Some may think, especially natives of Ireland, that writing about Dublin
and its environs is mere waste of time, ink, and paper, seeing that there
is so much known about them already. It should, however, be remembered
that this book is intended for people who are not Irish, as well as for
the Irish themselves. But even the Irish, and above all, the natives of
Dublin, want to be told something that may be new to some of them about a
city which so many of them seem neither to love nor admire as they should.
There is, unfortunately, a certain class of people in Dublin who, although
many of them were born there, think that it is one of the most backward
and unpleasant places in Europe. They do not admire the beauty of its
environs, and will not acknowledge willingly that it has been improved so
much as it has been during the last twenty-five years. It has been
improved and beautified in spite of them. Those citizens of Dublin who
take no pride in it should go abroad and see as many cities as the author
of this book has seen, and they would come back with more just ideas
about Dublin. If there is any other city in Europe as large as Dublin,
with environs more beautiful, where life is more enjoyable, and where life
and property are more secure, it would be interesting to know where that
city is. Dublin is a great deal too good for a good many who live in it.
The history of Dublin may be said to commence with the Danish invasions of
Ireland. It is rarely mentioned in Irish annals before the time when the
Danes took it, and first settled in it in the year 836, according to the
Four Masters. It probably existed as a small city long before the Danes
got possession of it, and there is reason to believe that it was a place
of some maritime trade at a remote period. It is stated on legendary more
than on historic authority, that when Conn of the Hundred Battles and
Eoghan Mor divided the island between them in the third century, the
Liffey was, for a certain part of its length, the boundary between their
dominions; and that the fact of more ships landing on the north side of
the river than on the south side gave offence to Eoghan, who owned the
southern shore of the Liffey, and caused a war between the two potentates.
It is, however, hardly probable that Dublin was a place of much importance
before its occupation by the Scandinavians in the first half of the
ninth century.
[Illustration: SACKVILLE STREET (O'CONNELL STREET).]
The Irish name of Dublin is, perhaps, the longest one by which any city in
Europe is called. It is _Baile Atha Cliath Dubhlinne_, and means the town
of the ford of hurdles of black pool. In ancient Irish documents it is
generally shortened to _Ath Cliath_, and sometimes to _Dubhlinn_. We have
no means of knowing what was the size or population of Dublin in Danish
times; but long after it became the seat of English government in Ireland,
it extended east no further than where the city hall now stands in Dame
Street, no further west than James Street, and no further south than the
lower part of Patrick Street; both Patrick's cathedral and the Comb having
been outside the city walls.
We have no account of the first siege of Dublin by the Danes in 836. The
annals merely say that a fleet of sixty ships of Northmen came to the
Liffey, and that that was the first occupation of the city by them. The
Irish captured and plundered Dublin a great many times, but do not appear
to have ever tried to banish the Danes permanently out of it. It is
probable that the Irish found them useful as carriers of merchandise to
them from foreign countries; for seeing how often the city was captured
and plundered by the Irish, it is incredible that they could not have held
it had they chosen to do so. The Four Masters record its capture and
plunder by the Irish in A.D. 942, 945, 988, and 998. In 994 Malachy II.
sacked Dublin and carried off two Danish trophies, the ring of Tomar and
the sword of Karl; and in 988 he besieged it for twenty days and twenty
nights, captured it, and carried off an immense booty; and issued the
famous edict, "Every Irishman that is in slavery and oppression in the
country of the foreigners (Danes) let him go to his own country in peace
and delight." But the Irish were not always lucky in their attacks on the
Danes of Dublin, for in 917 Niall Glundubh, King of Ireland, was killed by
them, and his army defeated at Killmashogue, beyond Rathfarnham. He
evidently intended to take Dublin from the south, because it was so well
defended on the north by the Liffey. The battle usually known as the
battle of Clontarf was not fought in the locality now called by that name,
but between the Liffey and the Tolka. Where Amien Street is now was
probably the very centre of the battle-field. Here it may not be out of
place to make a remark on the curious fact that the Danes never made any
serious attempt to conquer Ireland after the battle of Clontarf, although
they were at the height of their power some six or eight years after by
the terrible defeat they gave the Saxons at Ashington, in Essex, which
gave Canute the crown of England. He thus became not only King of England,
but was King of Denmark and Norway as well--the most powerful potentate in
Christendom in his time. It is strange that historians have not taken any
notice of this extraordinary fact. There was comparatively little fighting
between the Irish and the Danes after the battle of Clontarf, although the
foreign people held Dublin until the arrival of Strongbow, and made a very
poor stand against him, for he captured the city with very little
difficulty. Dublin has hardly suffered what could be called a siege since
988, when Malachy II. took it from the Danes. When Strongbow held it, the
Irish under the wretched Roderick O'Connor marched a great army under its
walls, and were going to take it; but before they began siege operations,
and while they were amusing themselves by swimming in the Liffey,
Strongbow sallied out on them and totally defeated them. That was the last
serious attempt to besiege Dublin.
