Morning journal and courier., 1889-06-08

Ire with posterity as a writer, had not his close association with the material activities of his time remorseless1y linked his name with those of the great soldiers, discoverers and court diplomats of the Elizabethan era. For here Spenser knew and loved his "price- less friend" and brother poet, whom he named ''the summer nightingale" and set the seal of his own fine judgment upon Ral- eighs poetical power, in the line admitting no doubt of his geAius,
 '.Himselfe as skillful in that art any"
 Below each gable at the sides Is lesser bay window of the quaintest design, which the ivy has almost hidden from sight. The walls of the structure are fully five feet thick, and it's twenty to thirty apartments, all of which retain their original arrangement, are wains- eotted with Irish oak. Some vandal 're- storer" has covered this with hideous paint, in all save one apartment where the oak shows as black and fawless as ebony. The drawing -roona chimney-piece is a rare and now almost undiscoverable specimen of oak carving. It is also of Irish oak; and is an exquisite example of four hundred years ago ing of emblems and figures. The roof itself is worth long journey to see. doubt if there be elsewhere in England or Ireland such perfect illustration of the power of Irish oak to withstand the effects of time. I was enabled to examine every one of its
 
 cers of that time as they could be dressed and polished in piano factory of to-day. Net one showed check or flaw, and the rav- ages of four hundred years had brought no change, save to color them the rioh, dark brown of old rosewood one will sometimes find among the delicious nuts of the Amsri can hazel.
 One's heart irresistibly warns to the old place for itself alone. It's age, serenity, auaintness and beauty are very like the ten thousand old manor-housss that have pietur- esquely come down to us through English literature until, when real prototype like this is found, it is like unexpectedly coming upon one's own. But to all this is added the picturings loving fancy weaves within and without the place, around it and those two who gave it all the grace it possesses to the world at large. In this quaint study Raleigh paced the oaken floor and evolved new schemes for conquest and power. By this noble bay window, overlooking the sleepy old town and the broad expanse of the Blaokwster, he traced noblsr thoughts that should live when petty affairs of state should be forgotten. Here in priceless communion of sentiment and intellectual converse, he lived in myrtle -perfumed heaven with his poet-frisnd. In this great dining-hall, lofty and dark, weird with grotesque carvings, suggestive with secret pannellings, and toned with softened half-lights from the shade of the fragrant foliage without the two feasted and dreamed, as such may dream over the cloudy perfume of that strange and mystic leaf from the virgin land of dusky men across the ssa. Well might Spenser name the lovely spot Myrtle-grove; for in our own beauteous South never grew the myrtle in greater luxuriance. HeIe beneath these four huge yews, whose gnarled trunks and stout branches form a wondrous Gothic Rrotto, the two sat through unreckoned hours, axd the Faerie Qneene was read by Il- ak 11,,o T,of~ urp1d knew aught of Spenser's marvellous phanta- sy. And, stepping from food divine to food corporeal, just over the myrtle masses, in the little patch of soil lying against the sunny hillside behind, here Sir Walter planted the first potatoes ever grown in Ireland. There seems to be little in his life to make his memory dear to Irishnen. But tho two acts, his friendship for Spenser and his planting of the little patch of Virginia pota- toes, have been of more service to literature, and value to Ireland, than have been equaled by any other who has since come to Erin's shores.
 I feel sure that any one after lettering about the lovely, leafy, silent old city of Youghal, and then enjoying the glories of the Blaekwater with those of it's sweet and nnurmurous tributary, the Awbeg, and after tramp from old Doneraile town, set like a squalid gipsy encampment amid gorgeous s natural environs, to the level tract where stand the ruins of Kileo1man castle-would agree with me in pronouncing tke place one of the loneliest spots in all Ireland. 4 vast ! vale surrounds it; but as far as the eye can ! reach there is scarcely sign of human hab- itation. The once noble forests have disap- peared; only one little lake to the south can be seen; and searching in vain for sight or sound of human activity or nearness, only the gray of far horizon-edge settles lead en1y down upon the Waterford mountains to the east, the heights of Kerry to the west the Nagle mountains to the south, and the Ballyhowra Hills to the north It is said that from the top of the castle a view of above half the breadth of Ireland was once commanded If there was compensation in that in Spenser's time 1t could hardly be found now. Kilcolman, or Cill-Colman in Irish, means Colm ans Chureh. There were above sixty sain ts Colman, and any of these, to ones liking, may be taken as the patron saint of this particular townland locality. The castle, ss the ruins indicate, however re- mote its date of construction, must have been one of strength and importance. The lower portion of the great quadrangular keep is In good state of preservation for about thirty feet from the ground; one of it's side walls, showing noble window, rises solidly and firmly for perhaps twenty-five feet above this; and massive square hanking tower still lifts it's rough old walls to . probable height of seventy feet. It must have been weird and dreary place for one of Sponsors fine nature. But two things of the gravest importance to poet, prince or peasant, came to this man in his eleven years of practical banishment here, between 15S7 and 1899. The first of these was the christening and ex- alting influence of absolute self-denial. The second was in his wooing and marrying 8 woman "of mean birth" who was so loyal, sweet and good, that Spenser never knew an unhappy hour on her account during his life, more power to women "of mean birth" for it. These two good fortunes, despite bitter financial straits on the one hand, and, on the other, Irish rebellion of such startling fro quency that every far line of trees, like trembling silhouettes against the horizon, undoubtedly took on the form of Desmond and Tyrone avengers, made him sing as no English poet before or since ever sung. And in these true things of his life lay the com- pensations; for the later days of poverty in London, where, as the sequel proved, Eng fish indifference was more fatal than Irish savagery, brought him nothing savesthe loy- alty of his companion "of mean birth;" and he was allowed to die in want in tho land he had more infinitely honored than any other who ever lived in 1t save Shakespeare. There is but little here to remind of Spenser now. So desolate is old Kilcolmsn and de- void of suggestive association the region roundabout, that the pilgrim hither must perforce bring Spenser along in his heart, and build the entire fabric of life, home and haunts from his own loving fancy. Only one real and sweet thing remains which will al- ways remain as if revealing the radiance of the poets gentle presence. That is the little river, Awbeg, the "Mulla" of his joyous verse; more joyous and melodious ever as it sings of him who sung on it's sunny, beaute- aus way to the Biackwater and the sea.
 EDGAR L. WAKEMAN.
 PROBLEMS.
 A metaphysical problem that has for cen- Ar.ri zlad Ina ,ahiloaor,Lara hr1f