First.—They are all situated within a few yards of some ancient church, and which church is invariably without a steeple.
Secondly.—It is impossible to conceive, from their slender shape, their great height, and their contiguity to the church, for what other purpose they could have been intended, having, to a spectator inside, who looks up to the top, exactly the appearance of an enormous gun-barrel.
Thirdly.—That in all of them now entire, the holes, for the purpose of receiving the beam to support the bell, remain; and that in one at least, that upon Tory Island, co. Donegal, the beam itself may be seen at this day.
Fourthly, and which appears to me more conclusive than all the rest, that these towers, in every part of Ireland, are, to this day, called in Irish by the name of clogach, (cloig-theach,) that is, bell-house, and that they are never called (in Irish at least) by any other name whatever.
H.S.
P.S. We have heard a good deal of late of a chimney or high tower erected at Bow, by the East London Water Company, on account of its having been erected without any outside scaffolding. It is remarkable, that the traditions of all the people in the neighbourhood of the round towers in Ireland, agree in stating that they were built in the same manner.
BELLE SAVAGE INN.
(To the Editor of the Mirror.)
Observing in the daily papers an extract from the MIRROR respecting the Belle Savage Inn, I copy you an advertisement out of the London Gazette for February, 1676, respecting that place, which appears to have been called “ancient” so long back as that period.