DAPPING ON LOUGH DERG 



By Sir THOMAS GRATTAN ESMONDE, Bart., M.P. 



" May-fly rising ; come at once." 



This telegram on my London breakfast-table puts thought 

 of all else out of my head. The irresistible call of the wild 

 is in my ears ; and nothing else matters. 



A visit to the fishing-tackle makers ; the rest of the day 

 devoted to the settling-up of such odds and ends of business 

 as can be settled, leaving the remainder to settle themselves ; 

 and by 8.45 p.m. I have done with the dust and din of the Great 

 City, and glide out from Euston into the night. 



The opal-tinted hills of Wicklow smile a welcome, as the 

 mail-boat enters Dublin Bay next morning. Our breakfast- 

 car waits us on the Kingstown jetty ; Dublin is soon left 

 behind. By 9.30 the train has dropped me at the little way- 

 side station — its station-house buried in yellow laburnums — on 

 the border of the promised land. 



An hour's drive brings us to a grey village nestling among 

 leafy trees, where we stop at the Post Office, ostensibly to give 

 directions about letters and suchlike abominations, but in 

 reality to shake hands with the genial old postmaster, while 

 the young ladies of the establishment cluster round ; and 

 between them we are told of all the things of moment in the 

 district since our last visit a year agone. Of how Father Pat 



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