Arizona citizen., 1873-09-06
LETTER FRoMTRE "oLD soD.' g
About Pictures that are not Painted What a Hasty Tour Amounts to at Best--A Zigzag Run Across the Emerald Isle.


 at Best--A Zigzag Run Across the
 Emerald Isle.
 BELFAST, IRELAND, July 30.-There is only this excuse 1 have for myself
 or any other idiot or Innocent Abroad
 on flying trip, as @ majority of
 Americans in Europe ever are, and
 this year particularly. If we are
 truly capable Of appreciating real
 painting by human handsome by the best of hands-we are, or should
 be, all the better able to enjoy the
 scenery, natural and artificial, which
 1 fancy everywhere abOunds in this old world. 1 refer more specially
 now to the works of man touched by
 nature through years and centuries of
 them; almost geological periods as it
 were. We have greater rivers, noun tains, etc. at home, but we have not got the universally cultivated or i'm
 proved hills and valleys, lakes and rivers, which are everywhere found in Europe; so solid and enduring, that even tradition is unsatisfactory as to the founder of this castle, that bridge, or wonder wall in general. Here Is art finished by nature into the grandest picture gallery l can conceive. X birdseye view thereof IS d continual pleasure to me, whether l am more fit to judge of study by old Mike Angel in tue Vatican, than a mule Is to sing tenor for Mad. Mill l son. I feel that 1 am not wholly | upon a wild goose chase, and if you now understand whet l am talking about-all right; you will have the best of me once, if you do.
 l was not sea-sick, but rather sick of the sea-its monotony-hence 1 got off 1t the first opportunity. Queens town Is the harbor for the very inter esting city of Cork in the south of Ireland. Cork is twelve miles up the | river Lee from the beautiful and well 1 fortified harbor. The scene Is almost 1 in its lnxuriance of verdure. The river Is walled up the sides, and ! the banks and rolling country adioin- ing are lined and marked with all sorts of fine residences, cottages, fences Of stone tipped or covered with differ ent kinds of hedge; flowers of the most delicate construction and colors. If l could have bought the whole Is- land then, 1 should have certainly done 1t and sent the remainder of the across to help out the De- mocracy in '76. 1 Ithink 1t were bet ter for the Irish if such Democratic sort of devil as myself owned it all. instead of the half-dozen thorough bred old tyrants of landlords that now have it among them. This IS the very first grand, distinguishing feature of the picture of Ireland that an observing tourist " will discover, ' and when found make note on. Mexican towns and cities as a rule terminate short off like precipice- 10 houses outside to speak of as in OUT country where the farmers own the and they live on and sooner or later nave cousidera ble mansions. Here IS . country older than Christ and great deal more crucifed, and we ,nly yet see towns and cabins. Its owners mostly live in England or on he continent and let Pat and the Pig pay the rent, whether the crops are good or bad. One may read of these hings when thousands of miles away, put the fact is never quite fixed in the mind thereby. 1 will read of the picture hereafter perhaps more in ,ently for this trip. But Ireland is i -ruly as green as reported. Notwith- standing 1t is all on the latitude of the Gulf Stream twirls { 'Ound 1t like an affectionste vine and , ones down the atmosphere to about f hat of the Willamette Valley. Ore , 5on. Here, however, the rainy season nay be repeated all the time It has aimed every day since 1 landed, and will continue till leave. (No pun . ntended). l never went out visiting I where the weather could interfere, z put what it did. Owing to the orig ' nal forests of Ireland being long ago : into peat, etc, wood and umber are secondary items. Barns Ire not Q part of the scenery further han that the various cattle all live lnder one roof. The hay is stacked Fat moving his potato-patch grass 'lat with the quaintest old gcythe,