Dublin does not appear to have grown much until after the wretched, and
for Ireland terribly unfortunate, Jacobite wars were over. It grew and
prospered rapidly almost all through the eighteenth century when a native
parliament sat there; but from about 1820 until about 1870 there was not
very much either of growth or improvement in it. Since then, in spite of
what the census may show, it has grown considerably, and has been improved
immensely. It is not easy to see what has caused such improvement in
Dublin since 1870. The only way that the improvement in the state of the
streets, the pulling down of old buildings and the erection of new ones,
can be accounted for, is by the fact that the local government of the city
is in the hands of a different class of men from those who ruled it so
long and so badly up to about the time mentioned. When one considers all
that has been done since then in the paving of streets, the laying down of
new side walks, the tearing down of old buildings, the erection of
cottages for the working classes where rotten and pestiferous houses had
stood, the deepening of the river so that the largest ships can now enter
it, the extension and perfecting of the tram-car system, and other
improvements too numerous to mention, it strikes him as something
astonishing; but when it is remembered that all these improvements have
taken place in the face of declining trade, declining population, and
declining wealth in the country at large, what has been accomplished
becomes absolutely sublime. It shows clearly that there is a class of the
Irish people who, with all their faults, possess hearts and souls
"that sorrows have frowned on in vain,
Whose spirit outlives them, unfading and warm";
and that they never give up and never despair. Never has any city been so
much improved in so short a time, and in the face of such difficulties.
The improvements are still being carried on. If they are carried on for
another quarter of a century at the same rate at which they were carried
on during the last quarter of a century, Dublin will be one of the
cleanest, pleasantest, healthiest, and most beautiful cities in the world.
In an educational point of view, there are very few cities either in these
islands or on the Continent that offer more facilities for culture than
Dublin. Its new National Library is, for its size, one of the finest and
best organised and best managed in Europe. It is not a British Museum, nor
is it a Bibliotheque Nationale; and the citizens of Dublin who have
children who are fond of reading, and who wish to add to their store of
knowledge, ought to feel very well satisfied that their National Library
is _not_ like either the monstrous and little-good-to-the-masses
institution in London, or the still more monstrous and still less
good-to-the-masses institution in Paris. Those to whom time is of little
value can afford to wait during a considerable part of the day to get a
book from the great libraries of London and Paris; but for any one to whom
time is really valuable, to visit the great libraries mentioned as a
reader of their books, should, in most cases, be the last thing he should
think of.
There are three libraries in Dublin, of which two are free to any one
known as a respectable person--these are the National Library and the
Royal Irish Academy. To become a reader in Trinity College Library costs,
to a person known to be respectable, only a couple of shillings a year.
Seeing the facilities that are in Dublin for cultured people, or for those
who wish to become cultured, it is strange that it does not stand higher
as an educational centre. The three great libraries it contains--that is,
the National Library, Trinity College Library and the Royal Irish
Academy--contain almost every sort of book required for the most complete
education in every art and science known to civilised men. But one of the
grand advantages of these institutions, an advantage almost as great to
the people at large as the treasures they contain, is the fact that they
are not controlled by "red tapeism." The amount of trouble and downright
humiliation one has to go through to become a reader in the British Museum
of London, or in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris, is enough to deter
any but a person of nerve from seeking admittance to them as a reader. The
British Museum is not so bad in the matter of "red tapeism" as it might
perhaps be; but the Bibliotheque Nationale puts so many obstacles in the
way of those who desire to become readers, that it is little else than a
disgrace to Paris and to France. For ridiculous red tapeism it beats any
institution of its kind on earth. There are probably not three libraries
in the world more easy of access than the three Dublin ones that have been
mentioned, and in which there is less red tapeism, or more courtesy shown
to readers.
