Three Months Tour in
Ireland by Madam De Bovet, Translated and edited by Mrs Arthur
Walter, London 1891. Anne Marie De Bovet
was a French novelist and travel writer who married the Marquis de Bois-Hébert
but wrote under her maiden-name. She
wrote three books on Ireland.
Lismore is a clean little
town, the aspect of which is refreshing to eyes wearied with poverty and rags. If as some would have us believe, the ills of
Ireland are to be entirely ascribed to the negligence or rapacity of landlords,
the comfortable appearance of Lismore does honour to the Duke of Devonshire.
Neat low houses, mostly of
one storey, stand in well- kept streets, their fronts white-washed, and
embowered in clematis, laurels, myrtles, and fuchsias. The windows have curtains of red calico, and
seen through open doors, are dressers well-polished and furnished with store of
pottery. The people are comfortably
clad, not too ragged, and almost clean. Beggars are comparatively rare; and if the
children go barefoot, that is an affair of fashion rather than of necessity. Many of them being dressed in gaudy tartans
and cashmeres, the boys wearing caps and the girls adorned with ribbons tied
round tresses that really appear to be combed daily.
Though residing [The Duke
of Devonshire] but little in Lismore – where, however, some of his family come
every year for shooting or change of air – he is popular in the county. The magnificent park of Lismore is hospitably
open to the public; and one may pass delicious hours in the shadow of gigantic
beeches or wandering by the swift flowing river. Upon picturesque elevations, covered with
trees, villas succeed one another all the length of the river.