To-morrow we go to Clonmacnoise and to-night, as I sit reading about it, my thoughts become a strange jumble of crosses and round towers, haunted castles, and ancient Manor-houses towards which I am carried in a wild rush through the aisles of the forest surrounded and pursued by dogs, geese, fairies, and ghosts until the top of the hill of the fairies is reached and I am being tried for high treason because of my doubts to-day of the powers of each and all of them. The headless monk is my judge while the sheep with the long claw prosecutes the suit against me. My fingers are dripping blood, it seems, and I am about to be delivered to the dogs of Wingfield when I distinctly hear it stated that I am snoring and had better go to bed. Perhaps such is the case; so good night.
As Clonmacnoise stands on the banks of the Shannon and is but some thirty miles north of Birr, and the day yet young, we are off for a run thither. The morning is moist and the roads slippery, but we make good progress, most of the way through narrow lanes, and sometimes through pastures, to the astonishment of the cattle settled for their noonday's sleep.
Clonmacnoise was once the Oxford of Ireland, where the sons of the nobles were sent for education, its name "Cluan-mac-noise" meaning "the secluded recess of the sons of nobles."[6]
It was in addition, one of the favourite burial places of the Irish kings. Even to-day, to be interred here is considered a blessing, as those so honoured pass straight to heaven.
The Abbey dates from the days of St. Kieran, 548 A.D.,—he died of the plague and was buried here,—and at one time was one of the richest, compressing within its bounds almost the half of Ireland. It flourished all through the wars with the Danes, and seems to have been finally plundered by the English, who carried off the wonderful bells and every other movable object. From that time onward the roofless churches and buildings fell more and more a prey to advancing time, until the whole became as we see it to-day, a small ruined church, a fragment of a castle, a round tower, and a stately cross, crowded upon by the graves of those who have eagerly sought this direct route to the realms of the blessed, but, for us, this world is as yet too full of interest, and we do not envy these dead even though they have here found the portals of heaven.
At Clonmacnoise is one of the many holy wells dating from pagan days, and which the traveller finds all over Ireland. These wells would appear to have formed a prominent feature in the paganism of the ancient nations. There are traces of them all over Africa, Asia and Europe.
It's a slippery, sliding run back to Birr, which the motor several times attempts to take backwards, but it ends safely and we reach "Mr. Dooley's Hotel" for luncheon.
It is a misty morning as we depart from Birr, but mist at this season in Ireland falls like a benediction upon man and upon all the world of green around him—and where else in this world will you find such green as in Ireland?
To-day the woods and meadows stretch away before us and over all bends a grey sky with patches of vivid blue and white cutting through it every here and there.