County Kerry

“ The area is 1,159,356 acres, or 1811 sq. m., the county being the fifth of the Irish counties in extent. Kerry, with its combination of mountain, sea and plain, possesses some of the finest scenery of the British Islands. The portion of the county south of Dingle Bay consists of mountain masses intersected by narrow valleys. Formerly the mountains were covered by a great forest of fir, birch and yew, which was nearly all cut down to be used in smelting iron, and the constant pasturage of cattle prevents the growth of young trees. ”

“ Kerry (179) , maritime county in the SW. of Ireland, between the Shannon and Kenmare Rivers, with Limerick and Cork on the E.; has a rugged, indented coast, Dingle Bay running far inland; is mountainous, having Mount Brandon, the Macgillicuddy, and Dunkerron ranges, and contains the picturesque Lakes of Killarney; there is little industry or agriculture, but dairy-farming, slate-quarrying, and fishing are prosecuted; iron, copper, and lead abound, but are not wrought; the population is Roman Catholic; county town, Tralee (9) .
Kertch (30) , a seaport of the Crimea, on the eastern shore ”

“ Killaloe gives name to Protestant and Roman Catholic dioceses.
KILLARNEY, a market town of county Kerry, Ireland, in the east parliamentary division, on a branch line of the Great Southern & Western railway, 1851⁄4 m. S.W. from Dublin. Pop. of urban district (1901) , 5656. On account of the beautiful scenery in the neighbourhood the town is much frequented by tourists. The principal buildings are the Roman Catholic cathedral and bishop’s palace of the diocese of Kerry, designed by A. W. Pugin, a large Protestant church and several hotels. ”

“ The character of the landscape on either side the stream is not particularly picturesque, but large, liberal, and prosperous. Gentle sweeps of rich meadows and cornfields cover the banks, and some, though not too many, gentlemen’s parks and plantations rise here and there. But the landscape was somehow more pleasing than if it had been merely picturesque; and, especially after coming out of that desolate county of Kerry, it was pleasant for the eye to rest upon this peaceful, rich, and generous scene. ”

“ Again, the territory of Cairbre Aobhdha is not the barony of Kenry, neither is it a hilly district, but one of the most level plains in all Ireland; and lastly, the name O’Donovan does not moan “chiefs of the hilly district on the river,” for this family name was called after Donovan, the son of Cathal, chief of the Hy Figeinte, a people whose country extended from the river Shannon to the summit of Slieve Logher in the county of Kerry, and from Bruree and the river Maigue westwards to the verge of the present county of Kerry. ”

“ He said, "Clare has always been an exceptional county. Clare returned Daniel O'Connell, by him secured Catholic Emancipation, and from that time has called itself the premier county of Ireland. They are queer, unmanageable divils, are the Clare folks, and we are only divided from them by the Shannon. So the Kerry folks go mad sometimes by contagion. I should advise you to keep away from Clare. You might get a shot-hole put into you. Every visitor is noticed in those lonely regions, and the little country towns only serve to disseminate the arrival of a stranger to the rural districts. ”

“ Some features of County Wicklow, such as the position of the principal workhouses and holiday places on either side of the coach road from Arklow to Bray, have made this district a favourite with the vagrants of Ireland. A few of these people have been on the roads for generations; but fairly often they seem to have merely drifted out from the ordinary people of the villages, and do not differ greatly from the class they come from. Their abundance has often been regretted ”

“ In Kerry, besides Glanageenty, where Desmond was killed, there was Glenflesk near Killarney, and indeed the whole county is evidently suited for guerilla warfare. Sir Nicholas Browne reported, in 1597, that Iraghticonnor, the country of O’Connor Kerry, was wedged in between his deadly enemies, Lord Fitzmaurice and the Knight of Glin: ‘his country is but small, and he is not able to make above seven score men, but by reason of his woods and bogs [Pg 444] he was wont to hold his own in spite of them both.’ But of all the Munster strongholds none was so famous as the glen of Aherlow in Tipperary. ”

