a
veritable cocktailed nag of the true old Irish breed. Sometimes she
seemed to go from under you as she suddenly dipped into a slight
depression. Sometimes she rolled like a ship at sea, and you began to
wonder if sea-sickness were possible on land. The scenery is not
striking, and the surrounding country, though poor and desolate, is by
no means sterile. No tracts of black bog, no impassable morasses, no
miles of rocks and boulders, but a fairly good grazing country, with
here and there, at long intervals, a white cottage. The engine slows
at one point, where the rails are twisted into serpentine convolutions
by yesterday's tropical heat. Both sides are considerably displaced,
but they still bear the right relation to each other, and the faithful
machine, sniffing and picking her way carefully, glides safely over
the contorted path. A short tunnel, with sides of solid masonry and
roof-arch of brick, again demands extra care, and it is well that the
pace is slowed, for half-way through, a man becomes dimly visible
running a trolley off the line. Mountains arise on the left and in
front, and my old friend Croagh Patrick puts in his Nationalist
appearance. Then Newport heaves in sight, a cemetery on high ground
opposite the site of the station, and overhanging the line, kept in
its place by an immense retaining wall, without which the "rude
forefathers of the hamlet" would fall from their narrow cells and
block the progress of the civilising train. A handsome viaduct ends
the run, _finis coronat opus_, and I walk a hundred yards to see the
awkward spot which at first seemed to have no bottom, but which energy
and industry have conquered, as they conquer everything. The line was
going on happily until this point was reached, when a soft bog was
broached, which threatened to swallow everything, opening its
cavernous jaws with appetite which long seemed insatiable. The
engineer choked it off with a hundred thousand cubic yards of earth, a
quantity which to the untechnical ear sounds like a little kingdom, or
at least like a decent farm, and the bog cried, Hold! enough. The
total length of the line will be twenty-six-and-a-half miles, the
cost, exclusive of the permanent way, which is an extra of some L1,800
a mile, being L110,000, most of which is dispensed among the labourers
of the district, who thank the Balfour Administration for a great work
which would never have been undertaken as a merely commercial
speculation. The