging to the Earl 
 of Arran. On a rocky height stand considerable remains of the monastery founded in 1474 for Franciscan 
 Friars, by Hugh Roe O'Donnell. In it were compiled, under the patronage of Ferga! O'Gara, Lord of 
 Moy O'Gara and Coolavin, the famous Annals of Donegal, popularly called the Annals of the Four 
 Masters, of whom we have already stated Brother Michael O'Clery, of Kilbarron, was the chief. The 
 work comprised, in 1100 quarto pages, the political, military, ecclesiastical, and social history of Ireland, 
 from anno mundi 2242 to anno domini 1616 — a period of 4500 years — and is especially rich in the details 
 of the eventful period in which the authors themselves lived. 
 
 f The cliffs along the Donegal coast are remarkably grand, and especially so a short distance north of Donegal 
 Bay, where Slieve League shoots up perpendicularly from the water's brink. "The lofty mountain," remarks 
 Murray, "gives on the land side no promise of the magnificence that it presents from the sea, being in fact a 
 mural precipice of nearly 2000 feet in height, descending to the water's edge in one superb escarpment — 
 
 ' Around 
 
 Whose caverned base the whirlpools and the waves. 
 Bursting and eddying irresistibly. 
 Rage and resound forever.' 
 
 And not only in its height is it so sublime, but in the glorious colors which are grouped in masses on its face. 
 Stains of metals, green, amber, gold, yellow, white, red, and every variety of shade are observed, particularly 
 when seen under a bright sun. contrasting in a wonderful manner with the dark blue waters beneath." 
 
 II — IA 
 
194 
 
 LONDONDERRY AND THE NORTHWEST. 
 
 have to avail itself of improved means of locomotion and, better 
 accommodation for the stranger within its gates. 
 
 The railway continues for four miles beyond Ballyshannon to 
 Bundoran, the favorite marine watering-place of the people of Ennis- 
 killen. It is situated at the mouth of the river Drowes, and on the 
 southern shore of Donegal Bay, where the action of the sea has, like 
 in many other parts of the coast, washed the cliffs into strange forms, 
 one of which, termed the Fairy Bridge, consists of an arch 24 feet in 
 span, with a perfectly formed and detached causeway 12 feet in breadth. 
 At Bundoran we were once more compelled to accept the national car 
 as a means of locomotion, and in our passage to Sligo, a distance of 
 21 miles, found the road to cross the heads of the various small bays 
 which indent the coast, and to present on the right views of the sea, 
 and on the left the towering mountains of Benbulbin, Benduff, Benwicken, 
 and their brethren. On crossing the Drowes we re-entered Connaught, 
 and passed during the earlier part of our journey within the western 
 confines of the county of Leitrim, and for the remainder in that of 
 Sligo. About five miles from our destination the road took us through 
 Drumcliff {Druim-chliabh, the ridge of baskets), where there is a neat 
 little church, and some remains of a monastery founded by St. Columb 
 in 590, and constituted a bishop's see, afterwards united to Elphin. 
 Glencar Lough, a few miles to the east, at the head of the pretty glen 
 through which runs the Drumcliff River, is a lovely sheet of water 
 lying at the base of the mountains, having, as a scenic adjunct, a fine 
 waterfall of 300 feet in height. 
 
 The town of Sligo (SligeacJi, " shelly "), rose into importance in 
 the thirteenth century, when Maurice Fitzgerald, Earl of Kildare, erected 
 in it a castle and a monastery, both of which were destroyed by 
 O'Donnel in 1270, and again by Mac William Burgh, after being 
 rebuilt by the Earl of Ulster. Of the former there are no traces, 
 but of the Abbey of Sligo considerable remains exist. The restored 
 edifice was burnt in 1414, but shortly after re-erected, indulgences 
 being granted by Pope John XXII. to those who contributed towards 
 the expense. It is now a picturesque ruin of very large dimensions, 
 divided into several apartments. The first has a beautiful window of 
 carved stone, under which is the altar, also of cut stone. Here are 
 
THE TOWN OF SLIGO. 
 
 195 
 
 two ancient monuments, one bearing the date 1 6 1 6, and the other 
 belonging to one of the O'Connor kings, 1623, the latter in good 
 preservation. The steeple or dome is supported upon a carved arch 
 or cupola, the inside of which is also carved. Adjoining, on three 
 sides of a square, are beautifully-carved little arches or cloisters, of about 
 four feet in height, which seem to have been anciently separated from 
 each other, and probably formed cells for confession and penance. 
 Almost all the pillars are differently ornamented, and one in particular, 
 very unlike the rest, has a human head cut on the inside of the arch. 
 
 Sligo obtained a charter of incorporation in 161 3, and in 1641 
 sustained a siege and was captured and held for a time by the Parlia- 
 mentary army under Sir Charles Coote. It subsequently espoused the 
 side of James II., and was in turn occupied for William III. by the 
 Enniskilleners, taken by General Sarsfield, and finally surrendered to 
 the Earl of Granard. It is now an important sea-port of over 10,000 
 inhabitants, having regular steam communication with Glasgow and 
 Liverpool, and is the terminus of a branch of the Midland Great Western 
 Railway connected with the main line at Mullingar. It is open to the 
 Atlantic Ocean on the west through Sligo Bay, a small arm of the sea, 
 while towards the northeast it is backed up by fine mountains, and on 
 the southwest is connected by a short river with Lough Gill, the whole 
 combining a series of picturesque scenes that it is the lot of few 
 commercial towns to have in such close proximity. The river Garrogue, 
 where it passes through the town, is crossed by two bridges connecting 
 its parts, the houses of which slope upwards from the banks of the 
 stream. The shipping is accommodated by the Ballast Bank Quay, 
 2250 feet in length, at which vessels drawing 13 feet of water can lie, 
 while those of large draught find safe anchorage in the pool. St. John's 
 Church is a pointed cruciform structure with a massive western tower. 
 The county buildings are hardly worthy of special notice. Sligo is the 
 residence of the Roman Catholic bishop of Elphin,* which small but 
 ancient cathedral city lies about 40 miles to the southeast. At 
 Carrowmore, about three miles from Sligo, there are some very extensive 
 
 * The see of Elphin was erected about 450 by St. Patrick, who appointed a monk named Assicus the first 
 bishop ; but no regular succession of prelates is recorded previous to 1262. The Protestant see was united to 
 Kilmore and Ardagh in 1841. 
 
196 
 
 LONDONDERRY AND THE NORTHWEST. 
 
 monumental remains— 64 in all — consisting of cairns, circles, dolmens, etc., 
 greater in number than are to be found elsewhere in the British Isles. 
 It is presumed that they mark the battle-ground of Northern Moytura, 
 an early Irish conflict, and cover the graves of the slain. 
 
 The people of Sligo are not only blest by having within easy access 
 mountain peaks from which they can obtain extensive . and delightful 
 views, but they have almost at their very doors a beautiful lake dotted 
 over and environed with sylvan charms of the most attractive character. 
 An excursion to Hazlewood and Lough Gill, sometimes called Lough 
 Gilly, was a treat that we could not withstand. A row of a little over 
 two miles on the river, with its pleasant grassy and wooded banks, 
 carried us into the lough, which in itself is a sheet of water about five 
 miles in length by one-and-a-half broad, and 90 feet deep, embosomed 
 in an amphitheatre of, and almost entirely encircled by hills, and 
 scarcely surpassed in picturesque effect by the famed Lakes of Killarney. 
 Hazlewood, one of the finest and most charming estates in Ireland, 
 extends on both sides of the lake and along the river. The mansion, 
 situated on a small promontory at the outlet of the lake, is the seat 
 of the Right Honorable John A. Wynne, to whose taste, and that of 
 his father in the plantation of ornamental trees, must be accredited 
 much of the pleasure derivable from a visit to this lovely spot. Mr. 
 Inglis was particularly charmed with it, and speaks in rhapsodies of the 
 magnificent timber he found in the demesne. Of the lake he remarks : 
 " Its scenery is not stupendous — scarcely even anywhere bold ; but it 
 is ' beautiful exceedingly.' Its boundaries are not mountains, but hills 
 of sufficient elevation to form a picturesque and striking outline. The 
 hill sides, which in some places rise' abruptly from the water, and which 
 in others slope more gently, are covered to a considerable elevation 
 with wood ; and the lake is adorned with twenty-three islands, almost 
 every one of them finely wooded. Here, too, as well as on Hazlewood 
 demesne, I found that the arbutus is not confined to Killarney. The 
 extent of Lough Gilly is highly favorable to its beauty. The eye 
 embraces at once its whole length and breadth ; the whole circum- 
 ference of its shores ; all their varieties and contrasts at once ; all its 
 islands. One charm is not lost in the contemplation of another, as in 
 a greater lake : the whole is seen at once and enjoyed." The largest 
 
BALL YSADARE AND BALLINA. 
 
