Travel A HOLIDAY IN IRELAND ONCE upon a time that
prototype of all Irish politicians, Dan O'Connell, went on a deputation to the Chancellor of the Exchequer (who happened to be another Irishman). He received such cordial assurances about whatever he wanted • that when he left the room he said to a colleague, "Did you observe how he took me by both hands ? " "Yes, indeed— I thought it a very good sign." "That means," sighed Dan, "that he is going to deceive us." I am reminded of the story by an American friend who has just been touring Ireland. "Everyone," he chuckles, "has beak assuring me so heartily that Ireland is quiet now, that I really believe it is not." I shall not therefore say anything about the really monotonous calm that pervades this island, except that the characteristic architecture of Ireland was once a ruined castle, it is now an abandoned gaol—deep in nettles.
Construction follows on quietness, and by offering new experiences asks for a different kind of travel. Under a native government there is a new evenness all over Ireland. One place is now just as racily Irish as another. On the other hand, within that general pattern that is slowly but surely establishing itself, there are separate local patterns of life— certain areas that are beginning to offer special interests. And I suggest that one might well choose, accordinely, a separate area where one can relish at once both the general pattern and the local variation. There is, that is to say, more to be found out, more to enjoy than there used to be.
For example, there is no need to go now more than forty miles from Dublin to taste the far West, since there is a large colony of .Connemara folk settled in Meath, all speaking Irish, all with their traditional costumes and crafts. On the other hand, the effect of the new decentralised factories may be seen equally well almost anywhere ; cotton piece goods are made in Westmeath, typewriter ribbons in Meath, enamelled hollow-ware in Kerry, razor blades in Carlow, copper tubing in Galway, pottery in Wicklow, and so on. Again, Carlow, Leix, and Tipperary are consolidating a somewhat different type of farming life as a result of the sugar-beet factories in Carlow town, Thurles, and Mallow.
The sportsman is the easiest traveller of all to cater for, since, if he is a fisherman he centres himself, so to speak, not on one point but on a flowing line ; and if he is a golfer, on many points. Not to take the well-known lakes or rivers, Corrib (centre Oughterard) or Mask (Clonbur, or Cong, or Ballinrobe), or the Blackwater (Fermoy), or the hundred streams of Donegal, there is that all-too-little known river, the Slaney, one of the most pleasant retreats for the discriminating angler, which gives us three counties, quite varied in their configuration and modes of life. It lures the visitor to follow it to the mountainy region of Wicklow, through the leafy beats below Tullow, an excellent centre, up from the slob-lands at Wexford (which, by the way, are at another season one of the best places in these islands for wild duck). Or he will be tempted to run across in his car to the Barrow, if he wants bigger fish than a 2 lb. trout or a 12 lb. salmon. If he centres himself at Tullow, for salmon, or the picturesque hill-village of Baltinglass, for brown trout, he will have his fill of scenery and history on the off- days; for Eimiscorthy takes him back to the thirteenth century, Parnell and Redmond lived across at Aughavannagh, and the Ninety Eight rebellion is all over the place. While, as for the neighbouring Barrow, whiCh offers trout up to 3 lb. and salmon to 35 lb., he will find near Carlow, which has associations from the Duke of Clarence to Mr. Bernard Shaw, an image of the new field-and-factory Ireland that is most pleasing and persuasive.
I know that if I were a long time out of Ireland and eager to taste its life again—the nearest analogy to the stranger possible for me to imagine—I had far rather settle for a fort- night at some little village on one of these rivers with a rod and a golf-bag and a few books, and be more certain of getting a contented holiday and " bottling " the flavour of the country than by any amount of wandering about at forty miles an hour day after day. To move inland I might pick the Suir, at Carrick or Clonmel—one of our really charming country towns —for the variety of the Golden Vale. Or the Blackwater whose rich, heavy, wooded land might, like the Home of Morpheus in Spenser, whom it surely inspired (he living at Kilcolman Castle) : " lulle me into a slumber soft . . .
mixt with a murmuring winde much like the swoyne of bees . . ." Or .go North to Omagh or Strabane whece the Mourne and the Finn rivers link the Free State to Northern Ireland. Or, for the South West, pick any of the rougher , Kerry streams, or wilder lakes (at Caragh, or Kenmare, or Waterville) which suggest a hundred more like them in Connemara where the favourite centres and hotels are around Cara.% Cashel, Renvyie and Leenane—places, says one fanciful wit, "created by a fisherman who was a God for a devil who was a fish."
