Morning journal and courier., 1889-06-08
FOOT IN IRELAND.

AFOOT IN IRELAND.
 The old City eff YouehaI-Homes of
 Sir Walter Raleigh and Spenser.-
 KoughaI and Kfleolman-The Lone-
 IY Place About KtIcelnan Castle,
 and the Little River AWbeg.
 MALLow, Ireland, May 27.
 Tothe Editor ofthe JOURNAL AND COURIER:
 About good days tramp east of Cork,
 along the sea, is the sleepiest old city in all
 Ireland. This Is Youghal. Eochaill, or
 "the wood of the yews," is it's true Irish
 name; for somewhere between twenty and
 were prowling about here in their leather
 bottom curraghs, the surpassing loveliness of
 the harbor-scena was crowned by a noble
 forest of yews, and these swept from the
 western heights in billowy curves down to
 the very edge Of the romantic Blackwater,
 which here reposeful finds it's estuary and
 the sea.
 The little old city winds along the Black
 water shore in practically a single street with
 moldy warehouses and idle whsrves at the
 one side, and with cavelnous shops at the
 other, behind which, like brown Gipsy tents
 in mountain-jungle of fragrance, century
 old cabins, mansions and villas are hidden
 in mass of foliage and bloom. No one can
 tell why Youghal is here. Your eye may
 sweep the wide, sunny harbor, to the sea ho-
 rizon in vain for glimpse of a single sail.
 Even the great round sun looks in from above
 the ocean over the ripplelsss bay as if with passing, pressing demand for recognition in responsive life. The white walls of the shops, pierced with diminutive windows, are glarinG and dull There is no sound of foot-fall upon the stone of pave or street. Wooden blinds are drawn and barred. If there be life within the shadowy silencss be- hind window and door, it must only be per turbed that the stiffness may never end. There is not even at old Youghal life left in zephyr or breeze to shake the odors and scents from the buds and blossoms of spring. But there is transcendent smile upon the face Of Youghal, dead or in trance. Only in tropic-land are such skies, such palpabIe pulse and thrill despite the sleep of human activities, such miracle in foliage, marvel in plant and shrub, and such delicious languor in breath of myriad perfumed flower. And it was an old, old mansion so banked with myrtle, so shaded by yews, and so matted found by tip-toeing stranger in the voice- less city, that l had tramped all the way from hospital Cork to see.
 But there it stood, this old home of Sir Walter Raleigh, as lovely picture as one would wish to see; lovelier to-day, no doubt, with it's ivy-rounded gables than in the wild and austere time in which it was built, when the vengeance of the Desmonds reddeu ed the fair valleys of the Bride and Blackwatel with the crimson wine of war. This fine old house, although 1t has undergone many | changes and "restorations," Is more than \ four hundred years old for the structure is the identical one originally founded AS col legiate establishment by the Earl of Dss- mond in 1464, and was attached to the ! church of St. Mary, which dates back to the thirteenth century. At the foundation ot the house the establishments consisted of ''a warden, eight fellows, eight singing men, and the endowment was six hundred pounds | per year" Raleighs first visit to Ireland, like those of long and illustrious line of \ Englishmen before and since, was 8 sol- dier of fortune. He first came as captain in body of troops sent from England, in 1879, to assist Deputy Lord Gray de Wilton in quelling the dangerous Desmond rebellion. His intrepidity, remorselessness and skill were qualities which were in demand at Elizabeth's court, and Ralsigh's fortunate favor there, under the brilliant and prodi- gate Dudley, shortly gave him twelve thou sand acres of land about Youghal in one pa tent, and under another, in 1886 under the queens pr1Vy &eaIy au hQUltlOn&l three SSliSQ- tories and half were granted in the coun- ties of Cork and Waterford. This was Ral- eighs splendid portion of the most heartless confiscation and plunder which ever occurred in any land. For the vanquished Earl of Desmond was the greatest, noblest and rioh- est subject of that time In all Europe. Ex- elusive of his own subjeet-vassals he had over five hundred gentlemen of his kindred and surname; no equal portion of Europe was so dotted with noble castles and armed and provisioned fortresses, and so rich in the fruits of cultivation; while the confiscation of his estates, at his attainder, comprised nearly six hundred thousand English acres, all of which were parcelled out to Elizabeth's victorious foragers. With whatever admira- tion we may contemplate Raleigh's splendid genius and his daring and eventful career, or with however much commiseration deplore his melancholy and cruel taking of, 1t can not be gainsaid that through his share of this colossal Irish plunder was first provided the means which largely aided, if not actu- ally made possible, the impressive exercise of his tremendous and intrepid energies; 6 fortune so out of proportion to all just de serts that he was enabled at one time to on case his feet in diamond-studdeds shoes whose cost exceeded eighty thousand dollars!
 It is difficult to determine just how many years Raleigh occupied this fine old mansion at Youghal. But 1t is certain it was always more or less his loved retreat between 15S6 and 1909, when by deed to the crafty Rich ard Boyle, afterwards Earl of Cork, for an ignoble sum he disposed of his entire vast Irish estates; and it is also certain that Sir Walter retired to this spot after his quarrel with the Earl of Essex, in 1897, at the taking of Fayal, in the Azores, which afterwards contributed to the downfall of Essex, until Raleigh became the English ambassador to the Netherlands in 1900. To these visits and this residence the world undoubtedly owes it's knowledge of the gentle poet, Ed mund Spenser. The latter, like Raleigh, was court follower in 6 small way, and his real or imaginary services to the adherents of Queen Bess had secured for him patent of dreary old Kiloolman Castle and manor of about three thousand acres, some twenty-five miles to the north of Raleigh's home, in the valley of the Blackwater; but unlike Ral- eigh, no fortune or power, and little else in material sense save loss, tragedy and final poverty and distress, came from Spenser's little portion of the Desmond copfscation. But Raleigh, genius and poet that he him self was, generously recognized the greater poets true greatness; warmed his heart with sunny Inequalities; sustained his doubtful dreamings with a strong and heartsome friendship; and, in 1889, bodily took the timorous Spenser to London; personally in troduced him to the Queen; and that very year saw the publication of the first three books of Faeris Queene.
 The old house at Youghal is etill occupied
 It is owned by, and is the residence of, the widow and family of the late Colonel Faunt, who purchased it from the Duke of Devon shire. As it stands to-day 1t is singulsrly apt illustration of the now scarce Elizabeth
 an manor houses; and at first glance one in stinctively recalls Hawthorne's ssHouse of the Seven Gables," or rather identifies this messy old structure in the mind with Flaw thorne's idealized house at Salem; for the Raleigh house has just seven gables, almost wholly hidden by ivy, which has completely enfolded the quaint old place in such em-
 bace that, in many places, it would almost
 seem that it's guarded branches would in time twist and crush the walls into ruined mass. Three gables are on each side and one forms queer old peak in front. Immense chimneys rise between the side gables, and one in front, above and behind the bay win dow of Raleigh's study, pushes up to great height, the ivy winding about it in swirlg of foliage, until it bears startling resemblance to diminutive, ivy-clad round-tower set up on the peak of some gray old crag. There is no doubt that below this fairy tower Raleigh composed number of those works which would have given his name the greatest Jus