THE WEST, PAST AND PRESENT. 383 



To overcome their early lounging gait and slovenly 

 habits, is found by military men a troublesome task ; 

 and while the Tipperary man speedily passes through 

 the hands of the drill-sergeant, the Mayo peasant requires 

 a long and patient ordeal, before a martial carriage 

 can be acquired, and he be perfectly set-up as a soldier. 

 These defects once conquered, none are better cal- 

 culated for the profession. Hardy, active, patient 

 in wet and cold, and accustomed to indifferent and 

 irregular food, he is admirably adapted to endure the 

 privations and fatigue incident to a soldier's life on 

 active service — and in dash and daring, no regiments 

 in the service hold a prouder place than those which 

 appertain to the kingdom of Connaught. 



It is said that the physical appearance of the Irish 

 peasantry deteriorates as the northern and western 

 sea-coasts are approached ; and, certainly, on the 

 latter the population are very inferior to that of the 

 adjacent counties. Even the inhabitants of different 

 baronies in the same county, as their locality advances 

 inland, will be found to differ materially ; and in an 

 extensive cattle-fair, the islander will be as easily dis- 

 tinguished from the borderer, whether he be on the 

 Galway or Roscommon frontier, as from the stock- 

 master of Leinster, or the jobber from the North. 



Indeed, fifty years back, the communication between 

 the islands and the interior was so difficult and 

 unfrequent, that the respective occupants looked on 

 each other as very strangers. Naturally, slowly as 

 civilization crept westward, the islands and remoter 

 coasts, from local causes, were last visited, and many 

 curious circumstances to this day would prove it. In 

 this age of machinery, when the minutest matters are 



