A pleasant excursion from the city is to the Bay, which is considered one of the most beautiful in the world; and to Howth Harbor, formerly the landing-place of the Dublin packets, but now superseded by Kingston.
The first object which strikes one on approaching Dublin by sea, is the famous Hill of Howth, which rises bold and high, on the northern coast of the bay, and stands like the great guardian and champion of Ireland.
The Dublin people are as proud of this as the Neapolitans are of Mount Vesuvius, which overlooks their noble bay of Naples. "Ah, sure ma'am," said an Irish sailor,—"it's as fine an ilivation, barrin' a few thousand feet of height, as that same smokin', rumblin' ould cratur, an' a dale betther behaved."
At Howth there are some very interesting Druidical remains to be seen, a fine old castle and an abbey, in which repose many brave and famous knights—the Tristrams and St. Lawrences, barons of Howth.
There is a curious and romantic legend of Howth Castle, which I will relate here.
GRACE O'MALLEY.
In the time of Queen Elizabeth, there was a celebrated woman living in the province of Connaught, Ireland, named Grana Uille, or Grace O'Malley. She was the chieftainess of the O'Malley's of Clare Island, and called herself a princess, but she was most famed as a female pirate-captain, or vi-queen, as, perhaps, she would have preferred to be called.
She lived in rude, stormy times, when the Irish were nearly as wild and warlike as savages, and fierce feuds and bold robberies, on land and sea, were every day affairs. Indeed, for a man to be a peaceful, honest, sober citizen, was then no ways to his credit; then children were taught by their quarrelsome parents, to fire up on the slightest occasion, and fight for their rights,—to revenge all insults, and make free with the property of their enemies; and little was the Sunday-school teaching they had to the contrary; then when women became leaders of lawless predatory bands, they were admired and wondered at; but few thought of condemning them, or dared to scout at them.
Those must have been the days, or Ireland the country, of "woman's rights," for throughout the warlike career of the great chieftainess, nobody seems to have been much shocked, or to have thought that Miss O'Malley was going out of her "proper sphere," and infringing on the sacred rights of the nobler sex, in fighting and pirating; except it may be those men who got the worst of it, in engagements with her.
Grace O'Malley was the daughter of a powerful chief, who, having no heir, brought up his one little girl as though she were a son—teaching her all sorts of manly and martial exercises. Instead of dolls and pets, her childish playthings were pistols and daggers, which she soon found very useful in scaring her attendants into instant obedience to her whims; and instead of being allowed to play among the sands and hunt shells on the wild seashore, she was taught to swim, to fish, to row, and to shoot the shy water-fowl. Instead of taking her airings, like a modern nobleman's little daughter, on a well-trained pony, or a sober, sure-footed donkey, over smooth lawns, and through shady parks and flowery lanes, she was accustomed to accompany her father and his rough followers, mounted on one of the wild horses of the country, on long mountain hunts—to dash through bog and briar, to ford swollen streams, and leap wide, dark chasms.