CHAPTER VII. CONNAMARA.

_Oughterarde_ is termed the entrance to Connamara, but the boundaries seem somewhat undefined, like the sensations induced by the wildly beautiful scenery,

“The vague emotion of delight While climbing up some Alpine height.”

Measured and mapped _Connamara_ may be, but painted or described it never can. Those sublime landscapes of mountain, moor, and mere, are photographed on the memory for ever, but cannot be reproduced on canvas; and a great master of art, a _Michael Angelo (Tilmarsh)_ throws down his brush, with the wise confession, “all that we can do is to cry, Beautiful!” Who shall take it up, and paint? Not mine, a prentice hand, to daub a caricature (about as like the original, as a pastile to Vesuvius, or a “cinder-tip” to the Himalayas) of those glorious Irish Alps, of the _Maum-Turk_ mountains, or of _Bina Beola_, rising, in solemn majesty, amid a sea of golden and roseate flowers. It requires a confidence which I do not feel, to attempt the Hallelujah Chorus on my penny trumpet, or, where Phidias distrusts his chisel, to commence a Colossus with my knife and fork. But I shall never forget our silent happiness, a happiness like childhood's, so complete and pure, as, mile after mile, we watched the sunlight and the shadows, sweeping over hill, and lake, and plain, (so swiftly that every minute the whole view seemed to change), and saw the snow-white goats among the purple heath, and the kine, jet-black and glowing red, knee-deep in the silver waters.

But there are minds no scenery can delight or awe. I remember, how, travelling by rail, one glorious morning in December, the trees all hoar with frost, and glittering against a sky blue as the turquoise, I met a Cockney gent, who condescendingly surveyed the scene, and said that “it reminded him of _Storr and Mortimers!_ The water was very like those plate-glass things, which were used to set off the silver, and the trees a good deal resembled the candelabra clustered above.” And he smiled as one who was pleased to approve the article which Nature humbly submitted to his inspection, and seemed, out of his overflowing goodness, to pat Creation's head. And now, seated upon the box, a “party” from Sheffield insulted that pure delicious atmosphere with very villainous “shag,” and talked as flippantly and without restraint, as though he were in the Chair at “The Cutler's Arms,” presiding over a Free-and-Easy. No sooner did he ascertain from the driver that the grand Highlands before us were known as “_The Twelve Pins_” than he desired the company to inform him, “what degree of relationship existed between them and the _Needles_ off the Isle of Wight?” a genealogical problem, which would have been received with a due and dignified silence, but for his own unrestrained applause and laughter. Then he favoured us with an enigma, “Why have them pins no _pints?_ Because they're principally composed of _quartz!_” His geology he had got from a guidebook, out of which he treated us to various extracts, appending commentaries of his own. “Miss Martineau says the hair 'ere” (of course he transplanted every h) “is very like breathing cream. Wonder whether the old gal meant cream of the valley, or milk-punch--ha! ha! ha!”

From this subject he passed very naturally to mountain dew, and the illegal manufacture of whiskey, shouting at the top of his voice, “I cannot help loving thee, _Still_;” and then singing, “_Still_, I love thee, _Still_, I love thee,”--“_Fare thee well_, and if for ever, Still, for ever fare thee well” (the music by Mr. Joseph Miller), until, happily for us, his pipe went out, and playfully wondering “how he should obtain a light, when all around was _matchless_,” he collapsed into a state of quiet suction, like a gold fish in a vase.

Incidents, in a country unreclaimed and almost uninhabited, must necessarily be small and infrequent, like the currants on an Irish cake. We had a change of horses at the _Half-way House_ (half-way between _Oughterarde_ and _Ballinahinch_), and this rapid flight of horsemanship was performed something under the half-hour. I took advantage of the interval to recline on the green sward hard by, and commenced, in dreamy enjoyment, a silent oration to the scenes around. “_O Connamara_,” I began, “_non amarat sed amcena!_ let me hear and heed thy sermons in stones, though thine own sons be deaf to them.”

Alas! for the sad contrast, where every prospect pleases, and only man is vile! 1 Why should not fields of golden corn, and orchards heavy with fruit, bring plenty from thy fertile plains? Why should rank weeds, rag-wort, and loose strife, (evil signs and sounds!) usurp thy untilled soil, a 'soyle most fertile,' as old Spenser saith, 'fit to yielde all kinde of fruit that shall be committed thereunto?'” And the answer which I heard, “awaking with a start” from my reverie, was a surly grunt close to my ear, and a loud laugh from Frank, who thus perpetuated the _tableau vivant_:

1 Lord Chesterfield spoke of Ireland as “that country for which God has done so much, and man so little.”

We lunched at “_The Recess_,” a pleasant little inn (with a cheerful landlady and civil waitress), but somewhat damp withal; for Ireland is “the Niobe of nations,” 1 and, as the beautiful bride of the Atlantic, ofttimes weeps in her western home, when her husband is at low water, or subject to lunar influence. But there is no time for metaphor or meteorology, the cutler having already scooped the interior from the heads of both the lobsters, and it being quite necessary to propose some saving clause to this sweeping Act of shellfishness. “I am no gastronomer,” as the old lady observed, when they asked her to go out and see the comet, but I do acknowledge, in unison with the majority of my fellowmen, the powerful fascinations of lobster; and I shall not shrink from the confession, that our feelings, as we witnessed this gross monopoly, were hot and acid as the pepper and the vinegar, which was almost all he left us.

