It was a wail as if every
heart-string was torn. A countryman explained to me that the Irish were
a people that wept tears out of their hearts till they wept their hearts
away. By the conversation of the emigrants, I found that one girl had
turned back. "She failed on us, my lady," said her comrade. "Her heart
gave up when she saw the mother of her in a dead faint and she turned
back. One has but the one mother and it is hard to kill her with the
bitter grief of parting before the time."
People who have travelled much, and are loosely tied to any spot on
earth, ridicule the affection of these mountain people for their cabin
among the hills, but love of home is a glorious instinct, and if the
country of these people could afford them a little bit of the soil for a
home - liberty to live and toil - they would be both loving and loyal. All
the poor want is permission to live in a corner of their own country.
Castlebar is reached by rail. The station is a little out of town.
Castlebar is the first town where my few belongings were fought for. The
victor in the strife was a most determined old man. I thought he had a
car, but he had only his sturdy old legs. He shouldered my big bag,
little bag and bandbox and trudged off. I ventured to ask him had he not
a car. "Sorra a car, miss. After all your sitting in the cars sure it
will do you all the good in life to walk a bit." They think to flatter
elderly women by calling them Miss individually.
I had an introduction to a member of the Royal Irish Constabulary in
Castlebar. He was son to a gentleman who was kind enough to claim
kindred with me in Antrim. When I alighted from the cars I noticed a
sub-constable with quiet face taking note of all arrivals, and saw that
he was good enough looking to be an Antrim man. Found I was right and
entered Castlebar protected by a member of the force. Paid the
victorious old heathen who had walked off with my luggage the price of a
car, partly for his bravery and partly for his impudence. The approach
to Castlebar from the station, about a mile, is bounded on one side by
Lord Lucan's demesne, shut in behind a high wall, over which the tall
trees wave their arms at you. Another domain, Spencer Park, I think, is
on the other side, and as it is only shut in by a hedge, one gets
delicious peeps at it as one goes along.
