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which runs west, and the other northwards, while at New Ross it receives the Barrow and the Nore. All this extent of land and water, as far as Waterford and New Ross, and then somewhat farther up the Suir, Barrow, and Nore, is one of the most beautiful and charming districts in Ireland.

I took tea in Waterford, at an hotel which had a separate room for the friends of repeal. On the windows of this apartment the words "REPEAL ROOMS" were displayed in large characters. Similar rooms are met with in many Irish towns, where the friends of repeal are always to be found, perusing the opposition papers of England and Ireland, which are taken for their use. Most of the provincial papers of Ireland are, of course, opposition papers. In Waterford alone, three of them are published. The Dublin Evening Mail is the leading Tory paper of Ireland, and I did not find it in any of the repeal rooms I visited. I am inclined to think that we Germans, were we ever so zealous repealers, would sometimes read the Evening Mail, if it were only to ascer tain what our adversaries said of us. English parties, however, are always so completely absorbed in their own interests, that they merely read the papers of their party, and appear not to give themselves the slightest trouble about the arguments of their opponents. In this respect they rely implicitly on the commentaries of their own journalists, who sometimes apprise them of the "disloyal and outrageous machinations" of the opposite party.

At Waterford the east of Ireland commences. As the nations of the south-the Phoenicians, the Spaniards, and the Frenchchose their landing-places at Bantry, in Kerry, Clare, and other places in the south-west; so those sailing froin the east, as the Danes, the Welsh, and the English, first arrived near Waterford, which town, with Wexford, the Danes first possessed and longest retained. The Welsh Strongbow effected his landing between Wexford and Waterford. The English King Henry II. landed at Waterford, and there commenced his conquest of Ireland. Here Cromwell also landed, and from hence he marched into the heart of the land, to conquer it once more. The city, even at the present day, exhibits abundant proofs of the exploits of this ruthless warrior, and mighty oppressor of Ireland. Every citizen can point out to the traveller the rock, opposite the town, from which he battered it with his cannon; and there yet stands, at the end of the quay, an old ruined tower, which bears traces of a breach made in it by Cromwell's artillery. How many similar breaches made by Cromwell in Irish walls still remain, as apparent as when his soldiers left them-and how many wounds inflicted by him ou the political condition of the country are yet unhealed !

Cromwell's time was almost contemporaneous with our Thirty Years' War, and may, in many respects, be justly compared with it; but the injuries inflicted on Germany by the latter have long been healed and forgotten; its devastating effects have long disappeared, and every thing has again long resumed its former aspect. It seems as if there were something peculiar in the nature and condition of Ireland that prevents her wounds from ever healing she is constantly bleeding from a thousand wounds and sores; and although still clinging to life with too much tenacity entirely to die away, she never at any moment possesses energy enough completely to achieve her freedom, or restore herself to a more healthy state of existence.

CHAPTER XXII.

FROM WATERFORD TO WEXFORD..

THE REPEAL SHIP-WATERFORD HARBOUR-THE RUINS OF DUNBRODYIRISH JIG-THE BANKS OF THE BARROW-NEW ROSS-THE COUNTY OF WEXFORD THE BARONY OF FORTH-TEMPERANCE MEN-ANNOUNCEMENT OF FATHER MATHEW-SPORTING MEN AND READING MEN-ST. PATRICK-FINGAL.

On the following morning, when I came to the river, it was exactly low water. Several vessels were lying on their sides in the mud, as if stranded. Above the beautiful bridge, the Suir seemed almost entirely drained, and the banks were slimy and muddy. But as the tide rolled in, the sand-banks were covered, the ships righted themselves and danced upon the waves, the artery of the river was filled, and the landscape again reflected in its restored mirror. The sun mounted high in the heavens, and our steamboat, The Repealer, rushed forth through the waves. What is there to be found in Ireland that has not some connexion with repeal? I was informed that the repealers go almost exclusively by this boat, and hence it was also called the People's Steamer. On the flag which waved from the quarter-deck were the words, "Hurrah for the Repeal of the Union!" O'Connell can now, at his meetings, truly boast that the repeal cause is progressing with the rapidity of steam. In this corner of the earth, indeed, steam does not go very far-only to the town of New Ross, fifteen miles distant, whither we were bound. Nor does it afford any exclusive advantage to the repealers, as the anti-repealers also employ steam in their cause. Another steamboat, bound to the same place,

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splashed alongside of us, in opposition to ours. In England one never gets rid of this opposition: it follows him every where.

Had I not been in Scotland, and sailed down the Frith of Clyde, I would pronounce this trip on the arms of Waterford Harbour to be the finest in the United Kingdom. Or, were there not much that is beautiful out of the United Kingdom, I could also say that it is the most delightful journey I ever made in my life. But it is sufficient to affirm that the landscape on the shores of these waters is as picturesque, pleasing, and diversified in its kind as any other in the world. The waters flow through the deep and convenient bays somewhat more quickly than through a lake; and as its entrance from the sea is concealed from the spectator by a very sudden turn, he actually believes he is on an inland-lake, aud is astonished at the large ships which ascend it, seeking harbours hidden far in the heart of the land. At times the shore is a hill, sloping down to the water, which, like almost every river-bank in the United Kingdom, is studded with charming seats and pleasuregrounds; at others, it juts out in steep, rocky, and wooded headlands, which the Repealer almost grazes as she speeds past.

