Look! Look!

Asenath Nicholson

Ireland's Welcome to the Stranger

1847

Chapter XXII (14) | Start of Chapter

The tower was erected for a telegraph, and was going to decay. Supposing this was the only object of curiosity, I felt a little disappointed. Leaving the young ladies in the tower, I ascended the mountain, which appeared at the top a sharp ridge like the roof of a house. I was just about taking the last step to gain the height, and then call out that I was on the loftiest peak of Sybil Head, when a little unobserved shepherd-girl called out, "Ye'll be destroyed! Look, look!" I looked, and started back with horror. A precipice overlooking the sea many hundred feet below, presented itself, a wall secured a little part, and then a shelving rock, bending over the waves, which were dashing and roaring with awful grandeur. I heard the roaring, but supposed it was the sea we had left at the foot of the mountain, and but for the little shepherd-girl should doubtless have stepped over into the awful abyss.

Ireland’s Welome to the Stranger is one of the best accounts of Irish social conditions, customs, quirks and habits that you could wish for. The author, Mrs Asenath Nicholson, was an American widow who travelled extensively in Ireland on the eve of the Great Famine and meticulously observed the Irish peasantry at work and play, as well as noting their living conditions and diet. The book is also available from Kindle.

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An American widow’s account of her travels in Ireland in 1844–45 on the eve of the Great Famine:

Ireland’s Welcome to the Stranger

Sailing from New York, she set out to determine the condition of the Irish poor and discover why so many were emigrating to her home country.

Mrs Nicholson’s recollections of her tour among the peasantry are still revealing and gripping today.

The author returned to Ireland in 1847–49 to help with famine relief and recorded those experiences in the rather harrowing: Annals of the Famine in Ireland.

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The Scotch-Irish in America tells the story of how the hardy breed of men and women, who in America came to be known as the ‘Scotch-Irish’, was forged in the north of Ireland during the seventeenth century. It relates the circumstances under which the great exodus to the New World began, the trials and tribulations faced by these tough American pioneers and the enduring influence they came to exert on the politics, education and religion of the country.

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