obliged to confess that though he had visited Woodford more than once,
and conversed freely with Mr. Blunt about it, he had "never heard of the
murder of Finlay."

Such an incident is apparently of little interest to politicians at
Westminster. Fortunately for Ireland, it is of a nature to command more
attention at the Vatican.

Nature has sketched the scenery of this part of Ireland with a free,
bold hand. It is not so grand or so wild as the scenery of Western
Donegal, but it has both a wildness and a grandeur of its own. Sir Henry
Burke's seat of Marble Hill, as seen in the distance from the road,
stands superbly, high up on a lofty range of wooded hills, from which it
commands the country for miles. And no town I have seen in Ireland is
more picturesquely placed than Loughrea. It has an almost Italian aspect
as you approach it from Woodford. But no lake in Lombardy or Piedmont is
so peculiarly and exquisitely tinted as the lough on which it stands.
The delicate grey-green of the sparkling waters reminded me of the
singular and well-defined belts and stretches of chrysoprase upon which
you sometimes come in sailing through the dark azure of the Southern
Seas. I have never before seen precisely such a hue in any body of fresh
water. The lake is incorrectly described, Mr. Tener tells me, in the
guide-books, as being one of the many curious developments of the Lower
Shannon. It is fed by springs, but if, like the river-lakes, it was
formed by a solution of the limestone, this fact may have some chemical
relation with its very peculiar colour. It contains three picturesque
islands. No stream flows into it, but two streams issue from it. The
town of Loughrea is an ancient holding of the De Burghs, and the
estate-office of Lord Clanricarde is here in one wing of a great
barrack, standing, as I understood Mr. Tener to say, on the site of a
former fortress of the family. Lord Clanricarde's property here is put
down by Mr. Hussey de Burgh at 49,025 acres in County Galway, valued at
L19,634, and at 3576 acres in the county of the City of Galway, valued
at L1202. These, I believe, are statute acres, and in estimating the
relation of Irish rentals to Irish land this fact must be always
ascertained. Of the so-called "Woodford" property the present rental is
no more than L1900, payable by 260 tenants. The Poor-Law valuation for
taxes is L2400. There was a revision of the whole Galway property made
by the father of the present M