THE TECHNOLOGIST. .[March 1, 1865. 



360 IRISH BOG-OAK ORNAMENTS. 



Sweden. The project was successful, and amongst the pupils one of 

 the name of Thomas Rogers attained to such excellence that his work 

 will safely bear comparison with the best artists of any country. He 

 is, of course, in full business. Erom time to time he comes down from 

 his retired home, a glen in the Dublin mountains, known by the poetic 

 name of Glen-na-Smohl, or the " Valley of the Thrush," receives his 

 orders, takes home his wood, and returns in due time with his work 

 executed in the most exquisite manner. This year he executed for Mr. 

 Johnson, of Suffolk-street, one of the most elaborate and beautiful 

 pieces of work that has ever been produced in Ireland — the large bog- 

 oak box made for the purpose of holding the Irish lace presented to the 

 Princess of Wales by the ladies of Ireland, the box being a gift to her 

 from the Irish gentry. 



It is not easy to estimate the amount of the sales of bog-oak work. 

 Mr. Johnson sells between 4,000Z. and 5,000?. a year, and Mr. Samuel 

 M'Connell and others do a proportionately large business. It is to be 

 regretted that a very inferior imitation is produced in England made of 

 common deal, stamped and coloured, which is sold as genuine Irish 

 carved bog-oak. It can, however, deceive only the very ignorant or 

 the very unwary. 



The stranger who visits Dublin may dispose of an idle hour very 

 agreeably in the inspection of the shops where these bog-oak ornaments 

 are sold. The principal establishments are those of Mr. Johnson and 

 Mr. Goggin already alluded to, and of the brother of the latter in 

 Grafton-street, and those of Mr. Samuel in Nassau-street and Mr. John- 

 son in Fleet-street. Articles of very much the same character may be 

 seen in them all : antique sculptured crosses in high relief, round 

 towers, abbeys, antique brooches and fibulae, harps, shamrocks, and 

 other national emblems, besides a multitude of articles used in the 

 boudoir and the drawing-room. 



Unhappily, there are not many Irish manufactures ; it is a duty to 

 encourage those that do exist. Thty will in time become better as well 

 as more numerous. We have strung faith, not only in the capabilities 

 of the country — so fertile in raw materials of every available and useful 

 kind — but in the power of its people to turn them to valuable account. 

 — ' The Ait Journal.' 



