Upon the farther corner of the third side of the square, where the neighborhood was somewhat better, we discovered the residence of the sexton who had charge of the church--a strong Orangeman, bitterly opposed to the Romish church, and with a strong liking for America, increased by the fact of having a brother in the American Union army, who rose from sergeant to colonel in one of the western regiments.
"Think o' that, sir! Ye might be as brave as Julyus Sayzer in the English army, and sorra a rise would ye get, except ye'd be sated on a powdher magazine whin it exploded."
The legend is, that this church was originally built by St. Patrick, and the sexton took me into a little old crypt at the end of one of the aisles of the nave--all that remains of that portion of the church, which it is averred was built A. D. 540. This crypt was floored with curious old tiles, over a thousand years old, put down and the fragments matched together with great labor and expense, and the flooring worth more money than a covering of an "aven layer o' guineas" upon it.
The old stone font, A. D. 1190, the old carved chest for vestments, and the curious stone coffins, relics of the old church, were interesting. Among the monuments in the church, Archbishop Whately's magnificently-carved marble sarcophagus, surmounted by his full-length effigy, was particularly noticeable; Swift's monument, Stella's tablet, and the economical tablet put up in memory of Duke Schomberg by Swift.
Here in St. Patrick's Cathedral are displayed the stalls, arms, and banners of the Knights of St. Patrick, the army "memorials" of the India and China British regiments, with the flags they carried from 1852 to 1857 in their campaigns. Upon the wall was suspended the cannon shot that killed Schomberg at the memorable battle of the Boyne in 1690, and the spurs that he wore at the time. Schomberg's remains are interred at Westminster Abbey.
My first ride in an old country park was in the Phoenix Park, Dublin a--beautiful pleasure-ground of over eighteen hundred acres in extent. I imagined how laughable it must have seemed to the Prince of Wales, when, at the review he attended on Boston Common, he politely assented to the remark of a militia officer, that "this great area" (the Common parade ground) "was well adapted for displays of large bodies of troops," as I sat looking at the parade ground of _this_ park, a clear, unbroken greensward of six times the size.