“ According to this theory of proprietorship, the only one recognised by law, Lord Lansdowne may legally spread desolation over a large part of Kerry; Lord Fitzwilliam may send the ploughshare of ruin through the hearths of half the county Wicklow; Lord Digby, in the King's County, may restore to the bog of Allen vast tracts reclaimed [pg 211] during many generations by the labour of his tenants; and Lord Hertfort may convert into a wilderness the district which the descendants of the English settlers have converted into the garden of Ulster. ”

“ The state of the poor in the whole county of Kerry represented as exceedingly miserable, and owing to the conduct of men of property, who are apt to lay the blame on what they call land pirates, or men who offer the highest rent, and who, in order to pay this rent, must and do re-let all the cabin lands at an extravagant rise, which is assigning over all the cabins to be devoured by one farmer. The cottars on a farm cannot go from one to another, in order to find a good master, as in England; for all the country is in the same system, and no redress to be found. ”

“ Under the Land Act of 1891 was created the Congested Districts Board, with an annual income of £55,000, for the purpose of promoting the permanent improvement of the backward districts of the West. The districts which come under its control are those which answer the following test, that more than twenty per cent. of the population of a county live in electoral divisions, of which the total rateable value gives a sum of less than 30s. per head of population. Such electoral divisions occur in the nine counties of Kerry, Cork, Galway, Mayo, Clare, Roscommon, Leitrim, Sligo, Donegal. ”

“ If we were the men that we ought to be, we would be doing something to have “vengeance wreaked on the murderer’s head,” instead of hugging to ourselves the satisfaction that we are doing all that belongs to Irish patriots to do, by celebrating those days, in singing “High Upon the Gallows Tree,” and “The Glories of Brian the Brave.”
But I have not done with Kerry yet. I was speaking of it when Father Bermingham’s speech about the Essex-Shirley invasion took me into the northern County. Another of those invaders of the time of Queen Bess got into the southern County. ”

“ LIMERICK, a western county of Ireland, in the province of Munster, bounded N. by the estuary of the Shannon and the counties of Clare and Tipperary, E. by Tipperary, S. by Cork and W. by Kerry. The area is 680,842 acres, or about 1064 sq. m. The greater part of the county is comparatively level, but in the south-east the picturesque Galtees, which extend into Tipperary, attain in Galtymore a height of 3015 ft., and on the west, stretching into Kerry, there is a circular amphitheatre of less elevated mountains. ”

“ After our stay in Kerry we returned to County Limerick, keeping along the banks of the Shannon all the time. Our wounds were by this time healing rapidly, and we were feeling strong again. We used to go in for a dip nearly every day, and we fished quite a good deal. We had to be doing something. None of us could ever stand a day of inactivity. ”

“ This district consists of the province of Connaught, the counties of Donegal, Kerry, and Clare, and the districts of Bantry, Castletown, Schull, and Skibbereen in the County of Cork. The land in those localities is very poor and is estimated at an average of eighty cents an acre, while farm lands in the rest of Ireland have an average value of $3.12 an acre. The majority of the people live on small plots, where they manage to raise a few potatoes and cabbages and keep a few cows, goats, pigs, and sheep of worn-out breeds, which they drive wherever they can find pasturage. ”

“ One other Commission besides that of the Times remains to be mentioned. Lord Balfour of Burleigh, a dour Scot with a lot of gumption in his head, was chairman of one on Imperial versus local taxation. My easy task was to show the excess of the latter in Kerry, which is the highest taxed county in the three kingdoms.
When a man thinks of the vast amount of information buried beyond all probable excavation in the Blue Books of the last fifty years, he may well break into Carlyle-like diatribes against the waste of the whole thing—which is paid for out of the taxpayer's pocket. ”

“ Lord Lansdowne, besides this estate in Queen’s County, owns property in a wild, mountainous part of the county of Kerry. On this property the tenants occupy, for the most part, small holdings, the average rental being about £10, and many of the rentals much lower. They are not capitalist farmers at all, and few of them are able to average the profits of their industry, setting the gains of a good, against the losses of a bad, season. In October 1886, while Mr. Dillon was organising his Plan of Campaign, Lord Lansdowne visited his Kerry property to look into the condition of the people. ”

