.J<JURNAL OF THE COUNTY DONEGAL HISTORICAL SOCI:ETY building materials and destroyed all the ornamented stones in the neighbourhood, . ... it is probable that the inauguration stone of the O'Donnells was originally placed on the Hill (recte Rock) of Doan, but the annals afford sufficient evidence· that it was in latter times, at least, in or at the Church of Kilmacrenan. Manus saw it under the NorthEast window of the old Church." (Sept. 18th, 1835). The town of Letterkenny is in the middle of Giensoolie, and yet the inhabitants deny that they are Glensooliemen, that appellation being applied to the wild yet distilling inhabitants of that Glen from Scarve .Sollus to the source of the river. ;Raphoe Sept. 30th, 1835). "Drumbo (Stra.norlai·) is now the Castle {as the peasants style it) of a Sir Edmond Hayes, a name which sounds plebeia1n on my ea:s, as his fortunes were not won by the long bow or the gallo,wglass axe, but by usury and prudence. This shows .what a wild sort of philosopher I am, to look with veneration at the fortune and castle of the ancient hangman or hanging man and cut throat. and to despise those acquired behind the counter by a patient a~nd perservering accumulation of pennies and white shillings. And why should not the physician who receives his fortune in isolated sovereign pieces be as profusely sumptuous and as open-handed as he who receives the golden shower at once-a shower iWhiCh he never eamed by the sword or dagger, but which flowed upon him from his sublimely rascally ancestors? One will answer that t·he money which one obtains in isolated small sums will be hoarded, because it is human nature to do so! No matter Irish property is now variously held-by night's service, by Knight's service, by fealty-<by soccage in capite et caetera, but we must respect all. The O'Muldories and O'Carnonans, men of ancient noble ,blood (if nobility consists, which l doubt, in robbing, burning, maiming, blinding, imprisonil1g for life. putting away wives and procuring others, building mOIIlasteries and making pure perpetual donations of land to the men of God, making pilgrimages to Loug·h Derg and Iona-and putHi1g on the habits of monks, and dying conquerers of the world and the devil) are now no more! Their very name is buried in the tomb of :non-existence. These were succeed by the O'Donnells-a proud and haughty race who disturbed the North and South for five successive centu:-ies. and by so doing, proved a most formiaable check to Terrni:nus and Ceres, and finally left their progeny a pennyless, p1oud race, stalking in the Glens of their ancient principality with p:·ide and wretchedness and deriving sustenance not from the rich fields of Raphoe but from the blue mountains and hungry glens of North and West Tirconnel l." (Sunday night, Ocitober 12th 1835). . . . Romantic Gleann Finne in the heart of a purely Irish country." We entered a Ch:apel Yard and soon found ourselves surrounded by a crowd of the old and long headed natives of Glen Fin- the r emnant of the men of Moy-ilha, who were driven to the mountains by the domina1nt party of J1ames 1 .... I am glad to say that the Irish of Glenfinn do not hate the descendants of their Scotch conquerors, though the :Scotch keep them at a most unnatural distance. A very respectable farmer, who lives close to the Church of Donoghmore, could not tell me the name of the Parish Priest-nor direct me to amy one individual of Irish descent who might be acquainted with the country! It is all the fault of the preachers·!" Ballybofey, Oct. 5th 1835. · "I had never thought there was any part of the Sacred ,Isle 242.
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