Wherever The
Coach Stopped We Were Beset With Swarms Of Beggars, The Wittiest Beggars
In The World, And The Raggedest, Except Those Of Italy.
One or two green
mounds stood close to the road, and we saw others at a distance.
"They are
Danish forts," said the guard. "Every thing we do not know the history of,
we put upon the Danes," added the South of Ireland man. These grassy
mounds, which are from ten to twenty feet in height, are now supposed to
have been the burial places of the ancient Celts. The peasantry can with
difficulty be persuaded to open any of them, on account of a prevalent
superstition that it will bring bad luck. A little before we arrived at
Drogheda, I saw a tower to the right, apparently a hundred feet in height,
with a doorway at a great distance from the ground, and a summit somewhat
dilapidated. "That is one of the round towers of Ireland, concerning which
there is so much discussion," said my English-looking fellow-traveller.
These round towers, as the Dublin antiquarians tell me, were probably
built by the early Christian missionaries from Italy, about the seventh
century, and were used as places of retreat and defense against the
pagans.
Not far from Drogheda, I saw at a distance a quiet-looking valley. "That,"
said the English-looking passenger, "is the valley of the Boyne, and in
that spot was fought the famous battle of the Boyne." "Which the Irish are
fighting about yet, in America," added the South of Ireland man.
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