From Waterford to Passage, and got my chaise and horses on board the
_Countess of Tyrone_ packet, in full expectation of sailing immediately,
as the wind was fair, but I soon found the difference of these private
vessels and the Post-Office packets at Holyhead and Dublin. When the
wind was fair the tide was foul; and when the tide was with them the wind
would not do. In English, there was not a complement of passengers, and
so I had the agreeableness of waiting with my horses in the hold, by way
of rest, after a journey of above one thousand five hundred miles.
October 18. After a beastly night passed on shipboard, and finding no
signs of departure, walked to Ballycanvan, the seat of Cornelius Bolton,
Esq.; rode with Mr. Bolton, jun., to Faithleghill, which commands one of
the finest views I have seen in Ireland. There is a rock on the top of a
hill which has a very bold view on every side down on a great extent of
country, much of which is grass inclosures of a good verdure. This hill
is the centre of a circle of about ten miles diameter, beyond which
higher lands rise, which, after spreading to a great extent, have on
every side a background of mountain: in a northerly direction Mount
Leinster, between Wexford and Wicklow, twenty-six miles off, rises in
several heads far above the clouds. A little to the right of this,
Sliakeiltha (_i.e._ "the woody mountain"), at a less distance, is a fine
object. To the left, Tory Hill, only five miles, in a regular form,
varies the outline. To the east, there is the Long Mountain, eighteen
miles distant, and several lesser Wexford hills. To the south-east, the
Saltees. To the south, the ocean, and the Colines about the bay of
Tramore. To the west, Monavollagh rises two thousand one hundred and
sixty feet above the level of the sea, eighteen miles off, being part of
the great range of the Cummeragh mountains: and to the north-west
Slein-a-man, at the distance of twenty-four miles; so that the outline is
everywhere bold and distinct, though distant. These circumstances would
alone form a great view, but the water part of it, which fills up the
canvas, is in a much superior style. The great river Suir takes a
winding course from the city of Waterford, through a rich country,
hanging on the sides of hills to its banks, and, dividing into a double
channel, forms the lesser island, both of which courses you command
distinctly. United, it makes a bold reach under the hill on which you
stand, and there receives the noble tribute of the united waters of the
Barrow and Nore in two great channels, which form the larger island.
Enlarged by such an accession of water, it winds round the hill in a
bending course, of the freest and most graceful outline, everywhere from
one to three miles across, with bold shores that give a sharp outline to
its course to the ocean. Twenty sail of ships at Passage gave animation
to the scene. Upon the whole, the boldness of the mountain outline, the
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