Wonderful days of youth in the islands around Conamara, as recalled, decades later in New York by Seamus Ridge. "We were chiefs of the ocean and lords of the shore. The smiling sea to the southwest, with small, lonely islands, was an unknown region waiting to be explored by us . . ." and there dilisg and laver, and periwinkles could be gathered. And the boys often picked up bits of wrack and lit a fire. And they didn't often go hungry. "A search among the weed coated rocks at low water often; rewarded us with lobsters and crabs. We could also share rabbits the sand dunes and catch birds with a crib."
Then, too, in the sand where the seabirds nested, they found fresh eggs, "laid that morning". There were bees galore and honey, he writes, could be found in nests of moss. "We often had a course of the sweet honey served in empty scallop shells to finish off the meal." Then they would swim and play games to their heart's content.
He tells of an unusual incident with dolphins. He and his friends were rowing out to Muskerry Island when a fog descended. They anchored. A dolphin jumped into their curach. And other dolphins began to bump against the bottom. One put his head on the gunwale, making strange noises. "The one on board began answering with queer moans, shivering as if in pain. Before we knew from heaven what to do, there was a new born beside her gasping for breath." The boys tried to pitch the mother out and the baby with her. Then "Mama dolphin lifted her head to reach him, and out they went." The oddest detail. A school of dolphins jumping around the boat, "tossed the baby high in the air. . . as if celebrating the occasion."
Conamara Man by Seamus Ridge was published in 1969 by Prentice Hall International. He seems to have taken the Republican side in the Civil War and hoped to resume his teaching of Irish in schools, according to the notes on the cover. But he would not subscribe, and emigrated to America in 1929. He worked on the New York subway system until his retirement in 1960, and died in 1967.
He has also written, according to the cover details, Claddagh Conamara. There is the fine lyrical touch of the recollections in tranquility. In New York, he thinks of the home shore and "the pulse beat of the surf on Long Strand lulls me to sleep in the dark of the night." Did anyone ever reproduce it in paperback?