Grandfather Walsh lived in comfort and content several years, and on his peaceful death-bed, blessed his son and daughter, and their children, very solemnly and lovingly. When all thought that he was gone, little Andy, who had been very quiet till then, began to cry aloud. The good old man, whose soul was just at the gates of heaven, heard him, opened his eyes, reached out his hand, and blessed his darling once more. Then he died.
Wicklow.
TIM O'DALY AND THE CLERICAUNE
After leaving Limerick, we returned to Dublin, and there took a carriage, for a little tour in the neighboring county of Wicklow.
Wicklow has been called "The Garden of Ireland," for the beauty of its scenery and the high cultivation of a large portion of its lands. It is full of romantic valleys and streams, lakes, glens, and waterfalls—varied by rugged, untamable wilds, and bleak, barren mountains.
We first visited "the Dargle," or Glenislorane River, upon Lord Powerscourt's domain. This would be thought "a small specimen" of a river with us, as, except when the waters are swollen with a freshet, it is but a narrow and shallow mountain stream. But in Ireland it passes at such times for a mighty torrent, and at all times is greatly admired and respected.
It runs very rapidly, with bright sparkles and pleasant murmurs, down a deep rocky ravine, whose jagged sides are overgrown with moss and ferns, and overhung with luxuriant foliage.
A path leads up the glen to the waterfall. This is considered by the people here a sublime and magnificent cataract, and it is very fine in its way, and abundantly makes up in beauty for what it lacks in awfulness; it is a charming thing to look at, and listen to, and ramble about; and though it does not thunder and plunge and roar, like Niagara, it glads the hearts of all who behold it—it manufactures quite as radiant bows in the sunshine, and makes soft, musical, lulling sounds enough to soothe all the peevish and restless children in the world to sleep.