One Irish Summer

by William Eleroy Curtis

In Ireland the Christian Brothers receive no grant from the government, and all their primary schools are free. Tuition is charged at the secondary and technical schools and the remainder of the support comes from legacies, private and public contributions, collections in churches, and other sources.

Edmund Rice died in 1844 at the age of eighty-two, and is buried in Waterford cemetery, with this simple epitaph:

BROTHER EDWARD IGNATIUS RICE,
Founder of Christian Schools
In Ireland and England.

Carton House, the seat of the earls of Kildare, is on the opposite side of Maynooth from the college. It is the present home of Maurice Fitzgerald, Duke of Leinster, a young man who came of age in March, 1908. He carries more rank and titles than any other person in Ireland, and has more money than any Irishman except Dublin’s titled brewer. He spends much of his time at Carton House, which looks like a Florentine palace, but is completely modernized and fitted up with electric light, telephones, and elevators, and stands upon an eminence in the center of a park inclosed within eight miles of stone wall ten feet high. It is a drive of three miles from his front gate to the threshold of his front door, and there are more than thirty miles of macadamized roadway within the demesne. There are hills and dales, twelve lakes, and four waterfalls, one of them thirty-nine feet high. There is a garden of sixty acres laid out in the French style, with fourteen or fifteen fountains and many arbors, kiosks, and pergolas. There are meadows, pastures, vegetable gardens, and fields of oats and other grain, but three-fourths of the park is primeval forest, that has never heard the sound of an axe, and most of the trees are as old as history. I am told that no private park in the world surpasses the grounds of Carton House. Among other curiosities is a cottage built entirely of shells, to commemorate a visit of Queen Victoria, who describes her experiences in “Leaves from Our Life,” and tells of jaunting cars, Irish jigs, and bagpipes. The shell cottage is now used as a museum to contain the family relics.

The young duke has several other residences. One of them is Kilkea Castle, County Kildare, which came into the family in the thirteenth century, with ninety thousand acres of farm land, which has just been sold to his tenants under the Wyndham Land Act for more than $6,000,000. The Duke of Leinster has also disposed of his farming lands in the neighborhood of Maynooth for more than $800,000. The estates commission, which has the responsibility of carrying out the provisions of the land act, has purchased more land from him than from any other landlord, and he has received from them in payment nearly one-fourth of the entire amount of money that has been paid under the act by the government. He has a plain but spacious town house on Dominick Street, Dublin, and Mrs. John W. Mackay now occupies his London residence, 6 Carlton House Terrace, under a long lease. His wealth is estimated at $50,000,000. He is unmarried, and has no attachments so far as known. His accumulation of titles is even greater than his wealth. He is the sixth duke of Leinster, which title dates from 1761, and was bestowed by Queen Anne; he is the twenty-fifth earl of Kildare, which title dates from 1316; and the thirty-first baron of Offlay, a title that has been in the family since 1168. He is the premier duke, the premier marquis, the premier earl, and the premier baron; the head of the Irish nobility. And all this rank and responsibility is borne by a frail boy of twenty-one.

Carton House, Maynooth, County Kildare; the Residence of the Duke of Leinster

He spent the winter of 1907-8 in America, incognito, under the name of Maurice Fitzgerald. He and his tutor visited Quebec, Montreal, and Ottawa, and all the principal cities in the United States. They inspected Harvard, Yale, the University of Chicago, and Stanford University, for the young duke has recently taken a degree at Oxford, and was naturally curious to see some American institutions. He spent some time in New York, and was in Washington for a couple of days without disclosing his rank. He enjoyed himself immensely during the entire journey and escaped all the matchmakers, the lion hunters, and the society cormorants. He was not in search of a wife, but was seeking health and completing his education. I am told that he is an exceedingly sensible young fellow, modest, intelligent, thoughtful, and studious. He does not need to marry for wealth nor for position. He can pick his own wife, and has plenty of time to consider the choice.

The duke has been very carefully brought up and educated. His mother died when he was nine years old. She was Lady Hermione Duncombe, daughter of the Earl of Faversham. His father died at the age of forty-two, when he was fourteen. The present duke inherits his delicate, frail constitution, and has symptoms of tuberculosis, which has been the death of many Geraldines. To preserve himself from its dreaded grasp he has lived an outdoor life under the care of a physician, and every preventive that medical science can devise has been used for his protection. Since the death of his mother he has been under the care of three aunts,—Lady Cynthia Graham, Lady Ulrica Duncombe, and Lady Helen Vincent,—his tutor, Rev. the Marquis of Normanby, and his trustee, the Earl of Faversham. He has had governesses and tutors, spent two years at Eton and three years at Oxford, although his studies have been frequently interrupted by sea voyages and camping tours in the mountains for his health. He has a brother, Desmond, two years his junior, and another, Edward, who is fourteen years old.