618 Scenes in the Irish Highlands Cunnemara. |_JUNE, 



of water, strewed with barren islands, and skirted with flat desolate shores, with 

 nothing to seize the eye, save here and there a mined castle, or the bleak unfinished 

 residence of a Lynch or a Bodkin. The face of the country round about, divided 

 and subdivided into numberless minute patches by dry stone fences, presents a 

 dreary aspect; when it is wild, it has none of the bold features that make wildness 

 picturesque ; when it is cultivated, such miserable cultivation would willingly be 

 exchanged for the most complete sterility. In short, nothing can be less interest- 

 ing than this stage of the journey ; we saw nothing worth notice except a natural 

 bridge formed by the working of a mountain stream through a solid ledge of rock, 

 and a surveyor measuring a new line of road with an apparatus, strikingly illustra- 

 tive of the state of the arts and sciences in Connaught to wit, a hay-rope ! Of 

 these two curiosities, the natural one is common in the county Galway. Except 

 that it is on a very reduced scale, it resembles exactly 'the phenomenon of the 

 "perte du Rhone" between Geneva and Lyons. The moment we entered Cunne- 

 mara, properly so called, the scenery grew interesting. The path lay along a con- 

 tinued chain of lakes ; and our gradual approximation to the highlands made the 

 features of the landscape more prominent and agreeable every step we advanced. 

 The mountains of Joyce-country (as the barony of Ross is popularly called), and the 

 singular chain of Beanabola, or " The Twelve Pins," exhibited to the right, and in 

 front, their magnificently irregular outline, and were rendered additionally strik- 

 ing by the contrast of their dark blue colour with the light tint of the sky. Some 

 of the lakes just mentioned have much beauty. One in particular drew our admi- 

 ration, being distinguished by the rare ornament of an island clothed with a fine 

 oak copse. A little beyond this we stopped to dine at a kind of inn, well known in 

 the country by the name of Flinn's, or the Half- Way-House, This solitary place 

 afforded better cheer than its situation or aspect promised ; the small sheep which 

 we thought picturesque objects upon the hills, we now found to be excellent mut- 

 ton upon the table ; and here for the first time we tasted the " potsheen" which, 

 next to the manufacture of a celebrated species of worsted stocking, is the chief 

 branch of industry in Cunnemara. I had nearly omitted to mention that travelling 

 from the town of Galway into the Highlands, is called, in the native phraseology, 

 "going back." The meaning of course is, going into the back or remote parts of the 

 country; but it puzzled us extremely at first, and led to some humorous mistakes. 

 " Your honours are going back ?" said a fellow with whom we had entered into 

 discourse a little before we came to Flinn's. " No," was the reply ; for we natu- 

 rally considered we were going forward. " Oh then, by my show], ye's have lost 

 your way," rejoined the mountaineer, who concluded it was the town of Galway we 

 had in view. 



As we had walked from Oughterard, a distance of ten miles, it was with no reluc- 

 tance that we now mounted ponies. We had sixteen miles to travel to reach that 

 place, and, as three miles an hour was the swiftest rate at which it was practicable 

 to ride upon so rugged a road, this was looked upon as a long journey. However, 

 if it was long, it made amends by its splendour. Every thing like tameness began 

 rapidly to disappear; it was soon not the distant prospects only that were picturesque, 

 but the scenery, with which we were almost in contact. The mountains approached 

 nearer, and rose abruptly out of the lakes ; the passes seemed to open ; and the eye 

 caught romantic glimpses of other mountains beyond and wild glens between ; 

 while at the same time the shifting elevations and directions of the road, which had 

 been previously tolerably straight and level, had the usual effect in diversifying the 

 views. Loch Garromin is lovely as well as wild. To the right, and considerably 

 below the level of the road, it lay, on a serene September evening, at perfect repose, 

 reflecting vividly a fine impending hill, to which the heath gave a pink hue exqui- 

 sitely soft and beautiful. Between the road and the edge of the lake is the demesne 

 and house of Dean Mahon, a dignitary of the establishment, the former finely 

 planted, though not by the hand of nature ; the latter (as far as the trees that em- 

 bosom it enabled us to judge) a small plain edifice tastefully suited to the situation 

 it occupies. A second lake, much inferior to the first in size, adds considerably to 

 the attractions of this place, which is sweet as well as romantic, the only spot 

 perhaps in Cunnemara of which that description can be given. If at Garrornin we 

 felt surprise at the little that has been said in praise of scenery of so high an order, 



