112 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



merely contains extracts from the Annals of the Four Masters,' Archdall. 

 and other printed sonrces. 



Fiuther accounts of the huildingB will be found in Petrie's " Ecclesiastical 

 Architecture," with some valuable woodcuts, showiug the state of St. Caimin's 

 in the first half of the last centuiy. Petiie ignores the other buildings. A 

 few of the inscribed slabs ai-e noted in his " Christian Inscriptions." The 

 ubiquitous S. C. Halls have a brief and popular account, which is not over- 

 burdened with accuracy, at p. 429 of the third volume of their gossiping 

 work on Ireland. E. R Brash contributed an illustrated description, in 

 spite of some blemishes by far the best that has hitherto appeared, to the 

 " Gentleman's Magazine " (1866, vol i. p. ~). In lx)rd Duuraven's "iN'otes on 

 Irish Architecture " is a good account of St. Caimin's, with two very valuable 

 photogi-aphs. We need only mention the short acco\mt in Dwyer's 

 " Killaloe." In the Journal of the Boyal Societj' of Antiquaries of Ireland, 

 voL xix, p. Ifii, is a paper on the island which, I understand, was put together 

 hurriedly at short notice, and bears all the marks of that unfortimate 

 circumstance. In the valuable survey of the Clare Churches by the inde- 

 fatigable Mr. Westropp' is a short but accurate summary of the features of 

 the churches on the island, ilr. Champneys, in liis " Irish Ecclesiastical 

 Ai-chil€ciure," gives some photographs, accompanied by useful and sensible 

 obser^•ations. 



The last event iu the history of the island to which we need allude is the 

 restoration of the churches under the Board of Public "Works. This took 

 place in 1879. It would appear that pre\-iously to this, in 1875, the Scariff 

 fcoai-d of Guardians had walled in the cemetery beside St. Caimin's, inspired 

 to this action by the letter of Professor O'l>ooney from which extracts have 



' This gives OT)onovan a welcome opportunitj", of which he avails himself to the full, 

 of flaying Charles O'Conor for his mistake in the matter of Coscrach the Anchorite. 

 Here is a sample of his elegant references to a fellow- worker : "Is it not extraordinary 

 to find a learned doctor come forward in the first quarter of the 19th century to 

 humbug antiquarians [«k] with such forgeries [m'c] as the preceding ? But any paltry 

 shift to support a theory by which one makes himself [sic] famous or notorious. My 

 only ambition is to be known to posterity as a detester of forgers, fabricators and liars, 

 and more particularly of those who wish to make the world believe that they are 

 possessed of knowledge of which they are entirely ignorant." This savage attack (on 

 O'Conor's personal morals rather than his scholarship) is all because in copying a 

 manuscript he had the misfortune to expand a contraction wTongly, and to be led astray 

 by the result. That self-advertising cheap-jacks should seek an easy reputation at the 

 expense of others by fireworks of this kind is not surprising ; but it is melancholy to see 

 a scholar of the calibre of O'Donovan making such a ridiculous exhibition of himself. It 

 provokes the comment that his own work is not infallible, even in the light of the 

 knowledge of his time. 



' I'roceedings, R. I. A., ser. lu, vol. vi, p. 156. 



