On the mainland, close to the southern shore, and within speaking distance of the castle, stand the ruins of the old church which was built by MacClancy, and which is of about the same date as the castle to which it was an appendage. In the immediate neighbourhood of the shore, guarded on one side by the lofty mountain range of Dartraigh, on the other by the waters of Lough Melvin, was MacClancy's "town"--an assemblage of primitive huts, probably circular in shape, and of the simplest construction, where dwelt the followers and dependents of the chief, ready, by night or by day, to obey the call to arms, or, as Cuellar expresses it, "Go Santiago," a slang expression in Spain, meaning to attack.[4] Of the manners and customs of the natives, Cuellar makes sundry observations. Having described at length how he occupied his leisure in the castle by telling the fortunes of the ladies by palmistry, he mentions incidentally that their conversation was carried on in Latin. He goes on to speak of the natives, or "savages," as he calls them. He says: "Their custom is to live as the brute beasts among the mountains, which are very rugged in that part of Ireland where we lost ourselves. They live in huts made of straw; the men are all large bodied and of handsome features and limbs, active as the roe-deer. They do not eat oftener than once a day, and this is at night; and that which they usually eat is butter with oaten bread. They drink sour milk, for they have no other drink; they don't drink water, although it is the best in the world. On feast days they eat some flesh, half-cooked, without bread or salt, for that is their custom. They clothe themselves, according to their habit, with tight trousers and short loose coats of very coarse goat's hair. They cover themselves with blankets, and wear their hair down to their eyes. They are great walkers, and inured to toil. They carry on perpetual war with the English, who here keep garrison for the Queen, from whom they defend themselves, and do not let them enter their territory, which is subject to inundation and marshy."