Irish News. OUR IRISH LETTER.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXX, Issue 40, 2 October 1902, Page 9

Irish News. OUR IRISH LETTER.

(From our own correspondent)

Cork, July, 1902

This is to be a Conk letter, for truly the Cork people have astonished us, and I secretly think they have astonished themselves by the brilliant success of the fairyland they have conjured up by ' the pleasant waters of the River Lee.' It is not enough to say that this exhibition is a credit to a city that is only the secondary capital of our Green lisle ; it would be a cnedit to the richest country as far as the buildings, the extent, variety, beauty and instructive interest of the exhibits, while, as for the site, itl is simply matchless. Once upon a time I overheard a literary discussion) between some ladies and gentlemen on the relative merits of Dickens and Thackeray, and I was greatly struck by the logical way in which one of the ladJies settled the question : ' Well,' she said, ' I have never read Thackeray, but I give the palm to Dickens.' I was not at the great Chicago Exhibition, nor at the Pafis Exhibition, but, of all such shows ever held the world over, I give the palm to Cork, and I doubt if even experts in such matters do not agr>ee with me. I have now spent a fortnight going in and out of the place, and find that not only my own delight and appreciation grow daily, but that the public become daily more and more enthusiastic, and, as their enthusiasm grows,, the throngs of visitors become so great and their enjoyment so intense that to take a walk in the neighborhood and watch tiie thousands pouring in is in itself a sight to do one's heart giood. Then there is the opportunity of seeing beautiful Cork at its very best, end that best is very chanming. Many Historic Memories. cling about the old city by the Lee, and pilgrims may daily be seen going, even before visiting the temporary point of attraction, to the older parts of the town, to the onco fashionable, now out-of-date quarters with which are connected honoured names, names that have helped to make Cork famous. An old mansion, now fast decaying, is pointed out to us ; here poor Oliver Goldsmith spent a night, and received from the wealthy owner, not a generous Up to help the youth on his journey, but much sage advice and a present of a wulking-stick, with which to belabor shank's mare. In another dingy street is the house, now a store, where Sheridan Knowles was borai ; there is the birthplace of Father Trout (Fathor Frank Mahony), the authon of ' The Bella of Shandon ' ; hero the homo where lived the Brothers Sheares, who stood side by side on the scaffold, and died fc^r, Ireland ih 1798. Cork gave birth to Barry, the gifted painter, the grateful friend of the great Edmund Burke ; in the same town were spent the childhood and early youth of John Hogan, the talented sculptor, to whose genius Cork owes the ' Dead Christ,' which the famous Danish sculptor, Thorsnglden pronounced a master-piece, one of the most beautiful and prized works of art in what we may call his native city ; and here too, was born the painter known as ' Thaddeus,' whoso portrait of Leo XIII. ia admittedly the finest portrait painted of the Holy Father. But perhaps Cork's greatest glory Is that with it are indissolubly connected the names of three persons whoso life-work was to t*-ing hlessings, not to one city alone, but to all Ireland, nay, to many and distant lands :

Father Theobald Mathow, Mary Aikenhead, and Nano Nagle.

In Blackmore Lane, and later on in Cove street, lived for many years the great Apostle of Temperance, Father Theobald Mathew, whose memory is fresh and green in the hearts of the Irish people and whose work is surely not dead when we canread in the morning's paper that although 100,000 people assembled yesterday in Cork to witness a regatta in which a tug-of-war was (with more beneath the surface than met the eye) between England and Germany, yet there was not a single case of arrest for drunkenness, no disturbance of any kind. A record any city and any people in the world might be justly proud of.

Another mission productive of incalculable good was that of Mary Aikenhead, who was the first to restore to Ireland those gentle benefactors of humanity, religious Sisterhoods for the care of the suffering pooru She was born while Penal Laws still held Catholics slaves in Ireland, when save through private benevolence, thene was no help for the needy, suffering Catholic, except in institutions where he must deny his faith. The condition of the poor m Ireland during the three centuries of penal times was a condition of tho most appalling, yet most heroic suffering that can be conceived, and it needed a heart of truly heroic mould to form and to carry out a plan for alleviating that misery through the medium of the very last means that existing circumstances could suggest to the ordinary mind : a Catholic religious community of women. Yet tho plan was formed in tho mind of a beautiful young girl, a. gay, glad - hearted belle of Cork society, and, early in the 19th century, Mary Aikenhead gave her life and her whole great Irish heart to that work now &o well known, directly or indirectly, throughout the world , for not only are the Irish Sisters of Charity personally known and venerated in many countries, but those who have learnt from their teaching and example are m every land, In their turn helping others and teaching others to realise the full beauty of the motto adopted by Mary Aikenhead for her daughters : ' The Charity of Christ urgeth us.' Another benefactress to the human race was a lady named Nano Nagle, also a native of this southern! city, who, in those same penal times of which we have just spoken gave to the Irish poor of her own sex the inestimable boon of a good education, soHlong denied them. Miss Naglo was the foundress of the Presentation Order, and from her convent, still a centre of good work in Douglas street, Cork, have gone forth thousands of holy women whoso object ljn life is to teach tho daughters of the poor to be good and useful members of Society. The Mar dyke. These are but a few of the memoriesl clinging to this oif,y |by the [Leo, a city that has endless interests, endle&s attractions at ordinary times, hut this summer it is fairly irresistible, as .some 20,000 daily visitors feel and declane. At tho western extremity of this most picturesque city there onced lived a Butch merchant who made a large fortune amongst the Cork people, and, in gratutude to the kindly southerners in whose midst he had found a home, he planted an avenue a milo long, close to the river Lee and leading from his house to the city. In time, as the trees grew tall, and formed a shady grovo with interlacing (branches overhead, tho long avenue became a fashionable resort for beaux and belles ; gradually, pretty villas were built in the fields alongside ; a dyke, through which runs a little tributary of tho Lee, gave it its name and the walk be-

came the Mary Dyke or Mardyke.. Here, for generations, the people of Cork, rich and poor, have taeen wont to enjoy, throughout the long summer days and balmy nights-, the pleasant shade of the old Dutchman's trees the cool \broeze from the Lee, the songs of summer birds, and strains of sweet music, their own happy voices and gay costumes making up as pretty a scene as could be imagined, at night, especially, when lamps gleam from the villas in the gardens and through the branches all along the walk,, a mile in length. ?<? dd u af L s , trai gbt as an arnow. Within the last decade the often destructive spirit of enterprise hag allowed too many houses to encroach °P- the ground at one side, but still the Mardyke is charming and is a fitting avenue of approach to the Cork Exhibition and its Ground*. Nowhere could a more picturesque site be found than that chosen by the Executive Committee for therir exhibition beside the Mardyke walk. Between this public promenade and the river Lee are broad meadows and well-planted pleasure grounds,, and on these meadows and grounds are the exhibition bluildingp and gardens, and the innumerable pavilions) and chalets erected by caterers for the amusement and for the comfort and refreshment of the inner man. M.Bi