cks novelty, but I quote him for the picturesqueness
of his style.

Salthill, May 18th.

No. 24.--THE ARAN ISLANDS.

The Aran Islanders seem to have passed most of their time in a state
of chronic starvation. The land seems to grow little but rock, and the
burning of seaweed, the kelp trade, does not seem to have helped them
much. True, the Atlantic was all before them, where to choose, but
what Father Mahony would call the teeming treasures of the deep were
practically left untouched. If we accept the plain meaning of the good
priest's speech, we must believe that the Aran Islanders and Irish
fishermen generally preferred to starve rather than to catch fish,
unless an Irish Parliament were fixed on College Green. They had no
objection to accept charitable aid, no matter from what quarter it
came, and the Araners required assistance every other year. They were
not unwilling to catch fish, but they had nothing to catch them with;
and, strange as it may seem, these islanders, who could scarcely move
five yards in any direction without falling into the sea, these
amphibious Irishmen, did not know the art of catching fish! They
tinkered and slopped around the shoals in the vicinity of the island,
but they were never able to catch enough fish to keep themselves from
starvation, much less to supply the Dublin and London markets. Their
boats were the most primitive affairs imaginable, and showed the Irish
spirit of conservatism to perfection. These coraghs are practically
the same boat as the Welsh coracle, but much larger. Those I examined
were from ten to fifteen feet long and three feet wide. Oak ribs, over
which are nailed laths of white deal, two inches wide and half an inch
thick. Cover this slight skeleton with tarred canvas, and the ship is
nearly complete. It only needs two pairs of wooden thole-pins, and two
pairs of oars, long, light, and thin, coming nearly to a point at the
water-end, having a perforated block which works on the thole-pins
before-mentioned. You want no keel, no helm, no mast. Stay! You need a
board or two for seats for the oarsmen. With these frail cockleshells
the Araners adventure themselves twelve miles on the Atlantic, and
mostly come home again. These makeshift canoes are almost useless for
catching fish. Having no helm, it is hard to keep them straight;
having no keel, it is needful to sit still, or at any rate to maintain
a perfect balance, or over you go. A gust of wind spins th