hour. With its noble river flowing through the very heart of the place,
and broadening soon into an estuary of the Atlantic, Limerick ought long
ago to have taken its place in the front rank of British ports dealing
with the New World. In the seventeenth century it was the fourth city of
Ireland, Boate putting it then next after Dublin, Galway, and Waterford.
Belfast at that time, he describes as a place hardly comparable "to a
small market-town in England." To-day Limerick has a population of some
forty thousand, and Belfast a population of more than two hundred
thousand souls. This change cannot be attributed solely, if at all, to
the "Protestant ascendency," nor yet to the alleged superiority of the
Northern over the Southern Irish in energy and thrift, For in the
seventeenth century Limerick was more important than Cork, whereas it
had so far fallen behind its Southern competitor in the eighteenth
century that it contained in 1781 but 3859 houses, while Cork contained
5295. To-day its population is about half as large as that of Cork. It
is a very well built city, its main thoroughfare, George Street, being
at least a mile in length, and a picturesque city also, thanks to the
island site of its most ancient quarter, the English Town, and to the
hills of Clare and Killaloe, which close the prospect of the surrounding
country. But the streets, though many of them are handsome, have a
neglected look, as have also the quays and bridges. One of my
companions, to whom I spoke of this, replied, "if they look neglected,
it's because they are neglected. Politics are the death of the place,
and the life of its publics."[2]

As we approached the shores of the Atlantic from Limerick, the scenery
became very grand and beautiful. On the right of the railway the country
rolled and undulated away towards the Stacks, amid the spurs and slopes
of which, in the wood of Clonlish, Sanders, the Nuncio sent over to
organise Catholic Ireland against Elizabeth, miserably perished of want