Peg of Limavaddy.

Between Coleraine and Derry there is a daily car (besides one or two occasional queer-looking coaches), and I had this vehicle, with an intelligent driver, and a horse with a hideous raw on his shoulder, entirely to myself for the five-and-twenty miles of our journey. The cabins of Coleraine are not parted with in a hurry, and we crossed the bridge, and went up and down the hills of one of the suburban streets, the Bann flowing picturesquely to our left; a large Catholic chapel, the before-mentioned cabins, and farther on, some neat-looking houses and plantations, to our right. Then we began ascending wide lonely hills, pools of bog shining here and there amongst them, with birds, both black and white, both geese and crows, on the hunt. Some of the stubble was already ploughed up, but by the side of most cottages you saw a black potato-field that it was time to dig now, for the weather was changing and the winds beginning to roar. Woods, whenever we passed them, were flinging round eddies of mustard-coloured leaves; the white trunks of lime and ash trees beginning to look very bare.

Then we stopped to give the raw-backed horse water; then we trotted down a hill with a noble bleak prospect of Lough Foyle and the surrounding mountains before us, until we reached the town of Newtown Limavaddy, where the raw-backed horse was exchanged for another not much more agreeable in his appearance, though, like his comrade, not slow on the road.

Newtown Limavaddy is the third town in the county of Londonderry. It comprises three well-built streets, the others are inferior; it is, however, respectably inhabited all this may be true, as the well-informed Guide-book avers, but I am bound to say that I was thinking of something else as we drove through the town, having fallen eternally in love during the ten minutes of our stay.

Yes, Peggy of Limavaddy, if Barrow and Inglis have gone to Connemara to fall in love with the Misses Flynn, let us be allowed to come to Ulster and offer a tribute of praise at your feet — at your stockingless feet, O Margaret! Do you remember the October day (’twas the first day of the hard weather), when the way-worn traveller entered your inn? But the circumstances of this passion had better be chronicled in deathless verse.
Peg of Limavaddy

Riding from Coleraine

(Famed for lovely Kitty),

Came a cockney bound

Unto Derry city;

Weary was his soul,

Shivering and sad he

Bumped along the road

Leads to Limavaddy.

Mountains sketch’d around,

Gloomy was their tinting,

And the horse’s hoofs

Made a dismal clinting;

Wind upon the heath

Howling was and piping,

On the heath and bog,

Black with many a snipe in;

Mid the bogs of black,

Silver pools were flashing,

Crowds upon their sides

Picking were and splashing.

Cockney on the car

Closer folds his plaidy,

Grumbling at the road

Leads to Limavaddy.

Through the crashing woods

Autumn brawl’d and bluster’d

Tossing round about

Leaves the hue of mustard;

Yonder lay Lough Foyle,

Which a storm was whipping,

Covering with mist

Lake, and shores, and shipping.

Up and down the hill

(Nothing could be bolder),

Horse went with a raw,

Bleeding on his shoulder.

“Where are the horses changed?”

Said I to the laddy

Driving on the box:

“Sir, at Limavaddy.”

Limavaddy ins’s

But a humble baithouse,

Where you may procure

Whiskey and potatoes;

Landlord at the door

Gives a smiling welcome

To the shivering wights

Who to his lintel come.

Landlady within

Sits and knits a stocking,

With a weary foot

Baby’s cradle rocking.

To the chimney nook,

Having found admittance,

There I watch a pup

Playing with two kittens

(Playing round the fire,

Which of blazing turf is,

Roaring to the pot

which bubbles with the murphies;)

And the cradled babe

Fond the mother nursed it!

Singing it a song

As she twists the worsted

Up and down the stair

Two more young ones patter

(Twins were never seen............