Official Organ of the Irish Tourist Association MARCH, 19:~9. Thrc 'pence CrOWning the Rock of Cashel in Tipperary the group of buildings once the home of Kings and of Princes of the Church show, even in their ruined state, a beauty outstanding In mediaeval architecture. 1 RI 511 TRA V EL March, 1939 FISHGUARD to CORK Leave Paddington *5.55 p.m. Every Tues., Thurs. and Sat. LIVERPOOL to DUBLIN Leave Euston *6.5 p.m. SaillO.15p.m. Nightly (Sun. ex.) LIVERPOOL to BELFAST Leave Euston ·6.5 p.m. SaillO.15 p.m. Nightly (Sun. ex.) GLASGOW to BELFAST Direct. Sail from Glasgow 10 p.In. tightly (Suncl:lvs ex.' GLASGOW to DUBLIN Direct. Mon. Wed. Sat. 5.15 p.m. via. Greenock. Fridays at 1 p.m. GLASGOW to DERRY via Greenock. Every Monclay, Wednesday, Friday & Saturday SaturdAYS 10.30 v,m For 1939 Become a constant* reader of " Irish TraveL" When you have finished with your copy, send it to a friend abroad. BANK OF IRELAND He will love it. ESTABLISHED 1783 * FACILITIES FOR TRAVELLERS Subscription, 5/- per annum AT post free to any part of the globe Head Office: COLLEGE GREEN,DUBLIN BELFAST .. CORK DERRY AND 100 TOWNS THROUGHOUT IRELAND; Forward your 5/- now*to- EVERY DESCRIPTION OF FOREIGN EXCHANGE BUSINESS TRANSACTED ON ARRIVAL OF LINERS The Irish Tourist Association BY DAY OR NIGHT AT COBH (QUEENSTOWN) O'CONNElL STREET, DUBLIN AND GALWAY DOCKS. IRISH TRA VEL .March. 1939 Wholesale Irom till SUBSCRIPTION : JrIJIl Tourist AssoolaUoD 5/- PER ANNUM, aDd from Post Free. EasOD & SOD, Ltd. COPIES FREE IRISH Retail Irom TO ALL MEMBERS all NI"'pDta aDd OF THE from the ASSOCIATION AND lrlsh' TourlJt AssoolaUoD. OF ITS ASSOCIATE Prlee 3d. DEPARTMENT. TRAVEL Official Organ of the Irish Tourist Association, Dublin No 6 VOL. :XTV. MARCH 1939. NAMESAKES ROUND THE WORLD by its geographical reality. There from over the way (in Canada) were HE other day Dublin had a associating themselves in full dress is a bright Idea in it which, perhap , "Monster Diamond Jubilee has not as yet been sufficiently with the triumph T Celebration." The Deputy attended to in a world convulsed Speaker of the House, many The home countries did not with leagues and internationalisms, Members of Parliament and repre­ altogether miss the event however. ascending or descending. sentative citizens from friendly The Irish Tourist Association, from It would be charming and practical neighbour-towns attended. Two of their headquarters at Dublin, were if we linked up a little more with our the nearest, Stratford-on-Avon and on the alert and sent greetings from namesakes around the world and London - on - the - Thames, joined the senior Dublin to the stripling invited them particularly to come especially in felicitating "old" overseas. Ireland, you may say, and see us; and, surely, there Dublin on its achievement. always was good at remembering ought to be a special welcome for things! the citizens of Dublin, Stratford­ Somehow the British and Irish Repeat the names again, Dublin, on-Avon, London-on-the-Thames, new.:spapers at home seemed to have Ontario, and all the rest of them missed the news altogether; though, Stratford-on-Avon, London-on-the­ Thames and reflect on the spectacle oversea when they come back to of course, there was a reason for that. the "mother-towns" whose names It was just Dublin town in Ontario, of them hand-in-hand, in these nagging days, congratulating one they borrow and bear. Canada, that was rejoicing at its D. L. KELLEHER, full coming-of-age, and Stratford­ another on their achievements! It in "Coming Events." on-Avon and London-on-the-Thames reads like a fairy tale, justified only ri~b ~btnts ~rintipal ((onttnt~ t)rintipal 31 MaI'ch PAGE 4 Hockey (Ireland v. Wales), at St. Patrick's Day Again. Dublin. By D. L. J(el/eher U8 7, 8, 9 Show and Sale of Pedigree Bulls, Our Gaelic Games (for 1939). Balbbridge, Dublin. By Sean O'Ceal/achail1 121 11 Rugby (Ireland v. Wales), Belfast. Legends About St. Patrick. 17 st. Patrick's Day (National). By Brian 0'1\.1ahoney 123 17 Association Football (Scottish Curiosities Around Ireland .... 125 'tn' •• MARCH tfS' League v. Football League of \Vexford for the Tourist. ... MOtIL .'fUI. .... "'" ,.. at. Ireland), Dublin. By Seamtt Wilmot 127 .. ,..1t14 17 Gaelic Football and Hurling (Inter- \\IJliam Penn in Ir land. 5 6 7 • 9 10 11 Provincial Final), Croke Park, By Brooke W. Brasier 128 Dublin. Mountaineering in Ireland-9: 1t 13 14 1S ·16 17 ,. 17 Dog Show (Irish Kennel Club), 19 to 11 It t3 U .ts Ball,bridge, Dublin. The Limestone Area. 17"18 Racing, Baldoyle, Dublin. By Claude W. Wall 130 ~t7 it It lI:l.t .