 197 
 
 of the islands are Cottage Island at the entrance, and Church Island, 
 on which there are some ruins, in the centre — both favorite resorts of 
 the Sligo people. The limestone banks of some of the islands are 
 curiously perforated and ribbed by the action of carbonic acid. In the 
 deer park of Hazlewood is a stone enclosure called Lcacht Con Mic 
 Ruis, " the Stone of Con, Son of Rush," the space in the middle 
 being 50 feet long by 25 wide, and connected by an avenue with two 
 smaller enclosures. In addition to this relic, not less than 30 raths 
 are. to be found within a circuit of three miles. 
 
 The main point of attraction on the thirty-six miles' drive between 
 Sligo and Ballina is the small town of Ballysadare, four miles on the 
 road. In approaching it we passed on our right the Hill of Knocknarea, 
 1078 feet high, east of the entrance to Ballysadare Bay, and on our 
 left the Slish Mountains ; while the railway from Sligo to Mullingar 
 kept us close company previous to trending to the southeast. Bally- 
 sadare is a prosperous place, having a valuable salmon fishery on the 
 river Owenmore, which dashes in rapids through the town as it enters 
 the bay which meets the ocean in company with that of Sligo. 
 Overlooking the rapids on the western bank are the ruins of a small 
 ivy-grown abbey founded by St. Fechin in the seventh century. For 
 half the rest of the way the road took us westward as far as Dromore, 
 first leaving on our right Aughris Head guarding the entrances to Sligo 
 and Ballysadare bays, then continuing not far from the Atlantic coast 
 and presenting fine sea views. At Dromore we turned to the south- 
 west, leaving several headlands some miles to our right, and passed 
 over very uninteresting moorland country, only relieved by the distant 
 Ox Mountains on our left. 
 
 Ballina (Bel 'an-atka, " Mouth of the Ford "), is pleasantly situated 
 upon the river Moy at the point where it becomes a broad stream, 
 and five miles above its entrance into Ballina Bay. The river divides 
 the counties of Sligo and Mayo, while the town has a population of 
 about 5000, and is situated on both banks, the larger portion on the 
 left or Mayo side, and the lesser, popularly called Ardnaree, on the 
 right or Sligo bank. Two handsome bridges cross the Moy, whose 
 waters dash over some bold rapids through the town and pass to the 
 quay a mile below, affording sights and sounds pleasant to the eye 
 
198 
 
 LONDONDERRY AND THE NORTHWEST. 
 
 and ear. The tide flows up to the town, but the river is not navigable 
 higher than the quay, and there only to vessels of less than 450 tons. 
 Ballina's only historical incident is its capture in 1798 by the French 
 under General Humbert, who landed at Killala. On the Sligo side are 
 the ruins of an abbey founded by St. Bolcan, and a fine Roman 
 Catholic cathedral, Ballina being the residence of the Roman Catholic 
 bishop of Killala. Though the town is not very attractive, it presents 
 fine views of Mount Nephin and the other hills west of Lough Conn. 
 It is, however, a favorite resort of the angler, who finds abundant sport 
 in the river and neighboring lakes. The salmon fishery of the Moy 
 is important and one of the most productive in Ireland. Anglers are 
 freely granted permission to fish, but are required to pay for all they 
 catch at wholesale value. Ballina has steam communication with 
 Glasgow, and is the terminus of a branch line from the Mayo division 
 of the Midland Great Western Railway, which unites with the trunk 
 line at Athlone. 
 
 From Ballina we drove northwardly along the old hilly road that 
 skirts the left or Mayo bank of the river to Killala, and at four miles 
 came upon the ruins of Roserk Abbey, or the monastery of Rosserik 
 {Ross-Searka, the Promontory of Searka), calmly slumbering in a 
 sequestered dell overlooking the Moy at its broadest part. It was 
 founded for Franciscan friars by the Joyce sept, of whom we shall 
 have something to say in the next chapter ; and in style is very 
 similar to the Abbey of Clare-Gahvay, being cruciform in shape, and 
 having a lofty tower rising from the intersection of nave and 
 transepts. 
 
 Two miles further on are the better preserved ruins of the once 
 magnificent Abbey of Moyne, lying in a sequestered pastoral district, 
 on the banks of the Bay of Killala, watered by a small rill, which, 
 dipping into the granular limestone, reappears under the abbey and 
 supplied the convent. The building, erected in 1641, is 135 feet in 
 leneth and has some decorated windows and a slender tower. The 
 latter can be safely ascended, and presents from its summit a good 
 view of the ruins, the surrounding country, the bay, diversified by 
 the Island of Bartragh, and the accompanying ledges of long, low/ 
 white-crested ' sand hills. 
 
KILLALA AND THE MAYO COAST. 
 
 199 
 
 The ancient cathedral city of Killala is two miles still further to the 
 north, also upon the margin of the bay. The see* was founded by 
 St. Patrick between 434 and 441. The cathedral, erected in the 
 seventeenth century and since altered, is a plain building, occupying 
 the site of the original church erected by Gobhan Saer, the great 
 architect of the sixth century. There is also a Round Tower on an 
 insulated height, but it was struck and considerably damaged by 
 lightning in 1800. This tower, together with those at Kilmacduagh 
 and Antrim, were likewise the productions of Gobhan Saer. Killala 
 Bay was the scene, during the rebellion of 1798, of the landing of 
 General Humbert with a force of 1100 from three frigates, which had 
 sailed from La Rochelle with the intention of disembarking at Donegal, 
 but were driven by contrary winds to this point. The garrison of 
 Killala at the time consisted of 50 men, of whom two were killed and 
 twenty-one taken prisoners by the invading force, while the remainder 
 fled. The French then made an incursion into the country, killed in 
 an ambuscade the Rev. George Fortescue, of Ballina, and two men, 
 captured that place and defeated some royalists at Castlebar, after which 
 the whole force were taken prisoners at Ballinamuck by Lord Cornwallis, 
 having been defeated by him in battle. 
 
 Following the line of coast, Ballycastle lies about nine miles to the 
 northwest of Killala, beyond the mouth of its bay, and commands a 
 fine view of Downpatrick Head jutting out into the Atlantic about three 
 miles to its north, and rising to a height of 126 feet over the sea 
 level. The coast, which then proceeds for about 20 miles in a direct 
 line west, presents lofty cliffs of from 600 to 800 feet in height, with 
 their bases riven and serrated by the action of the waves — like those 
 seen in other parts of the Atlantic seaboard. We did not, however, 
 proceed so far, but returned to Ballina, and thence engaged a car to 
 convey us to Castlebar, a score of miles to the south, in order that 
 
 * The Protestant bishopric of Killala had that of Achonry annexed to it in 1623, and in accordance with the 
 church temporalities act of 1833, the united sees were annexed to Tuam on their voidance in 1834. In the 
 Roman Catholic church Killala and Achonry are distinct sees, with the bishop of the former residing at Ballina, 
 and of the latter at Ballaghadereen. The bishopric of Achonry in Sligo County, formerly called Achad-Chaoin, 
 and Ackad-Conair, was one of the most ancient in Ireland. Its church is said to have been founded about 530 
 by St. Finian, Bishop of Clonard, on a site granted by the Lord of Leney, or Luigny, by which name the bishops 
 were first known. St. Finian's friend and disciple Nathy, was the first bishop. 
 
200 
 
 LONDONDERRY AND THE NORTHWEST. 
 
 we might see Loughs Conn and Cullen, and passed between them at 
 about midway. We could have readied Castlebar in much shorter time 
 by railway, though the distance is some five miles more, but then we 
 should have missed the view of the larger and finer lake. 
 
 The view of Lough Conn and Mount Nephin, as depicted in our 
 engraving, exhibits the lake, bordered on the west by the huge mountain, 
 the highest in Mayo, lifting its head to an elevation of 2646 feet 
 above the level of the sea. The two lakes are only separated by a 
 narrow neck of land, the northern, Lough Conn, which contains a few 
 small islands, being about eight miles in length and three-and-a-half in 
 breadth at its widest point, and at its northeastern corner only about 
 four miles from Ballina. The other, Lough Cullen, sometimes called 
 Lower Lough Conn, is about three miles long by one-and-a-half broad. 
 With the exception of Mount Nephin and its spurs to the west of 
 Lough Conn, the shores of both sheets of water are low and marshy and 
 devoid of interest ; the view, however, of the upper lake, when coupled 
 with the rocky height that stands sentry over it, is remarkably fine. 
 The elevation of these lakes above the sea level is stated to be from 37 
 to 42 feet, there being a difference of five feet between summer and 
 winter. Lough Conn is fed by the river Deel, which enters its north- 
 western extremity, and by many mountain rills ; and Lough Cullen by 
 streams entering it from the south, the principal of which, the Clydagh, 
 is the outlet of some small lakes near Castlebar. Both lakes discharge 
 their waters through a shallow and short channel of a quarter of a 
 mile in length, running from the eastern extremity of Lough Cullen 
 into the river Moy, near to the point where it makes a sudden change 
 in its course from west to north. An extraordinary phenomenon is 
 observable in the ebbing and flowing of these lakes, though there is no 
 tidal connection between them and the sea, the water sometimes rushing 
 with great force through the connecting channel from Lough Conn into 
 Lough Cullen, and at other times in the opposite direction, so that 
 they have alternately high and low water, the marks of which are 
 discernible on the shores. 
 
 Sir John Forbes, writing in 1852, relates of these lakes from 
 information received on the spot, that " they were formerly, and from 
 time immemorial, celebrated for the great quantity of trout and salmon 
 
THE PONTOON BRIDGE AND CASTLEBAR. 
 
 201 
 
 contained in them. These have, within these dozen years, sustained a 
 wonderful diminution, especially the trout, from the introduction of pike 
 into the lakes about the time specified. How this introduction took 
 place no one seems to know, though there is so pretty a legend got up 
 respecting it, that it makes one almost regret that it is not true. It is 
 stated that an old poacher on the lakes, convicted and punished for his 
 misdemeanors, conceived a project of revenge on those who had been 
 instrumental in his disgrace, that should touch them all very nearly. 
 This was the introduction of some living pikes into the lake, which he is 
 reported to have brought from some distant lough in the county of 
 Galway." 
 
 The carriage road from Ballina to Castlebar is carried over the stream 
 connecting the two lakes by what is known as the Pontoon Bridge, 
 consisting of a bold single arch, from the top of which remarkable and 
 beautiful views are obtainable. The boggy and moorland character of 
 the country, with patches of small farms, which had met our view before 
 approaching the lakes, was continued throughout the rest of our journey 
 to Castlebar, the road thither passing Turlough, in which there are some 
 interesting church ruins, and another ancient Round Tower. 
 
 Castlebar, though the county town of Mayo, and a pleasant little 
 place, possesses nothing important to detain the wayfarer. Its greatest 
 notoriety is obtainable from its capture by the French under Gen. Hum- 
 bert in 1 798, of which we have already spoken, when the enemy routed 
 a stronger force under Gen. Lake, whose headlong flight and pursuit has 
 been sarcastically designated as "Castlebar Races." At Castlebar we took 
 the branch of the Midland Great Western Railway to its terminus at 
 Westport, and passed over eleven miles of uninteresting country, with 
 some distant glimpses of mountain ranges. 
 
202 
 
 CONNEMARA AND JOYCE'S COUNTRY. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 CONNEMARA AND JOYCE'S COUNTRY. 
 
 Historic Districts — Westport and Clew Bay — Croagh Patrick and the Prospect it embraces — 
 Achill and Clare Islands — Grace O'Malley, the Sea Rover — Leenane — The Joyce 
 Family — The Killary — Loughs Fee and Kylemore — Pass of Kylemore — Letter/rack — 
 Lough Inagh — Maamturc and Binabola Mountains — Characteristics of the Scenery — 
 Loughs Derryclare and Garromin — Roads to Galway and Cong — Hens Castle — Cong, 
 its Abbey and ancient Crosses — Monumental Remains — Subterranean River — Plain of 
 Moytura — Loughs Mask and Corrib, their islands and fortresses — Return to Galway — 
 Ancient Irish Forests — Humidity of the Climate — Concluding remarks. 
 
 OUR survey of the Emerald Isle terminated with a visit to those 
 wild and romantic, but picturesque, regions of the west, which 
 cover portions of the counties of Galway and Mayo, but are popu- 
 larly designated Connemara and Joyce's Country, and whose coastline 
 we visited on our cruise, and described in our first volume. Con- 
 nemara, already mentioned as signifying " Bays of the Sea," may be 
 said to comprise that portion of Galway which lies between Lough 
 Corrib and the Atlantic, except the portion bordering on the Killary, 
 which, with the district lying to the north-west of Loughs Mask and 
 Corrib, and an adjoining strip of Mayo, constitutes Joyce's Country, 
 while the district lying southwest of Lough Corrib, and north of 
 the bay of Galway is distinguished as Jar-Connaught, or Western 
 Connaught, and was formerly the headquarters of the powerful clan 
 of the O'Flahertys. Connemara embraces the noble Twelve Pins of 
 Binabola, while Joyce's Country includes the Maamturc Mountains, 
 Lough Mask, the upper end of Lough Corrib, and a portion of the 
 fine scenery of Killary harbor. 
 
 Westport, however, where we left the reader at the close of the 
 last chapter, is some miles north of this region, so we must treat of 
 
WESTPORT CLEW BAY, AND CROAGH PATRICK. 
 
 203 
 
 it and of its pleasant and grand surroundings before we speak of the 
 peaks and passes of the Irish Switzerland. The town, which obtains 
 its name from its westerly position, once possessed a fair export trade, 
 and was a considerable producer of linen, but both industries have 
 declined in late years. Yet should its situation as a railway terminus 
 have the effect of re-establishing its prosperity, it will not lack the 
 accommodation necessary to carry on an extensive business, for even 
 in its palmiest days its warehouses and its grand hotel must have 
 been of a character more befitting the requirements of a commercial 
 metropolis than of a provincial seaport. Though many of its establish- 
 ments are now untenanted, the town has an air of neatness, which 
 is enhanced by the stone quay bordering the stream which bisects it, 
 previous to entering Clew Bay, at whose southeastern corner Westport 
 stands. The bay, as seen from the town, presents a checkered aspect, 
 for it is dotted over with islands, of which it embraces a greater 
 number than any on the Irish coast. On the margin of the bay, 
 Croagh Patrick, or as it is called in the vicinity, the Reek, raises its 
 lofty head to the height of 2510 feet above the surface of the waters 
 which glisten at its base. It is approached through the demesne of 
 the Marquis of Sligo, the proprietor of the district, whose handsome 
 mansion decorates the centre of the park, the gates of which, close 
 to the town are ever open to the public. 
 
 Croagh Patrick {Cruach-Phadraig, the Rick of St. Patrick), is the 
 distinguishing feature of all the views hereabouts, and its lofty eminence 
 is celebrated as a place of religious pilgrimage at certain seasons, when 
 its sides are climbed by devotees from all parts of Ireland, who "perform 
 stations" as they ascend, and upon reaching the summit proceed upon 
 their knees fifteen times around the long station, four hundred yards in 
 circumference.* At the point where the ascent begins, six miles from 
 Westport, stands the ruined monastery of Murrisk, founded by the 
 O'Malleys lor Austin friars, and containing the tomb of the O'Malleys, 
 part of a stone altar cross representing the Crucifixion, and a collection 
 
 * St. Patrick is said to have stood on the verge of a very deep precipice on the south side of this moun- 
 tain, called Lug na Narrib, and there cursed all the toads and venomous reptiles in Ireland. We are assured 
 that he "stood, bell in hand, and every time he rang it he flung it away from him, and it, instead of plung- 
 ing down the Lug, was brought back to his hand by ministering spirits ; and every time it thus hastily was 
 rung, thousands of toads, adders, and noisome things, went down, tumbling neck and heels one after the other." 
 
204 
 
 CONNEMARA AND JOYCE'S COUNTRY. 
 
 of immense thigh bones. To the searcher after scenic effect the labor of 
 a climb is amply repaid by the view obtained when the platform on the 
 top of Croagh Patrick is reached ; for he has then before him the whole 
 expanse of Clew Bay, almost a parallelogram in shape, 18 to 20 miles 
 long by 8 or 10 wide, with its hundred islands, varying from a few acres 
 to a mile in extent, the majority of which are grouped so near the shore 
 that down below they look like part of the mainland. 
 
 "Probably," says Murray, "no bay in the kingdom is surrounded by 
 such magnificent ranges of mountains. On the south the rugged declivi- 
 ties of the Reek run down almost to the water's edge, while further 
 seaward the coast is overhung, though at a greater distance, by Mweelrea, 
 Benbury, and the mountains of the Murrisk - district. On the north are 
 the wild and lofty ranges of the Nephin Beg, ending in the precipices 
 of Slieve More and Croghan in Achill Island. The precipitous cliffs of 
 Clare Island form a fitting seaward termination to the beauties of this 
 wonderful bay." While of the Reek he remarks that from its height it 
 "affords most splendid panoramas of the west of Ireland, extending 
 northwards over Murrisk, Ballycroy, Achill, Erris, even to Slieve League 
 on the coast of Donegal, and southward to the Leenane district and the 
 Twelve Pins." 
 
