Rockery

This romantic tour ended in the evening, and I stopped with the "good landlady" over the night, and arose while all were asleep in the morning, and scoured through the pretty wood that fringed the river, and back of the house, and selected the choicest moss-dotted stones, both great and small, for a rockery; and when the laborers had arisen, they assisted in carrying and wheeling them upon the lawn which fronted the cottage and bordered the stream, and around a solitary young fir standing there, we placed these stones. The daisy and primrose were in bloom—these were dug and planted in the niches, while the landlady added her skill in setting the young plants, when, in three hours—the same time that the wall of the Partra Priest was in building—there was a rockery of firm finish, blooming with the young flowers of spring. This was my last work in the county of Mayo, and frivolous as it might be, it was so in accordance with the ancient customs of Ireland, and my own feelings too, that when I turned from it forever, I said, "Stand there, when the hand that raised you shall be among the dead; and say to the inquiring traveler who may visit this spot, that Asenath Nicholson, of New York, raised these stones, as a memento of the suffering country she so much pitied and loved, and as a monument of gratitude to the God who had conducted her safely through all the dangerous scenes encountered while passing over it."