pelled to hazard a desperate excursion into the Knight of Glen's country, where a severe skirmish of eight hours took place, in which the English came off without much loss, having killed fifty of their opponents. Shortly after the death of Desmond it was seized by the Lord Kerry, and the garrison put to the sword, but Captain Zouch obliged him to abandon it. CHAPTER IV. KILMALLOCK. "Castles high fall in decay, And the Lords who once did hold them; As our beads when we have told them." THE road leading from Limerick towards Cork is for some miles flat and uninteresting, though the horizon is bounded by mountains with an agreeable outline. The cabins of the peasantry are most deplorable; and the state of filth in which the owners live, inconceivable to an Englishman who has not travelled in Ireland. Twenty of these hovels sometimes succeed each other without a chimney; and invariably a stagnant black puddle is seen close to the door, appointed receiver-general of all kinds of filth, streams from which issue in every direction, one generally entering at the cabin door and trickling down over its mud floor:-" Such habitations," to use the words of Sir Richard Hoare," teeming with a numerous population of children, pigs and poultry, present a truly deplorable and affecting sight to every man of feeling and humanity." About nine miles distant from Limerick, not far from the road, lies Lough Gur, formerly a place of consideration; its castle, which stood on an island, being out of the reach of musketry, and the ruggedness of the surrounding country rendering the approach of cannon a matter of difficulty. Sir George Carew, in the beginning of 1600, shortly after he assumed the government of Munster, reconnoitered Lough Gur Castle, and found it garrisoned by more than two hundred soldiers, commanded by James Fitz Thomas, a near relative of the Earl of Desmond, to the history of whose ruinous fate the present chapter is chiefly devoted. On observing the President's approach, a few shots were fired from the castle, but without effect, and Sir George Carew returned to Limerick, where, after much parade in the preparation of ordnance to reduce Lough Gur, its surrender was purchased for sixty pounds from Owen Grome, who had been entrusted with its defence by James Fitz Thomas. An Irish topographical manuscript without date, the writer of which I have reason to believe was John M'Donald, or Shane Clarah, mentioned hereafter, is at present in my possession, and lies before me with a translation. In it " Lough Guir" is described as more than eight miles distant from Limerick, and remarkable on account of a beautiful and verdant hill, almost in the centre of the lake. "On the foot of this hill," (I copy literally the translation,) “at the north side, is a stately castle in the Gothic fashion. The hill is about an English mile and a half in circumference, and on its south-west side is the largest part of the lough; there, at the distance of three or four hundred yards from the shore, formerly stood a square castle rising out of the water, on the vault of which was planted, as I was told by Mr. Baily the owner of the place, five or six apple trees which then bore fruit; and on the edges of the vault he caused battlements to be raised to prevent their destruction by the undulation of the waters. I have been," continues the writer," at this extraordinary orchard and vault, the owner of which partly supports himself by what money he receives from the curious who visit this place; there is but one causeway to the hill, no doubt |