_Around about Lough Swilly_
To a tired New Yorker who has sixteen days at his disposal I would
recommend a day on Lough Swilly at Rathmullan. It is separated from
the island of Manhattan by little else than the Atlantic, and every
one knows that a sea voyage is good for a wearied man.
Take a boat for Londonderry from the foot of Twenty-fourth Street, and
then for the mere cost of a shilling (if you travel third class, and
that is the way to fall in with characters) you will be railroaded and
ferried to Rathmullan, where you'll find as clean an inn and as
faithful service as heart could wish. And such scenery!
And every one will be glad to see you, because you are from America.
("Welcome from the other side," and a hearty hand grip from leathery
hands.)
Of course a day is a short time in which to get the full benefit of
the peaceful atmosphere of the place and perhaps you will stay on as
we are doing for several days.
Then you can return for a shilling to 'Derry, take Saturday's steamer
to the foot of Twenty-fourth Street, New York, and you'll soon be
walking the streets of the metropolis filled with pleasant memories of
one of nature's beauty spots.
Lough Swilly is an arm of the Atlantic and its waters are salt. At
Rathmullan the lough is surrounded by lofty green hills, mostly
treeless, gently sloping to the water, and for the better part of the
time softened in tone by an Indian summer haze indescribably
beautiful.
We came down according to the program I have outlined, and traveled
third class for the reason I have stated, but as the only other
occupant of the coach was a lone "widow woman" we were unable to get
any characteristic conversation. In fact, up here in Donegal, as far
as I have observed, the natives talk more like the Scotch than they do
like the Irish made known to us by certain actors. When I get south I
expect to hear rich brogues, but here the burr is Scotch.
We were ferried from Fahan in a side-wheel steamer, and soon the
painfully neat-looking white houses of Rathmullan lay before us and we
disembarked, and carrying our own grips unmolested (a sure sign of an
unusual place) we made our way up the stone pier between restless
steers who were waiting for us to get out of the way so that they
could go to the slaughter house. There had been a cattle fair that day
in Rathmullan.
We knew little of the town save what Stephen Gwynn says of it in his
delightful "Highways and Byways in Donegal and Antrim."
There is a most picturesque and ivy-grown ruin of an abbey dating
back to the fifteenth century. It is much more beautiful than
Kenilworth.
We bent our steps to the plain-looking little inn, and entering the
taproom we asked for lodgings for the night. The inn is kept by a
widow who still bears trace of a beauty that must have been
transcendent in her girlhood. As it is, she could serve as a model to
some artist for an allegorical painting representing "Sorrowful
Ireland"; the arched eyebrows, the melting eyes, the long, classic
nose, and the grieving mouth--very Irish and very lovely.
We have seen many pretty women here in Ireland, but in her day this
inn keeper must have been the peer of any.
Her husband kept the inn formerly, but as an Irishman told me, "He
died suddenly. Throuble with the head," said he, tapping his own.
"'Twas heart disease, I think." This is the first Irish bull I've
heard.
[Illustration: TO THE MEN OF
'98 OLIVER SHEPHARD, SCULPTOR]
My companion thought he would like a room fronting Lough Swilly and so
did I.
The maid who had taken charge of us said that that wouldn't be
possible, as the only available rooms having such an outlook had been
engaged by wire.
"But," said my insistent friend, who is the type of American who gets
what he wants by smiles if possible, but who certainly gets it, "they
won't be here to-day, will they?"
"No, not to-day; to-morrow."
"Well, let us have the rooms for to-night."
"But, will ye give them up when they come?" said she, still
hesitating.
"Surely. Depend upon it. Count on us to vamoose just as soon as you
give the word."
"But these people come every year," said she tenaciously.
"I don't wonder at it," said O'Donnell. (My friend is of Irish
descent.) "I would, too, if I didn't live so far away. Don't you
worry, honey. We'll just go out like little lambs as soon as you give
the word."
There was something delightfully quaint in the notion that because
people were coming to the rooms to-morrow night we ought not to have
them to-night--the girl was perfectly sincere. She evidently knew the
lure of sunrise on the mountains and the lake and feared her ability
to oust us once we were ensconced.
"We're passing on to-morrow and will be _just_ as _careful_ of the
rooms," said O'Donnell in the tone of one who talks to a child, and
the pretty maid succumbed, and our valises were deposited in the
coveted rooms.
But just as she left us she said once more, "You'll go when they come,
won't you?"
"We sure will," said O'Donnell, with a solemnity that carried
conviction with it. "Now about dinner," said he; "we'd like dinner at
six thirty. It's now four."
"We haven't begun to serve dinners at night yet," said the maid. The
summer season had evidently not begun.
"Oh, that's too bad," said O'Donnell, "but you'll make an exception in
our case now, won't you?"
She thought a minute, and O'Donnell smiled on her.
I can imagine ice banks melting under that smile.
"I suppose we could give you hot roast chicken," said she.
"Why, of course you could. Roast chicken is just what you _could_ give
us, and potatoes with their jackets on----"
"And soup," said the girl, evidently excited over the prospect.
"Yes, we'll leave the rest to you."
