Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 2: Great Britain and Ireland, Part 2
General
Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 2: Great Britain and Ireland, Part 2
Great Britain -- Description and travel; Ireland -- Description and travel
Walking toward the river, you have on either side of you, at Carlisle
Bridge, a very brilliant and beautiful prospect. The four courts and
their dome to the left, the custom-house and its dome to the right; and
in this direction seaward, a considerable number of vessels are moored,
and the quays are black and busy with the cargoes discharged from ships.
Seamen cheering, herring-women bawling, coal-carts loading--the scene is
animated and lively. Yonder is the famous Corn Exchange; but the Lord
Mayor is attending to his duties in Parliament, and little of note is
going on. I had just passed his lordship's mansion in Dawson Street--a
queer old dirty brick house, with dumpy urns at each extremity, and
looking as if a story of it had been cut off--a rasée house. Close at
hand, and peering over a paling, is a statue of our blest sovereign
George II. How absurd these pompous images look, of defunct majesties,
for whom no breathing soul cares a halfpenny! It is not so with the
effigy of William III., who has done something to merit a statue. At
this minute the Lord Mayor has William's effigy under a canvas, and is
painting him of a bright green picked out with yellow--his lordship's
own livery.
The view along the quays to the four courts has no small resemblance to
a view along the quays at Paris, tho not so lively as are even those
quiet walks. The vessels do not come above-bridge, and the marine
population remains constant about them, and about numerous dirty
liquor-shops, eating-houses, and marine-store establishments, which are
kept for their accommodation along the quay. As far as you can see, the
shining Liffey flows away eastward, hastening (like the rest of the
inhabitants of Dublin) to the sea.
In front of Carlisle Bridge, and not in the least crowded, tho in the
midst of Sackville Street, stands Nelson upon a stone pillar. The post
office is on his right hand (only it is cut off); and on his left,
Gresham's and the Imperial Hotel. Of the latter let me say (from
subsequent experience) that it is ornamented by a cook who could dress a
dinner by the side of M. Borel or M. Soyéld there were more such artists
in this ill-fated country! The street is exceedingly broad and handsome;
the shops at the commencement, rich and spacious; but in Upper Sackville
Street, which closes with the pretty building and gardens of the
Rotunda, the appearance of wealth begins to fade somewhat, and the
houses look as if they had seen better days. Even in this, the great
street of the town, there is scarcely any one, and it is as vacant and
listless as Pall Mall in October.
DUBLIN CASTLE [Footnote: From "Ireland: Its Scenery, Character, Etc."]
BY MR. AND MRS. S. C. HALL
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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