All through Orrery's district, a land I was in,
From Easter to August, while sunbeam and raw gust
Pierced into my marrow, and peeled off my skin;
I saw women devouring wild radish

And weeds by the way-side-a sight rather sadish.

;

But of all places Desmond, in truth takes the lead
In fasting. I Pray God it may win its just meed
If a pilgrim gain Heaven for his sandal and scallop,
Then Desmond, methinks, should course in at a gallop!

1 Orrery, a half barony in the north of the County of Cork, which was desolated by famine at this period. Mangan has here left out the verses relating to Coolishel, as well as those carping at the Clangibbon, O'Donoghue of Glenflesk, and Magillycuddy of the Reeks. Mr. Hardiman has given the following versified translation of the quatrain relating to Clangibbon, in his Irish Minstrelsy, vol. p. 132.

ii..

"His Lordship [Lord Clare, Chancellor of Ireland] was descended from the old sept of the Clan- Gibbons, and was the best friend to the English interest in Ireland that these latter times have produced. Against this clan our Irish bards have been bitterly invective. The following stanza is taken from a satirical poem written by Angus O'Daly, called Aengus na n-aor, or the Bard Ruao, about the year 1600.

[Here he gives the Irish as in our original text]

"The sternest pulse that heaves the heart to hate,
Will sink o'erlaboured, or with time abate;
But on the Clann-Fitz-Gibbon, Christ looks down
For ever with unmitigated frown!

Did mercy shine! their hearts' envenomed slime,
Even in her beam, would quicken to new crime."

The following well-known epigram is added, to enable the classical reader to judge between it and the foregoing productiou of the Irish bard.

"Vipera Cappadocem nocitura momordit, at illa,
Gustato periit sanguine Cappadocis !"

"A viper bit a Cappadocian-fain

Her curdling poison through him to distil,
But the foiled reptile died-her victim's vein
Had poison subtiler than her own to kill."

2 Desmond, i.e., South-Munster. The country of Mac Carthy Mor was generally so called after the suppression of the Earls of Desmond. The quatrains relating to Clanmorris, Carrigafoyle, Hore's house, and Thomas, knight of Glynn, are here omitted by Mangan.

The Mac Edmonds' are still to the fore, as I know,
Though some people fancy them dead long ago;
There is a precious large lot of them near Shanagolden,
To whose dinners and drink I was little beholden.

In Clanwilliam3 they nail up the doors to keep out
The snows and the storm-winds-

I'd rather have warm winds

Than cold in my bed-chamber nightly, no doubt;
But for this watch-box nailing I never

Could try such a plan, though they count it right clever.

Bread, fish, flesh, or fowl, you are safe to see none,
In the districts of Thomond,

But lots of our beau monde,

Who deluge your inside with wine from the tun,
Ale, usquebaugh, cider, and sherry;

In fine all potations that make the heart merry.

From the Ford to the Leap, on a fine summer day,

[lands

I saw green lands and brown lands, Clan-Colen's broad town-
In Thomond looked well; but along my whole way
Never met with one poor copper penny,

I might just as well travel for smoke to Kilkenny.

1 Mac Edmonds. This should be "The sons of Mac Edmond," by which the Bard Ruadh intended to designate the sons of Thomas, son of Edmond Fitzgerald, knight of Glynn, in the County of Limerick. The portion relating to Kerry is also left out by Mangan.

2 Mangan was certainly dreaming of his relatives here. His father was from Seanzualainn or Shanagolden, in the County of Limerick ; and according to the son's report, he was both an indolent and indiscreet parent. See a sketch of Mangan's life, written by himself, but unpublished, in the hands of the Rev. C. P. Meehan, of SS. Michael and John's, Dublin.

3 Clanwilliam in the County of Limerick. Four quatrains are here omitted by Mangan.

4 Thomond, i.e., North-Munster, the country of the O'Briens. 5 The Ford to the Leap, i.e., from Killaloe to Loop-head, at this time considered the limits of Thomond at the east and west side.

6 Clan-Colens, i.e., Mac Namara's country, lying between the Fergus and the Shannon, by far the best portion of the County of Clare.

O, Burrin! O, Burrin! what sights hast thou seen !
"Tis known the Dalcassians' got into fierce passions,
At seasons, and then there were wigs on the green!"
And Clare suffered much,-yet men brag an
Immense deal to-day on the banks of the Lagan.

I've a horror of Thomond, because after noon,
In its houses you never meet noggin or spoon;
Twelve o'clock daily there bounds the stomach's horizon,
And food after that you can no where clap eyes on!

In the house of O'Brien (that's Donough) I spent
A Christmas that lasted till long after Lent;
We had bread, butter, bacon, and beef in abundance,
And oft round the board made the bottle, our sun, dance.

