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| SHRINE AT GOUGANE BARRA, CO. CORK. -A typical Irish scene is presented to our readers in the foregoing picture. Amid the hoary ruins of the venerable shrine of St. Finn Barr, on the island, in "lone Gougane Barra," the simple country people kneel and offer up their prayers to heaven as did their fathers before them for twelve hundred years! St. Finn Barr's natal day occurs on June 12, and each succeeding year, the peasantry, of both sexes, for miles on miles around the sacred spot, throng to the holy island and drink water from the pure depths of the blessed well, at which the patron saint himself, slaked his thirst in the twilight dawn of Christianity that followed the black, repulsive night of Druidical paganism. The remains of the once stately ecclesiastical edifices are now but a feeble reminder of the splendor that crowned them in the early Christian ages of Ireland. It is singular that, in a land of piety, no effort has been made to renovate them. At one time, the crowds that visited the ruins were not always free from turmoil, and a good priest, Father O'Mahony, became a resident of the island for the purpose of preserving order among the pilgrims. His self-imposed task kept him a prisoner here from the year 1700 to 1728, when he died full of years, and in the odor of sanctity. His grave on the island is still pointed out to visitors. |
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