Sport not entirely apart, but less specially considered, the,re are roughly speaking six worth-while divisions in Irelatid today. Kerry and West Cork are absolutely distin9tfie, externally and in the nature of the people. There, the rougher the country the more the interest, and the brighter the colour; for the people are mountainy men and fisher-folk of upstanding character who live and die hard. For myself I should prefer to. approach it, and indeed every part of Ireland, by the less frequented back-doors. So Killarney is surely best approached from the Caragh Lake side, aye or even from so far away as that unique little pocket of Gougane Barra. ''the East Coast is of a different mixture of blood and country from any other part of Ireland ; the Slaney line is its back-door. Then softness and richness wave up across the flat central plain from Limerick and Tipperary to Louth—the inland region which, apart from a visit to Cashel, KilIaloe, Clozunacnoise or Tara, is rarely if ever explored ; it is not wildly picturesque—it is flat or rolling—and yet it is the very heart of Ireland. Everyone knows the most colourful part of all the Free State, Galway, Mayo and Sligo, which no doubt will always be approached through Connemara. But how few, and What. a Pity how few, enjoy the lake-country east of the upper lakes of the Shannon. It is one of those regions that constantly surprise the .visitor who finds in Roscommon, Leitrim; Cavan or Fermanagh, With their rolling downs and sedgy, grass-mered pools that drink the skies, a charm quite unlike another part of Ireland—more subtle, perhaps responding to a little more than usual sympathy and discrimination, so well: defined in whit I might' call the Turgenevian prose and verse of William Allingham-,- Maria Edgeworth, or even Oliver Goldsmith.
And there, with Allingham at Enniskillen, we are in the sixth of these natural groupings of life—Northern Ireland,. an area whose individuality (even if the pillar-boxes do change from green to red, and the uniforms from grey to khaki) is so evident, compared either with England or the twenty-Six counties that, with magnificent insolence, are to be known in future (under Mr. de Valera's new constitution) as Ireland ! One has the trout-streams of Derry, like the Bann, Ind anglers' haunts, like Magherafelt ; the Eight Glens of Antrim ; the seaside resorts of Donaghadee, Newcastle or Warrenpoint, each with eighteen holes, good hotels, all snuggling under the Mourne Mountains that send to another pleasant centre, Kilkeel, excellent mountain streams for the angler. '
That, inevitably, prevents me from forgetting the Royal Portrush, where the Irish Open Championship begins on July 27th, and suggests that a few dates might prove welcome reminders. First, there are : Races, around Dublin (at various courses), 3rd, 7th, roth, r6th, and at the Curragh on the 21st-22nd of July ; Killarney, 5th-6th ; Ballinrobe,, 8th ; Galway (not to be missed), 28th-29th. Then there is the Irish End-to-End Motor Cycle Trial (Ulster Centre) on the x2th-13th. On August 2nd there is the Limerick Grand Prix. The Royal Dublin Society Horse Show from the 3rd to the 7th ; while anyone who wants to see Clare having a day out should he at Miltownmalbay on the 12th. Last of all there will be a General Election on July 1st, in which week either Mr. de Valera or Mr. Cosgrave will once again march on Dublin at the head of roo,000 words. The preliminary venue for that sporting event is Everywhere. . . . The visitor arriving before July 1st need not be advised "not to miss" it. He will not be able to. SEia4 O'FAOLAIN.
The Irish Tourist Association, i6 Jermyn Street, S.W. x, will supply the fullest information to intending travellers in the Irish Free State (Dublin office, 14-15 Lower O'Connell Street). For Northern Ireland—The Travel and Industrial Development Associatiob of Great Britain and Irdand, 6 Arlington Street, S.W. x.. In the Six Counties there is The Ulster Tow ist Development Association, 6 Royal Avenue, Belfast.
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