is enchanted, it must be that water; and as you round the cliff
it is more beautiful still. For there, under Beaupark House, is
a cliff answering that on the Stackallen bank, and a precipitous
lawn beside it; and the river, bending south here at right angles,
then breaking out again, stately and splendid, on its old line
due east, has movement and stillness all in one; it is a sliding,
swirling mirror for banks which well deserve such a glass to echo
their perfection."
That valley is to my mind the most beautiful and the most typically
beautiful thing in Leinster. For Leinster is the province of cultivated
fertility; it is also the province of great and beautiful rivers. The
Shannon, except from Killaloe and Limerick, is somewhat lacking in
beauty; it has majesty, but not charm. In Leinster the rivers are more
manageable in size--the Nore, the Barrow, the Boyne, the Liffey, and
the Slaney. Each of them has its own character; and the lower tidal
reaches of the Slaney, reed-fringed and swan-haunted, are not less
lovely than the salmon pool in the upper waters near Carlow which Mr.
Williams has drawn so lovingly. And those who imagine Ireland as a
country of mere beggary might find something to learn as well as to
see either amid the fertility of Meath or again in South Leinster,
where a poorer soil has been tilled into high perfection. The valley
of the Nore in particular is affluent in loveliness from its banks
at Kilkenny, where Moore courted the pretty actress who made him the
best of wives, down to the head of the tideway at Inistiogue, where
under the shelter of Mr. Tighe's great woods you can stay at a neat
little hotel in a charming village, and fish to heart's content in
splendid pools and shallows, where trout and salmon are plenty, and
if you cannot catch them, it must be either your fault or theirs. And
if they are hard to capture--as I found them in weather which all but
fishermen adored--that is just because it is a free water, because here
as everywhere there is something of that easy live and let live spirit
which endears Ireland to those that know her, and which everywhere
makes the visitor welcome--perhaps with most natural kindliness in
those parts which are least accustomed to look upon the stranger as a
source of revenue. The most beautiful places in Leinster are far less
known to Englishmen than the barren cliffs of Achill. Yet if you go to
Inistiogue, or any similar place in Leinster, you will begin to realize
why it is that in Leinster only of the provinces does the population
increase in these days.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account