[ 188 ] 



XIII. 



FORTIFIED HEADLANDS AND CASTLES OX THE SOUTH 

 COAST OF MUNSTER. 



Pakt II. — From Akdmore to Dfnmoke, Co. "VVaterfokd. 



By THOMAS JOHNSON WESTROPP, M.A. 



Plates XX-XXI. 



Read June 22. Published August 27, 1914. 



The coast of Co. "Waterford must be studied along with that of Co. Cork to 

 give us a wider raw of the fortified headlands of Southern Ireland. Together 

 they give us a typical collection of these antiquities. The coast which we 

 now study is less broken than that of Cork, where the endless long creeks, so 

 beautifully wooded and so sheltered, meet us at regidar intervals and add so 

 much to the distances and the difficulty of exploration of the cliffs between 

 them. Here, the only considerable breaks are the creek of Dimgarvan, with 

 its great intake, behind the sandy spit of the warrens, and the wide sand- 

 filled bay of Tramore. The coast, however, if more accessible, is even more 

 troublesome to explore on foot, for its edge is cut through at close intervals 

 by deep, and sometimes precipitous, stream-glens, between which the sections 

 are often termed " islands." Though without the varied loveliness of Kerry 

 and Cork, and the gloomy, rampart-like grandeur of Clare and Mayo, the cliffs 

 are very picturesque. The bold headlands, with outlying stacks, reefs, and 

 islets, assume every fantastic shape, resembling towers, oratories, rows of cruel 

 fangs, and monsters, underarched by caves and bridges. The rocks, unlike 

 those north of the Shannon, are very varied in colour — red, dark brown, 

 lichened with grey or tawny-gold, draped with slopes of rich green velvet or 

 purple and gold with gorse and heather-bells. Far-reaching, often for over 

 thirty miles, are the views that we gain from the salient points, reaching from 

 the silver sparks of light that are the towers of Hook and Tramore to the 

 lighthouse of Mine Head. Inland, for many miles, run the long yellow lines 

 of furze-clad fences, and, beyond, are the huge blue peaks and scalloped 

 " cooms " of Knockmeildon and the Comeraghs. To the other side towards 

 the sun, shimmers the frosted gold of the unbounded sea ; peregrines, choughs, 

 gulls, ravens, and cormorants enliven every " jutty, frieze, buttress, or coign 



