Ireland/Irish > Black's guide to Killarney and the south of Ireland

DUBLIN TO CORK.
This journey, which is 164f miles, takes the passenger
through portions of five counties. The interesting objects on
the route may be specially visited, by procuring a ticket for
the nearest station, and continuing the journey by the next
train.
CLONDALKIN, already noticed in connection with the
neighbourhood of Dublin, is interesting, as affording the tourist
his first view of a round tower. The tower stands at a con¬
venient distance from the railway; it is 85 feet 9 inches high,
and surmounted with a conical top. There is a difference of
14 inches between the thickness of the walls in the lower and
upper storey. This tower can be ascended, from the inside,
on a series of ladders reaching to its summit. Though no
record can be traced of the building of these beautiful and
interesting objects,* it is of interest to know that they present
architectural excellences seldom met with in modern works.
Sir John Forbes, in his “ Memorandum made in Ireland,”
says, “ Of all the relics of antiquity still preserved in Ireland
—I had almost said in Europe—there are none which, in my
mind, can vie in point of attractiveness with these towers.
No one who sees but once their beautiful, lofty, and slender
shafts shooting up into the sky, and dominating in solitary
grandeur the surrounding landscape — all strikingly resem¬
bling one another, and resembling nothing else—but must be
struck with admiration and curiosity of the liveliest kind.
And yet these primary feelings are but slight in degree, when
compared with those which are excited by the consideration of
all the extraordinary circumstances involved in their history.
That these towers have existed for upwards of a thousand
years is certain, that they may have existed twice or thrice
that period is far from improbable; but that the era of their
origin and the object of their erection remain as secrets
yet to be unfolded, are circumstances which only add to the
mysterious interest which attaches to them.”
THE COUNTY KILDARE is entered about eleven miles
from Dublin. The population in 1851 was 95,688; it returns
* Giraldus Cambrensis, who wrote in the twelfth century, regards them as of
too great antiquity to be traced.