Tea at Trianon: The Beehive Huts

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Wednesday, April 22, 2015

The Beehive Huts

In South West Kerry. To quote:

Beehive huts can be found in great numbers in County Kerry, Ireland. The most well known examples are to be found at the monastic settlement on Skellig Michael (Sceilig Mhichíl). A UNESCO World Heritage Site, this early Christian monastery clings to the steep cliffs of an isolated rocky island situated to the west of the mainland of the Iveragh Peninsula. A visitors centre on Valentia Island (Dairbhre) gives some excellent background on the monastic settlement, its structures, and the men that dwelt in them. From Valentia, the more intrepid explorer may travel by boat to the Skellig Isles and explore Skellig Michael by foot if they dare tackle the hundreds of steep steps leading to the monastery which was believed to have been founded between the 6th and 8th Centuries. (Read more.)