TWILIGHT SCENERY. 109 



play. They were very numerous, and exhibited a greater 

 variety than those of the other warrens that I had as yet 

 visited. We selected some of the gayest colour for our practice, 

 and whiled an hour away, until a summons from the cook 

 recalled us to the village. 



The spillets had provided us sumptuously with flat-fish, 

 and a present of shrimps and lobsters completed oar cuisine. 

 The best house in the island had offered us its accommo- 

 dation, and there was an appearance of comfort and rustic 

 opulence in the furniture, that we had not anticipated when 

 we landed. 



There are numerous chances and godsends incident to these 

 islands, which the other lines of sea-coast seldom obtain. 

 Frequent and valuable wrecks furnish the inhabitants with 

 many articles of domestic utility. The drift timber from the 

 Atlantic gives them an abundant supply for the building and 

 repairs of boats and houses ; and immense quantities of sea- 

 fowl feathers are annually collected upon the Black Rock, 

 which is contiguous to Inniskea. The island affords excellent 

 pasturage for sheep ; and thus timber, feathers, and wool, 

 enable the inhabitants to have domestic comforts in abundance. 

 In winter, the take of cod, hake, and ling, is inexhaustible ; 

 peats are excellent and plenty, and food and fuel are conse- 

 quently never scarce in Inniskea. 



These are, doubtless, great advantages over the interior 

 districts, but they are barely necessary to compensate the 

 other local inconveniences. Throughout the greater portion 

 of the winter, all communication with the main is interrupted. 

 The sick must die without relief, and the sinner pass to his 

 account without the consolations of religion. Should anything 

 beyond the produce of the island be requisite in the stormy 

 months, it must be procured with imminent danger; and 

 constant loss of life and property, forms the unhappy theme of 

 the tales and traditions of this insulated people. 



A calm and misty twilight had fallen on Slieve More, and 

 abridged the almost boundless range of ocean, over which 

 the eye passed when we first landed. At a little distance the 

 village girls were milking, carolling those melancholy ditties 

 to which the Irish are so partial. I strolled among the rocks, 

 and chose the narrow path, which the full tide left between 

 its margin and the cliffs. The moon was rising now in 

 exquisite beauty the water was rippling to the rocks one 



