Page:Once a Week Dec 1861 to June 1862.pdf/639

 31, 1862.] freaks of these bold headlands, that all we can do is to urge the pedestrian to come and see for himself.

Very unpretending, though comfortable quarters can be procured, both in the village of Glen, and at the hamlet of Malinmore, a little further south, while at Carrick there is as pleasant a little inn as ever tourist need stop at. Carrick is just at the foot of Slieve Liagh, or, as it is commonly called, Slieve League, a mountain wanting but a few feet of 2000 in height, the sea-front being a grand mural cliff, from the summit of which you can drop a stone into the sea. There is certainly no precipice in the British Isles to match this, and we question whether, taking it all together, it has a rival in Europe. The line of cliffs, fortunately, curve round a little, and thus give an opportunity of observing the sea-front, which one would otherwise lose.

During our stay at Carrick, we made two excursions up to this spot, which is called Bun-glas, or beautiful view, and saw the Slieve under two aspects—under a dark, louring sky, with the mists eddying round the summit, and an angry, breaking sea, and again when the day was cloudless and the sun bright, and certainly never was there such a rare combination of colouring. Every variety of hue, from great blotches of ochre-brown iron-staining, to streaks of green and gold, relieve the neutral tints of the rock in alternation with gleaming white quartz and patches of mica,

all still more brilliantly brought out by a wonderfully blue sea and still bluer sky. There is no difficulty about the ascent of Slieve League, though the narrow path demands careful walking and a tolerably steady head, particularly at a spot called the One Man's Path, which is flanked on one side by the sea-cliff, and on the other by a very steep slope, so steep that a person would have great difficulty in stopping himself if he once began to roll; but, after all, there is not half so much danger here as there is on the Striding-edge of Helvellyn or the Clawdd Coch of Snowdon. There are a few antiquarian remains on the summit in the shape of an ancient oratory, or chapel, but we fancy that the view will be the greatest attraction, embracing as it does miles and miles of the opposite coast of Sligo and Erris, together with the greater part of the Donegal mountains, amongst which we recognised several ridges which by this time had become familiar to us.

The remainder of our route homeward lay along the southern coast, past the mountain village of Kilcar, and the wooded bay of Fintragh to Killybegs, which, for all its funny name, is as charming a little watering-place as is to be met with in a long summer's day—at least by those who seek for the advantages of a sea-bathing place without the gaieties and expenses of one. And as we here rejoined civilisation in the shape of a long car, which plied between Killybegs and Donegal, we felt that a magnificent country was, as far as the British tourist is concerned, comparatively unknown and unexplored, and we trust that even this slight sketch will induce a few pedestrians to ramble into Donegal.

past a Doric village
 * Heard at night a spirit summons,
 * Sounding over wood and commons,

Over fallow, rock, and tillage,
 * Waking all the rustic sleepers,

Weary with the toil of tillage.

For that music shook the branches,
 * From their clay nests woke the thrushes;
 * Where the brook thro' fern leaves gushes—

Brook that summer scarcely stanches;
 * Woke the bird whose endless sorrow

Rest, nor years, nor absence stanches.

Watchmen by the gate's barred portal
 * Woke and heard the spirit calling,
 * As the chill night dew was falling.

“Lo!” they said, “’tis an Immortal
 * Come to bless our new-built temple—

Now the moonbeam strikes its portal.”

Dusky faces, over doorways,
 * Peered into the moonshine quiet,
 * Thinking it some rustic riot

Of god Pan, who often plays
 * To the Bacchants in the midnight.

All dark through, so they but praise.

Hark! it rises and it hovers "Where the dew, so fresh and gleaming,
 * Like a diamond treasure beaming,

Studs the rose-flowers, dear to lovers.
 * Can it be a wandering Siren

Luring Dryads from their lovers?

Now a bird returning seaward,
 * Then it moaneth like the dying;
 * Now it clamours like the flying

Of a host fierce driven seaward;
 * Then there comes a sound of pinions

As of creatures winging seaward.

Floats through ilex boughs that tangle,
 * Where moss-banks the violets cover.
 * Where the amorous night-moths hover,

By the brooks that playful wrangle,
 * Washing round the roots of beeches.

Where the water-courses jangle.

Now it seems a Pæan holy
 * Keeping cadence to the beating
 * Of the wild Fauns' golden cymbals,

When their blood the wine is heating,
 * When the lambs burn on the turf,

And the worshippers are meeting.

Hearing it, the green-mailed adder
 * From the bramble wood came creeping,
 * Then the tortoise from its sleeping

Slowly woke, and loud and madder
 * Howled the wolf, as if tormented
 * By those sounds that cheered all other

Sounds that Echo answered sadder.

Now it passes to'ards the village,
 * In between the wattled houses,
 * And each drowsy shepherd rouses.

Faces stare out on the tillage,
 * Thinking that some god were coming,

Or the light-armed hot for pillage.