Friday July 14th
Cork is a large & handsome City & is said to contain about 80,000 Inhabitants.48 A Street called the Parade, as also St. Patrick's Street, are very wide & handsome & the former is ornamented with an Equestrian Statue of King George 2nd.49
About 10 we ordered our Bill & found the charges so exorbitant that even any English Tavern Keeper would have blushed to have made them. Mr. Leach & I slept in the same Room in two beds scarcely larger than Coffins, for which we were each charged 2s. 8 1/2d. per night. We were charged 4s. 4d. a day for our tiny sitting room, & so enormously high for {MS page 25} all we ate & drank that I shall certainly warn all my Friends who dislike imposition against ever going to Mac Dowels Hotel at Cork.
It was not 11 O'Clock when we set out but tho' the distance is only 13 1/2 Irish Miles or about 17 English Miles we did not reach Bandon till 4 in the afternoon. Pat, let the Road be ever so good, always drove very slowly but it was here very rough & hilly which annoyed him greatly & he called one part of it ‘The Devil's own half acre’. The country thro' which we passed is uninteresting except about Innishannon which is a pretty & neat tho' very small Town. By the Road side about two Miles from Cork we gathered Hypericum calycinum50 in the spot described to us by Mr. Drummond but I confess myself extremely doubtful whether it has any claim to a place in the British Flora. By the road side we also gathered Euphorbia hyberna51 which is extremely common in this Country, but has long since been out of flower.
{MS page 26}I had often heard of the wretchedness of an Irish Cabin but had no idea that any of them were so wretched as are most of those which we passed this day. They are built with Mud roofed turf, & have rarely any window whatever; some of them are without any Chimney & in others the Smoke is let out by a hole cut in the roof. The insides were generally filled with Smoke of which we frequently observed more issuing from the Door than from the Chimney. We were told that these poor Wretches prefer a Room when thus filled, & think it warmer & more comfortable. I never in my life saw so many Blind People as since I came into this country, which may perhaps be attributed to this singular prediliction & in almost all the old people I observed. ‘The Eyes with scalding Reum were galled & red.’52.
While our Dinner was preparing at Bandon we walked about the Town which is rather large & very populous. We left it soon after six but tho' the distance is only 9 Irish Miles it was near 10 before we arrived at Cloghnikilty where at a small Inn called the Saint {MS page 27} George revived we stowed ourselves for the Night.