As the vale in whose bosom the bright waters meet.”
The meeting of the three Killarney lakes was referred to, and Moore was telling truth as well as poetry. The upper lake and the middle lake narrow to small streams and flow together as they merge into the little rosebud of a mouth which the lower lake puts up to greet them. There is a rapid which the boat shoots for a sixpence, but it was not thrilling. In the triangular park made by lakes and mountains are said to be specimens of every kind of tree known. The driver told this proudly, but when I called for a cottonwood he couldn’t produce. Then I told him all about the wonderful cottonwood, and he promised to see the keeper and find out why they couldn’t have one in Killarney.
That reminds me of my experience with music. The first morning I awoke in Ireland at Queenstown I heard the voices of a number of sailors of the royal navy, and as the melodious sounds rolled into the window I was surprised to realize that they were singing “Under the Anheuser-Busch.” At the hotel in Cork the orchestra played the same. At the theatre that night it was greeted with an encore. The driver on the jaunting-car whistled the tune. And last night when I had made friends with a cottager and was sitting with him by the side of a peat fire and he was telling me of Ireland’s woes, his little girl came in and he proceeded to show her off. First he had her sing an old Gaelic song. Then he said, “Now give us an American song,” and she responded with “Under the Anheuser-Busch.”
I have hardly met an Irishman but has told me he had brothers and sisters in America. At Glengariff the hotel proprietor said at least 2,000 young men and women had gone to America from that parish in the last few years—the brightest and best of the young people, he said—nearly all of them to Boston. From Killarney nearly all go to New York. I told them how Boston and New York were ruled by the Irish, and put the question as to why the Irish couldn’t run Ireland. I am trying to answer that conundrum to my own satisfaction, and am gathering ideas on the subject from everyone I meet.
The ordinary Irish village like Killarney is a quaint picture. The streets are narrow, mostly eight to twelve feet wide. The main street is about thirty feet wide. Nearly all the houses are a story or a story and a half, thatched roof, whitewashed walls, dirt floors except in one room, low ceilings, doors and windows, full of chickens, cats and children. I have not yet seen a pig in the parlor. The pig is kept in a little room at one side. But the chickens have as much liberty of the house as anybody and the goat is monarch of the outside. There is very seldom any yard, the houses being built right up to the street. The house is heated by a fireplace and the cooking is done in the same. Peat is the fuel, and it is cleaner and not sooty like coal. The dirt floor and the chickens in the house sound as though the Irish cottage would be dirty, but the whitewash and the scrubbing-brush fight on the other side, and you don’t get that impression. The women-folks are always neat-looking and everybody is pleasant and cheerful. Every window has a window-box of geraniums. There are usually so many children that the house does not hold them, and the street is always filled with them. Remember when you are driving through a town the street is filled with children, and if you are an American and not used to it your heart will be jumping into your throat for fear some of them will be run over—but I am told they never are.
After the chickens and the children the most novel sight is the donkeys with their two-wheel carts, the only ordinary carriages for passengers or freight of the people. The donkey is the size of our mountain burro, and has the same degree of intelligent expression. All of the hauling is done by this patient animal, and he is looked upon as a valued member of the family.
In riding or walking the rule of the country is the same as in England—turn to the left. I have not yet gotten over the yearning to grab the lines from the driver when he turns to the left to avoid a passing carriage. Fortunately the other driver is always fool enough to also turn to the left. I confided my trouble to an Irish driver, and he said it was ridiculous to turn to the right.