BLARNEY CASTLE.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 103, 5 May 1926, Page 8

BLARNEY CASTLE.

! A NEW OWNER. KISSING THE FAMOUS STONE. In the County of Cork, in Southern Ireland, there is a little town of less than a thousand inhabitants which bears the name of Blarney. it was near here that in 1446 an Irishman by the name of Cormac McCarthy, after contemplating for some time the erection of a ' castle which would adequately represent his importance and his military j strength, began to lay the foundations of Blarney Castle. Evidently the pugnacious Irish temperament was something to be contended with in those days, for Cormac McCarthy built well and truly, and made some of his castle walls no less than -eighteen feet thick. It was a fine castle that Cormac builded, and he loved it and could not be easily persuaded to part , with it, but a time came when he realised , j that force could not prevent it passing into the hands of the Lord-Lieutenant , of Ireland, who demanded its surrender. I Therefore, though the lord of Blarney . Castle may not have been the first I ! cajoling-tongued Irishman, he was at , least the man who gave flattery a new | name, for by Mb "blarneying" he was , ■ able to stave off confiscation of his ' ; castle. I j There ia a stone in Blarney Castle ; which has literally put the castle into r J history, for otherwise we would never ( I hnve heard of it.. It is said that to kiss the "Blarney Stone" endows one with the art of Cormac McCarthy, but ti to reach it one must be hung by the heels by an obliging guide. 1 Blarney Castle has just changed hands t upon the death of Sir George Colthurst r i and the seventh baronet of the same r name takes over the picturesque ruins. > It is still open to visitors v and every 6 1 year pilgrims to the Blarney 'Stone arc 3 j lowered by their heels to teat the efficacy • of the old Irish relic.