a cordial welcome and usually an invitation to come in and rest and
drink a cup of milk. There is no apology for poverty, or the appearance
of things; there is no obsequiousness and no insolence, but a dignified,
hearty handclasp at the coming and at the going and a cheerful
invitation to call again. The Children of the Mist are invariably well
behaved and polite. Although their clothes are ragged and their bodies
are filthy with dirt, they have the same manners you would expect among
the nobility. They are always obedient, deferential, and unselfish. They
are kind and attentive to their younger brothers and sisters, and show
perfect respect to their parents and elders. We have seen them in the
cabins, in the fields, and in the schools. I have asked everybody where
they get their manners, and who teaches them deportment in this barren
wilderness of filth and bad smells. I asked Miss Walshe, the medical
officer of the district, who goes from cabin to cabin as an angel of
healing; I asked Miss O'Donnell, who has charge of the lace school; I
asked the head constable at the police station; I asked the
school-teachers and others, and they all say that the politeness of the
Irish peasants, like their pride, is inborn and final proof that they
are the descendants of kings. This pride is a strange thing, and it is
most surprising. Every woman you find in a soiled and ragged dress in a
wretched cabin receives you as her equal and talks with dignity and
without restraint, and Mr. Duke, manager of the Eccles Hotel, told me
this morning of a mountain peasant whose raggedness aroused his
sympathy, but who would not accept a suit of clothes.
Miss O'Donnell, the lace teacher, and Miss Walshe, the nurse, told us
that the pretty young women we saw in the lace school and the boys and
girls we saw in the national school, all come from such cabins as I have
described. Some of the blue-eyed, bare-footed urchins have complexions
that society belles would give their souls for, and long, beautiful
coal-black hair, yet they sleep on a mud floor with pigs and chickens,
and many of them walk three and four miles and back for the privilege of
attending school. With a little training these children make excellent
servants, faithful, obedient, and tactful, and almost without exception
they go to mass and confession regularly, and they have a high standard
of morals and a conscientious devotion to duty. Although it costs as
much to get married as it does to buy a ticket to America, there are no
unmarried people living together here; illegitimate births are extremely
rare and chastity is the commonest of virtues.
There is no compulsory education law, but the priests drive the children
to school until they are fourteen and will not confirm them until they
have passed a certain grade. A gentle, soft-voiced woman in a rude cabin
in the mountain side told us the other day that her greatest trouble was
that her daughter had been kept from school by sickness and she was
afraid that the priest would not confirm her because she was so far
behind the other girls in her lessons.
The same rule applies to the lace school which has been established by
the government through the Congested Districts Board in the old building
used by the Catholic church before the new one was erected. The
government pays a teacher and advances the material. The girls get the
price their lacework brings when sold in the shops of London or Dublin
or at the Eccles Hotel here at Glengariff. Miss O'Donnell tells me that
Mrs. Duke, the wife of the manager of the hotel, is their best sales
agent, and a stock of samples is always kept where the guests can see
them. Fifty-one girls are now attending the school, and some of them
walk seven miles and back every day. Father Harrington will not allow
them to attend the lace school until after they are confirmed, and it is
a great inducement to join the church because they are able to earn
forty, fifty, and some of them sixty pounds a year, which secures them
better clothes, better food, and some comforts for their families. Last
year this little school sold nearly three thousand dollars' worth of
lace, and the money was divided among fifty-one girls who made it.
Every young person who can get money enough goes to America. And if it
were not for the money they send back here many of their parents and
younger brothers and sisters would starve. A gentleman who handles the
postal orders in one of the most forlorn and wretched villages of
Ireland told me that the Christmas gifts of money that came from America
kept many a family in food during the winter. It is the ambition of
every young man and woman to go to the United States, and only the lack
of steamship fare keeps them in Ireland. A sturdy lad of eighteen who
guided us across the moor to the roadway this morning told me
confidentially that he was going to Arizona as soon as his uncle, who
was doing very well out there, was able to send him the price. He asked
many questions about that part of the country. His uncle is working in a
gold mine near Tombstone and is "earning more than a pound a day,
steady, six days in the week, and they pay him double wages if he works
on Sunday." To a lad whose life is so barren and whose horizon is so
narrow and who sees his father and his neighbors trying to wrest a
scanty sustenance partly from the sea and partly from the land, and who
scarcely catch enough fish or raise enough potatoes to feed the mouths
of their own families, a pound a day looks like the income of an earl.
