before mentioned, has a cliff beetling and overhanging the ocean, and protruded like a horn, from whence it derives its name; adjoining which a signalstation was erected during the war, in which a poor man was induced to reside. Oh! what a horrid place for a poor mortal to reside when the ocean-tempest, came on; but now in the midst of July the scene was quite different; if it was a scene pregnant with grandeur, it was also one teeming with life: the whole surface of the boggy or mossy soil, of which the mountain was composed, even to the edge of the cliff, was burrowed with holes caused by certain aquatic birds that make their nests under the ground; the soil was in this way so hollow, that there was much danger in walking; thence, for 1500 feet down the precipice, on every ledge of the rock, on every slope, or crag, or point where a nest could be placed, it was black with birds carrying on the process of incubation, all arranged in their different families and species on the face of the precipice; and here and there on some bolder and broader prominence, too high from below and too deep from above to be accessible to man, were eagles' nests, and young ones as large as turkeys, and the old birds

G

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INSTINCT TRUER THAN REASON.

from thirty to forty at a time, floating in mid-air above, shrieking and challenging from on high our audacity in molesting their sovereignty. Oh! that some atheist, standing on these cliffs, and surveying this magnificent scene, would reflect upon what it wa that brought all these unimaginable myriads of sea-fowl to meet at unvaried seasons on these precipices; must he not ask himself who imposed a necessity on these dwellers of the trackless ocean to congregate here, coming thousands of leagues from east and west, from all the winds of heaven, and guided hither by an instinct surer than pole-star, or cynosure, or magnet. How they came, how they returned, who fixed the unerring law on them, and see how generation after generation they still obey. But these animals of God have never fallen; they never broke the original law imposed; they still give God the obedience of unbroken fealty and instinct. Man alone is the law-breaker, and sin has degraded reason, while instinct is upright; or, as the prophet Jeremiah says, "Yea, the stork in the heaven knoweth her appointed time, and the turtle and the crow and the swallow observe the time of their coming, but my people know not the judgment of the Lord."

A DANGEROUS TRADE.

83

Here the country-people carry on a more fearful trade than even gathering samphire, namely, the taking these birds off their nests. These dark dwellers of the ocean are all furnished with a covering of the finest down, which bears a high price-I believe about five shillings per pound, and about two dozen of these birds furnish a pound; it is, therefore, a most tempting employment for these poor people; for an active and experienced man can take three or four dozen every day; but it is accompanied with immense danger, and annually two or three or more fall a sacrifice, and are dashed to pieces. This practice of taking birds is described in some treatises on natural history, so I shall not trouble my reader with it here. I shall, therefore, proceed further along the promontory, where the cliff arose not so high, to where the curious natural phenomenon occurs, called M'Swine's Gun, which is caused by a horizontal cavern running for many yards under the cliff, from whence a perpendicular shaft rises to the surface, and this is called M'Swine's Gun. This particular point lies open to the north-west, and when the tempest sets in from that quarter, the storm forces the sea with tremendous power into the

cavern, and whenever the gale is most fitful, and an immense surge beats in, up flies the water through the perpendicular shaft, like the Geiser spring in Iceland, some hundreds of feet high, accompanied with a report louder than any piece of artillery, and the shot of M'Swine's Gun is asserted to have been heard in the city of Derry.

CHAPTER III.

DONEGAL.

Mulroy Bay-Giant's Grave-Vitrified Fort-Peninsula of Fannat-St. Columbkill's Miracles-Excels St. Patrick-Confers on the inhabitants of Fannat indemnity from being hanged-The Fannat Ghost and Jerry M'Cullum-Priest lays the Ghost, and Jerry becomes Catholic-Distinctive Character of Romanists, Presbyterians, and Church Protestants-Power of Romish Priests often exercised for good purposesDondy O'Donnel, and his wife's funeral-Instances of Protestant Superstition-Improvement of the Established Church-Effects of Preaching the Gospel-Mineralogical Sketch of Donegal,

On the following day my friend and I set out to retrace our steps homeward, and, to vary our route, we returned along the shores of the deep, land-locked arm of the sea called Mulroy Bay. Nothing can equal the variety that this water presents-here, like a beautiful and placid lake winding through mountains, and without any apparent outlet-there, like a broad and magnificent river, and again opening into a fine harbour in which navies might ride in safety. Formerly the hills and shores of the bay were covered with timber. The oak, ash, hazel, in stunted copsewood, still cover the declivities. If these beautiful shores were in any other country, they