The life of the dwellers must have been very crude and rude, but they were all very tenacious of their right of sepulchre with their forefathers. Each old will directs, after kindly returning the "soul to the God who gave it," that their bodies be buried "in the chapel adjoining the Abbey of St. Dominick in Lorrha," and so it was done; but, as I have stated, years have gone and other dead have claimed the same graves in this holy spot, until the place, now a tangle of ivy and wild brier, is buried deeply and heaped high with the silent sleepers whose rest is rarely disturbed by a passer from the great outer world of the living.
In the surrounding graveyard the dead sleep closely together and the spot is better cared for than is usually the case. Apparently they are not so soon forgotten, at least, one is not horrified by the appalling desolation and abandonment usually to be found in such places in rural Ireland. Of course the people are very poor, but at least they could lock the doors of the vaults and cut the grass over the graves of their dead. It may be that they consider that nothing is necessary or can be done once they pass beneath the sod of "holy ground," that, having been consecrated by the church, any touch of man's hand would be a desecration thereof. Be that as it may the effects upon one from another land is horrible. Such is not the case here in Lorrha, I am pleased to state.
A quick run of nine miles brings us to the quaint old city of Birr, just as the night closes in.
Birr is an eminently respectable town. Its streets are wide and its houses have a delightful seclusion which reminds one of the main square in Frederick City, Maryland. There are arched doorways shaded by climbing vines and bearing great brass knockers. There are family cats every here and there, and ancient dames peer at you from behind lace curtains. In its main square at the base of the column to the Duke of Cumberland and his victory of Culloden, one of the present citizens of Birr is declaiming. He does not declaim long; truth compels me to state that he is tight, and that even now two servants of the law are escorting him into the calaboose. Pity 'tis, 'tis true. But this is Saturday night and a man must have his little enjoyments.
We descend at the door of an hotel whose name sets us whistling, "Mr. Dooley's Hotel." I think it fairly good—Boyse does not agree with me but withal we are very comfortable in it.
Birr is the very centre of Ireland, and probably takes airs to herself in consequence.
We arrive here very weary to-night. There are days when motoring is not all joy—this has been one. The lime dust and cold winds around Galway have cut our faces into segments, and I find a bath, an open fire, and easy chair too attractive to resist, but Boyse has gone off in a jaunting-car eight miles to see some friends and arrange for a visit to-morrow to an ancient castle where a real ghost still holds forth. We shall see what we shall see, but it would take more than a ghost to keep me awake to-night, much less to make me drive sixteen miles to call, but it seems nothing to Boyse who does not return until late—too late to talk—and so good-night.
Morning dawns in mist and rain, which continue off and on all day long. Birr is as silent as only an Irish or English town knows how to be on a Sunday,—every shop is closed, the houses show scarce any sign of life, while Cumberland upon his column seems to offer an apology for being in gala array on the first day of the week.