The Catholic church at Glengariff is a brand new building of stone, and
looks large enough for ten times the population of this parish, which
has only about four hundred souls, men, women, and children. It was
built with American money raised by Father Brown, the late priest, who
went to Brooklyn, Boston, and several other cities of the United States,
hunted up the relatives of the people who live here and those who went
from these parts, and obtained £3,000. He was a good man and took a
great interest in the temporal as well as the spiritual welfare of his
people. Since his death Father Harrington has succeeded him and serves
four churches in a radius of seventeen miles.
We attended mass on Sunday. The church was crowded. All the aisles were
filled with kneeling worshipers, up to the very feet of the altar and in
the vestibule, or the steps, and around outside were forty or fifty men
and women kneeling reverently upon the sod, although they couldn't hear
the voice of the priest. One of the men told me that he believed every
person in the parish was present and that they always came unless they
were too ill to move, that no storm could stop them. As a rule they came
from mountain cabins five and six miles away, in carts and on foot, and
some of them carried children in their arms the entire distance.
Notwithstanding their poverty they were better dressed than the working
people of Dublin. Their clothes were neat and well brushed and mended.
However ragged the garments they wear on week days may be, they always
have a decent suit to wear to the house of God. The solemnity of the
service was very impressive. To these people the church is the gate of
heaven. Its decorations and ceremonies appeal to their imagination, to
their senses of color and sound, and the mystic rites sink into their
souls.
Although there are six saloons for a parish of four hundred people the
chief constable tells me there is very little drinking or disorder, and
practically no crime. He hasn't had a case of robbery for a year, and
except upon convivial occasions like weddings and wakes the people are
very orderly. Most of the saloons, he tells me, sell very little liquor,
and some of their licenses run back for years, being renewed annually to
the same family for generations. A liquor license in Ireland cannot be
taken away except for serious reasons, as long as the annual fee is
paid. They can be sold or transferred, but if they lapse they are
cancelled.
In a neat stone cottage, surrounded by a well kept garden, among the
rocky mountain sides that overlook Bantry Bay, lives Lacia Walshe,
strong in body, strong in mind, and strong of purpose. She goes among
the wretched hovels in this locality attending maternity cases which
occur with amazing frequency, for the poorer the family the more
children is the rule. Miss Walshe does not give her entire attention to
midwifery, however, but treats every case of illness that comes within
her ken, from sore fingers to delirium tremens. That is not a figure of
speech, but an actual fact, for many a time at midnight has she been
called from her cottage to some miserable stone hovel in the mountains
to quiet with opiates a drunken ruffian who is haunted with reptiles and
raving in his dreams. Miss Walshe belongs to the poor, and is kept here
by a society with a name of fifteen words--"Lady Dudley's Scheme for the
Establishment of District Nurses in the Poorest Parts of Ireland." She
wears a badge the shape of a heart supporting a crown and in the center
is a shamrock leaf encircled with the words of Another One who went
about doing good as she does: "By love serve one another."
The Countess of Dudley organized this work in 1903, beginning with two
nurses in Geesala and Bealadangan, County Galway. And they did so much
good that the number has now been increased to fifteen and they are
located at as many places in the poorest districts of Ireland, where
there are no physicians and where the people are too poor and the
population too scattered to support a doctor if one could be induced to
go there.
