73 



4/A Atril 1882. 



The President, Robert Lloyd Patterson, Esq., in the Chair. 



Mr. R. Young, C.E., read 



NOTES ON BUN-A-MAIRGE ABBEY AND ITS 

 SURROUNDINGS. 



The reader at the outset referred to the great interest which 

 the north-eastern coast of the county Antrim possesses for the 

 artist and the antiquary. The cliff scenery all the way from 

 Larne to Portrush is probably unrivalled in respect of variety 

 and colouring, and the mural precipices of columnar basalt, 

 which attain their greatest height in Fair Head, near Bally- 

 castle, add a character of peculiar solemnity to the landscape. 

 Forming, as it did, a part of Dalriada, this portion of Antrim 

 was in very early times brought into close relations with the 

 western side of Scotland, and the little town which was founded 

 at the mouth of the Mairge river, and was known subsequently 

 as Markstown, seems to have been the chief port of communi- 

 cation on the Irish side. At a later time, the district of which 

 Ballycastle may be considered the centre, became the battle- 

 ground on which the rival clans of MacDonnels and M'Quillans 

 engaged in deadly strife, which only ended in the complete de- 

 feat of the M'Quillans in the year 1559, on the slopes of Slieve- 

 an-Aura, at the head of Glenshirsk. 



There seems no reason to doubt that it was one of the chief- 

 tains of the M'Quillans who erected the little Franciscan 

 monastery, of which we now see only some fragments in the 

 picturesque remains on the banks of the Mairge river. 



