The Zoologist — February, 1869. 1551 



On one of my incursions into the Bog of Allen, near its southern 

 extremity, I visited the ruins of Monaincha. In former times it ap- 

 pears what is now bog was a lake, in which were two islands, and even 

 a century ago they are said not to have been accessible except in 

 boats, the present drainage being choked by fallen trees : the 

 old islands are a little raised above the level of the surrounding bog, 

 and on them are the very ancient monastic ruins. Little of their struc- 

 ture can now be made out; but as the account given by Cambrensis, 

 who visited them in the reign of King John, about a. d. 1185, is curious, 

 and may be new to many of the readers of the ' Zoologist,' I venture 

 to transcribe it : — " In North Munster is a lake containing two isles ; 

 in the greater is a church of the ancient religion, and in the lesser a 

 chapel, wherein a few monks called Culdees devoutly serve God. In 

 the greater isle no woman or any animal of the feminine gender ever 

 enters but it immediately dies. This has been proved by many experi- 

 ments. In the lesser isle no one can die ; hence it is called Insula 

 Viveutum : often people are afflicted with diseases in it, and are almost 

 in the agonies of death ; when all hopes of life are at an end, and the 

 sick man would rather quit the world than lead longer a life of misery, 

 they are put into a little boat and wafted over to the larger isle, where 

 as soon as they land they expire." I cannot say whether ladies ever 

 venture to visit these interesting ruins; perhaps the drainage of the 

 lake has broken the charm, but I will not guarantee their safety. 



Amongst the Irish state papers there is a record relative to Mona- 

 incha, which exhibits a curious and melancholy picture of the state of 

 Ireland in the early part of Queen Elizabeth's reign. Commissioners 

 (two of whom rejoiced in the elegant cognomens of Dermoyd O'Towgha 

 and Dermoyd Oge O'Dolgen) who were appointed to inquire as to " all 

 land and all and singular other things for the Queen," report that the 

 Monastery of the Virgin Mary in the island, of the living with all its 

 profits, belongs to the Queen, and valued the land of the Priory in 

 arable and pasture, comprising 533 acres, at £4 2s. 2d. The O'Mores 

 and the O'Connors, and the rest of the O's of the period, are described 

 as perpetually in array against the English Government; the country 

 about Monaincha was alternately wasted by the English and Irish 

 forces; the labour of the plough ceased, and the miserable peasants 

 deserted their cabins and withdrew to the mountains and bogs to 

 prolong a wretched existence. 



Dr. Ledwich's ' Antiquities of Ireland,' published in 1803, contains 

 a curious paragraph relative to the great extinct deer {Megaceros 