The most distressing cases are those of confinement in cabins of only
one room, into which sometimes six, eight, and ten men, women, and
children are crowded, sleeping upon the floor. We went into a hut of
only one room, not more than twelve by fourteen feet in size, which is
occupied at night by nine persons,--father and mother, and grandmother
and six children, the oldest being eighteen years of age. We visited
another hut where there were eight children living, and were told of one
where there were seventeen, the births of most of them not more than a
year apart. To relieve conditions that may be easily imagined, Lady
Dudley's society with the long name was formed, and is now doing an
immense amount of good. Fifteen courageous and conscientious women are
comfortably placed in localities where their services are most needed,
at a cost of not more than a thousand dollars per year each, which
includes a bicycle, the most convenient means of locomotion they can
find, and an allowance for the hire of horses and jaunting cars when
they can be obtained. Because it is impossible to find lodging and
boarding places, it has been necessary to build cottages for the nurses,
and in some cases the demands upon them are so great that they are
allowed to employ assistance. They are equipped with surgical implements
and medical stores. Each of the nurses has taken a course in surgery
for emergency cases for they are frequently called upon to set bones and
dress wounds and even to perform operations. They are also furnished
with baby clothes, old linen, warm garments, stores of condensed milk
and beef extract, and other delicacies, and although Florence
Nightingale relieved thousands, her work did not compare in peril or
privation or fatigue with the almost daily experience of some of these
noble women.
XXVI
THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY
The big stages that cross the mountains from Glengariff to Killarney are
chiefly loaded with Americans. It is singular how few other
nationalities are represented in the passenger traffic. The morning we
crossed there were four great vehicles carrying twenty-four persons
each, and every passenger, except one German bridal couple and a funny
acting Englishman, was from the United States. In our coach were
representatives from Cincinnati, Washington, St. Louis, Omaha, Texas,
and Minnesota, and I suppose other sections were equally represented
upon the three other coaches. Everybody who comes to Ireland takes this
ride because it offers the grandest scenery and one of the most
delightful experiences that tourists can enjoy. The coach begins to
climb slowly through the beautiful glen as soon as it leaves the Eccles
Hotel and continues climbing, up and up, for six miles through a dense
forest of glowing green, until it emerges into a wilderness of rock and
moorland, wild, picturesque, and almost entirely uninhabited. There is
very little vegetation, only a few streaks and bunches of grass that
grow along the cracks in the rocky surface, or in wind-carried soil that
has been caught in crevices. It is one of the wildest places you can
imagine, and as we go upward it becomes more so. The stage winds around
the brow of a mountain that seems a solid mass of stone, and as far as
one can see there is nothing else in the universe except a ribbon of
silver that winds at the foot of the slope where we left a river when we
began the journey. One has the sensation of awe that solitude often
produces, but it is disturbed by the chatter of the passengers. It is as
dreary and desolate and lonesome a place as the world contains.
This is a comparatively new road. It was not built until 1838, but, like
all the roads of Ireland, it is solid and perfect and made to last
forever. The old road, and the principal line of communication between
the counties of Cork and Kerry for centuries, ran along the slope of
Hungry Mountain, so called because it is so devoid of vegetation that a
goat would have to take his luncheon if he went up there. And from there
it crossed to the mountain of the "Priest's Leap," which was named from
a legend that grows out of persecution of the Catholics in Cromwell's
time. The driver told it in this way:
"Ye see, yer honor, in Cromwell's time there was a bounty of five pun'
fer the head of a wolf and five pun' for the head of a priest; an' a
dale of money was made o' both o' 'em. Well, bedad, one foine day a
priest was ridin' over the hill, whin the Tories caught sight o' him (we
called thim Tories in those days, the blaggards that did be huntin' o'
the priests), and them that purshued him were jist to lay their bloody
hands upon his blessed robe, whin he prayed to St. Fiachna. The blessed
saint heard him, and the donkey he was ridin' gave a lape siven miles
from one mountain to the ither, and yees can see the marks of the
baste's hoofs in the solid rock to this day."
It takes but little encouragement and a minimum of material to supply
legends in this desolate and weird region, where every sound seems
unnatural and the trembling of a leaf causes the nerves to tingle. The
road resembles Brünig Pass in Switzerland more than any other that I
have seen, with the Lakes of Killarney corresponding to Lake Lucerne,
but it is less civilized and there are very few human habitations.
