the horizon. This hill was studded with clumps of beeches, and sometimes
enclosed as a meadow. In the month of July, when the grass on it was
long, many an hour have I spent in solitary enjoyment, watching the
wavy motion produced upon its pliant surface by the sunny winds, or
the flight of the cloud-shadows, like gigantic phantoms, as they
swept rapidly over it, whilst the murmur of the rocking-trees, and
the glancing of their bright leaves in the sun produced a heartfelt
pleasure, the very memory of which rises in my imagination like some
fading recollection of a brighter world. At the foot of this hill ran a
clear, deep-banked river, bounded on one side by a slip of rich, level
meadow, and on the other by a kind of common for the village geese,
whose white feathers, during the summer season, lay scattered over its
green surface. It was also the play-ground for the boys of the village
school; for there ran that part of the river which, with very correct
judgment, the urchins had selected as their bathing-place. A little
slope, or watering-ground in the bank, brought them to the edge of
the stream, where the bottom fell away into the fearful depths of the
whirlpool, under the hanging oak on the other bank. Well do I remember
the first time I ventured to swim across it, and even yet do I see,
in imagination, the two bunches of water flaggons on which the
inexperienced swimmers trusted themselves in the water.

About two hundred yards from this, the boreen (* A little road) which
led from the village to the main road, crossed the river, by one of
those old narrow bridges whose arches rise like round ditches across
the road--an almost impassable barrier to horse and car. On passing the
bridge in a northern direction, you found a range of low thatched houses
on each side of the road: and if one o'clock, the hour of dinner, drew
near, you might observe columns of blue smoke curling up from a row of
chimneys, some made of wicker creels plastered over with a rich coat of