1 “If,” writes Mr. Young, in his _Tour in Ireland_, “as much rain fell upon the clays of England as upon the rocks of the sister country, they could not be cultivated.” I should doubt this, taking into account our modern improvements as to drainage; but, at all events, it is evident that “the humidity of the climate renders Ireland decidedly better fitted for a grazing than for an agricultural country.”-- See M'Culloch's Statistical Account of the British Empire, ed. 2, vol. ii., p. 367.

At the same time, it may be said, in mitigation of his ill-taste and our ill-temper, that the love of the lobster has ere now troubled the equanimity of greater and better men; and I have seen a noble Duke scowl malignantly at an unconscious Earl, whose plate preceded his own. But all ended well, for our greedy knife-grinder having finished his lobster, two bottles of Guinness, one ditto Bass, and a go of whiskey “for luck,” had scarcely ascended the box, and favoured us with that assurance of plethory, which the Chinese expect as a compliment from all well-bred (and well-fed) guests, than his head began slowly to fall and rise, like a large float, lazily influenced by some undecided fish; and he only intruded himself upon our silent admiration of that magnificent scenery with occasional imitations of swine asleep.

There was a time when the Martins ruled in _Connamara_, and _Ballinahinch_, which we now pass, was the palace of Richardus Rex; when Lord Lieutenants were told plainly, that the excellent claret they were drinking had _done_ its duty, without discharging it; and gaugers, bailiffs, writ-servers, and the like, were as rare upon the mountains as the Irish elk. The estate extended to _Oughterarde_, some six and twenty miles away, and “_Martins Gate-house_” is shown there still; but extravagance and neglect brought all to the hammer at last, and the very name of Martin will soon only survive, in its association with the humane Act for the prevention of cruelty to animals, which was originated by the Lord of _Ballinahinch_. The Law Life Insurance Company are now the owners of this property, and are making, we were informed, very great improvements. There can scarcely be an estate more capable thereof. The immense extent of bog-land presents an excellent “fall” for the drainer; and a large quantity of it, lying upon limestone, would grow any amount of pasture or of cereal produce. (The monosyllable _corn_ would be equally expressive, but it looks “mean and poky,” as Martha Penny said of the Protestant religion, when compared with “_cereal produce_”) Then there is abundance of manure close by, in the sea-weed and coral-sand; and under the soil lie rich veins of marble, rose-colour, and yellow, and, white, and green; and of which you may purchase specimens from the little merchants who come round the car. But where, it may well be asked, are the hands to ply the mattock and pick? For famine, and ejection, and the Exodus, have swept away the working men; and though it is evident, from the number of children, that great efforts are being made to repopulate the country, there seems to be no staff on the spot for any large undertakings. 1 But men are to be found when they are wanted by master-minds; and the Irish and English labourers, instead of deserting for America and Australia a land so full of promise, 2 would readily be induced, by leaders of energy and capital, to appropriate advantages nearer home. The sale of encumbered estates (one of the cleverest, cleanest cuts, that surgeon ever made, to save his patient from mortification) amply justifies the healthful hope that English and Scotch farmers 3 will soon be numerous upon Irish soil, not to become, like the Norman visitors of yore, “_ipsis Hibernis Hiberniores_,” but to inoculate Paddy with their own activity and earnestness, and to persuade him, just for once and by way of a change, to work in his own land, as he can and will in any other.

1 According to the Report of the Registrar-General, the population has decreased to the number of half a million since the Census of 1851.

2 See Letters from The Times' Commissioner, ed. 2, p. 271, and The Saxon in Ireland, chapter x.

3 “Why are there so many more Scotch than English? It appears that there are 756 'Britishers' agriculturally settled in Ireland, and of these 660 are natives of Scotland.”--Agricultural and Social State of Ireland in 1858, by Thomas Miller.

The Saxon says that the Celt (how one despises those malicious nicknames, stereotyping hate, and perpetuating a lie, as if there were a true Celt or Saxon extant!) that the Celt will shoot him; and, perhaps, he may if nothing is done to conciliate, but everything to offend his prejudices. Those prejudices are the growth of ages, and will not vanish before slang and compulsion, but only before goodness, teaching by example a better and a happier way. If I wish to propitiate a high-spirited unbroken steed, not warranted free from vice, and can do so by checking him sharply with the curb, and by sticking in both spurs, without ruining the horse, and finding myself in a position to take an uninterrupted view of the firmament, Mr. Rarey and reason plead in vain. John Bull is a magnificent fellow, but his mere repetition of “curse the Pope” will do no more to evangelise mankind than Grip the Raven's “I'm a Protestant kettle;” nor can we specify any signal blessings as likely to accrue to the human race, when “Sawney, with his Calvinistic creed in the one hand, and allaying irritation with the other,” denounces smiling on Sunday as a deadly sin, or goes

“Bellowing, and breathing fire and smoke, At crippled Papistry to butt and poke, Exactly as a skittish Scottish bull Hunts an old woman in a scarlet cloak.”

Were I desirous to impress upon the people of Connaught the advantages of protecting their feet with leather, I should scarcely proceed to demonstrate my proposition by kicking them with hobnailed boots; and although bread as an article of food is vastly superior to potatoes, few men would essay to enforce this argument by pelting the peasantry with quartern loaves.

The Saxon says that the Celt will shoot him; and nothing can be more vile and despicable than those cowardly murders which disgrace Ireland. But we must not forget, in our righteous horror, that our own capital convictions are thrice as numerous, according to population, as those in the sister-country; and, though this does not denote the exact proportion of crime, because conviction in Ireland is far more difficult than with us, it may still suggest a wholesome restraint, when we are minded to sit in judgment upon others.