At no great distance below Waterford are seen, in the background of a bay, the immense ruins of the far-famed Abbey of Dunbrody, one of the most celebrated and beautiful ruins of Ireland, which are here held in about the same estimation as the ruins of Melrose are in Scotland. Alas! they are now, like the times of their grandeur, in the far distance; and the Repealer has too much to do with the opposition steamer, which is walking close upon her heels, and forces her to keep her straightforward way, to turn from her course, and give the traveller a look at the ruined abbey. In truth, it afforded us no little amusement to see our rival, as she was about to turn into the mouth of the Barrow, run aground on a sand-bank, where, as our captain drily observed, she must stick till the tide would rise somewhat higher, and float her off. As for the Repealer, being obliged to be at New Ross by a certain time, she soon left Dunbrody far behind, and splashed away with the flowing tide up the Barrow. The British Islands must reap important benefits from the double alternating currents, one landwards, the other seawards, of the navigable rivers. In no other country do the waters of the sea flow so far inland, bearing ships into the very heart of the country.

On the deck of an Irish steamer there is seldom a want of entertainment. On the quarter-deck the company is twice as talkative as on that of an English steamer; and the forecastle resounds even with music and singing. To the music, which, of course, was that of the bagpipes, we had dancing. Since Paddy,

as I have before remarked, generally uses only an old door, or a couple of boards laid close together, for a dancing-floor, he naturally finds it impossible to leave unoccupied the beautiful space which, on the deck of a steamer, remains vacant, between butterfirkins, flour-bags, egg-boxes, hen-coops, baskets of turkeys, tiedup cows, and a confused heap of grunting pigs. He therefore lays aside his stick, and throws his cares and his sorrows to the winds, with much greater case than can be done by the rich maıı of five thousand a year who is looking at him; with good-humour in his face, he seizes a struggling maiden, and, in a merry and lively jig, or Scottish reel, he shakes his rags as if they were the bell-tipped lappets of a fool's dress. The splashing paddles of the steamer beat the time for him, and the lovely banks of the Barrow give to this spectacle a decoration which the ballet-dancers on the boards of Covent-garden or Drury-lane cannot boast of.

The evening was wondrously calm, and even the fishes, though still poorer than Paddy, jumped in the water for joy. I planted myself beside the captain, on the high platform in the centre of the vessel, and, while I observed the grave and serious rich on the quarter-deck, and the merry poor in the forecastle, I could not refrain from praising the justice of God, who, while he makes man poor, at the same time renders him more capable of taking delight in the most trifling things.

The beautiful seats of the Powers, the Asmonds, and other families which lay along the banks, are all so charming that one would like to take a sketch of each separately. Near Castle Ennis, in a broad beautiful meadow, stands the largest, most lordly, and picturesque oak I ever saw. One looks on these mansions with increased interest, if, as I had, he has an Irish priest as confessant at his side, who, from being intrusted with the private affairs of the families that reside in them, can give him a sketch of the history of each. While I listened to my priestly confessant, I was somewhat amazed at the extra-ordinary things which happen in the usual every-day life of these families. In one of these mansions there yet dwells an old lady, the widow of one of the most distinguished of those rebels who were beheaded by the English during the last rebellion in Ireland.

As we passed a rock, our cannon were fired, in memory of a sailor, who, some months previously, had fallen overboard at this spot, and was drowned. The reports were re-echoed from the rock, and the manes of the dead were no doubt highly gratified by the honour thus conferred upon them.

We anchored at New Ross, and as this place is the extreme end of the Barrow navigation, and the brightest gem in the entire

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landscape-gallery of the neighbourhood, it would no doubt have well repaid us to pass this delightful evening here. It is at once apparent that New Ross is an old town, since it does not present that picturesque grouping which is peculiar to new regular towns: at the same time it is also a fallen place, for it is said once to have possessed a great part of the trade which Waterford has now entirely drawn to itself. It no longer dispatches a single ship to sea, and merely sends agricultural produce to Waterford, to be from thence exported. Beyond New Ross the waters, which had hitherto been broad and deep, seem entirely to lose themselves in a thicket of woods and rocks. In this thicket there are said to be most beautiful scenery, splendid landscapes, and waterfalls. Yet it was not granted me to explore these beauties any further. As I found my travelling companion disposed to avail himself of the beautiful moonlight night to continue his journey, at eleven o'clock we troubled an Irish horse and a little jaunting-car to take us over to Wexford, about twenty miles distant.

The country between New Ross and Wexford is pretty level. fertile, and entirely under tillage. This is the case with the whole county of Wexford, which occupies the most south-easterly point of Ireland. By nature it is quite cut off from the rest of the country; for on one side it is bounded by the Wicklow and Carlow mountains, and on the other by the sea and Waterford Harbour. The most extreme point of this county, a peninsula that runs out into the sea, is again separated from it by the Forth mountains. This point is the far-famed Barony of Forth, which is inhabited by a separate little population of its own.

The county of Wexford is one of the districts of Ireland which the traveller beholds with peculiar satisfaction, for the annals of Irish crime and criminals declare that it is in it that morality must be highest, as the fewest crimes occur here. I even found many years in which, out of the 300, or 200, or 160 murders which were committed in Ireland, not a single one had taken place in Wexford. In fact, the inhabitants boast of much greater enlightenment than is possessed by those in the west. They every where speak of the dark west, and believe themselves more intelligent, better educated, and better farmers.

The Barony of Forth, that extreme little peninsula, is the crown of the entire county, for here dwell the most orderly people in all Ireland. It is celebrated throughout the south of Ireland, and when it is mentioned every one takes off his hat, for its very name awakens ideas of a nobler race of men. The people are said to be the descendants of a colony which Strongbow, the famous Welsh knight, who first came to Ireland with English troops to