The buildings that have been recently erected in Kildare Street, Dublin,
the Library and the Museum, would be considered chaste and elegant in any
city in the world; and it is questionable if any buildings of their kind
can be found in any city to surpass them in architectural beauty. Even the
Picture Gallery and the Natural History Gallery, close to them in Leinster
Lawn, are very handsome buildings. If the front of Leinster House, facing
Kildare Street, were brightened up and made to look like its rear, the
whole group of buildings, including Leinster House itself, would form an
architectural panorama hardly to be surpassed anywhere; and if Dublin
contained nothing else worthy of being seen, it would make Dublin worth
travelling hundreds of miles to see.
But it is the Museum of Irish Antiquities that is, or that ought to be,
the glory of this splendid group of buildings, and it is the only one of
them with the management of which fault can be justly found. The way it
has been managed ever since the articles it contains were removed from the
Royal Irish Academy in Dawson Street is a disgrace to all Ireland, and a
blot on the Irish people. There is not room to show the public much more
than half the objects of antiquity. They are stowed away in drawers, and
have been so for nearly ten long years. They might as well be in the earth
from which they were recovered as be packed into drawers in a back room
where none but officials can see them. If there was a decent and proper
national spirit among the Irish people, such treatment of Ireland's
wonderful and unique antiquities would not be tolerated for a single week.
Her antiquities are among the chief glories of Ireland. In monuments of
the past she stands ahead of almost all countries save Greece and Egypt.
It is not alone in her ruined fanes, round towers, gigantic _raths_,
sepulchral mounds, and Cyclopean fortresses that she can boast of
antiquarian curiosities more numerous and more unique than those of almost
any other country, but also in her multitudinous articles in gold, bronze,
and iron. A good many of these--the greater part of them, perhaps--are in
positions where they can be seen; but thousands of them are where no one
but an official can see them. If the Irish antiquarian department were
properly arranged, and if _all_ the objects it possesses that have been
dug up from Irish soil were properly exhibited, Ireland could boast of an
exhibition of national antiquities greater, more entirely her own, and
more unique than that possessed by any other country in Europe.
Some may think that this statement is not true. They may point to the
enormous collection of antiquities in the museum in Naples. It is,
however, hardly fair to class the treasures of that museum with the
objects found in Ireland. It was the accidental calamity that befel
Herculaneum and Pompeii that stocked the museum in Naples. If that
calamity had not happened, it is all but certain that not a single object
in the Neapolitan museum would now be extant. It was by no accidental
calamity that the enormous number of Irish antique objects were brought to
light. They were found from time to time all over the country. There are
many private collections in the hands of private individuals in almost all
the large towns in Ireland, and a very large percentage of the bronze
objects in the British Museum were found in Ireland. No other country of
its size has yielded so many objects of a far-back antiquity. It seems a
pity that those who have so many private collections of antique objects in
so many parts of Ireland do not send them all to the Royal Irish Academy;
but if they are to lie there, stowed away in drawers in a back room, they
might better remain in the hands of private collectors. If there was a
real national press in Ireland, there would be such widespread indignation
awakened at the way Irish antiquities have been treated since they were
removed to the Museum in Kildare Street that those who manage it would be
_forced_ to treat one of the finest collections of its kind in the world
in a very different manner. Hardly a word has appeared in the Dublin press
protesting against the way the department of Irish antiquities has been
managed.
With all the advantages Dublin possesses over most of the European
capitals in great facilities for education, in cheap house rent as
compared with many other cities, in uncommon beauty of environs, very few
rich, retired people with families to educate, choose it for a residence.
It is not to be wondered at that wealthy English and Scotch people should
prefer to live in their own countries, but wealthy Irish people seem not
to desire to live in Dublin unless it is their native place. Ireland,
unfortunately, does not possess very many rich people, but she has at
least some outside of Dublin; but very few of these, even if they have
young, growing-up families, go to reside in the capital in order to
educate them. Some seem to think that outside of Trinity College, Dublin
has no advantages in an educational point of view worth speaking of. This
is not now the case. It is true that some years ago Trinity College was
the only institution in Dublin where high-class education could be
obtained, but it is not so any longer, since the rise of other educational
institutions. But it is in the excellence of its libraries, and the easy
access that there is to them, that Dublin offers such great advantages to
those who do not desire to enter Trinity College. There is, of course, a
much larger collection of books in the British Museum, and in many of the
Continental libraries, than there is in the libraries of Dublin; but
between red tapeism, and the greater number of readers that frequent those
places as compared with the Dublin libraries, it is safe to say that more
reading could be done and more knowledge gained by a student in one week
in a Dublin library than in two weeks in any of those enormous places
where there are such crowds and consequently such loss of time.
