IRELAND'S ANCIENT GOLD-FIELDS.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XVII, Issue 32, 29 November 1889, Page 19

IRELAND'S ANCIENT GOLD-FIELDS.

Gold appears to have been found in Ireland at a very remote period. It is recorded that Tiernmas, one of the apocryphal Kings of Ireland, worked gold mines 111 the forests of the Dubliu and Wicklow mountains, refining the metal there and manufacturing it into cups, brooches and various other articles. Tne great number of gold ornaments found ia various parts of Ireland, their exquisite workmanship aud inimitable design testify tj the high degrees of artistic xcellencj attained by those early artificers, says Chambers s Journal. It appears to have been the practice in ihose uuies for ihe gold-smitti to reside close to the mine, digging up and prepaung on the spot small quautuies of the precious metal, which be then f*shioue<l and flushed at his own horaa into those mte.esting articles which to-day alorn the various museums. At a place called Cullen, on the borders of the counties Limerick and Tipperary, is an extensive big, in which great numbers of valuable gold ornaments hive been tound, accompanied by crucibles, caldrons, ladles and other smelting implements, clearly indicating that the district was at some remote period inhabited by a race of professional gjlusmiihs, wnose existence must date from a time autesedent to the formation of the bjg. In many other parts of Ireland besides, similar evidences of ancient gold mining have been. discovered, the mine in most cases having been exhausted. Tue wealth of Ireland in the precious metal seems at a later period 10 have constituted one of tne chief attractions to the Danes in invading the country, and the tribute they exacted from the inhabitants of the conquered districts was largely paid ia gold and silver. The Dauish kings an 1 chieftains adopted the native faahion of weariDg massive oruaments of Irish gold. The ancient gold smiths held high social rank in early Irish civilization, and were even regarded wnh superstitious veneration by their ignorant neighb jrs, who believed them to be endowed with magic powers as exorcists and charmers. The tra lition of the gold mines in Wicklow never was completely lost ; but tue secret remained for hundreds of years at a time cloaely kt.pt among a few families in that remote neighbourhood. About 1780 a schoolmaster in the neighbourhood of Arklow discovered the existence of alluvial gold in the Ballin Valley stream, now the Goldmine Kiver, rising in the Uroghan Kinshella, and flowing into the Aughrim Kiver, at the beautiful «nd celebrated vale of Avoci. He kept the secret well and gradually enriched himself, much to the amassment of his neighbours, who firmly believed that he had sold himaelf to the power of darkness ; but in 1796, when a man crossing the stream found a nugget twenty-two ouaces in weight and disposed of v for eighty guineas, inquiries were set on foot aad the secret leaked out. The report spread like wildfire aad operated so powerfully on the minds of the untutored peasantry that they forsook every 01 her employment and flocked in thousands to the newly-discovered El Dorado. All hoped to realise thefortunes of All Baba or Aladdin. S eady, sensible men who had never weilded a pick or handled a spade laid down their pens on their desks and thronged to the slopes of Croghan Kinshella. From the 24th of August, when the news became publicly known, till the 15th of Oc'ober, when (the Government took possession of the diggings, over 2,500 ounces ot gold was found by these inexperienced miners and sold by them for about £10,000. The proce3S of mining waß extremely simple. They dug up the sand from the river bed, washed it and then picked out the granules of gold, which they preserved in quills to bring to the goldsmiths. — Exchange.