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Updated: May 19, 2025
Berwick and Sarsfield on the one side and Ginkle and Lanier on the other, kept up the winter campaign till an advanced period, on both banks of the Shannon. About the middle of September, the former made a dash over the bridge of Banagher, against Birr, or Parsonstown, the family borough of the famous Undertaker.
We know, for example, that Lord Rosse's great telescope at Parsonstown, possessing a power of magnifying 6000 times, brings the Moon to within 40 miles of us; not to speak of Barbican's great telescope on the summit of Long's Peak, by which the Moon, magnified 48,000 times, was brought within 5 miles of the Earth, where it therefore could reveal with sufficient distinctness every object above 40 feet in diameter.
But while the visitors to Parsonstown will look with great interest on this residence of an Irish landlord, whose delight it was to dwell in his own country, and among his own people, yet the feature which they have specially come to observe is not to be found in the castle itself. On an extensive lawn, sweeping down from the moat towards the lake, stand two noble masonry walls.
The strongest point I have heard made in favour of the owner is, that he is habitually described by that dumb organ of a down-trodden people, United Ireland, as "the most vile Clanricarde." I found a good car at the railway station, and set off at once for Portumna. Parsonstown was called by Sir William Petty, in his Survey of Ireland, the umbilicus Hiberniæ.
The inhabitants of that town frequently insist that its name is Birr, * while the official designation is Parsonstown, and to this day for every six people who apply one name to the town, there will be half a dozen who use the other. But whichever it may be, Birr or Parsonstown and I shall generally call it by the latter name it is a favourable specimen of an Irish county town.
A large number of these misty objects, which the utmost powers of Herschel's specula had failed to resolve into stars, yielded at once to the Parsonstown reflector; while many others showed under entirely changed forms through the disclosure of previously unseen details of structure.
When Michael had attained a thorough knowledge of his business, he was employed till '58 at Parsonstown; he then went to England to improve his condition, and after some time he married, and continued to work on industriously at his business till May, '67, when he visited his native country to receive the last benediction of his dying father.
It is, in fact, known that the instrument set up by Lord Rosse at Parsonstown, which magnifies 6,500 times, brings the moon to within sixteen leagues; and the powerful telescope set up at Long's Peak magnifies 48,000 times, and brings the moon to within less than two leagues, so that objects twelve yards in diameter were sufficiently distinct.
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