Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent

Excerpt: 'The town of Castle Cumber it is not our intention to describe at more length than simply to say, that it consists of two long streets, intersecting each other, and two or three lanes of cabins-many of them mud ones-that stretch out of it on each side at right angles. This street, and these straggling appendages, together with a Church, a Prison, a Court-house, a Catholic chapel, a few shops, and half a dozen public houses, present to the spectator all the features that are generally necessary for the description of that class of remote country towns of which we write. Indeed, with the exception of an ancient Stone Cross, that stands in the middle of the street, and a Fair green, as it is termed, or common, where its two half-yearly fairs are held, and which lies at the west end of it, there is little or nothing else to be added. The fair I particularly mention, because on the day on which the circumstances I am about to describe occurred, a fair was held in the town, and upon the green in question. The month was December-the day stormy and unpropitious. There had been a deep snow and hard frost for nearly three weeks before; but now the aspect of the white earth contrasted wildly with the large masses of black clouds which hung motionless in the air, and cast a dark and gloomy spirit not only over the appearance of inanimate nature, but into the heart of man himself.'