ountain-path that brought me through a wretched
village, and led to the top of a hill. Here my boy left me, and went
to look for the man who was to ferry us to Purgatory, and on the ridge
where I stood I had leisure to look around. To the south-west lay Lough
Erne, with all its isles and cultivated shores; to the north-west lay
Lough Derg, and truly never did I mark such a contrast. Lough Derg under
my feet--the lake, the shores, the mountains, the accompaniments of all
sorts presented the very landscape of desolation; its waters expanding
in their highland solitude, amidst a wide waste of moors, without one
green spot to refresh the eye, without a house or tree--all mournful in
the brown hue of its far-stretching bogs, and the gray uniformity of its
rocks; the surrounding mountains even partook of the sombre character
of the place; their forms without grandeur, their ranges continuous and
without elevation. The lake itself was certainly as fine as rocky shores
and numerous islands could make it: but it was encompassed with such
dreariness; it was deformed so much by its purgatorial island; the
associations connected with it were of such a degrading character,
that really the whole prospect before me struck my mind with a sense of
painfulness, and I said to myself, 'I am already in Purgatory.' A person
who has never seen the picture that was now under my eye, who had read
of a place consecrated by the devotion of ages, towards which the tide
of human superstition had flowed for twelve centuries, might imagine
that St. Patrick's Purgatory, secluded in its sacred island, would have
all the venerable and gothic accompaniments of olden time; and its ivied
towers and belfried steeples, its carved windows, and cloistered arches,
its long dark aisles and fretted vaults would have risen out of the
water, rivalling Iona or Lindisfarn; but nothing of the sort was to be
seen. The island, about half a mile from the shore, presented nothing
but a collection of hideous slated houses and cabins, which gave you
an idea that they were rather erected for the purpose of tollhouses or
police-stations than any thing else.

"I was certainly in an interesting position. I looked southerly towards
Lough Erne, with the Protestant city of Enniskillen rising amidst its
waters, like the island queen of all the loyalty, and industry, and
reasonable worship that have made her sons the admiration of past
and present time; and before me, to the north, L