It is, however, hardly to be wondered at that Dublin has heretofore
attracted so few rich people to it. It got a name for being dirty and
ill-governed; and it has to be confessed that the name was, in a large
measure, deserved. Dublin _was_ dirty and _was_ badly governed, but it is
not now. A bad name lasts a long time, and is not easily got rid of; and
the improvements made in Dublin are of such recent origin that it is only
natural that outsiders should think it is still what it was thirty years
ago. Let Dublin continue to be improved for the next twenty years as it
has been during the twenty years that have elapsed, and it will be one of
the most attractive of the European capitals. It is not yet what it should
be; there are many things of many kinds in it which require improvement or
alteration; but so much good has been done already that it is only
reasonable to expect that still more will be done, and that the time
cannot be far distant when the city "of the black pool," badly as its
English translation may appear, will attract not only visitors from all
parts of the world, but rich people who will take up permanent abode
there, attracted by the educational advantages it will afford, by the
beauty and cleanliness of the city itself, and by the superlative beauty
of the country around it.
The situation of Dublin can hardly be called romantic. It is built at the
mouth of a river, and consequently not on high ground; but the site is
good, for the ground rises on both sides of the Liffey, making the
drainage easy. When the system of main drainage that is now being carried
out is finished, it will be one of the best drained cities in the world.
Dublin has not such a picturesque site as Edinburgh has, neither has any
other city in Europe; but outside of Edinburgh there are no objects of
scenic interest unless one goes forty or fifty miles away to see them. But
if the site of Dublin cannot be called picturesque, it can boast of having
some of the most beautiful, if not the largest, public buildings in the
world. For chasteness, harmony, symmetry, and grace, the Bank of Ireland,
if it has any equals at all in modern architecture, has very few. The
Custom House is one of the finest buildings in Europe. The new public
buildings, containing the National Library and the Museum, are gems of
architectural beauty; so are some of the banks, and so is the Great
Southern Railway Terminus, and so are many other public buildings. Dublin
cannot boast of possessing any building as large as St Paul's or the
Tuileries; but size and beauty are two different things.
But it is in its environs that Dublin stands ahead of all the capitals in
Europe, or, perhaps, of any other city of equal size in any country.
Because the beauties around Dublin were not described in the first
chapters of this work does not imply that they are much inferior to what
may be seen in other parts of the country. There is nothing like the Lakes
of Killarney in the environs of Dublin, and Dublin Bay is hardly equal to
Clew Bay; but barring those two gems of scenic loveliness, it is
questionable if there is, for beauty alone, leaving sublimity aside,
anything in Ireland that surpasses the immediate environs of Dublin,
without going further north than Howth, or further south than Bray. Every
inch of the country round Dublin has some peculiar scenic charm of its
own. The Botanic Gardens of Glasnevin are the most interesting and
beautiful in Europe; not so much for the care that has been taken of
them, or the quantity and variety of the plants that are in them, but
principally on account of the charming locality in which they are
situated. It is not meant to be implied that they are not well taken care
of, or that their collection of plants is not both rare and large. What is
meant is that had they the rarest and largest collection of plants to be
seen in any gardens in the world, they would not have the same attraction
were they situated in a less picturesque locality. If ever there was a
place made to spend a hot summer day in, it is these gardens, with their
murmuring river, their shaded, sunless walks, their gigantic trees and
deep glens. The place where the flower gardens of Glasnevin are would
still be beautiful if there wasn't a flower in it.
