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                        THE IRISH PENNY JOURNAL.

         NUMBER 15.    SATURDAY, OCTOBER 10, 1840.    VOLUME I.

[Illustration: THE TOWN AND CASTLE OF LEIXLIP, COUNTY OF KILDARE.]

Localities are no less subject to the capricious mutations of fashion in
taste, than dress, music, or any other of the various objects on which
it displays its extravagant vagaries. The place which on account of its
beauties is at one period the chosen resort of pleased and admiring
crowds, at another becomes abandoned and unthought of, as if it were
an unsightly desert, unfit for the enjoyment or happiness of civilized
man. Some other locality, perhaps of less natural or acquired beauty,
becomes the fashion of the day, and after a time gets out of favour in
turn, and is neglected for some other novel scene before unthought of or
disregarded. Yet the principles of true taste are immutable, and that
which is really beautiful is not the less so because it has ceased to
attract the multitude, who are generally governed to a far greater extent
by accidental associations of ideas than by any abstract feelings of the
mind.

Perhaps it is less attributable to any characteristic volatility in the
character of the inhabitants of our metropolis, than to the singular
variety and number of the beautiful localities which surround our city,
and in emulous rivalry attract our attention, that this inconstancy
of attachment to any one locality is more strikingly instanced among
ourselves, than among the citizens of any other great town with which
we are acquainted. But, however this may be, the fact is unquestionable,
that there is scarcely a spot of any natural or improved beauty, within
a few miles of us, which has not in turn had its day of fashion, and its
subsequent period of unmerited neglect. Clontarf, with its sequestered
green lanes, and its glorious views of the bay--Glasnevin, the classical
abode of Addison, Parnell, Tickell, Sheridan, and Delany--Finglas,
with its rural sports--Chapelizod, the residence of the younger
Cromwell--Lucan, Leixlip, with their once celebrated spas, and all
the delightful epic scenery of the Liffey--Dundrum, with its healthy
mountain walks and atmosphere, and many others unnecessary to mention,
all experiencing the effects of this inconstancy of fashion, have found
their once admired beauties totally disregarded, and the admiration of
the multitude almost wholly transferred to a wild and unadorned beauty on
the rocky shores of Kingstown and Bullock, which our forefathers deemed
unworthy of notice. But let that beauty take warning from the fate of her
predecessors, and not hold her head too high in her day of triumph, for
she too will assuredly be cast off in turn, and find herself neglected
for some rival as yet unnoticed.

Of such unmerited inconstancy and neglect there are no localities in
the neighbourhood of Dublin which have greater reason to complain than
the village of Lucan and that which forms the subject of our prefixed
embellishment. As the establishment of peace in Ireland led to an
increase of civilization, which exhibited itself in improved roads and
vehicles of conveyance, and the citizens, emerging from their embattled
strongholds, ventured to enjoy the pleasures of nature and rural life,
Lucan and Leixlip, with the beautiful scenery in which they are situated,
became the favourite places of resort; and their various natural
attractions becoming heightened by art, were described by travellers,
and chaunted in song. About “sixty years since” they had reached their
greatest glory, and Leixlip was the favourite of the day. It is thus
described at this period by the celebrated Doctor Campbell:--“All the
outlets of Dublin are pleasant, but this is superlatively so which leads
through Leixlip, a neat little village about seven miles from Dublin, up
the Liffey; whose banks being prettily tufted with wood, and enlivened
by gentlemen’s seats, afford a variety of landscapes, beautiful beyond
description.” It was at this period also that O’Keefe, in his popular
opera of “The Poor Soldier,” makes Patrick sing--

    “Though Leixlip is proud of its close shady bowers,
      Its clear falling waters and murmuring