46 Walks in Ireland. [|Jult, 



name our mountains, who dared to call " the Altar of the Sun,"* Sugar- 

 loaf. Well, I have often longed to know who set the example to the 

 absentees, and I hope we will no longer gi-umble at our nobility for 

 abandoning their palaces to shopkeepers, when we see that our mountain 

 spirits led the fashion. 



I paused on the brow of the Long Hill to enjoy the prospect, and if 

 ever you chance to go there, I advise you to follow my example. In the 

 east, huge piles of clouds were huddling together over the sea, as if they 

 were going to sleep, while Sugar-loaf, like a tall sentinel, stood out boldly 

 in the fore ground ; southward, beneath my feet, lay Eniskerry, nestling 

 among its pleasant woods, with its fjmtastic pass " the Scalp" in the 

 distance, and stately Powerscourt beside it; and in the west, a gorgeous 

 sunset was piercing the thin grey mist that hung over Glencree, and 

 raining down purple and gold on the tops of its lofty mountains, while 

 their tall shadows threw into deeper gloom the dark chasm, where the 

 upper and lower Lough Bray lie buried. And this was " the Valley of 

 the Kings," — a lofty name for a wild glen traversed by a brawling 

 stream, with its unpeopled hills and solitary lakes. And who were ye, 

 the rulers in the desert, the monarchs of flood and fell, whose title has 

 outlived your name, and race, and language, to linger like an echo in 

 your native valley ? Did peace and plenty smile on your pati'iarchal 

 sway ? or did ye stoop from your mountain fastness, like the eagle from 

 his eyrie, on the flocks and herds of the imwarlike Lowlander ? Were ye 

 of the unbelieving race against whom Adrian lifts up his voice in pious 

 horror ? or did ye consecrate your domains, like the mysterious Valley of 

 the Seven Churches — the Tadmor in the desert of these lonely regions — 

 with gloomy rites of by-gone, antique superstition, whose very name has 

 perished with your own } All these things let the antiquarian settle, or 

 ratlier, I will settle them myself some other time, for I too, am of the 

 craft ; but in my present mood I would not exchange this grand and solemn 

 sunset view, for all the monastic dogmatism, and sullen, sententious, but 

 profitable ignorance, that ever Leland or Ledwicli gulled the world with. 



Slowly and imperceptibly the features of the landscape changed, like 

 the altered aspect of an inconstant friend : the warm and glowing tints 

 faded away into the dull grey unformity of twilight ; and casting " one 

 longing, lingering look behind," I addressed myself to my journey. A 

 wild upland road of a few miles brought me to the rustic, comfortable 

 auberge of Roinidwood, where poor old Judy (every one who has ever 

 visited the County of Wicklow will remember her) stood ready to receive 

 me, with her quiet, mirthful, twinkling eye, that age might dim, but care 

 could not, and her unchanging, lack-a-daisical, simpering smile, and well- 

 worn, venerable jests, with such a careless, fresh, and new-born air about 

 them, that thirty years old as they Avere, not a guest but chuckled at the 

 thought that they were inspired by his own good-humoured, wit- 

 creating fiice. Have you ever seen the kitchen of an Irish inn, a village 

 or a mountain inn, where one room serves for parlour, kitchen and all .'' 

 probably not, so I will take chance and describe it to you, or, as we say 

 in Ireland, tnscnsc* you about it. 



• This was the ancient Irish name of that most picturesque and singular looking peak- 

 From its castfrly situation, it is the first of the M'icklow mountains whicli is " kissed by 

 the morninf; lixht ;" besides, once upon a time, we ignorant Frish, in common with our 

 Phtrnician ancestors, and other barbarians, worshipped the sun ; you see we were always 

 making blunders. 



•f i. e. inform ; literally, put sense into you. 