Its bay is the great scenic attraction round Dublin. It cannot be seen to
real advantage but from the south-west side of the hill of Howth. The bay
has very few islands, but its background of mountains on one side and
woodland on the other is so wonderfully fair, that were there myriads of
islands to be seen, they could hardly add to the wondrous beauty of the
view. What a Scotch mechanic said about the view of Dublin Bay from the
high land on the south-west of Howth the first time he was there will
give the reader a better idea of Dublin Bay than a whole chapter of
descriptions, and loses nothing by being expressed in the strong doric of
the north: "Ech, mon, I seed mony a bonny sicht in Scotland, but this
beats a'." There are many who think the view from Killiney Hill finer than
that from Howth. The view from the former takes in Sorrento Bay, which is
in reality part of the Bay of Dublin that can hardly be seen from Howth,
and also takes in many valleys in Wicklow and plains in the interior that
are not visible from Howth. It is not easy to say which of the views is
the finer; but either is worth travelling not only ten miles, but a
hundred miles, afoot to see.
In describing the beauties of Dublin Bay, it cannot be out of place to
give the finest poetic address to it that was ever written. It will be new
to most English and many Irish readers. The poem is by the late D. F.
M'Carthy:--
"My native Bay, for many a year
I've loved thee with a trembling fear,
Lest thou, though dear and very dear,
And beauteous as a vision,
Shouldst have some rival far away,
Some matchless wonder of a bay,
Whose sparkling waters ever play
'Neath azure skies elysian.
"'Tis love, methought, blind love that pours
The rippling magic round these shores,
For whatsoever love adores
Becomes what love desireth;
'Tis ignorance of aught beside
That throws enchantment o'er the tide,
And makes my heart respond with pride
To what mine eye admireth.
"And thus unto our mutual loss,
Whene'er I paced the sloping moss
Of green Killiney, or across
The intervening waters;
Up Howth's brown side my feet would wend
To see thy sinuous bosom bend,
Or view thine outstretched arms extend
To clasp thine islet daughters.
"My doubt was thus a moral mist,--
Even on the hills when morning kissed
The granite peaks to amethyst,
I felt its fatal shadow;
It darkened o'er the brightest rills,
It lowered upon the sunniest hills,
And hid the winged song that fills
The moorland and the meadow.
"But now that I have been to view
All that Nature's self could do,
And from Gaeta's arch of blue
Borne many a fond memento;
And gazed upon each glorious scene,
Where beauty is and power has been,
Along the golden shores between
Misenum and Sorrento;
"I can look proudly on thy face,
Fair daughter of a hardier race,
And feel thy winning well-known grace,
Without my old misgiving;
And as I kneel upon thy strand,
And clasp thy once unhonoured hand,
Proclaim earth holds no lovelier land
Where life is worth the living."
One great charm of the country around Dublin, like one of the great charms
of Killarney, is its diversity. There are mountain, bay, woodland, and
river. There is a variety of scenery in the immediate vicinity of Dublin
such as cannot be found so near any other European capital, and such as
not even Naples itself can boast of. Great indeed is the difference in the
style of scenery between the cliffs of Howth and the green lanes of
Clontarf, although both places are hardly more than four miles apart. To
go a few miles further from the city, Bray is reached. It is only
twenty-five minutes by train from Dublin. There one finds himself almost
within a gunshot of some of the most picturesque and peculiar scenery in
the world. The Dargle and Powerscourt Waterfall are in the same locality.
They are gems of loveliness that surpass anything of their kind in these
islands. Even Killarney has nothing like them. Their very smallness adds
to their charms. The Dargle is exactly what its name, _Dair-gleann_,
signifies, an oak-glen. It is a chasm some two or three hundred feet deep,
every inch of the sides of which is covered in summer-time with some sort
of tree, shrub, or flower. In its depths laughs or murmurs a limpid stream
that can rarely be noticed, such is the thickness and luxuriance of the
trees and shrubs that overhang it. Powerscourt Waterfall is close by the
Dargle. The river that forms it leaps down a rock nearly three hundred
feet in height, into a valley of brightest verdure, covered with a thick
growth of primeval oak-trees. An enchanting spot--which it is gross folly
to attempt to describe--in a land of towering hills and flower-crowned
rocks. Its wildness, winsomeness, and loveliness must be seen in order to
form anything like a just idea of it. And all within about twelve miles of
Dublin!
Then there is Howth on the north side, and only nine miles from Dublin,
one of the most wonderful spots of earth for its size in Europe. It is a
hill-promontory that juts out into nearly the middle of the bay, about
three miles in width and nearly the same in length. It is over five
hundred feet high, and in autumn is a pyramid of crimson and gold; for
wherever there are not trees or cultivation, there are furze and heath. A
place of wondrous beauty of its own, in no way like the Dargle or
Powerscourt. From the summit of Howth there is one of the most enchanting
and extensive views conceivable, reaching north to the Mourne Mountains
and east to Wales. And all this about nine miles from Dublin! Yet with all
these glories at her very feet, Dublin is still the Cinderella among the
capitals of Europe.
