St Senan’s Well, which we have selected as a characteristic example of the holy wells of Ireland, is situated near the west bank of the Shannon, near Dunass, in the county of Clare. There is nothing very peculiar to distinguish this well from a thousand other fountains of the same kind, but the unusual character of the votive offerings made at it, which, as our engraving exhibits, consist chiefly of wooden bowls, tea-cups whole and broken, blacking-pots, and similar odd offerings of gratitude to St Seanan Liath, or Seanan the Hoary, the patron saint of the parish.
Having a strong desire to procure some of the small compact Norman draught horses for my farm-work, I ventured last year to visit Normandy, for the purpose of making the desired selections. I took with me a young friend, who had been partly educated in France, as my interpreter with the French horse-dealers, and to arrange every particular for me during my intended hasty intercourse with the foreigners. But previously we went for passports to the office in Poland-street, where the Consul filled up the documents without ever looking at our faces, and I believe very incorrectly as to portraiture. “Your profession?” inquired he in French, as he was scribbling down the length of my nose, the colour of my hair and eyes, &c. “Homme de lettres,” responded my companion for me. I nodded my head in acquiescence, without knowing anything about the matter; but I was quite satisfied when my friend explained it afterwards to me, and assured me that Lord Brougham, when Lord Chancellor, had from sheer modesty sunk his rank and other artificial honours on going to Paris, and simply designated himself as “Avocat, et homme de lettres.” “Does not all the world,” said my companion, “know perfectly well that you are, in the first place, one of the props of the Irish Penny Journal?” “Enough,” said I, somewhat tickled by the reference to Lord Brougham; “be it as you please--though I think that, as a farmer going to France merely to buy horses, I might as well have been written down under the useful character of ‘agriculturist.’” My passport, however, was by this time in my pocket, and any alteration in it was out of the question.