The Letters of "Norah" on Her Tour Through Ireland Part 9

"My brother does not get much profit from the town of Ramelton."

"He gets all he is ent.i.tled to, his ground rent, we built the houses ourselves," was the answer.

These people are safe, having a secure t.i.tle, not trusting to the Ulster Custom or the landlords' sense of justice.

I have not been much among landlords. I did sit in the library of a landlord, and his lady told me of the excessively picturesque poverty prevailing in some parts, citing as an instance that a baby was nursed on potatoes bruised in water, the mother having hired out as wet-nurse to help to pay the rent. There was no cow and no milk. I had a graphic description of this family, their cabin, their manner of eating. The mother cannot earn the rent any longer and they are to be evicted. I was told they were quite able to pay, but trusting to the Land League had refused.

Naturally what I have seen and heard among the poor of my people, has influenced my mind. I could not see what I did see and hear what I did hear of the tyranny wrought by the late Earl of Leitrim, and the present Captain Dobbing, or walk through the desolation created by Mr. Adair, without feeling sad, sorry and indignant.

XX.

LORD LIFFORD--THE DUKE OF ABERCORN--WHOLESALE EVICTIONS--GOING SOUTH-- ENNISKILLEN--a.s.sES IN PLENTY--IN A GRAVEYARD.

On the banks of the Finn, near Strabane, was born the celebrated hero Finn ma Coul. I think this just means Finlay McDougall, and, therefore, claim the champion as a relative. Strabane lies in a valley, with round cultivated hills, fair and pleasant to the eye, swelling up round it.

Near it is the residence of Lord Lifford. I have heard townspeople praise him as a landlord, and country people censure him, so I leave it there. His recent speech, in which he complains of the new Land Bill, that, if it pa.s.ses into law, it will give tenants as a right what they used to get as a favor from their landlords, has the effect of explaining him to many minds.

Leaving Strabane behind, went down or up, I know not which, to Newtown- Stewart, in the parish of Ardstraw (_ard strahe_, high bank of the river). In this neighborhood is the residence of the Duke of Abercorn, spoken of as a model landlord.

The Glenelly water mingles with the Struell and is joined by the Derg, which forms the Mourne. After the Mourne receives the Finn at Lifford it a.s.sumes the name of the Foyle and flows into history past Derry's walls.

At the bridge, as you enter the town of Newtown-Stewart, stands the gable wall of a ruined castle, built by Sir Robert Newcomen, 1619, burned by Sir Phelim Roe O'Neil along with the town, rebuilt by Lord Mountjoy, burnt again by King James.

Upon a high hill above the town, commanding a beautiful view of the country far and wide, stand the ruins of the castle of Harry Awry O'Neil (contentious or cross Harry), an arch between two ruined towers being the only distinct feature left of what was once a great castle. This castle commanded a view of two other castles, owned and inhabited by two sons or two brothers of this Harry Awry O'Neil. These three castles were separate each from each by a river. Here these three lords of the O'Neil slept, lived and agreed, or quarrelled as the case might be, ruling over a fair domain of this fair country. I do not think the present generation need feel more than a sentimental regret after the days of strong castles and many of them, and hands red with unlimited warfare.

Towering up beyond Harry Awry's castle is the high mountain of Baissie Baal, interpreted to me altar of Baal. I should think it would mean death of Baal. (Was Baal ever the same as Tommuz, the Adonis of Scripture?) In the valley beyond is a village still named Beltane (Baal teine--Baal's fire), so that the mountain must have been used at one time for the worship of Baal. The name of the mountain is now corrupted into Bessie Bell.

In the valley at the foot of the mountain is the grand plantation that stretches miles and miles away, embosoming Baronscourt, the seat of the Duke of Abercorn, and the way to it in the shade of young forests. There are nodding firs and feathery larches over the hills, gla.s.sing themselves in the still waters of beautiful lakes. Lonely grandeur and stately desolation reign and brood over a scene instinct with peasant life and peasant labor some years ago. The Duke of Abercorn was counted a model landlord. His published utterances were genial, such as a good landlord, father and protector of his people would utter. Some one who thought His Grace of Abercorn was sailing under false colors, that his public utterances and private course of action were far apart, published an article in a Dublin paper. This article stated that the Duke had evicted over 123 families, numbering over 1,000 souls, not for non- payment of rent, but to create the lordly loneliness about Baronscourt.

His Grace did not like tenantry so near his residence. Those tenants who submitted quietly got five years' rent--not as a right, but as a favor given out of his goodness of heart. They tell here that these evictions involved accidentally the priest of the parish and an old woman over ninety, who lay on her death-bed. He had called upon the priest personally and offered ground for a parochial house; he forgot his purpose and the priest continued to live in lodgings from which he was evicted along with the farmer with whom he lodged. Of the evicted families 87 were Catholics and 36 Protestants. If they had been allowed to sell their tenant right they might have got farms elsewhere. Of those cleared off seventeen who were Protestants and six who were Catholics got farms elsewhere from His Grace. Some sank into day laborers, some vanished, no one knows where.