There is beauty of a "truly rural" kind within half-an-hour's walk from
the Dublin General Post Office, or from the centre of the city. Thackeray
said in his "Irish Sketch Book," half a century ago, that it was curious
how some of the streets of Dublin so suddenly ended in potato fields; but
the potato fields Thackeray saw there are all covered with houses now. It
is true, however, that on the north side of Dublin one gets into the real
country by walking only a quarter of an hour from the city limits; no sham
country of cabbage gardens, but real fields of grass and grain growing
from soil of the most exuberant fertility. Trees and hedgerows abound; so
do some of the best and most thrifty farmers in Ireland, who generally pay
enormous rents for their land. The country north of Dublin is almost
perfectly flat, while on the south side the mountains commence within a
few miles of the city limits. But flat as the country north of Dublin is,
it is one of the finest and most fertile parts of Ireland, and was known
in ancient times as Fingall, because some _Finn Galls_, or fair-haired
foreigners from Scandinavia settled in it when they ceased to plunder
churches and monasteries. Those who prefer a flat, well-wooded, and very
fertile country to a land of mountains and valleys, like that on the south
side of Dublin, should see the plains of Fingall.
It has been said that the gentle and refined are ever fond of flowers. If
this be so, the gentle and refined ought to be very plentiful in Dublin
and its environs, for in no other part of this planet known to man are
there as many wild flowers to be seen so near a great city as in the
environs of Dublin. This statement is made in sober earnestness, and with
absolute certainty as to its truth. It may be asked, if this is so, how is
it to be accounted for? It is easy of explanation. To begin, Ireland is,
_par excellence_, the land of wild flowers because of its moist, mild
climate and generally rich soil. Sunlight, when it is the burning sunlight
of southern climes, is death to flowers. Dublin enjoys a milder climate
than any city in Great Britain, although not so mild as Cork or some other
Irish southern cities. It is only a few miles from the mountains on the
south of Dublin to Howth on the north. Between Howth and the mountains,
if the whole of the mountains of Wicklow are counted and taking
inequalities of surface into account, for government surveys always mean
level surfaces, there are every autumn at least a hundred thousand acres
of wild flowers within half a day's journey of Dublin. It may be said that
these wild flowers are nearly all of one species--heath. That is true; but
heath, or heather as it is more frequently called, is a wild flower, and
one of the most beautiful that grows. The reason the Irish mountains
produce so much more heath than those of Great Britain is because they are
less rocky and more boggy, and are in a milder climate. The mountains of
Wales, being so stony, have hardly any heath on them. Then there is the
furze or gorse, as it is generally called in England. Heath and gorse
bloom side by side over thousands of acres in Howth and on the Dublin and
Wicklow mountains. Then there is the hawthorn. Where in these islands, or
on the continent of Europe, are there as many hawthorns to be seen on an
equal space of ground as in the Phoenix Park, Dublin? Let those who have
seen them in their snowy glory of white blossoms in the early summer
answer. But there are still other flowers that do certainly bloom in
greater luxuriance, and are more plentiful round Dublin than round any
other city in these islands--one of these is laburnum. Florists have said
that nowhere else does it bloom with such luxuriance as around the Irish
capital. Dublin is indeed seated in a flowery land, for it is well known
that even the rich soil of Ireland produces more wild flowers than the
rich soil of Great Britain. It is true that not only the flora but the
fauna of Ireland are less numerous in species than those of Great Britain.
There are a great many species of flowering plants that are common in the
larger island but unknown in the smaller one except in gardens. It is not
easy to account for this; but if there are fewer indigenous flowering
plants in Ireland than in Great Britain, the former country produces those
that are natural to it in much greater abundance than the latter. The
reason of this is easily understood. It is because the climate of Ireland
is milder and moister than that of Great Britain; and it is probable that
the soil is of a different quality in Ireland. But one thing is certain,
that not in England or in any European country are there such a quantity
of wild flowers to be seen as in Ireland. It is not alone on Irish bogs
and mountains that wild flowers are more abundant than in most other
countries, for the most fertile soil in Ireland, the best fattening land,
generally grows wild flowers in such abundance that pastures become
parterres.
