NOTES ON IRISH NATURAL HISTORY 571 



ferry-boat takes you across to the island of Achill. The sea 

 was very rough, the raft had broken adrift with the violence 

 of the waves, and the people said it was " too severe " to at- 

 tempt the passage. However, there appeared nothing worth 

 waiting for, so, after talking a good bit, the raft was obtained, 

 but directly I was on board a wave gave it a cant, and T un- 

 fortunately lost my centre of gravity, fell against a seat, and 

 in an instant lay sprawling on the bottom, having scarified 

 one shin in performing the summerset. I mention this, as a 

 hint to future pedestrians, because the wound was a constant 

 walking-companion the rest of my journey, and a considerable 

 drawback to its pleasure. At night I reached " the Settle- 

 ment," an establishment for the purpose of inducing the na- 

 tives to renounce the doctrines of the Church of Rome for 

 those of the Church of England. 



The island of Achill is more like a foreign land than any I 

 have visited ; the natives reside in huts, which a good deal 

 resemble those of the Esquimaux Indians ; they are without 

 chimneys or windows, and the roof seems continuous with 

 the walls : the interior is generally undivided, and is tenanted 

 by men, women, children, pigs and poultry, and often goats 

 and cows. These little cabins or huts are built in what may 

 be called loose clusters, varying from twenty to eighty in a 

 cluster ; these clusters or villages are sixteen in number, some 

 of them are summer residences only, and are entirely deserted 

 in the winter; — others winter residences only, and deserted 

 in the summer. The island of Achill is very mountainous : 

 it rises principally towards the west, where it attains a great 

 elevation, and then falls perpendicularly to the sea : it seems 

 like a remote corner of some vast continent, which has sunk 

 for ever beneath the waves : its soil, like that of the greater 

 part of the west of Ireland, is bog, or, as it is termed, turf, 

 and this is covered with heath and sedge, intermixed here 

 and there with a fine velvety turf. The inhabitants possess 

 a good number of cows, sheep, and goats ; the latter are al- 

 most invariably white, and ramble the mountains in large 

 flocks. The heaths are Calluna vulgaris, Erica cinerea and 

 Tetralix, of all which I found beautiful white varieties. Se- 

 dum anglicum occurs in great abundance on the rocks, and 

 Anagallis tenella forms, in many places, a pink turf, so pro- 

 fusely does it flower. 



In birds the island appears to be poor ; it is doubtless vi- 

 sited by a variety of sea birds, but I saw nothing but gulls 

 and terns. Eagles are very abundant, particularly (perhaps 

 exclusively) Aquila albicilla : and of hawks I saw several 

 species. The red-legged crow breeds in the cliffs; and I 