People here say that the reason why there are Fenians in America and people inclined to Fenianism at home is owing to these large evictions-- clearances that make farmers into day laborers at the will of the lord of the land. The people feel more bitterly about these things when they consider injustice is perpetrated with a semblance of generosity.

Nothing--no lapse of time nor change of place or circ.u.mstances--ever causes anyone to forget an eviction. Now they say that the Duke of Abercorn holds this immense tract of country on the condition of rooting the people in the soil by long leases, not on condition of evicting them out; therefore, he has forfeited his claim to the lands over and over again. This article, published in a Dublin paper, was taken no public notice of for a time, but when sharply contested elections came round, the Duke and four others, sons and relations, were rejected at the polls because of the feeling stirred up by these revelations. Such is the popular report of the popular Duke of Abercorn.

Omagh is a pretty, behind-the-age country town. The most splendid buildings are the poor-house, the prison, and the new barracks. The hotels are very dear everywhere; they seem to depend for existence on commercial travellers and tourists. Tourists are expected to be prepared to drop money as the child of the fairy tale dropped pearls and diamonds, on every possible occasion, and unless one is able to a.s.sert themselves they are liable to be let severely alone as far as comfort is concerned, or attendance; but when the _douceur_ is expected plenty are on hand and smile serenely.

Left Omagh behind and took pa.s.sage for Fermanagh's capital, Enniskillen of dragoon celebrity. The road from Omagh to Enniskillen showed some, I would say a good deal, of waste, unproductive land. Land tufted with rushes, and bare and barren looking--still the fields tilled were scrupulously tilled. The houses were the worst I had yet seen on the line of rail, as bad as in the mountains of Donegal, worse than any I saw in Innishowen. I wonder why the fields are so trim and the homes in many cases so horrible. Not many, I may say not any, fine houses on this stretch of country.

Arrived at Enniskillen on market day, towards the close of April. The number of a.s.ses on the market is something marvellous. a.s.ses in small carts driven by old women in mutch caps, a.s.ses with panniers, the harness entirely made of straw, a.s.ses with burdens on their backs laid over a sort of pillion of straw. I thought a.s.ses flourished at Cairo and Dover, but certainly Enniskillen has its own share of them. The faces of the people are changed, the tongues are changed. The people do not seem of the same race as they that peopled the mountains of Donegal.

A little while after my arrival, taking a walk, I wandered into an old graveyard round an old church which opened off the main street.

Underneath this church is the vault or place of burial of the Cole family, lords of Enniskillen--a dreary place, closed in by a gloomy iron gate. A very ancient man was digging a grave in this old graveyard, sacred, I could see by the inscriptions, to the memory of many of the stout-hearted men planted in Enniskillen, who held the land they had settled on against all odds in a brave, stout-hearted manner. None of the dust of the ancient race has mouldered here side by side with their conquerors. There was a dragoonist flavor about the dust; a military flourish about the tombstones. A., of His Majesty's regiment; B., officer of such a battalion of His Majesty's so-and-so regiment; C., D., and all the rest of the alphabet, once grand officers in His Majesty's service, now dust here as the royal majesties they served are dust elsewhere. Went over to the ancient grave-digger, who was shovelling out in a weakly manner decayed coffin, skull, ribs, bones, fat earth--so fat and greasy-looking, so alive with horrible worms. He was so very old and infirm that, after a shovelful or two, he leaned against the grave side and _peched_ like a horse with the heaves.

"How much did he get for digging a grave?"

"Sometimes a shilling, sometimes one and six, or two shillings, accordin' as the people were poor or better off."

"How were wages going?"

"Wages were not so high as they had been in the good times before the famine. A man sometimes got three-and-six or four shillings then; now he got two shillings."

"And board himself?"

"Oh, yes, always board himself."

"Some people now want a man to work for a shilling and board himself, but how could a man do that? It takes two pence to buy Indian meal enough for one meal. You see there would be nothing left to feed a family on."

A stout, bare-legged hizzie appeared now, and kindly offered the old man a pinch of snuff out of a little paper to overcome the effects of the smell, and keep it from striking into his heart. This was one errand; to find out who was talking to him was another. She did not; we gave the poor old fellow a sixpence and moved away.

XXI.

ENNISKILLEN MILITARY PRIDE--THE BOYS CALLED SOLDIERS--REMNANTS OF BY- GONE POWER--ISLAND OF DEVENISH--A ROUND TOWER--AN ANCIENT CROSS--THE COLE FAMILY

Owing to the very great kindness of Mr. Trimble, editor of the Fermanagh Reporter, we have seen some of the fair town of Enniskillen.

Knowing that Innis or Ennis always means island, I was not surprised to find that Enniskillen sits on an island, and is connected with the mainland by a bridge at either end of the town. Of course, the town has boiled over and spread beyond the bridges, as Derry has done over and beyond her walls. There is a military flavor all over Enniskillen, a kind of dashing frank manner and proud steps as if the dragoon had got into the blood. There is also nourished a pride in the exploits of Enniskillen men from the early times when they struggled to keep their feet and their lives in the new land. They feel pride in the fame of the Enniskillen dragoon, in the deeds of daring and valor of the 27th Enniskilleners all over the world. Enniskillen military pride is closely connected with the Cole family, lords of Enniskillen.

