Evening star., 1895-08-03

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-.S<IaSA NJ majority Of people,
NM and some of them
nv >kTGiNV worldwide travellers
~ .MNllY too, who have never
-4sSNkNHL been in Ireland. have
<N#NEi2fNwHS an idea that the rich
Irish. who are sup
posed to be few and
far between anyway.
are never found in their own country, and
all that the average traveller may hope to
observe is poverty, dirt and misery gener-
ally. We used to hear great deal few
years ago about the absent landlords, and
1t Is no less true now, but that does not
drive all the rich from the Gould sod by
any means. Last summer the Cork cricket
team was playing for the championship
against the English military team, and
the latter beat them, too, by the way,
more's the pity. for the Corkies played
mighty pretty game for the three days the
contest was on.
The captain of the Cork team is Sir
George Colthurst, baronet and ]. P,
charming man socially, and one of the best
crieketers in the United Kingdom. He is
the owner of Blarney castle and the many
productive acres with which it is sur
rounded, as well as the new Blarney castle
where he lives. Four of the men on his
team, about as good-looking q quartet of
brothers as could be found anywhere, each
enjoy an annual income of 100000.
OF course, most of the rich men, and
rich mems sons, too, have accumulated
their wealth by vulgar trade, and are still
attending strictly to business, but If there
Is any pleasure or comfort which these
people have not tasted or surrounded them
selves with it is only because they have
not heard of it. The four young men just
cd a ia6 hrYf fhnr
plenty more just like them in Ireland: and
If something could be only devised to en-
courage that class of emigration to
drawing rooms it would make the problem
ters?" much easier to solve here, where ELI
g7ble men are SO scarce.
At BIarney Castle.
Talking about Blarney castle as purely
business speculation, the ruins pay, not
because of the price of admission, for that
is entirely voluntary and does not any more
than cover the salary of the care-taker.
She Is a pleasant-faced. red-haired woman,
whom tourists find in the intervals of their
visits to Blarncy looking always the same
and never growing day older. 1t is the
little railway from Cork to Blarney, with
a half dozen stops between and along the
running waters of the River Lee," that
makes the shillings for the corporation
operating 1t, of which the owner Of Blar-
ney castles, new and old, Is a heavy share
holder.
From the top of the ruins one of the
prettiest pictures on which the sun ever
shone repays the traveller who has climbed
SO high to look down on the Blarney stone.
The stone Is there, and venturesome in
dividuals for a couple of centuries have
easily distinguished themselves by hanging
ever the parapet to kiss it. 1t takes some
rerve, but the Irish air is full of that and
no end OF confidence can be reposed In the
steady fellow holding your heels. There is
n hnr OnI NrN,vr Ht>rnl lla ,,~h
the opening and kiss the point which
touched the rock. The charm will prob
ably work as we'll at long range.
About the Hotels.
There are good hotels in Ireland, some
almost as good as in this country. The
best of them are not found in the Cities
though, but at the lake and seaside re-
sorts. Too many Of them in Ireland. as
well as in England, make too strong card
Of the martial glories of the gorgeous hall
porter. He is done up In gold lace and a
snowy uniform, with a background of shin
ing brasses and other front door effects
AS rule, he Is really the only perfect fea-
ture about the establishment, and. to the
American i1ea, absolutely worthless.
In the south of Iceland hotels are uni
formly bad in every respect but food.
That would be hard to spoil. There is a
new hotel, Or rather, an old one trans
formed, in Dublin, owned by English capi-
tai. which is about as near perfection as
the traveller will find in any country. The
room furnishings are daintiness personihed
in every particular. The electric lighting
and a telephone in each room are wonders
for the old country, and, indeed the latter
is not common in this. French cooking
and French walters are other surprises.
and the price Is trif1e lower than the
hotels in the neighborhood of the national
galleries IL London.
Strawberries in Abundance.
The summer tourist in Ireland wilq not
find the variety Of vegetables and fruits
that is in our markets now. If you long
for pineapple, a small one will cost at least
81; peaches, home grown, u and Is cents
apiece; tomatoes will be just as expensive
and hothouse grapes will obtain our winter
prices. Oranges are about the only standby
to be recognized by home prices. Plums
and green cages at % cents quart are
not the food of the multitude; but the
Strawberries, the currants and the big
gooseberries come the nearest to it.
The Irish strawberry is very small, but 1t
makes up in sweetness, provided it has not
been deluged with rain. AT this season
yond Phoenix Park, are places of fashion
able resort. The beds are on the hillsides,
and along the base rushes with tumultuous
leaps the Liffey, soon to lose all it's sparkle
as its waters receive the dirt of the city,
and becomes instead an inky stream. The
public houses are pretty close together for
mile or two.
The proper refreshment with your berries
and powdered sugar. is milk and soda or
rich cream, or a nice hot punch, with a
raisin loaf You can have all this out on
the roadside, with a cabbage leaf for
plate, or in little summer house way back
from 1t, or in the low-ceilinged dining room,
which has snowy white curtains In the
windows and the reddest of geraniums
blooming on the sills. And the whole busi-
ness, simple as it sounds. is well worth
crossing the ocean to enjoy.
A Progressive Youth.
Talk about the precocity of Young
America, why, 1t is nothing compared to
Young ireland. He was about as high as
seat Of the chair, as broad as he was
long, and was simply stuffed into his first
pair of breeches He had high heels on
stiff pair of boots and made consider
able noise as he strutted up and down
the railroad station in Killarney one fine
day lately. He was just exactly four years
old, and was putting away vigorously at
a cigarette, a package of which he had Sc
cured by putting his last big penny in the
sic t.
All 1t once his light went ont and caD in