 The island of Achill lies at the northern entrance to Clew Bay, 
 between the Atlantic Ocean and the mainland, from which it is separated 
 by a channel a mile in width. It is the largest island off the Irish coast, 
 being about 16 miles long and 7 broad, is of irregular shape, and has a 
 population of about 5000, who live in rude hovels. There is scarcely 
 a tree upon it, the vegetation consisting almost exclusively of-heath, juni- 
 per, and coarse grasses. It possesses two lofty mountains — Slieve More, 
 2204 feet high, and Slieve Croghan, 2192 feet. The latter stands on 
 the western verge of the island, and, while sloping to landward, presents 
 a terrific precipitous side to the ocean, whose angry waves at times lash 
 it with tempestuous fury. 
 
 Clare Island, situate about midway in the entrance to Clew Bay, 
 is four miles long by one and a half broad, and contains a popu- 
 lation of about 4000 persons. It is the most fertile of the many 
 islands surrounding the kingdom, and is celebrated in history as the 
 principal abode of Grana Uaile, the heroine of the seas. From the 
 
GRACE O'M ALLEY, THE SEA ROVER. 
 
 205 
 
 hill of Knockmore, 1520 feet in height, rising on the west of the 
 island, very fine views are obtained of the neighboring coast. Doona 
 Castle, near the southern margin, and of which nothing now remains 
 but a square keep, was Grana Uaile's principal stronghold, and it was 
 in the little bay which indents the shore that her fleet was moored. 
 It is said that so vigilant was she that the cable of her chief galley 
 was passed through a hole in the wall and fastened to her bed-post, 
 in order that she might be readily alarmed in the event of any 
 attempted surprise. On the western side of the island are the ruins 
 of Clare Abbe)', which claims to be the last resting-place of the female 
 rover. It once possessed a skull with gold ear-rings attached, which 
 tradition accorded to the heroine, and its disappearance is attributed 
 to the depredations of a speculative Scotchman, who rifled the burying 
 grounds on the western coast of their bones for the purpose of 
 converting them to fertilizing uses. In this individual case retributive 
 justice may have stepped in to avenge the raids of the rover upon 
 her Scottish neighbors. On the mainland, near to Newport, at the 
 northeastern corner of Clew Bay, are the square keep and ruins of 
 the Castle of Carrigahooly, the Rock of the Fleet, another of Grana 
 Uaile's strongholds, and not far from it the interesting remains of 
 Burrishoole Monastery, which contends with Clare Abbey as being 
 the place whence her skull was carried off. * 
 
 * We abridge from Mr. Otway's work an account of the heroine of the West : — Grace O'Malley, corrupted 
 into Grana Uaile, was the daughter of Breanhaun Crone O'Maille, tanist or chieftain of that district of Mayo 
 surrounding Clew Bay, and comprising its multitude of isles, still called by the old people the Uisles of 
 O'Malley ; and its lord, owning, as he did, a great extent of coast, and governing an adventurous seafaring 
 people, had good claim to his motto, " Terra Marique Potens." Breanhaun Crone O'Maille dying early, left 
 a son and daughter — the son a mere child, but the daughter, just ripened into womanhood, seemed to have a 
 character suited to seize the reins of government, and rule over this rude and brave people. Setting aside, 
 then, the laws of tanistry, that confined the succession to the nearest male, the latter took upon herself not 
 only the government, but the generalship of her sept, and far exceeded all her family in exploits as a 
 sea rover ; and from her success, whether as a smuggler or pirate, won the name of Grace of the Heroes. 
 Acting in this wild and able way, she soon gathered round her all the outlaws and adventurers that abounded 
 in the islands, and from her daring strokes of policy, and the way in which she bent to her purpose the 
 conflicting interests of the English government and the Irish races, was called the Gambler. As a matter of 
 interest, she took for her first husband O'Flaherty, Prince of Connemara ; and there is reason to suppose that 
 the grey mare proved the better horse, for Castle Kirke, on Lough Corrib, would have been lost to the Joyces, 
 by O'Flaherty the Cock, had it not been for Grana the Hen ; hence it got the name which it still keeps, of 
 Krislane na Kirca, the Hen's Castle. Grana's husband, the Prince of Connemara, dying, left her free to make 
 another connection, in which, too, she consulted her policy rather than her affections. She then became the wife 
 
206 
 
 CONNEMARA AND JOYCE'S COUNTRY. 
 
 A car drive of eighteen miles took us from Westport to Leenane, 
 
 approaching. Some little distance past midway, at Eriff Bridge, we 
 joined the little mountain river Eriff, which falls into the head of the 
 
 the confines of the county of Galway, and near the mouth of the river, 
 is remarkable for the natural beauty of its situation in the midst of most 
 
 of Sir Richard Bourke, the M'William Eighter, and tradition says that in accordance with the marriage contract 
 the union was to last positively for one year, at the end of which time if either said to the other "I dismiss 
 you," it should be dissolved. It is said, that during that year Grana caused her own creatures to garrison all 
 M'William's eastward castles, valuable to her, and then as the lord of Mayo one day approached Carrigahooly, 
 Grana cried out the dissolving words. Shortly after, Grana joined Sir Richard Bingham against the Bourkes, 
 and doing battle with the English, turned the fortune of the day in favor of the President of Connaught, when 
 most of the M'William leaders being taken prisoners, six were hanged, "in order to strengthen the English 
 interest." Probably in gratitude for this signal aid, Queen Elizabeth invited Grana over to the English court, 
 whither she sailed from Clare Island, and before arriving at the port of Chester was delivered of a son, the issue 
 of the marriage with M'William Eighter, and who being born on shipboard, was named Tohaduah na Lung, 
 or Toby of the Ship, from whom sprung the Viscount Mayo. The interview at Hampton Court between the 
 wild woman of the West, and the " awe commanding lion-ported" Elizabeth must have been a curious scene. 
 Fancy Grana, in her loose attire, consisting of a chemise, containing 30 yards of yellow linen, wound round 
 her body, with a mantle of frieze, colored madder red, flung over one shoulder, with her wild hair twisted 
 round a large golden pin as her only head-gear, standing with her red legs unstockinged, and her broad feet 
 unshod, before, the stiff and stately Tudor, dressed out with stays, stomacher, and farthingale, cased like an 
 impregnable armadillo. Grana having made a bow, held out her bony hand, horny as it was with many an 
 oar she had handled, and many a helm she had held, to sister Elizabeth (as she called her), and sat down 
 with as much self-possession and self-respect as an American Indian chief would now before the President of 
 the United States. It is said that Elizabeth observing Grana's fondness for snuff, which, though a practice 
 newly introduced, she had picked up in her smuggling enterprises, and perceiving her inconvenienced from the 
 want of a pocket-handkerchief, presented her with one richly embroidered, which Grana took indifferently, 
 used loudly, and then cast away carelessly. Evidently Elizabeth was not happy in the presents she proffered 
 to her guest, for, upon offering her a lapdog, Grana coolly told her that she had no use for such vermin, 
 which was only adapted for the amusement of such idlers as Her Majesty. Elizabeth offered at the last 
 audience to create Grana a countess, when the latter replied, "I don't want your titles — arn't we both equals? 
 If there be any good in the thing, I may as well make you one as you me. Queen of England, I want 
 nothing from you ; enough for me it is to be at the head of my nation ; but you may do what you like with 
 my little son, Toby of the Ship, who has Saxon blood in his veins, and may not be dishonored by a Saxon 
 title: I will remain as I am, Grana O'Maille of the Uisles." It was upon her return home from this visit 
 that Grana abducted the heir of Howth, (the story of which is told on page 65 of the present volume), and 
 carried him to Doona Castle where she kept him for a time. At the death of this strange and fearless 
 woman, it would appear that the power which was but concentrated by individual vigor and ability, dissolved 
 with the spirit that gave it energy. 
 
SCENERY OF THE K1LLARY. 
 
 207 
 
 magnificent scenery, and for having been once the capital of Joyce's 
 Country, and the residence of the renowned potentate Jack Joyce, who 
 dispensed justice and potheen at the little country inn of which he was 
 the landlord.* This small hostelry is now a favorite halting-place for 
 tourists making excursions in the district. 
 
 The progenitor of the Joyces, after whom the district of which 
 Leenane is the centre is named, came to Ireland in the reign of 
 Edward I., and acquired considerable property in Jar-Connaught, south 
 of Connemara. Many instances are recorded of the size and strength of 
 the members of the family, whom both Mr. Inglis and Mr. Otway found 
 in the first half of the present century to be a magnificent race, the 
 former considering them the biggest, stoutest, and tallest he had seen in 
 Ireland, eclipsing even the peasantry of the Tyrol. 
 