“ Kerry , who started the com munity in 1912 , when he was interested in the development of the first named railroad , extending it into his extensive timber holdings in the Nehalem Valley . Mr. Kerry has been for many years a prominent business man of Portland and Seattle . KIGER CREEK , Harney County . The name of this stream is fre quently misspelled Kieger and Keiger . It was named for the Kiger family , well known pioneer settlers near Malheur Lake . Kilchis Point , Tillamook County . Kilchis Point is on the east shore of Tillamook Bay , and Kilchis River is near by . ”

“ There are several large Presbyterian churches which show every sign of progress and prosperity. There were only a few people on the streets when we winged our way across the city at 6:00 o’clock. These stared up at us and we could see them running to the high places to keep us in sight. The farms in County Tyrone looked large compared with the microscopic farms of Connaught and Kerry, but they looked very small to an American. The macadamized roads are models in the way they are kept up, but they are narrow and winding. When the wagon roads cross a railroad, there is never a grade crossing. ”

“ Thus the Knight of Kerry, who started as a candidate for his native county, and who had spent his whole life in resisting Orangemen, because he refused to become an instrument in the hands of the popish priesthood and their agitator, was denounced as unworthy of being elected; every man who dared to vote for him was to have a death’s-head and cross-bones painted on his door: and the consequence was that he was rejected. Of a candidate for New Ross, who refused to enlist under his banner, O’Connell said, “Whoever shall support him, his shop shall be deserted; no man shall pass his threshold. ”

“ If we would have a good large Quota, or proportion of our Debt satisfied in Lemster and Ulster, then Kerry, (being the refuse County of Munster) is all good Land. If the Munster lot would be rid of Kerry, They cry up the Neating and with-drawing of dubious Lands for a divine Invention, to others an abominable project. If the Commissioners are sparing to shew their Maps to prevent projecting and contriving upon them, then Dr. Petty keeps all in the Dark. If we do not observe what every Juncto or Faction directs how contradictory or unintelligible soever, Dr. ”

“ In addition to the more genuine vagrants a number of wandering men and women are to be met with in the northern parts of the county, who walk out for ferns and flowers in bands of from four or five to a dozen. They usually set out in the evening, and sleep in some ditch or shed, coming home the next night with what they have gathered. ”

“ Leslie's Answer to King, 1692. ↑ There have been in the neighbourhood of Killarney specimens of the arbutus thirty feet high and four feet and a half round. See the Philosophical Transactions, 227. ↑ In a very full account of the British isles published at Nuremberg in 1690 Kerry is described as "an vielen Orten unwegsam und voller Wälder und Gebürge." Wolves still infested Ireland. "Kein schädlich Thier ist da, ausserhalb Wölff und Füchse." So late as the year 1710 money was levied on presentments of the Grand Jury of Kerry for the destruction of wolves in that county. ”

“ Munster comprises Clare, Cork, Kerry, Limerick, Tipperary, and Waterford; Ulster contains Antrim, Armagh, Cavan, Donegal, Down, Fermanagh, Derry, Monaghan, and Tyrone; Connaught has Galway, Leitrim, Mayo, Roscommon, and Sligo; Leinster comprises Carlow, Dublin, Kildare, Kilkenny, King’s County, Longford, Louth, Meath, Queen’s County, Westmeath, Wexford, and Wicklow. ”

“ A minute account of what passed in one district at this time has come down to us, and well illustrates the general state of the kingdom. The south-western part of Kerry is now well known as the most beautiful tract in the British isles. The mountains, the glens, the capes stretching far into the Atlantic, the crags on which the eagles build, the rivulets brawling down rocky passes, the lakes overhung by groves in which the wild deer find covert, attract every summer crowds of wanderers sated with the business and the pleasures of great cities. ”

“ The Kerry peasant is always warm with the sunshine of comradeship. He is a child of nature, gifted with wonderful facility of speech and with a simple joy in giving pleasure to others. It is impossible to be lonely in Kerry, for every peasant you meet is a gentleman anxious to do you a service, delighted if you will stop to talk, privileged if you will only allow him to be your guide. It is like being back in the childhood of the world, among elemental things and an ancient, unhasting people.
The old lady in the cabin by the Derrynane road seemed to me a duchess in disguise. ”