I accept it as the graceful tribute of an old civilisation to a younger one; the older men grow the better they like girls of sixteen, and why shouldn't the same thing be true of countries?
As long ago as 1589, one of the English 'undertakers' who obtained some of the confiscated Desmond lands in Munster wrote of the 'better sorte' of Irish: 'Although they did never see you before, they will make you the best cheare their country yieldeth for two or three days, and take not anything therefor....

They have a common saying which I am persuaded they speake unfeinedly, which is, 'Defend me and spend me.' Yet many doe utterly mislike this or any good thing that the poor Irishman dothe.' This certificate of character from an 'undertaker' of the sixteenth century certainly speaks volumes for Irish amiability and hospitality, since it was given at a time when grievances were as real as plenty; when unutterable resentment must have been rankling in many minds; and when those traditions were growing which have coloured the whole texture of Irish thought, until, with the poor and unlettered, to be 'agin the government' is an inherited instinct, to be obliterated only by time.
We supplement Mrs.Mullarkey's helter-skelter meals with frequent luncheons and dinners with our new friends, who send us home on our jaunting-car laden with flowers, fruit, even with jellies and jams.

Lady Killbally forces us to take three cups of tea and a half-dozen marmalade sandwiches whenever we go to the Castle; for I apologised for our appetites, one day, by confessing that we had lunched somewhat frugally, the meal being sweetened, however, by Molly's explanation that there was a fresh sole in the house, but she thought she would not inthrude on it before dinner! We asked, on our arrival at Knockarney House, if we might breakfast at a regular hour,--say eight thirty.

Mrs.Mullarkey agreed, with that suavity which is, after her untidiness, her distinguishing characteristic; but notwithstanding this arrangement we break our fast sometimes at nine forty, sometimes at nine twenty, sometimes at nine, but never earlier.

In order to achieve this much, we are obliged to rise early and make a combined attack on the executive and culinary departments.