 That weird inlet of the sea, the Killary,f is at its head confined 
 within narrow limits by rugged but picturesque shores, and presents to 
 the eye one of the most romantic and sequestered scenes that this region 
 of the sublime and beautiful can produce. As seen from the high ground 
 above Leenane, the view of the inlet, stretching its dark and deep-cut 
 line through the mountains, is a fine sight, which Mr. Otway declares to 
 be unlike anything else he saw in the island ; not, perhaps, presenting so 
 grand a prospect as either Bantry Bay or Lough Swilly, but having 
 features all its own. " About either of these fine estuaries," he remarks, 
 " there appears something that man has done — man has some share in 
 the decoration or even grandeur of the scene ; but here, at the Killary, 
 man and his works are out of the question ; no sail upon the waters ; no 
 cultivation along the shore — all as rough Nature has left it ; even trees 
 
 * When Jack Joyce resided at Leenane he was undoubtedly the reigning king of the district, and a visit 
 to him was considered a necessary part of every western tour. Mr. Inglis found him to be huge, even among 
 the tall race to which he belonged, "as near akin to a giant as a man can well be without being every bit a 
 giant." His immense stature and regal authority, however, did not prevent his being put out of the inn at 
 Leenane, after which he settled upon a neighboring farm belonging to Trinity College, Dublin. Mr. Otway 
 learned from his neighbors that he was not a favorite, that he was too apt to resort to his strength to settle 
 disputes, when the fist he threw into the balance made the scale descend in his own favor. Indeed, he 
 acknowledged to him on one of his visits, that, as a justice of the peace was a great way off, he used to settle 
 differences amongst the neighbors by taking the parties at variance by the nape of the neck, and battering 
 their heads together until they consented to shake hands and drink a pint of potheen between them, 
 which, of course, it was Jack's office to furnish for a consideration. 
 
 fin Irish, Coilshally Ruadh — Coil-Saile-Ruadh, "the narrow red brine," or salt water, has been corrupted 
 into Keel-paaly and eventually Keel-airy. 
 
208 
 
 CONNEMARA AND JOYCE'S COUNTRY. 
 
 seem out of character with the place ; and there is the deep bay, and 
 there are the high mountains all around, the same, we may suppose, as 
 when the first sea rover turned inwards his prow for shelter or curiosity, 
 and sought, and that in vain, for something that marked the occupa- 
 tion and dominion of man." The distinguished author of " A Tour in 
 Connaught," stoutly combats Mr. Inglis' assimilation of this inlet to the 
 fiords of Norway; for the latter, he maintains, "supposes pine-crowned 
 precipices hanging and frowning over the deep blue wave; but this is 
 not the case here ; perfectly bare of any timber, the mountains, though 
 rising all around, and assuming all manner of outlines, yet shelve 
 gradually down to the shore rendering the character of the place not 
 sublime but savage." 
 
 Taking a boat and rowing over the sombre waters of the narrow bay, 
 the mind is impressed with the rugged grandeur which encircles the 
 spectator. Mr. Otway has so graphically depicted the scene that we do 
 not hesitate to transfer his impressions to our pages, since they perfectly 
 harmonize with our own : " Nothing can be finer than the mountain 
 scenery all around. When you are in the middle of the bay you 
 seem locked in on every side ; and were it not for the smell, and 
 color, and vegetation peculiar to the sea — the incomparable sea — you 
 would imagine you were on a mountain lake. But there is scarcely 
 any lake that has not a flat, tame end, generally that where the 
 superabundant waters flow off and form a river ; but here nothing 
 was tame — on every side the magnificent mountains seemed to vie with 
 each other which should catch and keep your attention most. 
 Northwards the Fenamore mountains ; the Partree range to the east ; 
 Maamturc to the south. A little more to the southwest, the sparkling 
 cones of the Twelve Pins of Binabola ; then, a little more to the west, 
 the Renvyle mountain ; and off to the north of that again, the 
 monarch of the whole amphitheatre, Mweelrea with its cap of clouds 
 that it has caught, and anon flings fitfully off, as much as to say, I am 
 the great cloud-compeller of Europe, and not one of you, ye proud 
 rangers of the sky, shall come from the banks of Newfoundland without 
 paying me tribute." 
 
 The successor to Jack Joyce — in the inn-keeping, not the judicial 
 branch of his business — having supplied us with the necessary means 
 
LOUGH AND PASS OF KYLEMORE. 
 
 209 
 
 of locomotion, we started in the early morn to penetrate the lake- 
 gemmed dells and passes of the Western Highlands. Our first stage 
 took us along the Clifden road to the south of the Killary, whose 
 bank we skirted for a mile or two with the mighty Mweelrea in full 
 view on our right ; and then, parting company with the briny inlet, 
 passed for some distance over a dreary moorland, after which we 
 dived into a mountain defile. We soon descried on our right Lough 
 Fee, a long sheet of water encircled on every side, except to seaward 
 on the northwest, by lofty hills, of which the southern rises to the 
 height of 1973 feet. We next skirted the northern bank of Lough 
 Kylemore, a placid sheet of water two miles long and about half a 
 mile broad, embedded in mountains, the road overhung by huge 
 masses of rock, bright with scales of silvery mica, and verdant with 
 trailing foliage ; while towering over the lake to the south are ranged 
 the Twelve Pins of Binabola, which are seen to the greatest effect 
 from this point, where their heights can be compared with those of 
 lesser hills, an advantage not presented when viewed from the boggy 
 plains that border their southern bases. 
 
 The pass of Kylemore, three miles long, is the loveliest gem of 
 the district, and a noble rival to the celebrated Gap of Dunloe. 
 Doaghrue, on the north of the pass, rises to the height of 171 7 feet, 
 and half way up is covered with wood, with bold and rocky crags 
 jutting here and there through the foliage. The name of Kylemore, 
 or " big wood," is derived from this vegetation, the only natural wood 
 now remaining in the district, which the large amount of timber found 
 in its bos^s assures us was once covered with forest. The mountains on 
 the opposite side of the pass are completely bare of trees, and but 
 scantily covered with grass and heather, but their bald peaks sparkle in 
 the sunlight, and appear like burnished silver when the moon beams 
 upon them. A very handsome castle has recently been built upon the 
 north of Doaghrue, by Mitchel Henry, Esq., M. P. for the county, who 
 has expended considerable money in reclaiming bogs and improving the 
 district, and is evidently the right kind of a "man for Galway." The 
 road leads past the small Lough Pollacappul, through which the waters 
 of Kylemore run on their way to the ocean, and two miles beyond the 
 pass is the little village of Letterfrack, about a dozen miles from Leenane, 
 
 U— 56 
 
210 
 
 CONNEMARA AND JOYCE'S COUNTRY. 
 
 and a pleasant and thrifty colony established some years ago by a member 
 of the Society of Friends, named Ellis. The road proceeds for eight or 
 nine miles further to the town of Clifden ; but as we had previously 
 visited the latter and other places on the promontory that forms the 
 western extremity of Connemara, we retraced our route for a few miles 
 to the eastern end of Lough Kylemore, where we turned to the southeast 
 upon a modern road, ten miles long, constructed in the famine year by 
 the Board of Works, and opening out a previously much needed passage 
 through Glen Inagh and past the lough of that name to the road leading 
 from Clifden to the town of Galway. 
 
 Lough Inagh extends for three miles down the valley through which 
 the road runs, and is approached from Kylemore, through Glen Inagh 
 the pass between the Twelve Pins on the right, and the Maamturc 
 range on the left, the most conspicuous heights of the latter being, com- 
 mencing at the north, Letter-breckaun 2193 feet, Knock-na-hillion 1993 
 feet, Maumeen 2076 feet, and Shanfolagh 2003 feet. The opposite 
 mountains of Binabola (Beanna-Beola, Peaks of Beola, or the Twelve 
 Pins or Bins), form the dominant feature of the district. They are a 
 very remarkable group culminating in Benbaun, whose "conical dome-like 
 forms, and the distinct individuality of each mountain," says Murray, 
 "constitute their most remarkable characteristic. This, and the fact 
 that they rise from a plain which on an average is a little more than 
 100 feet above the level of the Atlantic, gives them an appearance of 
 greater altitude than is displayed by many mountains of double their 
 height. Like the Sugar Loaf Mountain near Dublin, Croagh Patrick 
 near Westport, and other hills of similar shape, they are composed of 
 quartzite, the white exposures of which, when lighted by the sunbeams, 
 add considerably to the scenic effect of this grand and picturesque 
 range. Benbaun, 2395 feet, is surrounded by Derryclare, 2220; Benlettery, 
 1904; Bengower, 2184; Benbreen, 2276; Bencollaghduff, 2290; Bencorr, 
 2336; Bencorrbeg, 1908; Muckanaght, 2153; Benglenisky, 2710; Benbrach, 
 1922, and a small supplementary summit known as the key of the Pins. 
 The beauty of their scarred and precipitous sides is still further enhanced 
 by the coloring imparted to them from the various heaths and lichens. 
 The tourist who wishes for a magnificent view cannot do better than 
 ascend Benlettery, which, though not quite so high as some of the others. 
 
