Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 21, 1910.djvu/526

 484 Collectanea.

ravens and owls connected with the Ross-Lewins, Westropps, and other families as death warnings have already been referred to (p. 190).

X. Spectral Lands and Cities.

Clare formed a part of the outmost fringe of the ancient world, and its people were deeply impressed with the mysteries and wonders of the Outer Ocean. The voyage of Maelduin tells of the son of a Clare man sailing out into " the great endless deep " and finding isles of surpassing beauty and wonder, and the " Hui Corra " in deep repentance sailed towards the setting sun from the creek at the northern bound of Clare " to meet the Lord on the sea." 2^ St, Brendan, eager to seek out new islands, went for advice to St. Enda, a saint closely connected with Clare, (where Killeany bears his name), and its appanage, Aran. In the bay to the north of Clare William Ires, a native of Galway, became accustomed to the ocean which he crossed with Columbus, and it may be that his tales of Hy Brasil, of St. Brendan's Isle, and of the "thrice fifty distant Isles in the ocean to the west of us. Larger than Erin, twice is each of them, or thrice," ^^ encouraged the frightened sailors of the great Admiral to persevere a little longer.

Hy Brasil,^^ the Isle of the Blessed, is possibly a legacy from ancient paganism, which placed its Tirnan-oge, The Land of Youth, in the waves " on the west side down from Aran, where goes the sun to its couch." 22 The desire for the ageless, deathless land prevailed all up the western coast, and was strong in Kilkee in 1868-78, and perhaps even still. I myself saw the mirage several times in 1872 giving the perfect image of a shadowy island with wooded hills and tall towers springing into sight for a moment as the sun sank below the horizon. I have also heard from Kilkee fishermen legends, like that embodied in the verses of Gerald

30 n Voyage of the Hui Coxx&," Revue Celtique, vol. xiv. (1893), p. 37; Voyage of Bran, (ed. Kuno Meyer), vol. i., p. 12; "Voyage of Maelduin," Revue Celtique, vol. ix. (1888), p. 45.

3^ Voyage of Bran, vol. i., p. 14.

^ It is marked on a series of ancient maps from the fifteenth to the middle of the seventeenth centuries.

" Grolla anfhinga, (Irish Texts Society, vol. i.), p. 21.