139 
The people of Aran, with characteristic enthusiam, fancy, that 
at certain periods, they see Hy-Brasail, elevated far to the west in 
their watery horizon. This had been the universal tradition of the 
ancient Irish, who supposed that a great part of Ireland had been 
swallowed by the sea, and that the sunken part often rose and was 
seen hanging in the horizon: such was the popular notion. ‘The 
Hy-Brasail of the Irish is evidently a part of the Atalantis of 
Plato; who, in-his Timzeus, says, that that island was totally swal- 
lowed up by a prodigious earthquake. Of some such shock the isles 
of Aran, the promontories of Antrim, and some of the western 
islands of Scotland, bear evident marks. Modern philosophy does 
not dissent from this ancient hypothesis. There are various and un- 
equivocal marks, leading to a rational presumption, that great por- 
tions of this globe had been depressed and swallowed up by enor- 
mous masses of water, rushing in opposite directions. How could 
the ignorant Aranite receive such a notion except by immemorial tra- 
dition ? But, it is only to an unmixed, aboriginal people, that such 
a tradition as this could descend unimpaired, through the long and 
tedious stream of ages. 
Analogies may be easily multiplied, in the present contemplation. 
Enough, however, has been said to establish a conviction, that in 
no part of the Celtic regions are the Celtic habits, feelings, and 
language, better preserved than in the southern Isles of Aran. 
The following Statistic table, officially drawn up, gives a correct 
view of the amount of the population of the three Islands of Aran, 
with other particulars. 