So we went out and walked through the lovely countryside, noting that
in Ireland fuchsias grow to the proportions of our lilac bushes and
are loaded with the pretty red flowers.
We were unable to name most of the trees we saw (but that sometimes
happens in America), yet we were both sure we had not seen their like
at home. And the freshness of them all, the brilliant quality of their
green, fulfilled all expectations.
We took a long walk and arrived at the inn with appetites sharpened.
Friends in America had told me that I'd not fare very well in Ireland
except in the large towns. I would like to ask at what small
hotel--New York or Chicago or Philadelphia--I would get as well cooked
or as well served a dinner as was brought to me in Londonderry for
three shillings and sixpence.
If one is looking for Waldorf magnificence and French disguises he'll
not find them here unless it is at Dublin, but if one is blessed with
a good appetite and is willing to put up with plain cooking I fancy he
will do better here than at like hotels at home.
[Illustration: PROSPERITY IN LIMERICK]
The Irish are such good cooks that we in the east (of America) have
been employing them for two generations. Let us not forget that.
We entered the dining-room and had an appetizing soup and then the
Irish potatoes (oh, such Irish potatoes!) and anything tenderer or
better cooked than the chicken it would have been hard to find. We
looked at each other and decided that we would not go on to Port Salon
next day, but would spend another night in Rathmullan, and we said so
to the maid.
"But you'll take other rooms?" said she, alarmed at once.
"Oh, yes, honey, we'll go anywhere you put us."
Now you know we had an itinerary, and to stay longer at Rathmullan was
to cut it short somewhere else, but the stillness and calm, the purple
shadows on the mountains and the lake (Lough Swilly means Lake of
Shadows), had us gripped and we were content to stay and make the
most of it.
A simple, golden rule sort of people the inhabitants are. We came on a
man clipping hawthorn bushes and asked him how far it was to a certain
point and whether we could "car" it there.
He told us we could and then he said, "Were ye thinkin' of hirin' a
car, sir?"
"Yes," said O'Donnell.
"I have one," said he.
"Well," said O'Donnell, "we've talked to the landlady about hiring
hers----"
"Ah, yes," said the man. "Sure I don't want ye to take mine if she
expects to rint hers."
Such altruism!
We had comfortable beds in the rooms that had been engaged by wire
"for to-morrow," and indeed they were so comfortable that we never saw
the sunrise at all. But the view from our windows was worth the price
of the rooms and that was--listen!--two shillings and sixpence
apiece!
Wheat porridge and fresh eggs (oh, so fresh!) and yellow cream and
graham bread and jam for breakfast. What more do you want?
Oh, yes, I know your kind, my dear sir.
"What! no steak? No chops, and fried ham and buckwheat cakes and
oranges and grapefruit and hot rolls? What sort of a hotel is this
for an American? You tell the landlady that they don't know how to run
hotels in this country. You tell her to come to God's country, that's
what. Then she'll learn how."
Yes, then she'll learn how to set out ten or twelve dinkey little
saucers of peas and corn and beans and turnips and rice, all tasting
alike.
But Mr. O'Donnell and I will continue to like the simplicity of this
inn.
We astonished the easy-going natives by climbing the mountain on Inch
Island in the morning for the magnificent view and going fishing for
young cod in the afternoon. The young fellow who took us out had the
somewhat Chinese name of Toye, but he was Irish.
When it came time to settle for the use of the boat and his services
for a matter of two hours he wanted to leave it with us.
"No, sir," said O'Donnell. "Your Uncle Dudley doesn't do business that
way," with one of his beaming smiles.
"Oh, I don't know what to charge, sir, pay me what's right."
"That's just it. I don't know what's right."
"Well, ye were not out so long. Is two shillin's apiece right?"
"Very good, indeed, and here's sixpence extra for you," said
O'Donnell, paying him.
"Oh, thank you, sir," said the boy, evidently thinking the tip far too
much.
But as we had caught forty-eight fish in the hour we were at the
fishing grounds we felt that it was worth it. Sixpence--and to be
sincerely thanked for it! There are those who are not money grubbers.
[Illustration: MACKEREL SELLER, BUNDORAN, DONEGAL]
They use a tackle here that they call "chop sticks"--two pieces of
bamboo fastened at right angles, from which depend the gut and hooks,
while back of them is the heavy sinker. The sinker rests on the bottom
and the ugly red "lugs" (bait) play around in the water until they are
gulped by the voracious coddlings, or cod. We had small hooks and
caught only the youngsters.
Time after time we threw in our lines, got "two strikes" at once and
pulled in two cod as fast as we could pull in the line.
No sport in the way of fight on the part of the party of the second
part, but not a little excitement in thus hauling in toothsome food.
We had them for supper and I tell you, O tired business man, if you
want to know how good fish can taste, come over here and go
a-fishin'. Like us you will stay on and on.
Oh, yes, about those other people. No, we didn't get out of our rooms,
because the landlady had relatives in America and so she made other
arrangements for her expected guests and we stayed on and overlooked
Lough Swilly.
Americans are popular over here. But I hope they won't spoil these
simple folk with either excessive tipping or excessive grumbling.