The town is not old, only dating back to the reign of the sapient James the First. Remembrance of the sept of Maguires who ruled here before that time, still lingers among the country people.

Had a sail on Lough Erne at the last of April; tried to find words sufficiently strong to express the beauty of the lake and found none. It is as lovely as the Allumette up at Pembroke. I can not say more than that. The banks are so richly green, the hills so fertile up to their round tops, checked off by green hedges into fields of all shapes and sizes; the trees lift up their proud heads and fling out their great arms as if laden with blessing; the primroses, like baby moons, more in number than the stars of heaven, glow under every hedge and gem every bank, so that though the Lake Allumette is as lovely as Lough Erne, yet the banks that sit round Lough Erne are more lovely by far than the borders of Lake Allumette. They are as fair as any spot under heaven in their brightness of green.

Sailing up the lake or down, I do not know which, we pa.s.sed the ruins of Portora old castle; ruined towers and battered walls, roofless and lonely. Kind is the ivy green to the old remnants of by-gone power or monuments of by-gone oppression, happing up the cold stones, and draping gracefully the bare ruins.

The Island of Devenish, or of the ox, is famed for the good quality of its gra.s.s. Here we saw the ruins of an abbey. It has been a very large building, said to have been built as far back as 563. The ruins show it to have been built by very much better workmen than built the more modern Green Castle in Innishowen. The arches are of hewn stone and are very beautifully done without the appearance of cement or mortar. The round tower, the first I ever saw, was a wonderful sight to me. It is 76 feet high, and 41 in circ.u.mference. The walls, three feet thick, built with scarcely any mortar, are of hewn stone, and I wondered at the skill that rounded the tower so perfectly. The conical roof is (or was) finished with one large stone shaped like a bell; four windows near the top opposite the cardinal points. There is a belt of ribbed stone round the top below the roof, with four faces carved on it over the four windows. Advocates of the theory that the round towers were built for Christian purposes have decided that there are three masculine, and one feminine face, being the faces of St. Molaisse, the founder of the abbey; St. Patrick, St. Colombkill and St. Bridget.

Near the round tower is the ruins of what was once a beautiful church.

The stone work which remains is wonderfully fine. The remaining window, framed of hewn stone wrought into a rich, deep moulding, seems never to have been intended for gla.s.s. It is but a narrow slit on the outside, though wide in the inside. There are the remains of two cloistered cells, one above another, very small, roofed and floored with stone, belonging to a building adjoining the church. Climbed up the little triangular steps of stone that led into the belfry tower, and looked forth from the tower windows over woodland hill, green carpet and blue waters, with a blessing in my heart for the fair land, and an earnest wish for the good of its people.

There is in the old churchyard one of the fair, skilfully carved, ancient crosses to be found in Ireland. It was shattered and cast down, but has been restored through the care of the Government. It is very high and ma.s.sive, yet light-looking, it is so well proportioned. There are pictures of scriptural subjects, Adam and Eve, David and Goliath, &c., carved in relief over it. Two I saw at Ennishowen had no inscription or carving at all.

The Government has built a wall around these fine ruins for their protection from wanton destruction. It takes proof of the kind afforded by these ruins to convince this unbelieving generation that the ancient Irish were skilled carvers on stone, and architects of no mean order. I have looked into some of what has been said as to the uses for which the round towers were built with the result of confusing my mind hopelessly, and convincing myself that I do not know any more than when I began, which was nothing. I am glad, however, that I saw the outside of this round tower. I saw not the inside, as the door is nine feet from the ground and ladders are not handy to carry about with one.

XXII.

THE EARL OF ENNISKILLEN AND HIS TENANTS--CAUSES OF DISSATISFACTION-- SPREAD OF THE LAND LEAGUE AMONGST ENNISKILLEN ORANGEMEN--A SAMPLE GRIEVANCE--THE AGENTS' COMMISSION--A LINK THAT NEEDS STRENGTHENING--THE LANDLORD'S SIDE.

It seems a great pity that the attachment between the Earl of Enniskillen and his tenants should suffer interruption or be in danger of pa.s.sing away. The Earl, now an old man, was much loved by his people, until, in a day evil alike for him and for his tenants, he got a new agent from the County Sligo. Of course, I am telling the tale as it was told to me. Since this agent came on the property, re-valuation, rent raising, vexatious office rules, have been the order of things on the estate. The result of this new state of things, has been that the Land League has spread among the tenants like wildfire. I did not feel inclined to take these statements without a grain of salt. To hear of the Land League spreading among Enniskillen Orangemen, among the Earl's tenants, of dissatisfaction creeping in between these people historically loyal and attached to a family who had been their chiefs and landlords for centuries, was surprising to me.

To convince me that such was the case, I was requested to listen to one of the Earl's tenants reciting the story of his grievances at the hands of the Earl's agent. It was a sample case, I was told, and would explain why the people joined the Land League. It was pleasant enough to have an opportunity of going into the country and to have an opportunity of seeing the farms and the style of living of the Fermanagh farmers, as compared with the Donegal highlands.