Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 10.djvu/843

* IREDELL. 749 House in 1817-18, and, with the exception of a short term on the bench of the Superior Court in 1819, served until liis election as Governor ol the State in 1H27. In the following year he succeeded Nathaniel .Macon in the United States Senate, serving until 1831, when he retired per- manently from public life and resumed the prac- tice of law. He was a tounuissioner to revise the statutes of North Carolina, the result of liis labors being the publication of the Uecised 8latutts (183«-37), and as- the reporter for the Supreme Court of the State for many years he compiled twenty-one volumes of Reports. He also published a Trcalise on the Laic of Executors und Administrators (1837), and Digest of Re- ported Cases in the Courts of Xorth Carolina, ITHj to lS',o (1839-46). IRELAND. Ir'l.md. The smaller of the two great island^ forming the United Kingdom of Oreat Britain and Ireland. It rises from the continental shelf amid shallow waters, the line marking a depth of (100 feet running from 2.5 to 100 miles west of the Irish coast. Beyond this line the bed of the Atlantic slopes rapidly to oceanic depths. Ireland is thus essentially a part of Europe, and lies on the western rim of the mighty land mass of Eurasia. Its area is 32..583 square miles, including about 500.000 acres in water areas. Ireland extends through nearlv four degrees of latitude, from the parallel of 51° 26' N. to that of .55° 21'. Topography. On the east, along the waters of the Irish Sea and Saint Cieorge's Channel, which separate Ireland from England and Wales, the coast is comparatively straight for long itretehes, and lias few deep indentations. On the west, however, where the coast is exposed to the gales of the Atlantic, the sea penetrates far into the land through long, deep valleys. These valleys are true fi<uds like those of the west coasts of Scotland and Norway, and. as in those countries, at the entrance to the inlets and all along the coast there are hundreds of little isl- ands that were torn from the mainland mass by ocean storms and other destructive influences. The northwestern edge of Europe, therefore, has the same general characteristics from Bantry Bay. at the southwest corner of Ireland, to the North Cajie, far north of the Arctic Circle in Scandinavia. The chief ports of Ireland are Belfast, Dublin. Waterford, Cork, and London- derry. The west-coast ports are of little im- portance except in the coasting trade. In its general surface Ireland may be de- scribed as basin • shaped. A traveler sailing along the coast waters might get the idea that Ireland is ver>' mountainous. As he nears the coast from Holyhead — the common route from England to Dublin — he sees the blvie line of the Wicklow Mountains rising 2000 feet above the sea. The details come into view as he ap- proaches Diddin. He sees the rounded bosses of Killiney and the grim promontories of Howth and Bray, which are only the outliers of the high granite moorlands that stretch away for 70 miles to the south. Farther north, between IXmdalk and Dimdruni bays, he sees a still more rugged and picturesque coast, with the huge domes of the Mourne Mountains rising above it: and then at Belfast come into view the long, black scarps, terraced and uninvitins. which lorm the edges of the high plateau behind them. IRELAND. Kounding the north coast, he sees along the At- lantic shores of Donegal and Mayo great walls of rock, 2000 feet high in places, the finest cliffs in the British Isles; and down the west coast are the rugged heights of Connaught, the high limestone terraces of northern Clare, and, far- ther south, range after range extends along the shores till they culminate in the gray masses that look down on Bantry Bay. 'The highest peak is Carrantuo Hill (Carran 'I'ual). near the picturesque Lakes of Killarney. which has an elevation of 3.414 feet above the sea. The in- terior of the northern portion of the country, from the latitude of Belfast, is partly broken and mountainous. The same is true of the southern part of the island a little south of the latitude of Dublin. Broadly sjjeaking, therefore, the highlands of Ireland are masked upon its nuirgin. The central area is a wide depression, in which numerous bogs and lakes have formed. When the traveler crosses Ireland, from Dublin to CJalway (115 miles), for example, he meets scarcely a hill on the way. He may travel over large parts of the central regions and feel himself on a great plain above Which hills or ranges of elevated surface rise here and there, though they are quite in- significant in comparison with the wide expanse of brown bog or level meadow land. HTDROGRAPnT. There is no well-defined water- parting feature in the country with rivers radiat- ing from it. There is, therefore, no reason why a stream rising in one of the central counties should flow to the Irish Sea rather than to the Atlantic Ocean. The central plain, in fact, is a gathering ground for the waters that flow down the inner slopes of the bordering hills, and for the rock waste that they carry with them. Most of the plain is not over 500 feet above sea-level. 'The water parting between the eastern and western rivers may be traced from Lough Foyle to Mizen Head; but it is a winding line, marked by no definite and determining surface features. The rainfall is abundant in the central plain, with the result that the slow-moving rivers widen into long lakes or loughs. The Shannon and Eine rivers are formed by these lakes, joined by stretches of river, the river sections being not very much longer than the lakes. The northern part of the centra! plain is drained by the Erne. The centre of the plain is drained by the Shannon, which empties into the Atlantic through a wide estuary 70 miles in length. Tlie Shannon, 2.50 miles long, is the longest river in the United Kingdom. Nearly half of it above the estuary is made up of the three lakes Allen. Ree. and Derg. All the most important rivers rise nn the plain, the moimtain streams being too limited in length and drainage area to have large volumes. Some of the plain streams, like tlie Boyne. are true rivers, and not made up partly of lakes. A few of these sluggish rivers serve as means of communication with the interior, and their usefulness is augmented by the con- siderably developed canal system of the country. The Shannon River, navigable by large steamers for 129 miles, is connected with Dublin by the CJrand and Royal canals, thus affording water comnumication across the island. Bogs covering a large part of the plain are the source of peat, so extensively used in Ireland for fuel. The Bog of Allen, to the east of the centre of the