The coach keeps climbing until we come to the grand divide, 1,233 feet
above the sea, where the passage from the "Kingdom of Cork" to the
"Kingdom of Kerry," as once they were called, is made through a tunnel
about six hundred feet long and two smaller ones that are cut through
the peak of the Esk Mountain. Until these tunnels were built travelers
were carried over the rocks to the other end of the road on the backs of
men. The country improves a little after the divide is crossed, and
there is a gradual descent into a rather good grazing country which
belongs to the Marquis of Lansdowne, but even here it is a good deal of
a job for a cow to make a living, and there is a proverb that "A Kerry
cow never looks up at a passing stranger for fear it will lose the
bite."
The Earl of Lansdowne, who has been governor-general of Canada,
governor-general of India, lord of the treasury, secretary of war,
minister of foreign affairs, and has held other important offices in the
British cabinet, is one of the largest landowners in Ireland, although
he spends very little of his time there. He has a long list of Irish
titles inherited from his ancestors. In addition to being Earl Wycombe,
Earl of Kerry, and Earl of Shelburne, he is Viscount Clanmaurice,
Viscount Fitzmorris, Baron of Lixnaw, Baron of Dunkerron, and Viscount
of Calstone, and his eldest son is the Earl of Kerry. He traces his
lineage to Maurice Fitzgerald, who came over with Strongbow, who also
was the ancestor of the earls of Kildare and the Duke of Leinster. The
Lansdowne family have intermarried with the Leinsters, the MacCarthys,
the Desmonds, the Ormondes, and other of the great families of Ireland,
and, near or far, the marquis can claim relationship with nearly all the
Irish nobility.
Occasionally we saw a stone cabin in the far distance, from which a pale
stream of smoke was arising, but until noonday, when we dropped into the
valley and approached the little village of Kenmare, there was scarcely
a human habitation. At Kenmare is an attractive hotel, at which a
bountiful lunch is served for two shillings, and a little time is given
the passengers to rest. Those who wish to do so can take a railway train
here and run over to Killarney in three-quarters of an hour, but they
will lose the most attractive part of the ride and some of the sublimest
scenery in Ireland. The stage commences to climb again shortly after we
leave Kenmare, and crawls along the mountain sides between the rocks and
the heather all the afternoon. This country was fought over again and
again ages ago. The mountain range was a sort of barrier between the
warlike clans of MacCarthy and O'Sullivan, who met upon its rocky
slopes and slew each other for any pretext, less for reason than for the
love of fighting.
The war cries of all the clans of southern Ireland, however, have been
heard upon these rocks. "Shannied-Aboo" was the cry of the earls of
Desmond; "Crom-Aboo" was the cry of the Geraldines, and the Duke of
Leinster has it for the motto upon his coat of arms. The word "aboo" is
the Gaelic equivalent to our "hurrah." The cry of the O'Neills was
"Lamh-Dearg-Aboo" (Hurrah for the Red Hand, which was the crest of the
O'Neills). The O'Brien cry was "Lamh-Laider-Aboo" (Hurrah for the Strong
Hand). The Burkes cried "Galraigh-Aboo" (Hurrah for the Red Englishman).
The Fitzpatricks, "Gear-Laider-Aboo" (Hurrah for the Strong and the
Sharp).
In the tenth year of the reign of Henry VII. an act passed by parliament
prohibited the use of these war cries in the following quaint terms:
"Item; Prayen the commons in this present parliament assembled; that for
as much as there has been great variances, malices, debates and
comparisons between divers lords and gentlemen of this land, which hath
daily increased by seditious means of divers idle, ill-disposed persons,
utterly taking upon them to be servants to such lords and gentlemen; for
that they would be borne in their said idleness, and their other
unlawful demeaning, and nothing for any favor or entirely good love or
will that they bear under such lords and gentlemen. Therefore be it
enacted and established by the same authority; That no person nor
persons, of whatsoever estate, condition or degree he or they be of,
take part with any lord or gentleman or uphold any such variances or
comparisons in words or deeds as in using these words, Com-Aboo,
Butler-Aboo, or other words like, or otherwise contrary to the King's
laws, his crown, his dignity and his peace; but to call on St. George in
the name of his sovereign lord, King of England for the time being. And
if any person or persons of whatsoever estate, condition or degree he or
they be of, do contrary so offending in the premisses, or any of them be
taken and committed to ward, there to remain without bayle or maiprixe
till he or they have made fine after the discretion of the King's Deputy
of Ireland, and the King's Counsail of the same for the time being."
