St. Patrick's little wooden building, which is supposed to be the first Christian sanctuary erected in Ireland, was replaced in 1191 by the present lofty cruciform edifice, three hundred feet long and one hundred and fifty-seven feet across the transepts. It was designed and erected by Comyn, the Anglo-Norman archbishop of Dublin, is supposed to have been completed in 1198, and was raised to the rank of a cathedral in 1219. There were frequent alterations and repairs during the first seven centuries of its existence, until 1864-68, when it was perfectly restored by Sir Benjamin Guinness, the great brewer, who also purchased several blocks of dilapidated slums that surrounded it, tore down the buildings, and turned the land into a park which not only affords an opportunity to see the beauties of the cathedral, but gives the poor people who dwell in that locality a playground and fresh air. Sir Benjamin purchased several of the adjoining blocks and erected upon them a series of model tenement-houses, the best in Dublin, and rents them at nominal rates to his employees and others. On the other side of the cathedral are several blocks of the most miserable tenements in the city, and sometime they also will be cleared away. A bronze statue has been erected in the churchyard as a reminder of his generosity. [Illustration: ST. PATRICK'S CATHEDRAL, DUBLIN] Benjamin Guinness was the great brewer of Dublin. In 1756 one of his ancestors started a little brewing establishment down on the bank of the Liffey River in the center of the city, which has been extended from time to time until the buildings now cover an area of more than forty acres. The property and good will were transferred by the Guinness family to a stock company for $30,000,000 in 1886, and since then the plant has been enlarged until it now exceeds in extent all other breweries in the world, represents an investment of $50,000,000, and turns out an average of two thousand one hundred barrels of beer a day. Sir Benjamin's son, Edward Cecil Guinness, was elevated to the peerage as Lord Iveagh and is the richest man in Ireland to-day. He is highly respected, has married into the nobility, is a great favorite with the king, is generous and philanthropic, encourages and patronizes both science and athletic sports, and is said to be "altogether a very good fellow." Another son is Lord Ardilaun, who is equally rich and popular, and owns several of the finest estates in the kingdom. Sir Benjamin expended $1,200,000 in restoring St. Patrick's Cathedral, and Lord Iveagh, his son, added $350,000 more. The driver of the jaunting car that carried us there told me how many billion of glasses of beer those gifts represented, and made some funny remarks about all the profit being in the froth. But if all men were to make such good use of their money there would be no reason to complain.