Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1889-10-10
THE HOME OF PARNELL.
A Rarely Beautiful Spot Near the
Far-famed "Vale of Avoca."
How the Landed Possessions of the
Great Uncr0wned King of Ire
land Now Appear.
Chicago Journal.

1t was UIlc Vi GIlOSc lovely duIUIl1u 6N6U-
| ings for which the Irish climate is so just
| " celebrated that the writer first beheld
| the ancestral home of the great Irish lead
er-Charles Stewart Parnell
The grand old house with its white walls
and pillared portico was shimmering in the
sunshine that fell redly upon it from the
of its old time glory having apparently
been lost with the lapse of recent wears.
The grounds were not In good order and the
handsome garden on the north side of the
mansion was overgrown with weeds. A
tall fruit tree had fallen and crushed
| through a costly dollhouse, and its branch
es had forced their way through one of
the windows of the mansion. The mansion
itself, a,large three-story structure is solid
" and plainly built. The portico is a
handsome one, and above it is the crest
motto of the Parnell family. From the
lOrdly height upon which it stands one of
the fairest views in all the fairy land of
| Wicklow can be obtained. From the rear
entrance to the house the hill slopes down
almost precipitously till it bathes its feet
in the gurgling, moaning, weirdly dancing
waters of the AvOnbeg. On the far side
of the river the pine-clad hills rise sharply
up to the height of thousand feet thus
forming shadowy legend glen that winds
| through woody hills and rocky gorges until
three miles further south it widens out
into the far-famed Vale of Avoca. To the
west, hills rise above hills in endless tiers,
through which the glen of the Avonbeg
winds with the course of the stream, first
into the beautiful woody vale of Clara, and
! terminating in the song-famed valley of
! Gendalough. All these stretched around
in full view of the writer's eye from the
grassy bank on which he sat close beside
the home of the great Irish leader 1t was
classic ground, too, every inch Of it. Not
/ a sod of those green and smiling valleys,
not shade of those spreading woodlands
that had not witnessed a fierce and bloody
| struggle for supremacy between Celt and
Saxon; every rock has from time to time
proven a shelter to the outlaw battling
for his own; every glen and mountain-hold
has been a refuge and resting-place for
the
EXPIRING SPIRIT OF LIBERTY.
A fierce and gallant race were these
Irish clansmen that for centuries owned
and ruled these lovely glens-so fierce and
sturdy, indeed, that they were never brok-
en- and demOralized, as other Irish septs
and clans were, by Norman Steel
The O'Byrnes, of Wicklow, or Lilman-
tain; as it was anciently called, fought for
their hills, and more bravely, stubbornly
and successfully than any other sept of
their countrymen, and to-day they till the
green fields and valleys of Wicklow as of
yore for it is an old saying that the names
of every third man you meet in Wicklow
is O'Byrne Ganet Byrne, the present
member of Parliament for the Western
Division of Wicklow, is a lineal descend
ent of :" the O'Byrne" the ancient chieftain
Of the sept and goodly representative he
is Of the race. To the north of Parnell' s
home on the Avonbeg is the ford of Rath-
drum. The latter place is small but very
ancient village which stood on those very
banks 200 years or more ago when the
English Lord Deputy Essex was defeated
by the O'Byrnes under their chieftain.
Feagh McHugh, and driven with much
loss back to the town of Glenealy. On the
march thither the English forces had to
pass through a very wild and woody glen,
where they were overtaken by the swift
foot hillsmen and cut to pieces, the Lord
This place is still known as ''the Deputy S
ass. The vale of Glendylough was the
scene of many a wild adventure of Mich
ael Dwyer, the Wicklow hero, who kept
alive in his native mountains for several
years after the rebellion of 1889, the spirit
that the defeat of Vinegar Hill in Wexford
crushed throughout the remainder of the
island. 1t is small wonder that young Par
nell, as he grew up among those lovely
scenes and stirring memories, should i'm
bibe with the very air he breathed lofty
spirit Of patriotism. His family sur
roundings, however, were not favorable to
such result, for although his ancestor
was the last speaker of the old Irish Par
lament and his father Sir John Parnell,
was a man of liberal principles and a
model landlord, yet the family was dis
tinctively aristocratic and moved inn at
mosphere of Conservatism.
Parnell owns all of the lovely glen of the
Avonberg. and the peasants for miles
around owe him fealty as
THE LORD OF THE SOIL.
But his estate terminates and that of his
cousin, the Earl of Wicklow, begins at the
meeting of the waters in the vale of Avoca.
This man s name is Howard, and he is
true type of the blue-blooded British aris-
tocrat His estate stretches for some miles
down the vale, until about mile below
Arklow it joins the property of the Earl of
Carysfort, first cousin of Mr.. Parnell, and
another rich conservative. Indeed, Carys
fort is bitter Unionist and Tory. He
bears striking personal resemblance to
the Irish leader, but the likeness ends ON
the outside; the two mems hearts are cast
In different molds.
1t was among such family associations as
these that the childhood and youth of
Parnell was passed, but his Judgment was
not biased by them The mothers infu-
daughter of Old Ironsides revolted against
the airs of these naughty aristocrats, and
she Withdrew to her native land. In his
| boyhood Parnell was a good deal of an
athlete, and was passionately fond of
cricket He was somewhat bad tempered
| in those days, and woe betide the member
/ of his team who made blunder or false
play. He succeeded, however, In getting
| together one of the finest cricket teams In
F.! the United Kingdom, the Avondale eleven
! being celebrated all over the country. The
club was mainly composed Of the young
peasants of the surrounding country, the
champion batsman being Pat Gaffney OF
| Rathdrum. When Parnell and his team
played in Dublin and in England, Calf
ney s prowress with the willow made the
Britons stare, and the old men in Rath-
drum still point out the distant trees
over which the young mountaineer drove
a ball delivered by a crack university
depended on his stroke. The beauti-
full cricket grounds are the only
part of the Avondale demense still kept
in good repair. But to return, Parnell s
FIRST APPEARANCE IN PUBLIC
,+n