Dublin and its vicinity are not quite so rich in antiquities as some other
parts of Ireland. Very few traces of the old Danish city have been left.
Its walls can be traced in some few places. But what sort of houses the
people lived in can only be guessed at. They were probably, for the most
part, built of wood; for it cannot be too often impressed on those who
have a taste for antiquarian studies, that in ancient, and even what is
generally known as mediaeval times, almost the entire populations of
northern countries lived in houses of wood or of mud, and sometimes in
houses made of both materials. For centuries after the art of building
with stone and mortar was well understood, stone houses were rarely used
by the masses either in towns or country places. They had stone-built
churches and round towers, and sometimes castles, but the people lived in
wooden or in mud houses. Dublin has more round towers in its immediate
vicinity than any other Irish city. There are three of them within a few
miles' distance. That of Clondalkin is on the Great Southern Railway; that
of Lusk is on the Great Northern; and that of Swords is only seven miles
from Dublin by road, and only two miles from Malahide Station on the Great
Northern. All these towers are in a good state of preservation; but the
one at Swords will soon be a ruin if the ivy, with which it has been
foolishly allowed to become completely covered, is not removed from it.
Ivy holds up for a time a building that is in a state of decay, but in the
long run it is sure to ruin it completely; for when the ivy becomes strong
enough, it forces its way between the stones, gradually displaces them,
and the building then tumbles down. If it is the Board of Works that has
charge of the Swords round tower, they are greatly to blame for allowing
the ivy to be gradually but surely bringing it to certain ruin. If it is
under the control of a private person, public opinion should compel him to
have the ivy removed from what was not long ago one of the most perfect
and best preserved of Irish round towers.
There is something connected with the census of Dublin published in Thom's
directory from official documents which may be more interesting to some
than any description of the Irish capital, however graphic. This something
is an evident error that has, by some means, been made in enumeration of
its inhabitants. According to the published census, there were in round
numbers 13,000 more people in Dublin in 1851 than in 1891; and only 14,000
more in county and city included in 1891 than in 1851. There is a gross
error here, for between the two epochs mentioned, the increase in what is
generally known as the metropolitan district has been so great that it is
visible to anyone who has been familiar with Dublin for forty years. It is
known that since 1851 nearly 25,000 houses have been erected in city and
county. That number of houses would represent at least 100,000 people, but
it only represents 14,000 according to the census, or two-thirds of a
person to each house! It may be said that a great many houses have been
pulled down in the city since 1851. True, there have; but ten have been
built since then for the one that has been pulled down. There are at least
a dozen streets, large and small, in Dublin, the population of which is
four times greater than it was in 1851; for there were no tenement houses
in those streets then, whereas they are all tenement houses now, and
consequently there are four or five families instead of one in each house.
The great increase in the population of Dublin during the last forty or
forty-five years is quite apparent in the more crowded state of the
thoroughfares. It seems not only probable, but certain, from all the data
that can be got at outside the census, that there are from fifty to one
hundred thousand more people in what is known as the metropolitan district
of Dublin than is shown by the published census. This will go far to
account for the weekly death-rate of Dublin being generally higher than
that of any other city in these islands; for if the weekly number of
deaths is based on a population less than what it is, it will make the
weekly death-rate per thousand higher than it should be. This is a very
serious matter for Dublin, for nothing has a more detrimental effect on
the welfare of a city than getting the name of being unhealthy.
It is to be hoped that the reader will not set down either to national
bigotry or private advantage what has been said in praise of Dublin and
its environs. The writer may be national in the broad sense of the word,
but he has no sentimental love for Dublin beyond any other Irish city. He
is not influenced by the _genius loci_; he has no personal interest
whatever in Dublin. What he has said in its praise, and in praise of its
environs, would be said of Timbuctoo had he the same knowledge of the
African city that he has of Dublin, and were Timbuctoo and its environs as
worthy of laudation. Dublin is not his native city; but even if it were
he would be perfectly justified in telling the truth about it. If what he
has said about Dublin be untrue, it can easily be shown to be untrue. If
that city has not been improved and beautified in a most remarkable manner
during the last twenty-five years; if some of its public buildings are not
remarkable specimens of architectural excellence; if its environs are not
beautiful beyond those of any other European capital; if any of these
statements be untrue, let them be proved to be so at the very earliest
opportunity.