Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 263, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 November 1915 — The Men of the Aran Islands. [ARTICLE]

The Men of the Aran Islands.

Later I met a man from the Aran islands, which lie oft the coast of Galway, far out of the world in the wind and the rain, and he told me proudly of the place. “They’re good people there,” he said. “I don't suppose you’d find any better people anywhere in the world. And they’re old-fashioned, too; maybe that's the reason for it. You’d see them wearing clothes they made themselves, grown and woven right there in the islands, and the women wear shawls they’ve made themselves. You’d see the pampooties, shoes made of cowskin, that they use for walking on the rocks. They’re bold sailors, too, and daring; sure, they have to be, and they go right out in the Atlantic itself. They have Bkin boats they go fishing in, with a high bow to them, the like of that one there. My uncle had a hooker he used to run, and he was lost off her —he wan anchoring one time, and somehow he got the chain around his leg, and it pulled him overboard, and drowned him. But he was a damn fool to get caught so, God save him.” —A. S. Hildebrand in the Forum.