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Account Of A Tour To Killarney, &C. In A Letter To J. And E, Fry.
often becomes an officious handmaid , until the first objects of admira * tion , being blended with the many succeeding ones , form but a small part of the collection . After viewing every thing curious in the gardens and shrubbery , we ' walked to an abbey founded in 1440 , and dedicated to Saint Finian ; it is still in pretty good repair , the steeple excepted . A large stone windowconsiderably embellished with Gothic art , exhibits a curious
, p iece of antient architecture .. There are twenty-two cells round a cloyster of thirty feet square , in the middle of which stands a very large and lofty yew-tree , whose widespreading branches nearly cover the whole of this venerable pile ; this we found to be a place of common sepulture , for both within the walls as well as in the ground adjoining , the dead are now promiscuously
mingled , without the least attention to rank or precedence . Amongst several other monumental inscriptions , some of which have only " their names and year , spelt by th' unletter'd muse , " we noticed one to the memory of Daniel Kerry , whom we understood had been a famous freebooter , the Robin Hood of these parts . Ascending about twenty stone stepsWe were shewn a place called Captain Drake ' s Hermitagewhere
, , a person of that name a few years since took up his abode . He taught the children of credulity to believe that he was brought here by a vow of eternal seclusion from the world ; a declaration that readily claimed ( what it was intended to claim ) admiration at his fortitude , and pity
for his fate . To the astonished crowds whom curiosity brought to the abbey , this voluntary exile from the haunts of men was generally seen at the window of his hermitage , but the farce did not last long , for an inquisitive wig ht , at once faithless and meddling , put an end to the imposition by a report founded on positive proof . After watching him narrowly for some timehe found that instead of Drake ' s being a nocturnal
inha-, bitant of the abbey of St . Finian , he stole privately every evening to the town of Killarney , and from thence returned to his cell , much more tinder the influence of jolly Bacchus , than even that of his own tutelary Pabula * . . From a terrace which forms a shore for the lake , we had a fine prospect of the mountains of Glena , Tomishand the Turkappearing
, , in . majestic grandeur ,, and the lower lake as a beautiful sheet of water . But I regret my want of ability to be more minute in the description of this place , as it claims the admiration of some visitors , more than any other part of this surprising mass of natural beauty . After viewing both the upper and lower lakes it was the si g ht of Mucrus which drew from the celebrated BerkelyBishop of Cloyne , this far-famed
excla-, mation : " Another Lewis Quatorze may indeed make another Versailles , but nothing short of Omnipotence can ever make another Killarney . " The upper lake is about six miles long , and in most places narrow ; it discharges itself into the lower lake , which has a communication with a small winding river called the Lane , that empties itself into" the ocean .
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
Account Of A Tour To Killarney, &C. In A Letter To J. And E, Fry.
often becomes an officious handmaid , until the first objects of admira * tion , being blended with the many succeeding ones , form but a small part of the collection . After viewing every thing curious in the gardens and shrubbery , we ' walked to an abbey founded in 1440 , and dedicated to Saint Finian ; it is still in pretty good repair , the steeple excepted . A large stone windowconsiderably embellished with Gothic art , exhibits a curious
, p iece of antient architecture .. There are twenty-two cells round a cloyster of thirty feet square , in the middle of which stands a very large and lofty yew-tree , whose widespreading branches nearly cover the whole of this venerable pile ; this we found to be a place of common sepulture , for both within the walls as well as in the ground adjoining , the dead are now promiscuously
mingled , without the least attention to rank or precedence . Amongst several other monumental inscriptions , some of which have only " their names and year , spelt by th' unletter'd muse , " we noticed one to the memory of Daniel Kerry , whom we understood had been a famous freebooter , the Robin Hood of these parts . Ascending about twenty stone stepsWe were shewn a place called Captain Drake ' s Hermitagewhere
, , a person of that name a few years since took up his abode . He taught the children of credulity to believe that he was brought here by a vow of eternal seclusion from the world ; a declaration that readily claimed ( what it was intended to claim ) admiration at his fortitude , and pity
for his fate . To the astonished crowds whom curiosity brought to the abbey , this voluntary exile from the haunts of men was generally seen at the window of his hermitage , but the farce did not last long , for an inquisitive wig ht , at once faithless and meddling , put an end to the imposition by a report founded on positive proof . After watching him narrowly for some timehe found that instead of Drake ' s being a nocturnal
inha-, bitant of the abbey of St . Finian , he stole privately every evening to the town of Killarney , and from thence returned to his cell , much more tinder the influence of jolly Bacchus , than even that of his own tutelary Pabula * . . From a terrace which forms a shore for the lake , we had a fine prospect of the mountains of Glena , Tomishand the Turkappearing
, , in . majestic grandeur ,, and the lower lake as a beautiful sheet of water . But I regret my want of ability to be more minute in the description of this place , as it claims the admiration of some visitors , more than any other part of this surprising mass of natural beauty . After viewing both the upper and lower lakes it was the si g ht of Mucrus which drew from the celebrated BerkelyBishop of Cloyne , this far-famed
excla-, mation : " Another Lewis Quatorze may indeed make another Versailles , but nothing short of Omnipotence can ever make another Killarney . " The upper lake is about six miles long , and in most places narrow ; it discharges itself into the lower lake , which has a communication with a small winding river called the Lane , that empties itself into" the ocean .