114.  “In the mountains of Slievelougher, and other parts of this county, the country people, towards the end of June, cut the coarse mountain grass, called by them ‘fenane’; towards August this grass grows white.”—­Smith’s Kerry.

115.  The abbey on the grounds of Darrynane was founded in the seventh century by the monks of St. Finbar.

116.  The river Lowne is the only outlet by which all the streams that form the Lakes of Killarney discharge themselves into the sea—­’Lan,’ or ‘Lowne,’ in the old Irish signifying full.

117.  “Killenane lies to the east of Cahir.  It has many mountains towards the sea.  These mountains are frequented by herds of fallow deer, that range about it in perfect security.”—­Smith’s Kerry.

118.  The Skellig Rocks.  In describing one of them, Keating says “That there is a certain attractive virtue in the soil which draws down all the birds which attempt to fly over it, and obliges them to alight upon the rock.”

A SHAMROCK FROM THE IRISH SHORE.

(On receiving a Shamrock in a Letter from Ireland.)

O postman! speed thy tardy gait—­
  Go quicker round from door to door;
For thee I watch, for thee I wait,
  Like many a weary wanderer more. 
Thou brightest news of bale and bliss—­
  Some life begun, some life well o’er. 
He stops—­he rings!—­O heaven! what’s this?—­
  A shamrock from the Irish shore!

Dear emblem of my native land,
  By fresh fond words kept fresh and green;
The pressure of an unfelt hand—­
  The kisses of a lip unseen;
A throb from my dead mother’s heart—­
  My father’s smile revived once more—­
Oh, youth! oh, love! oh, hope thou art,
  Sweet shamrock from the Irish shore!

Enchanter, with thy wand of power,
  Thou mak’st the past be present still: 
The emerald lawn—­the lime-leaved bower—­
  The circling shore—­the sunlit hill;
The grass, in winter’s wintriest hours,
  By dewy daisies dimpled o’er,
Half hiding, ’neath their trembling flowers,
  The shamrock of the Irish shore!

And thus, where’er my footsteps strayed,
  By queenly Florence, kingly Rome—­
By Padua’s long and lone arcade—­
  By Ischia’s fires and Adria’s foam—­
By Spezzia’s fatal waves that kissed
  My poet sailing calmly o’er;
By all, by each, I mourned and missed
  The shamrock of the Irish shore!

I saw the palm-tree stand aloof,
  Irresolute ’twixt the sand and sea: 
I saw upon the trellised roof
  Outspread the wine that was to be;
A giant-flowered and glorious tree
  I saw the tall magnolia soar;
But there, even there, I longed for thee,
  Poor shamrock of the Irish shore!

Now on the ramparts of Boulogne,
  As lately by the lonely Rance,
At evening as I watch the sun,
  I look!  I dream!  Can this be France
Not Albion’s cliffs, how near they be,
  He seems to love to linger o’er;
But gilds, by a remoter sea,
  The shamrock on the Irish shore!