The Irish Echosphere in 2003

Abstract

Searching the London Library for old books that might throw light on the his tory of Connemara, I came across Saxon in Ireland, or, the rambles of an Englishman in search of a settlement in the west of Ireland, published by John Murray in 1851; anonymous, but with the name John Henry Ashworth written into the title page by a librarian's careful pencil.1 Its professed intention was direct the attention of persons looking out either for investments or for new settlements, to the vast capabilities of the Sister Island, and it goes into great detail on the manuring of land, the Encumbered Estates Act, and other prac ticalities; I suspect it was also intended to boost the author's own courage and that of his family in facing emigration to the Ireland of that still famine-strick en date, for it is remarkably positive in outlook, and one has to read the small print of quoted matter in the appendices to find even a mention of potato blight. I did glean a few grains of information on Connemara, but it was an incident from his travels in Mayo that has lodged in my mind. In Ballycroy, a remote glen of Erris, the author calls upon another Englishman, Mr. S, who tells him about the strange meeting which led to his own settling there and the creation of a valuable property out of a wilderness. This episode, quite out of keeping with the rest of the book, is entitled The Echo Hunter. I have trimmed it a little. Mr. S says: