The Ruins Show It
To Have Been Built By Very Much Better Workmen Than Built The More
Modern Green Castle In Innishowen.
The arches are of hewn stone and are
very beautifully done without the appearance of cement or mortar.
The
round tower, the first I ever saw, was a wonderful sight to me. It is 76
feet high, and 41 in circumference. The walls, three feet thick, built
with scarcely any mortar, are of hewn stone, and I wondered at the skill
that rounded the tower so perfectly. The conical roof is (or was)
finished with one large stone shaped like a bell; four windows near the
top opposite the cardinal points. There is a belt of ribbed stone round
the top below the roof, with four faces carved on it over the four
windows. Advocates of the theory that the round towers were built for
Christian purposes have decided that there are three masculine, and one
feminine face, being the faces of St. Molaisse, the founder of the
abbey; St. Patrick, St. Colombkill and St. Bridget.
Near the round tower is the ruins of what was once a beautiful church.
The stone work which remains is wonderfully fine. The remaining window,
framed of hewn stone wrought into a rich, deep moulding, seems never to
have been intended for glass. It is but a narrow slit on the outside,
though wide in the inside. There are the remains of two cloistered
cells, one above another, very small, roofed and floored with stone,
belonging to a building adjoining the church.
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