A Curious Irish Collection.

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 1580, 11 March 1887, Page 3

A Curious Irish Collection.

Stowed away in the recesses of the Boyal Irish Constabulary Depot in the Park, at Dublin, out of the reach of further mischief, rests a collection of arms that for uniqueness and interest must be regarded as unrivalled in Ireland They represent at once a laborious gathering on the part of the police in all the provinces for several years, under the powers of various penal statutes, as well aa a good deal of the agrarian history of the country for the past fifty years. Bead in these lights, their examination cannot fail to be instructive. Most of the once formidable instruments possess a special history of their own, having doubtless io their time been engaged in many a lawless fray. The arms, which are principally piled on a dozen racks, each about twelve feet high, are the product of seizures under the Acts referred to, and of surrenders, the value of the latter being paid to the owners. The walls of the armoury a»e artistically covered with weapons of various eras and make, including claymores of formidable pattern, swords of terrible dimensions, sea pistols and cutlasses of villanous proportion, Turkish scimitars, modern revolvers of the " bull dog" and other forms, arquebuses, dirks, bowie and other knives, and all the instruments of carnage necessary for a fullyequipped piratical ocean rover. The armoury has, too, an interesting collection of artillery—brass and gun metal—which one can fancy having been used with effect at close quarters in the days when Paul Jones made the British coasting trade an unpleasant occupation for those who earned their living on the sea. What is apparently a handsome hazel.wood walking-stick is a decided curiosity in its way. You examine it carelessly, and wonder what business it can have there in such a collection. But your guide suddenly presses his finger opon it, and a trigger starts into view; the stick unscrews, revealing the hollow interior of the barrel in which the charge is deposited, and you have a deadly rifle complete. Another move of the finger, and the trigger disappears, leaving the instrument a walking-stick as before. Air guns of modern make are there in several forms, many of them of handsome finish, and as perfect as possible.

A iwivel gun, half cut, cannot fail to attract attention from its enormous and unwieldly dimensions, such a thing never been seen in actual use now, but fifty years ago it must have made considerable execution among wild fowl from its position in a boat where it was placed in a hole and worked round after the birds, the ■hot from its two-ujeh, bore doubtless causing sad havoc among the feathered crowd. It is only an antique fossil now, and like man? of the other ancient weapons that surround it, eminently fitted for a muaeum. Of this civs is alio an old long-barrel of Queen Anne's time, which recalls the famous weapon used by Fenimore Cooper's " Leather-stocking," and which was described by the Indians of a hundred years ago, who knew it* power and length of reach, as " La longut carabina." Like its prototype of the American prairie, the Qieen Anne of the armoury in the park has survived its day, and would prove decidedly more dangerous to him who us*d it than the object at which it might be directed. Quite as curious as anything else as in this most interesting of armouries is a double*barrelled carbine of the year 1700, apparently of the cavalry pattern of the period, with old flint lock and spring bayonet attached, the bore being a wide and smooth one, and the carbine three feet long. Weapons of this class were in use during the Williamite wars in Ireland, and beyond all reasonable doubt the particular instrument in question must have had an active participation in the stirring eventa of that momentous period, and in many a subsequent scene of Irish history before its final capture in the South, and in its deposit in the limbo of the Armoury in the Park. Side by side with this antiquity is a blunderbuss of four inches bore, with brass barrel and spring bayonet attached, made in London a hundred years ago; the weapon, which would prove a formidable one at cloee qu»rters, being in a wonderfully good state of preservation. So far aa the bore is concerned, there are even larger blunderbusses in the quaint old store —some of them recalling strange incidents in the pages of history, for several of these belonged undoubtedly to the Spanish Armada, their stocks being inlaid with silver chased and various kinds of ornamentation. There are, too, blunderbusses of the recognised Irish stamp, with muzzles of the dimensions of a morning tea-cup, the barrels ranging from one to two feet in length and fitted to throw any class of missile from shot and ball to nails and pebbles. Look. ing at these dreadful things, one can readily imagine the destruction caused by their discharge at near distance, as more tilliauous looking weapons it would be impossible to conceive. The largest of them is capable of receiving an enormous charge of anything and everytuiug that might come to hand, which u would setter with the dead* ly foico ot small artillery. Perhaps M corioua an instrument as^any^in

the collection is found in a weapon which is at once both revolver and con—a combination which ii anything bnt common now—and which seems to hare gone out of favour with modern makers. The revolver portion is on the top, projecting two inches over the barrel of the rifle proper, there being nine chambers for revolver practice and one for rifle shooting. No fear of accident from the simultaneous use of both weapons exist*, as by the action of a very simply-arranged string the working of either instrument is regulated at pleasure. This, it is said, was in service at the Galtees in 1818, and was afterward* captured in the district Following the outbreak at Tallaght in 1867, a great many captures of arms were made, many of which have since been disposed of by the authorities, and of those of this class which remain nothing require* to be said, as they are all of comparatively modern finish. In the general racks, which are all well laden, the arms sufficiently attest the destructive power of time, most of the stocks being moth-eaten and the barrels deeply encrusted with rust, which has rendered them unserviceable years ago. Of quite a different class is the modern portion of the Armoury. Here the weapons are many of them of the most beautiful finish and the most perfect kind. Revolvers of all the varied patterns are in profusion, s ime surrendered under proclamation in various parts of the provinces, the owners receiving their values, and more taken without any equivalent recompense. There are some curiosities in this section An ordinary cigar-case is showa to the visitor—as innocent and harmless lookinganarticleas cigar-cases usually are; but this one contains a hidden danger, as stowed away within it is a pretty miniature revolver, its smooth-bore and glittering little barrel and ivory stock nestling quietly in a dark green velvet recess, and in another beside it a supply of tiny cartridges, anyone of which would do work as deadly as a larger ball. Other revolvers have an added danger in the presence of brightly flashing steel bayonet*, which can be sprung on tr the muzzle in an instant, rendering them most formidable instruments of defence or attack. These are all in perfect preservation, and naturally have much attention bestowed on their condition by those to whom that duty is entrusted. But no Irish armoury, with any pretensions to represent the weapons of a by-gDne age, could by any possibility be complete, which did not contain the Irish pike, and accordingly the storehouse of ancient arms at the depot possesses some remarkably fine specimens of the '9B, '4B, and 'O7 periods. One has a pole 12ft. long, with an iron pike of tremendous proportions, requiring great physical power to handle, the others being a full foot shorter. Those of an ea'lier period seem to have been finished in a stronger and more workmanlike manner than the later ones, which, unlike the '9S pike, have no history of battle attached to them; and, as illustrating the durability of Irish wood, it may be mentioned that the timber portion of the weapons, which probably were in requisition at Vinegar Hill, looks as fre'h and sound to-day] as it could have done eightyseven years ago.