The Castle of Aughnanure, though greatly dilapidated by time, and probably still more so by the great hurricane of last year, is still in sufficient preservation to convey to those who may examine its ruins a vivid impression of the domestic habits and peculiar household economy of an old Irish chief of nearly the highest rank. His house, a strong and lofty tower, stands in an ample court-yard, surrounded by outworks perforated with shot-holes, and only accessible through its drawbridge gateway-tower. The river, which conveyed his boats to the adjacent lake, and supplied his table with the luxuries of trout and salmon, washes the rock on which its walls are raised, and forms a little harbour within them. Cellars, bake-houses, and houses for the accommodation of his numerous followers, are also to be seen; and an appendage not usually found in connection with such fortresses also appears, namely, a spacious banqueting-hall for the revels of peaceful times, the ample windows of which exhibit a style of architecture of no small elegance of design and execution. We shall probably in some early number of our Journal give a genealogical account of the noble family to whom this castle belonged; but in the mean time it may be satisfactory to the reader to give him an idea of the class of persons by whom the chief was attended, and who occasionally required accommodation in his mansion. They are thus enumerated in an ancient manuscript preserved in the College Library:--O'Canavan, his physician; Mac Gillegannan, chief of the horse; O'Colgan, his standard-bearer; Mac Kinnon and O'Mulavill, his brehons, or judges; the O'Duvans, his attendants on ordinary visitings; Mac Gille-Kelly, his ollave in genealogy and poetry; Mac Beolain, his keeper of the black bell of St Patrick; O'Donnell, his master of revels; O'Kicherain and O'Conlachtna, the keepers of his bees; O'Murgaile, his chief steward, or collector of his revenues. The date of the erection of this castle is not exactly known, though it was originally inscribed on a stone over its entrance gateway, which existed in the last century. From the style of its architecture, however, it may be assigned with sufficient certainty to the middle of the sixteenth century, with the exception, perhaps, of the banqueting-hall, which appears to be of a somewhat later age. While the town of Galway was besieged in 1651 by the parliamentary forces under the command of Sir Charles Coote, the Castle of Aughnanure afforded protection to the Lord Deputy the Marquess of Clanricarde, until the successes of his adversaries forced him and many other nobles to seek safety in the more distant wilds of Connemara. This event is thus stated by the learned Roderick O'Flaherty in 1683:--