All of which seems a simple and innocuous enough amusement. In spite of which, however, no very apparent coquettishness on the part of Galway young ladies is to be noted to-day,—at least, it has not been observed by the writer of this book. Perhaps that merely points to a lack of susceptibility on his part.
T. P. O’Connor once told the story of a travelling showman who brought to Galway from America a panorama of America. “He knew what he was about,” said Mr. O’Connor, “when he declared that Chesapeake Bay was the finest bay in the world with two exceptions,—the Bay of Naples and the Bay of Galway; and he was very loudly cheered.
“Without exaggeration, it is a beautiful bay, almost landlocked, with mountains—small enough in comparison with others, but to the untravelled eye of the Irish villager solemn and imposing as the Matterhorn—bounding it on the far side, and with a somewhat narrow mouth opening out into the Atlantic. A mouth that, under the light of morning or evening, is something to suggest either the vastness of this world of human beings, or the anticipation of the greater vastness of that other world beyond, which haunted the imaginations and thoughts of the pious Catholics of that region.”
These few lines serve to give a most truthful word-picture of Galway Bay; and also a glimpse of the brilliancy with which Mr. O’Connor writes. Continuing, Mr. O’Connor writes of his school-days in Ireland thus, in words which give a far more sympathetic and clear knowledge of things as they are—or were—than most reminiscences of a like nature:
“There had come to my native town of Athlone a new school, and it was but natural that my father should like me to go there, and, accordingly, I had no more of Galway—except at vacation-time—for five long years.
“These years belong to my native town and the school near it; and they were among the most unhappy years of my life.
“I remember still the bitter flood of tears I wept the first day after I returned to Athlone from the year or so I had spent in Galway.
“But Galway had to me, then, many of the chief charms of boyhood. There was a second house behind that in which we lived, which was usually unoccupied. From its roof you could see one of those beautiful scenes that, once seen, haunt one ever afterward. Beyond the town you could catch sight of the sea; and there, on certain evenings, you saw the fleet of herring-boats as they went out for their night-watch and night harvest of fish,—a sight that was more like something of fairy-land than of reality, though I dare say the poor crews found much grimmer reality than romance in their hard and laborious night-watches.”
Just off the mouth of Galway Bay are the Aran Islands. Between them and the mainland the sea is often so rough as to make it impossible for small boats to undertake the crossing. The principal food of the inhabitants is dried fish, naturally a home product.
The chief patron saint of Munster, aside from St. Finbarr’s association with Cork, was St. Albeus. He had already been converted by certain Christianized Britons, and had travelled to Rome before the arrival of St. Patrick among the Irish. After his return, he became the disciple and fellow labourer of that great apostle, and was ordained by him as first Archbishop of Munster, with his see fixed at Emely, long since removed to Cashel.