The above is a sample of British legislation at the period that act was
passed, and that conglomerate of words means simply that enthusiastic
Irishmen were forbidden to excite their own emotions and the emotions of
others by the cries of their clan and were admonished to use only the
war cry of the King of England, who in battle is supposed to appeal to
St. George.
The first glimpse of the Lakes of Killarney is obtained as the coach
comes around the point of a mountain, and a great green amphitheater
with a body of glimmering water at the bottom is suddenly spread out
before the passengers. The outlines are fringed with forests and the
lakes are studded with tiny islands of different sizes and shapes, but
all glow with a vivid color that is not found anywhere else. And this
picture is before the vision until the stage plunges into a tunnel of
foliage at the foot of the slope, near the ancient ruins of Muckross
Abbey, and follows along through a tunnel made of high stone walls and
overhanging boughs until the village of Killarney is reached.
Long, long ago there were two giants, the giant of Glengariff and the
giant of Killarney, and they were very jealous of each other. They kept
up a continual controversy, each boasting of his own strength and valor
and daring the other to cross the mountains. Finally, after everybody
got tired of these threats and challenges, just as people do nowadays
about the talking matches of pugilists, the giant of Killarney decided
to go over to Glengariff and see what sort of a person his foe might be.
Disguising himself as a monk, he crossed the divide, came down into the
village, and was shown the way to his enemy's cabin. The giant of
Glengariff, having heard of the approach of his rival, became very much
frightened and hastily made a cradle big enough to hold his enormous
carcass, and, lying down in it, ordered his wife to tuck him up with a
blanket. And there he lay, pretending to be asleep, when the giant of
Killarney approached the door and politely offered the compliments of
the season to the lady he saw sitting on a three-legged stool with her
knitting in her lap. Her hand was on the edge of a cradle twelve feet
long, and she rocked it gently, crooning an old lullaby.
"Hush, you spalpeen, lest ye wake the baby!" and she continued to sing
the slumber song in a soft, sweet voice.
"Let's see your baby," whispered the giant of Killarney, and she lifted
the blanket gently from her husband's face.
His enemy looked at him in amazement for an instant, and then, begging
the good lady's pardon for the intrusion, started back over the mountain
trail as fast as his big legs could take him.
"If the baby's as big as that, how big must the ould man be!"
Valentine Charles Browne, Earl of Kenmare, owns all of the Lakes of
Killarney, all the land that surrounds them, and, according to the grant
of James I., Feb. 16, 1622, "all the islands of, or in the same, and the
fisheries of said lakes, and the soil and bottom thereof." He owns all
the mountains round about, and one of his stewards told me that they
comprised 999,000 acres. He owns the village and everything within it,
even the ground on which the railway station stands. All of the hotels
occupy his soil under lease, and the insane asylum, with its six hundred
patients, and the poorhouse for County Kerry, with four hundred
friendless and destitute creatures within its walls.
Sir Valentine Browne, Knight of Totteridge, Lincolnshire, England, was
constable, warden, victualler, and treasurer of Berwick in the reign of
Queen Elizabeth, who sent him with Sir Henry Wallop in 1583 to survey
escheated lands in Ireland. He remained on the island, was subsequently
sworn of the privy council, represented the County of Sligo in
parliament in 1588, and in June of the same year purchased from
MacCarthy More, Earl of Glencare, certain lands, manors, etc., in
counties Kerry and Cork, and obtained by patents from Queen Elizabeth
all the remainder of the Glencare estates. He was afterward quite useful
to her majesty, as his posterity have been to her successors.