In Cealla,3 that region of hunger and storms,
The sick die of want by the road sides in swarms;
If you fancy a grave where broad meadows lie fallow
And blighted, you'll find one in dark dreary Cealla.

The pinch-bowel Clan of Mac Mahon, the Red,
Give you just on your dish the bare shadow of bread; .
An ant put in harness, I think, would be able

To drag their best cake and their biggest from table.

The O'Carrolls of Ely, love the quern's hoarse sound,
They've got only one cow and one sheep as I found;
After starving some while in the house of these skin-flints,
My hands became hard, black, and meagre, like thin flints.

1 Dalcassians, i.e., the O'Briens and their cor-relatives.

here is wide of Aenghus's meaning.

2 Donough. This is not in the Irish original.

The poet

3 Cealla, a townland near Corofin, in the County of Clare, also desolated by the famine in 1847. Mangan has here left out the verses relating to Kilkishin, the Fergus, and Caislean Chuinn.

4 Mac Mahon, i.e., Mac Mahon of Corca-bhaiscin, in the south-west of the County of Clare. Mangan has here left out the quatrain relat. ing to Corbally, the seat of one of the Mac Namaras of Clan-Choilen ; as well as that relating to O'Daly's house, and its reciters of song!

5 The O'Carrolls of Ely, were considered as belonging to Munster at this period.

Cross Kian O'Carroll dwells there, with his rib,
In a hovel the size of a basket or crib;

A withered and weazened old couple-forgetful
Of God and the Devil, sick, snappish and fretful.

Knocked down by a pig I fell into their den,

Such an upset I hadn't got, Munster knows when ;

I looked round quite bewildered, and heard Kian squall out,
"Fall out again,' friend, or perhaps you and I may fall out !"

Last O'Meagher, for yourself-last, though certes not least,
You're a prince, and are partial to mirth and the Feast;
Huge cauldrons, vast fires, with fat sheep, calves, and cows and
Harp-music, distinguish your house mid a thousand.

[Here the poet was stabbed by O'Meagher's servant, but before he expired he is said to have addressed these lines to his murderer:]

Many are the bitter satires that I acknowledge (alas !) to have

written

On the nobles and clans of Munster, but none ever requited me with a blow,

'Till O'Meagher gave me my death-wound :-I perish down

smitten

By a chieftain whom I eulogized-this is my lamentation and my woe!

1 Fall out again. This is in the true style of the satirist and the best stanza in the whole of this translation.

2 O'Meagher resided at Drom-saileach in the barony of Ikerrin, not far from Roscrea.

ADDITIONAL NOTES AND CORRECTIONS.

Page 13, line 16 from bottom, read "James Daly, the Cork Diзtiller, was a native of Carrigtoohill, and died in January, 1850, without issue."

line 3 from bottom, for "Laherdoty" read "Laherndota.” note 1, read " Mr. Peter Lavalli, Peruquier of the Four Courts, Dublin," as it appears that he has not removed to Paris.

14, line 5 from bottom, cancel " J. P." from Richard O'Donovan, Esq.

line 4 from bottom, for "Skibbereen" read "Ahakista.” 15, line 7 at top, for "Derry-clovane" read "Gleann-oulin." line 30, for "but of this we have no portion remaining" read "but this was very short, and, rather an impreca. tion than a satire." A copy of it is preserved in a MS. in the Library of Trinity College, Dublin, H. 3, 17, p. 840, which runs as follows:

"Cen colt ar crrb cernene,

Cen gert ferbu fonassad aithrinde;
Cen adba fir a rand rubaj,

Disoirce con dil daime reisse ropsen breisse."

This satire, which was composed by Cairbre Mac Eathna, surnamed Crithinbheal, is the oldest specimen of the Irish language we have seen; and we have here given it for the purpose of obtaining a translation from some of our Irish literati, for our next edition. It has been glossed by various writers; and O'Clery in his Glossary, under the word Černe, gives the following explanation of the first line :

"Cernine 1 miasa beaga, nó clair beaga, amhail a dúbairt an file Carrbre Mac Eażna.

"Gan colt for crib cerníne, 1 gan bjad go luaċ arꞌṁéisínib, no ar clairinib."

56, note 1.—It is but fair to remark, that Moryson writes as an enemy to the old Irish race; and besides, that he had not seen, with his own eyes, the Northern Irish Chieftain O'Cane, and his daughters, sitting naked. It is moreover, not unfair to question the authenticity of the assertion of an unknown Bohemian Baron; and it is but right for the Irish to argue, that it is not likely that the proprietor of a large territory (such as O'Cane was), who could converse in the Latin language with a Bohemian Baron, would have been so lightly, or so barbarously clad as Moryson describes him. Let the curious reader contrast it with the description given of the dress of a neighbouring chief O'Donnell, about half a century earlier, by Sentleger in a letter to the King, recommending that