The Pittsburgh Press (September 7, 1942)
Roving Reporter
By Ernie Pyle
ADARE, Ireland – On my first day in Adare a lady came along with two Shetland sheep dogs and sat down in one of the inn’s canvas chairs.
In case you have forgotten, a Shetland sheep dog is a toy Shepherd, and I happen to be the doting owner of one. They are magnificent little dogs, very rare in America, and these two here in Adare were the first I had ever seen at large outside our own.
They were to me like stick-candy to a child. I couldn’t resist them. And so, a stranger in a strange land, I girded my courage about me and boldly spoke to the lady.
Before she could strike me down, I whipped out a picture of our little dog, and presented it to her as though it were my card. The picture did the trick. In this world of big bad dogs the rare meeting of two Sheltie fans is an occasion indeed.
The lady was delighted to meet a dogman from across the sea. And it turned out that she was Lady Adare, the No. 1 woman of this part of Ireland. Her husband owns the town and practically everything around it.
I believe she is the first official “Lady” I’ve ever talked to, and I had considerable tongue trouble, but did manage to get through it without swearing in the wrong place.
Lady Adare says she has four Shelties, loves them like mad, and after the war she and Lord Somebody-or-Other down in Killarney are going into the business. They intend to advertise in American magazines and ship dogs to America. Maybe if I haven’t been eaten by a Schnauzer by then, I can become her American representative.
I didn’t meet Lord Adare, but I saw him. He is very horsey and he is in the height of his glory right now. He has just started a stage-coach line.
Transportation is getting so acute in Ireland that they are actually opening up horse-drawn stage lines again, and it isn’t just a stunt, either.
Lord Adare dug up a handsome old coach, and opened a route a few days ago between Rathkeale and Limerick. It is 18 miles each way, and they make one round trip a day.
The coach is a high-wheeled affair, without a top. In rainy weather people just have to sit and take it. You mount the stage by a circular stairway at the rear.
The driver, an aged man, sits on a high seat in front and the conductor, I suppose you call him, rides on the rear steps. Both are dressed in long, bright-red coats, with gray top hats. They look very medieval and historic. The coach holds about 25 people, and is always crowded. They made the 18-mile run in two hours.
The coach is pulled by four horses. Adare is about halfway, so they change teams here in front of the inn at 11 in the morning and 6 in the evening. Lord Adare is always on hand to supervise the changing. He is so proud of the whole thing he’s about to bust.
It takes about 10 minutes to change teams and get everything straightened away. Quite a little crowd gathers to watch the ceremony. Just after the coach starts, the conductor takes a trumpet from a hook on the back of the coach, and blows a long flourish.
The demand for coach seats is so great that Lord Adare has sent to England for another coach. He already has plenty of horses.
A similar stage line has opened in Dublin, and they will be springing up all over Ireland, people say. “We’re returning to medieval days,” a friend said to me only half-jokingly. “If you come back in five years we’ll all be living in thatched huts and wearing knee breeches.”
Incidentally, the lack of thatched roofs in Ireland was another surprise to me. It’s really very seldom that you see one. Most roofs, in both town and country, are either slate or galvanized iron.
Thatched roofs went out a long time ago when Ireland changed from a grain country to a grazing country, consequently doing away with the straw from which thatched roofs are made.
But now she is returning somewhat to grain again, so maybe the thatched roof will come back. I hope so, for there are few things prettier than a thick thatched roof on a white stone house, set against green fields, with flowers all around, and a donkey sticking its head out the front door.