Just Irish by Charles Battell Loomis

Author:Charles Battell Loomis [Loomis, Charles Battell]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, World
ISBN: 9780649620999
Google: ugS5tAEACAAJ
Publisher: Trieste Publishing Pty Limited
Published: 2017-09-13T16:03:03+00:00

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CHAPTER VIII

Random Remarks on Things Corkonian

THEY told me that Cork was a very dirty city. They even said it was filthy, and they said it in such a way as to reflect on Irishmen in general and Corkonians in particular.

Yes, they said that Cork was a dirty city, and so I found it—almost as dirty as New York. This may sound like a strong statement, but I mean it.

When I arrived in Cork I saw a hill and made for it at once, because after railway there is nothing that so takes the kinks out of a fellow's legs as a walk up a stiff hill. And anyhow I was on a walking tour.

I arrived at the top about sunset. On reading this sentence over I find that it sounds as if the hill was an all-day journey, but it was only a matter of a few squares, and when I started the sun had long since made up its mind to set.

In Ireland the sun takes on Irish ways, and is just a little dilatory. It always means to set, and it always does set in time to avoid being out in the dark, but it's "an unconscionably long time a dying."

At the summit of the hill I saw a church steeple that appealed to my esthetic sense, and I asked a little boy what church it was.

"Shandon churrch, sirr," said he with the rapid and undulating utterance of the Corkonian.

"Where the bells are?" said I.

"Yes," said he, smiling. "And over beyont is the Lee."

"The pleasant waters of the river Lee," I quoted at him, and he smiled again. Probably every traveler who goes to Cork quotes the lovely old bit of doggerel, but the Corkonian smiles and smiles.

The river Lee runs through the center of Cork, and at evening it is a favorite place for fishing, also for learning to swim on dry land.

The fishermen seem to fish for the love of casting, and the little boys swim on the pavement—two pursuits as useless as they are pleasant. Over the bridge the fishermen leaned, and cast their lines in anything but pleasant places—for the river is malodorous—and the little boys stood on benches and dived to the pavement, where they spat and then went through the motions of swimming.

There were dozens of the little boys, and most of them seemed to be brothers. Some of them were quite expert in diving backward, and all of them were dirty, but they seemed to be happy. I could not help thinking how soon the Celtic mind begins to use symbols, for it was easy to see that when the boys spat it signified a watering place to them. I dare say they were breaking a city ordinance in spitting, and if they knew that they were that much happier—stolen sweets are the sweetest.

During the time I watched the setting sun—which was still at it and, by the way, performed some lovely variations on a simple color scheme in

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