SAVAGE ASPECT OE THE SCENERY. 
 
 211 
 
 is less surrounded by rival eminences. The view embraces Urrisbeg, 
 Roundstone and Bertraghboy Bays in the south, backed up in the 
 distance by Galway Bay, while Cashel and Lettershanna Mountains serve 
 as a foreground ; westward is Clifden and the whole country from 
 Urrisbeg to Ardbear, Ballynakill Bay, the hill of Renvyle, with the 
 islands of Bofin, Inishark, and many others; while further north the 
 sharp crags of Achill Head open out. East are the ranges of the 
 Maamturc Mountains, with the melancholy pass of Maumeen." 
 
 The Scene from Coolnacarton Hill, on the south of Lough Inagh, 
 and between it and Lough Derryclare (depicted by Mr. Bartlett) 
 presents some of the most striking features of this district, embracing as 
 it does the two ranges of mountains referred to in the last paragraph, 
 with Lough Inagh and its islands in the foreground. Here we are in 
 the very heart of Connemara, a word, which a writer in the Dublin 
 Penny Jotirnal remarked in the fourth decade of the century, "to English 
 and even to Irish ears, is expressive of nothing but the Ultima Thule 
 of barbarism. Yet its signification is most poetical — 'Bays of the Sea.' 
 If the map does justice to its subject, Connemara will appear black with 
 mountains, dotted with lakes, and studded with bogs ; its coast will be 
 seen rugged, and indented with fine harbors; while the inland country, 
 though wild and mountainous, and ill-cultivated, and so little known and 
 visited that its name is a proverb, is yet equal to the finest part of 
 Wales or of Scotland ; and the traveler who ventures to enjoy its 
 romantic picturesque scenery, and who from natural or acquired taste 
 can relish 'the lone majesty of untamed nature,' may here have his 
 feelings gratified to the full. -As a proof how little is known of 
 this singular part of Ireland, it may be mentioned, that a magistrate in 
 an adjoining county, when he heard that a criminal had been arrested 
 who had long hid himself in the mountain fastnesses of these Irish 
 highlands, declared that the ' poor fellow had suffered enough, in all 
 conscience, for any crime he might have committed, by being banished 
 seven years to Connemara.'" It is true, however, that in the old times 
 this mountain region was the retreat of those daring spirits who scorned 
 to submit to the yoke of an invader; and here, preferring poverty 
 and freedom to restraint and submission, found a shelter amid the 
 deep valleys ard craggy rocks, like the ancient Britons in Wales, and 
 
212 
 
 CONNEMARA AND JOYCE'S COUNTRY. 
 
 the Highlanders in Scotland. Thackeray when visiting Connemara in 
 1842 remarked that "the best guide book that ever was written cannot 
 set the view before the mind's eye of the reader, and I won't attempt 
 to pile up big words in place of these wild mountains, over which the 
 clouds as they passed, or the sunshine as it went and came, cast every 
 variety of tint, light, and shadow; nor can it be expected that 
 long, level sentences, however smooth and shining, can be made to 
 pass as representations of those calm lakes by which we took our 
 way. All one can do is to lay down the pen and ruminate, and cry, 
 4 Beautiful!' once more; and to the reader say, 'Come and see!'" 
 And he adds, "wild and wide as the prospect around us is, it has, 
 somehow, a kindly, friendly look." 
 
 Since the railway has stretched out its iron arm to within half a 
 day's car drive of this district, it has been brought within the summer 
 tourist's sphere, and so the Ultima Thule of half a century ago has 
 begun to exhibit pleasant examples of the influences of civilization in 
 comfortable hostelries, country villas, and cultivated fields. The peculiar 
 characteristics of the scenery that Connemara presents to the eye are 
 distinct from those observable in any other locality in Ireland. The 
 great and striking features of its landscape are its mountains, whose 
 peaks of quartz start up magnificently from lakes that want only the 
 arbutus and holly of Killarney to rival the enchantments of Muckross. 
 
 The Twelve Pins, the Titans of the land, covering an area of about 
 40 square miles, though bare, glitter with the aerial brilliancy peculiar 
 to their formation, their summits seemingly pushed together, a splendid 
 cloud-pointing assemblage. But while their denuded peaks depend 
 mainly on their own quartz formation for their effect in the landscape, 
 their sides and bases, from which the violence of Atlantic storms has 
 not yet been able to wash away their vegetable covering, take tints 
 still more brilliant and various from their innumerable varieties of heaths 
 and lichens. What the arbutus is to Killarney, the heath is to 
 Connemara, and in the absence of any depth or breadth of foliage, 
 the eye rests most gratefully on a substitute so pleasing — for its streaks 
 are of pale pink, rich brown, or glowing purple, mixed with the tender 
 green of mountain-grasses, and occasionally alternating with the black 
 stripes of uplying bogs, giving a combination of colors that, seen under 
 
TOPOGRAPHY OP THE DISTRICT. 
 
 213 
 
 the clarifving influence of western skies, is almost magical.* Xor is all 
 this brilliancy inconsistent with breadth. Connemara proper, though a 
 mountainous, is not an upland country ; the plain from which its greatest 
 elevations rise is, as has been already stated, about one hundred feet 
 above the level of the Atlantic ; so that its heights lose not a jot of 
 their real altitude, but lifting themselves to their full extent at a stretch, 
 look over the plain with much greater majesty than many other 
 mountains higher by a thousand feet. In front, flank, and rear open 
 four principal glens, each one with its torrent, and three of ihem with 
 their proper lakes. One, enclosing the Lake of Ballynahinch, opens 
 southward on Roundstone and Bertraghbov ; Glen Inagh, cradling its 
 black waters under the tremendous precipice of Maam (down which 
 the stream that feeds Lough Inagh falls 1200 feet), opens the gorge 
 of its grand prison upon the east ; Kylemore forms a "'parallel pass 
 along the north, near to the margin of the Killary ; and on the west 
 and south, the ravine whose torrent waters Clifden gapes towaVd the 
 Atlantic. The southern or lower end of the vale of Inagh is filled 
 by Lough Derryclare, a narrow sheet of water about two and a half 
 miles long, communicating- with Lough Garromin bv a short stream 
 called Bealnacarra. and also with Ballynahinch Lake by another. After 
 passing Lough Derryclare. the new road enters that running from 
 Clifden to Galway. a few miles below Ballynahinch, which place we 
 visited from the coast during our vachting excursion, and it was 
 therefore unnecessary for us to turn in that direction on our second 
 visit to Connemara. Not far from the junction of the roads is Lough 
 Garromin, which possesses the characteristic features of its neighbors, 
 but with the additional advantage of having t upon its banks the Recess 
 Hotel and Glendalough House — two modern places of entertainment 
 
 The wild district of Connemara furnishes several rare and interesting plants, of which the following 
 are the most remarkable : Erica Mediterrunea , found in Urrisbeg, near Roundstone, and on the side of 
 Mweelrea Mountain, near the Killary ; Erica Mackaiana. Jfenziesia poHforia, or Irish heath, which, as well 
 as the beautiful variety with white flowers, are now general favorites in garden collections, are to be seen 
 between Clifden and Roundstone ; the curious EriocauL-n septangular*, which also grows in the Isle of Skye, 
 in Scotland, is here to be found in almost every lake. The London-pride, Saxifraga umbrosa, is met with 
 on several of the mountains in the greatest abundance, and the Saxifraga vppositi folia on die moontains 
 which separate Connemara. from Joyce's Country. The beautiful and delicate A d i a n t um cmpillus veneris, at 
 true Maiden-hair fern, is found near Roundstone ; the PimpineHa Magna in great abundance in the Ross 
 woods ; and the Silent Anglica. in great profusion, in cornfields two miles west of Oughterard. 
 
314 
 
 CONNEMARA AND JOYCE'S COUNTRY. 
 
 that must be specially attractive to those desiring a temporary residence 
 in a wild and picturesque region. 
 
