The Irish Penny Journal, Vol. 1 No. 12, September 19, 1840

Travellers whose only knowledge of our towns is that derived in passing through the principal street or streets, will be very apt to form an erroneous estimate of the amount of picturesque beauty which they often possess, and which is rarely seen save by those who go out of their way expressly to look for it. This is particularly the case in our smaller towns, in which the principal thoroughfare has usually a stiff and formal character, the entrance on either side being generally a range of mud cabins, which, gradually improving in appearance, merge at length into houses of a better description, with a public building or two towards the centre of the town. In these characteristics the highway of one town is only a repetition of that of another, and in such there is rarely any combination of picturesque lines or striking features to create a present interest in the mind, or leave a pleasurable impression on the memory. Yet in most instances, if we visit the suburbs of these towns, and more particularly if they happen, as is usually the case, to be placed upon a river, and we get down to the river banks, we shall most probably be surprised and gratified at the picturesque combinations of forms, and the delightful variety of effects, presented to us in the varied outline of their buildings, contrasted by intervening masses of dark foliage, and the whole reflected on the tranquil surface of the water, broken only by the enlivening effect of those silvery streaks of light produced by the eddies and currents of the stream.
Our prefixed view of the town of Antrim may be taken as an illustration of the preceding remarks. As seen by the passing traveller, the town appears situated on a rich, open, but comparatively uninteresting plain, terminating the well-cultivated vale of the Six-mile-water towards the flat shore of Loch Neagh; and with the exception of its very handsome church and castellated entrance into Lord Ferrard’s adjoining demesne, has little or no attraction; but viewed in connection with its river, Antrim appears eminently picturesque from several points as well as from that selected for our view—the prospect of the town looking from the deer-park of Lord Massarene.