It has a history that goes back to grope about Ararat
for the potsherds thrown out of the ark. It has a very old and famous
round tower, used at some time as a place of sepulchre, for a great
quantity of human bones have been found in it. In one stone of this
tower is the mark of two toes printed into the stone, or the mark of
some fossil remains dislodged by a geological hammer.
As Clones sits upon a hill, and the fort sits on the highest part, it
commands an extensive view. There is also an ancient cross in the market
square, once elaborately carved in relief, but the figures are worn
indistinct. There are the remains of an old castle built in among the
modern walls and hidden out of sight. There are stories of an
underground passage between the abbey and the castle. In fact, they came
on this underground way when levelling the market space, but did not
explore it. There is such a romance about mystery that it is as well, I
suppose, not to let too much daylight shine in upon it.
Clones, with its abbey, was burned by De Lacy in the thirteenth century,
which was, perhaps, its last burning.
I was glad on the evening on which I climbed to the top of the fort to
find little gardens lying up the slope at the back of the poorer houses.
Clones is better off in this respect by being behind the age. In Antrim
and Down, in too many instances, the farmers have taken the cotter's
gardens into their fields. I wished to be sure if the gardens belonged
to the people who lived in the thatched cottages, and I spoke across the
hedge to a man who was digging potatoes in one of them, a man with a
leather apron, marking him out as a shoemaker, and a merry, contented
face. Yes, the gardens belonged to the cottages at the foot of the hill.
All the cottages had gardens in Clones. The people had all gardens in
Clones. They were not any of them in want. They had enough, thank God.
There was every prospect of a good harvest and a good harvest brought
plenty to every home.
A few words often change the world to us. I climbed the three-storey
fort at Clones feeling sad and hopeless in the grey evening, everything
seemed chill and dreary like the damp wind, and this man's cheery words
of rejoicing over the prospect of good crops, over the yield of the
little gardens, touched me as if sunset splendor had fallen over the
world, and I came down comforted with the thought that our Father who
gives fruitful seasons will also find a way for Ireland to emerge from
the thick darkness of her present misery.