 After a night's sojourn in the heart of this land of enchantment 
 we turned our backs upon its Twelve Monarchs, and ascending for six 
 or seven miles by the side of a brawling stream, and past Lough 
 Ourid we reached the highest point of the road, and the old Half 
 Way House, of which its former landlord, Flynn, was less noted for the 
 luxury of his entertainment than for the beauty of his daughter, whose 
 praises have been chronicled by Inglis, and other fascinated wayfarers. 
 Immediately to the east of this house is Lough Shindilla, two and a 
 half miles long, whose waters flow in an opposite direction to those of 
 the lakes and streams we had recently passed, and after running through 
 Loughs Arderry, Bofin, and many minor sheets, pass through the 
 Owenriff river, and mingle with those of Lough Corrib, at Oughterard. 
 The mail road to the town of Galway runs past some of these lakes, 
 and over a moorland and boggy country, comprised within the Ballyna- 
 hinch estate, to Oughterard, near to the western shore of Lough Corrib, 
 and thence, at some little distance from the margin of the lake, to 
 Galway. The greater part of this route is extremely uninteresting, 
 especially in traveling eastward, for then the eye is not relieved as it is 
 when traveling in the opposite direction, by the gradually defining 
 outlines of the mountains ahead. We therefore diverged to the left at 
 Butler's Lodge, after passing Lough Shindilla, and traveled along a road 
 which took us for 18 miles past Maam to Cong, at the head of Lough 
 Corrib, over whose waters we were conveyed by a steamboat to our 
 destination. 
 
 Nearly five miles after leaving the Clifden and Galway Road, we 
 reached the pleasant little inn at Maam, built by Nimmo, the engineer, 
 which occupies a charming position " at the base of the giant Lough- 
 nabricka, and right in front of Leckavrea and Shanfolagh, while two 
 streams, the Bealnabrack and the Failmore, take away from the solitude 
 and tempt the fisherman ;" and, consequently, it is a place that has 
 special attractions for devotees to the gentle art. Here a road branches 
 off to the left, through the vale of the Bealnabrack, to Leenane, eight 
 and a half miles distant, having the Partree Mountains on the right, 
 and the Maamturc range on the left, and passing a mountain that 
 
FROM MAAM TO CONG. 
 
 enjoys the satanic appellation of the Devil's Mother ; but who that 
 matronly person was we admit we are in profound ignorance. 
 
 The road from Maam to Cong passes between small bays or inlets 
 of Loughs Mask and Corrib, and along the northern bank of the 
 latter sheet of water, and affords magnificent views of Benlevy, Bohaun, 
 Loughnabricka, Shanfolagh, and other members of the lofty Maamturc 
 family, with the hill of Kilbride in the direction of Lough Mask. A 
 little over two miles from the hotel, prominently visible upon an island 
 on the right of the road, are the extensive ruins of Castle Kirke — 
 otherwise Caislean-na-Circe, or the Hen's Castle — one reason for the origin 
 of which last title we have given in our account of Grana Uaile, in 
 the present chapter. Another legend, however, relates that the fortress 
 was raised in one night by a witch and her hen, which, together with 
 the castle she gave to the O'Flaherty,* telling him that, if he was 
 besieged, the hen would lay sufficient eggs to keep him from starving ; 
 and it further states that upon being soon brought to this strait he slew 
 the bird and was immediately starved out. The castle, however, was 
 really erected by the sons of Rory O'Connor, last king of Ireland, with 
 the help of Richard De Burgo ; and the Anglo-Norman keep and other 
 architectural features of the remains indicate its origin to have been 
 in the thirteenth century. 
 
 Cong (Irish Cunga, a neck, so called from its situation upon the 
 isthmus that divides Loughs Mask and Corrib) is a small, quaint, 
 but not over cleanly village, situated near to the north-eastern corner 
 of Lough Corrib, and on the semi-subterranean and rapid stream that 
 pours into it the waters of Lough Mask. It possesses the two-fold 
 attraction of interesting archaeological remains, and a vicinage dotted 
 with peculiar natural and artificial wonders, to say nothing of its 
 having once been the theatre of national warfare. The remains 
 consist of some not very extensive ruins of an Augustinian abbey of 
 
 * The O'Flahertys, whose descendants still hold considerable property in Jarconnaught, were, in the 
 thirteenth century, driven from their possessions on the east side of Lough Corrib by the De Burgos, when 
 they sailed across the lake, and seized and occupied Tullokyan, or the Hag's Castle, and Aghanure, to 
 the southwest of the lough. Queen Elizabeth took the chief of her time into favor, and pardoned him 
 "all murders, homicides, killings, etc., by him at any time heretofore committed." In the same reign 
 O'Flaherty of Guobeg and his four children were murdered, while his aged father, Hugh Og, was confined 
 m the Hag's Castle at Moycullen, and starved to death. 
 
216 
 
 CONNEMARA AND JOYCE'S COUNTRY 
 
 the Norman style, supposed to have been erected during the twelfth 
 century,* and partially restored by the late Sir Benjamin Lee Guinness, 
 Bart ; and, situated in the centre of the street, a stone cross bearing 
 an ancient Irish inscription indicating that it was erected in memory 
 of Filaberd and Nicol O'Duffy, formerly abbots of Cong. Roderic or 
 Rory O'Conor, the last native king of Ireland, spent the closing 15 years 
 of his life in strict seclusion within the walls of the abbey, which 
 undoubtedly gained in magnificence by his pious bounty. He died in 
 it in 1 198, aged 82; and the guides here point out his tombstone, 
 though he is said to have been buried at Clonmacnoise. Of the 
 rich ornaments for the possession of which this abbey was noted, an 
 example remains in the processional cross of Cong,f now in the Royal 
 Irish Academy, Dublin, to which it was presented in 1839 by Professor 
 MacCullagh, by whom it had been purchased from the Roman Catholic 
 clergyman at Cong, who disposed of it in order to provide funds for the 
 restoration of the roof of his church, damaged by a storm. 
 
 The neighborhood of Cong abounds with great monumental cairns 
 and stone circles, supposed to have been constructed upwards of 2000 
 years ago, and similar to those seen in the Arran Islands ; as well as 
 with wayside monuments, crosses, pillar-stones, and tumuli, erected at 
 the resting places of passing funerals on their way to the hallowed 
 precincts of St. Mary's Abbey. Many of the latter can still be 
 
 * A church dedicated to the Virgin, is assumed to have been erected at Cong, by St. Fechin, who 
 died in 664, but where it stood is unknown. Cong was originally a bishopric, and with those of Tuam, 
 Killala, Clonfert and Ardcharne, was named among the five sees of the province of Connaught, regulated 
 by the Synod of Rath-Breasill, in Leagh (the present Queen's County) in the year 1010 ; but the see 
 was removed to Annaghdown in 1114, upon the destruction of its cathedral by fire. 
 
 \ The cross of Cong is of oak, covered with plates and filagree work in gold, silver, and bronze, 
 exquisitely chased, with the height of the shaft two feet and a half, and the span of the arms 19 inches. 
 According to Sir W. R. Wilde, it was made at Roscommon by native Irishmen about 1123, in the reign of 
 Turlough O'Connor, and contains what was supposed to be a piece of the true Cross, as inscriptions in 
 Irish and Latin in the Irish character upon two of its sides distinctly record. The ornaments generally 
 consist of tracery and grotesque animals, fancifully combined, and similar in character to the decorations 
 found upon crosses of stone of the same period. A large crystal, through which a portion of the wood 
 which the cross was formed to enshrine is visible, is set in the centre, at the intersection. The letters 
 of the inscriptions which are extremely clear are not cut, but, from the impressions penetrating the wood 
 beneath the band, unmistakeably punched — a curious fact, proving that the Irish artist was acquainted with 
 the art of printing by single types ; had his necessities required him to have made many inscriptions, no 
 doubt his inventive faculty would have led him to have constructed and arranged his types somewhat 
 after the manner now adopted by printers. 
 
A SUBTERRANEAN RIVER. 
 
