St. Edna's burial-place, known as _Tegloch Edna_, is another curious premediæval church.
On the Aran Islands there are no bogs, but one has, instead, to dodge his footsteps in and out among pebbles and rolling stones of every size and shape. This is particularly so if one is to make the journey to Dun Ængus, one of the finest prehistoric forts of Western Europe; called, indeed, by Dr. Hindes Petrie, "The most magnificent barbaric monument now extant in Europe."
It is, undoubtedly, the most noteworthy object in Aran. It consisted originally of a triple line of works, but the two inner lines, of horseshoe shape on the verge of a bold headland, are those best preserved. Tradition assigns it to Ængus, a Firbolg chief who lived about two thousand years ago. The _chevaux-de-frise_ defending the second line is unmistakable, and the whole is as majestic in its grandeur as its supposed antiquity might indicate.
Temple MacDuagh, near Kilmurvy, is a "cyclopean" church of the seventh century, and Dun Oghil is a grand fort consisting of a circular cashel, within a second, which is roughly square.
These are the chief features of the great island, with the Temple Brecan, which has a chancel of rude ancient masonry, a choir which more nearly approaches our own time by four or five hundred years and is still modern, and a sacred enclosure devoted to the burial of saints, of which the Irish calendar seems quite full.
On Inisheer are the remains of an ancient place of worship dedicated to St. Cavan, brother to St. Kevin, the legend of whose life everywhere confronts one in County Wicklow. There is another to St. Gobnet, abbess of the sixth century.
It has been suggested before now that the domain of Achill Island, off the coast of Mayo, that wonderland of natural unspoiled grandeur, be preserved as a sort of national park.
Its primitive beauties are impressively great without rising to splendour or magnificence.
Said Sir Harry Johnston, in writing to the _London Times_:
"Is it impossible that individuals and the State together should intervene before it is too late and save Achill Island as a national park, as a paradise in which the last aspects of the indigenous British fauna may be exhibited? This might be done without disturbing the indigenous population, who could still carry on their fishing industry and the amount of agriculture necessary to their subsistence, without interfering unduly with the wild birds and beasts of the island. There would be, of course, an absolute interdict against 'sportsmen' and gunners; it would no longer be permissible to shoot the seals that haunt the caves and rocks around Achill, while the deer, wild goats, foxes, eagles, ravens, swans, gulls, choughs, and other wild birds and beasts would be similarly protected. People would then visit Achill Island at all seasons of the year (the climate is remarkably mild in winter) for the pleasure and interest afforded by the contemplation of its wild fauna. We should, in short, have an object-lesson of what Ireland and most other parts of the British Isles were like under prehistoric conditions."