CHAPTER XXXIX 



THE ARAN ISLANDS : AN OUTPOST OF IRELAND 



SOME twenty-five miles to the westward of Gal way, 

 and rising from the deep waters of the Atlantic, is a 

 group of three small islands, by name Innishmore, 

 Innishmaan, and Innishear. I think that on these islands 

 more primitive conditions prevail than in any part of Ireland, 

 for the islanders have little communication with the main- 

 land, and many of the older inhabitants have never left their 

 island homes. Innishmore, or the Great Island, is the largest 

 of the three. In length it extends to some eight miles, but 

 at its widest point is scarcely two miles across. Its principal 

 harbour is Kilronan, where the well-known Galway steamer, 

 ss. Dun Mngus, calls on her eagerly awaited trips, and where 

 there is much fishing activity during fine weather, both in 

 summer and winter. A couple of miles to the southward 

 there lies the small rounded island spelled in the charts as 

 Innishmaan, but more correctly Innis Meadhon, or Middle 

 Island. This island is the most primitive of the group, and 

 its people are said to be the most simple and unspoiled, while 

 their Gaelic is held to be the purest to be found throughout 

 Ireland. Bearing south again, one comes to the smallest 

 island of the group, known in the Erse as Innishear, or 

 Eastern Island. From the nearest point of the Clare coast 

 this island is scarcely five miles distant, yet there is little 

 communication with this part of the mainland. 



I shall not readily forget the first occasion on which I 

 attempted to visit these remote islands. An hour before 

 daylight, on a wild winter's morning, we shoved off from the 

 pier at Galway. The moon shone high in the heavens, but 



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