 217 
 
 identified as belonging to particular families, and are augmented by the 
 contribution of stones or pebbles, one from each relative or passing 
 friend.* The locality also exhibits many natural and artificial caverns 
 or chasms. The former of these are caused by the vagaries of the 
 river connecting Lough Mask with Lough Corrib, of which Murray 
 remarks : " Although the distance is really four miles, its apparent 
 career is only three-quarters of a mile, as the remainder is hidden 
 underground, with but few tokens of its presence. The country to 
 the north of Cong, as far as Lough Mask, is a series of carboniferous 
 limestone plateaux, singularly perforated and undermined by the solvent 
 action of the free carbonic acid contained in the river water. The 
 subterranean river, and the lofty tunnel through which it flows, is 
 accessible in several places where the surface of the ground has caved 
 in. The ' Pigeon Hole 1 (so-called from the number of pigeons that 
 used to flock into it), about one mile from the village, is one of these. 
 In the centre of a field there is a marked depression, having on one 
 side a perpendicular hole of some 60 feet deep, and of a diameter 
 barely that of the shaft of a coal pit. The aspect of this aperture, 
 covered as it is with ferns and dripping mosses, is very peculiar, and 
 it requires a little resolution and a good deal of care to descend the 
 slippery steps to the bottom, where we find a considerable increase 
 of room, in consequence of the hollowing away of the rocks. When 
 the tourist's eyes get fairly accustomed to the semi-darkness, he will 
 perhaps be fortunate enough to detect in the river, which runs babbling 
 by him, the blessed white trout, which always frequent this same spot, 
 and to catch which was an act of impiety too gross to be committed. 
 In addition to the guide, he is accompanied down the hole by a 
 woman carrying a bundle of straw, which she lights and carries as 
 far into the depths of the cavern as the suffocating atmosphere will 
 
 * About eight miles from Cong, and over two from the eastern shore of Lough Corrib, is the 
 monastery of Ross, one of the most extensive and beautiful establishments of the kind in Ireland. It 
 was founded for Observantine Franciscans at the close of the fifteenth century by Lord Granard, and 
 bestowed on the Earl of Clanricarde at the suppression of religious houses. It is the cemetery of many 
 Connaught families, and, says the guide book, ' ' probably contains more grinning and ghastly skulls than 
 any catacomb, some of the tracery of the windows being filled up with thigh bones and heads." The 
 church has a nave, choir, and south transept, with a slender and graceful tower arising from the 
 intersection. 
 
 II— 57 
 
218 
 
 CONNEMARA AND JOYCE'S COUNTRY. 
 
 allow her to venture. As she follows its windings, every now and 
 then disappearing behind the rocks, and then reappearing, waving the 
 fitful torch above her head, the scene is at once mysterious and 
 picturesque." 
 
 The artificial caves abound on the plain of Moytura, and were 
 probably once surrounded by forts or cahers, within which they served 
 as places of protection and security for women and children, sleeping 
 apartments, hiding places for valuables in case of attack, or storehouses. 
 The plain of Moytura, covering a portion of the isthmus between 
 Loughs Mask and Corrib, and extending about five miles north to 
 south, is the site of the four days' battle of Southern Moytura, or 
 Moytura Cong, fought about 700 years before the Christian era, and 
 in which 100,000 warriors were engaged. The story of this conflict 
 is thus briefly related by Fergusson : "At a certain period of Irish 
 history, a colony of Firbolgs, or Belgae, as they are usually called 
 by Irish antiquaries, settled in Ireland, dispossessing the Formorians, 
 who are said to have come from Africa. After possessing the country 
 for 37 years, they were in their turn attacked by a colony of Tuatha 
 de Dannans, coming from the North, said to be of the same race, 
 and speaking a tongue mutually intelligible. On hearing of the 
 arrival of these strangers, the Firbolgs advanced from the plains of 
 Meath as far as Cong, where the first battle was fought, and, after 
 being fiercely contested for four days, was decided in favor of the 
 invaders. The second battle was fought seven years afterwards, near 
 Sligo (Northern Moytura), and resulted equally in favor of the Tuatha 
 de Dannans, and they in consequence obtained possession of the 
 country, which, according to the Four Masters, they held for 197 
 years." The stone circles and cairns that are still to be found upon 
 the site, and to which we have referred, have been identified by Sir 
 W. R. Wilde in his interesting work on Loughs Corrib and Mask, 
 as connected with incidents of the former of these battles. 
 
 Near to a cairn on Blake Hill, about a mile westward of Cong, 
 an extensive view is obtained of the battle-field and of the loughs on 
 its north and south. Lough Mask is a fine sheet of water, ten miles 
 long and four broad, with two arms about a mile apart, stretching for 
 three and four miles respectively into Joyce's Country, the longer being 
 
LOUGHS MASK AND CORRIB. 
 
 219 
 
 that near to whose margin we had traveled in our road from Maam 
 to Cong. The eastern shore of the lough is flat and tame, but on 
 its western bank it has the Partree Mountains, the highest of which 
 are Toneysel, 1270 feet, and Bohaun, 1294 feet. One of its islands, 
 Inishmaam, contains the ruins of a church built by St. Cormac in the 
 sixth century, and afterwards enlarged. A partly artificial islet is 
 covered with the ruins of Caislean-na-Caillighe, or the " Hag's Castle," 
 a stronghold of the O'Conors, supposed to have been the earliest 
 built in Ireland, and which must not be confounded with the Hag's 
 Castle, south-west of Lough Corrib. Remains of other ancient castles 
 border the lake, the principal being those of Lough Mask Castle on 
 the eastern shore, a fortress of the Eighter or Mayo branch of the 
 Burkes, said to have been built by one of the Anglo-Norman barons 
 in 1238. The surface of Lough Mask is 36 feet above the summer 
 level of Lough Corrib, which accounts for the swiftness of the connecting 
 partially hidden stream. 
 
 Lough Corrib (Irish Lough Orbsen), is the second in size of the 
 Irish fresh water loughs, being at its greatest length and breadth, twenty 
 miles and six miles respectively, without including the arm that extends 
 to Maam. It is, in fact, two sheets of water joined by a narrow strait, 
 covers 43,485 statute acres, and its summer level is 13 feet, 9 inches 
 above that of the sea at high water. Like Erne and other Irish loughs, 
 Corrib is popularly believed to contain an island for every day in the 
 year, but like them it actually numbers far less, though what it does 
 contain conjointly cover an area of 1000 acres. Of its islands, six 
 are inhabited, of which one, Inchagoil (Inis-an-Ghoill Craibthigh, the 
 island of the devout foreigner, who is supposed to have been a nephew 
 of St. Patrick), contains the ruins of a church attributed to St. Patrick, 
 and another. Inishmicatreer, formerly contained an abbey. 
 
 Some years ago a governmental survey was made with a view 
 towards establishing inland navigation from Galway, through Loughs 
 Corrib. Mask and Conn, to Killala, so as to avoid the inconveniences 
 and dangers of the coast route. But the scheme became abortive 
 except deepening and marking a channel through Lough Corrib, and 
 the construction of a canal to connect it with the sea at Galway. 
 The navigation of Lough Corrib consequently now merely consists of 
 
220 
 
 CONNEMARA AND JOYCE'S COUNTRY. 
 
 the steamer and a few barges, plying between Cong and Galway. The 
 canal to connect Lough Corrib with Lough Mask was a gigantic failure. 
 It was constructed during the famine year, and the work afforded 
 relief to the suffering peasants ; but it was discovered when completed, 
 that it was incapable of holding water, from the porous character of 
 the stone through which it was cut. 
 
 From Cong, which is more than half a mile from the landing stage, 
 we passed over the waters of Lough Corrib on the deck of the little 
 steamer Eglinton, to Galway, the peaks of the northern and northwestern 
 hills fading into the distance as we proceeded southward. Numerous 
 towers of castles and ruined churches studded the banks of the lough, 
 and we noticed on the left those of Annaghdown * and Clare-Galway, 
 mentioned in our first volume ; and on our right, the fortresses of 
 the O'Flahertys, Aghanure, and the Hag's Castle, previously referred 
 to in the present chapter. As we approached the lower end of the 
 lake, the isolated hill of Knocknaa, near Tuam, was distinctly visible 
 beyond the flat eastern bank, while on the western shore the high 
 ground over which the road between Galway and Oughterard is carried, 
 appeared with a leafy clothing, through which peeped many pleasant 
 residences. Four miles before reaching our destination we entered the 
 short river which carries the waters of the lake into the bay at Galway 
 and possesses little interest to the tourist, though it is a mine of 
 treasure to the angler, to be explored, however, only by a pecuniary 
 compensation to the proprietors of the fishery. It is said that at the 
 proper season, the salmon flock in such numbers at low tide below 
 the weir, waiting to ascend it and proceed to Lough Corrib, that they 
 literally pave the bottom of the river. Four hours after leaving 
 Cong, we landed at Galway and completed our survey of Ireland. 
 
 * Annaghdown, Annaghdune, or Enough-Duin, the dun or fortress of the bog — and in modern Irish, 
 Enagh-Coin, the fort of the bog, or possibly of St. Coona. Its ruins consist of a picturesque tall square 
 castle, the walls of the bishop's residence, the wells of St. Brendau, the founder, who died here in 577, 
 and St. Cormac, the extensive remains of an abbey, and other ecclesiastical buildings. It was the site 
 of the fifth bishop's see in Connaught, the boundary of which was co-extensive with Jar Connaught, the 
 ancient see of Cong having been transferred to it in 1141. The bishopric was, however, annexed by 
 Pope John XXII, in 1321, to that of Tuam, when many of its valuables and revenues were transferred 
 to the collegiate church of St. Nicholas in Galway. The papal mandate, however, does not appear to 
 have been implicitly obeyed, for some of its ecclesiastics are enumerated with the dignity of bishops after 
 that date. 
 
s 
 
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