• 19 Association Football (Ireland v. Motoring in Ireland. Hungary), l\1ardyke, Cork. By D. P. lI1allen 133 25 Hockey (Ireland v. England), Radio Eireann 135 Belfast. A Directory of Irish Hotels 139 II7 IRISH TRAVEL ~t. ~atritk'~ 1!lap By ~gain D. L. KELlEHER ! HERE are as yet no Utopias come true in this world: pro­ (From a Broadcast Release distributed through many [l.S. all.t T hably there never will be. Canad1:an Stations) But once a year when the national festival of the country comes round fancies it was laughed at for Europe and Asia knew? And yet there is a sort of utopian mood in hundreds of years. People said not altogether a " no man's land" every citizen's mind. He sees his "Oh, that story of the Firbolgs since it was full of strange deeds native land then in a kin I of halo. and the Greeks and Ireland is just and strange men and their still "Lives there a man with soul so Irish!" It happens, h0wever, that stranger alphabets and tongues. dead, who never to himself hath down in south-western Ireland, near said-This is my own, my native Killarney, there are many standing A Man of Common Sense. land." That is how the poet put it, stones that date back to the first It was to this fascinating ~and and there is a hi t of a poet in most centuries A.D. On them in a sort almost unknown country that St. of us on Thanksgiving Day or what­ of morse code the names of the Patrick came filst in the year 432. ever fe tival we keep in the pot of dead are carved. Since th:n, of course, his memory earth that seems next door to is the great inspiration for the Irish heaven for an hour or two on at Athens Killarney Axis. on his name-day. He had .that least one day in the year. For a long time the scholars have common sense that appeals to the The Irishman, especially, looks been trying to find out the origins multitude. He wrote his own life­ back over tides and time on his of that primitive stone code. How story and called it his confession. festival of St. Patrick's day every did this alphabet of dots and dashe We· have it still, a vivid simple 17th of March. There are millions come into use in Ireland in the first, account. There is nothing high­ of people in the four corners of the second and third centuries A.D.? brow or patronising in the man 0r earth whose hearts go homing then "Where did it come from? "Who his religion. He did not assume the to the very small i land off Europe invented it ? All was a mystery dictator manner, there was no that is called Ireland. And the until a couple of months ago when apoleonic bombast in his spiritual lrish everYWhere have a lot to be the scholars discovered certain knapsack. One thousand five proud of ·when their thoughts go similaritie between it and the early hundred years before all our modern back to their Emerald Isle. Greek alphabet. Then the Firbolgs cry of realism and open confession and their legend of the Greeks came St. Patrick had written down in his . Three Thousand Years Ago. into the picture. The absurd old confession, " r Patrick am the most The story of the country seems story suddenly challenged for recog­ rustic and the meanest of all the anchored in St. Patrick, of course; nition. Killarney and ancient faithful, and contemptible in the but long before his time Ireland was Athens developed an axis all their esteem of very many." There was a place of signs and wonders that own. The other old story that no thunder of the Gods in that, are only now very slowly giving " east is east and west is west and no chosen-people nonsense of up their secrets. There was, for never the twain shall meet" lost national arrogance. This man instance, the legend of a race called its local application. It was evident would surely have been the despair the Firbolgs who coloni~ed part of now that even if the Greeks had of a thousand pres!: agents; but Ireland three thou and or so years not come to Kerry these three he knew what he was about becau;;e ago. That was the time when the thousand years or more ago at there was love in him and despised Pharoahs ruled Egypt and the least their alphabet had crossed the and thwarted as he often was later ancient Greeks were rising to power. mountains and the seas and invented on he could not lay aside his longing The Firbolgs, it was said, came to a small language away out on the to share with the Irish the faith Ireland, on the run from the Greeks wild and beautiful edge of the that was in him.