theirs the same expression of countenance--that of
celestial calm--and, holiest of the sisterhood, one that still retains
the ruins of an oratory, and bears the name of the Virgin Mother Mild,
to whom prays the mariner when sailing, in the moonlight, along Sicilian
seas.

Killarney! From the village of Cloghereen issued an uncouth figure, who
called himself the "Man of the Mountain;" and pleased with Pan, we
permitted him to blow his horn before us up to the top of Mangerton,
where the Devil, 'tis believed, scooped out the sward beneath the cliffs
into a Punch-bowl. No doubt he did, and the Old Potter wrought with
fire. 'Tis the crater of an extinct volcano. Charles Fox, Weld says, and
Wright doubts, swam the Pool. Why not? 'Tis not so cold as the Polar
Sea. We swam across it--as Mulcocky, were he alive, but he is dead,
could vouch; and felt braced like a drum. What a panorama! Our first
feeling was one of grief that we were not an Irishman. We knew not where
to fix our gaze. Surrounded by the dazzling bewilderment of all that
multitudinous magnificence, the eye, as if afraid to grapple with the
near glory--for such another day never shone from heaven--sought relief
in the remote distance, and slid along the beautiful river Kenmare,
insinuating itself among the recesses of the mountains, till it rested
on the green glimmer of the far-off sea. The grandeur was felt, far off
as it was, of that iron-bound coast. Coming round with an easy sweep, as
the eyes of an eagle may do, when hanging motionless aloft he but turns
his head, our eyes took in all the mighty range of the Reeks, and rested
in awe on Carran Tual. Wild yet gentle was the blue aerial haze over the
glimpses of the Upper Lake, where soft and sweet, in a girdle of rocks,
seemed to be hanging, now in air and now in water--for all was strangely
indistinct in the dim confusion--masses of green light that might be
islands with their lovely trees; but suddenly tipt with fire shone out
the golden pinnacles of the Eagle's Nest; and as again they were tamed
by cloud-shadow, the glow of Purple Mountain for a while enchained our
vision, and then left it free to feast on the forests of Glena, till,
wandering at the capricious will of fancy, it floated in delight over
the woods of Mucruss, and long lost among the trembling imagery of the
water, found lasting repose on the steadfast beauty of the sylvan isle
of Inisfallen.

But now for the black mass of rapid waters that,