Sunday 24 ((April 24 was Fleischmann senior’s 47th birthday – maybe that was the occasion for the outing to Dunmanway.))
Had a fine week, and, what’s more important, swotted a lot. Have given up Carlyle as a bad job, and taken to Chesterton, also seems to me to be good for comp. At any rate, he does away with platitudes. On Tues. drove Fr. Pat to Dunmanway, and remained there two days. Was engaged in studying, reading and mountain climbing. There were interesting funerals and auctions. Mám and Páp came down and we drove to Glengarriffe, going then by motor boat to Garnish, Mrs Bryce’s island. I never saw anything so beautiful. If one had the least bit of culture, there it would have to blossom. Tropical plants grow in abundance in wonderfully planned gardens. There is an Italian pavilion filled with specimens of sculptures etc. with pillars in front, flights of steps, a fountain and square pond. In another portion is a magnificent ascent to a mediaeval tower, a remnant of a fortress which would remind one of Horace dum Capitoleum scandet [climbing the Capitol] etc. ((Horace Odes Book III, Exegi monumentum aere perenius, line 30.)) To crown all, the magnificent sea and mountain scenery on all sides! We were in Cork at 12 and Fr. Pat and I left at 6 for Dunmanway. Came home by 1 [o´clock] train, having learnt and enjoyed Shelley’s glorious ‘Ode to the West Wind’.
Hopes were held out of Mám becoming accompanist to broadcasting station here, but discarded as she is alien. ((Tilly Fleischmann was born in Cork, so was a British subject, though both parents were German. She probably took on her husband´s German nationality on her marriage in Dachau in 1906. The Irish broadcasting service opened on Jan 1 1926, known as Dublin 2RN. It could only serve the area around Dublin having but 1 kw; it operated from 7.30 p.m. to 10.30 p.m., had a staff of 4 and an ‘orchestra’ of piano, violin, viola and cello. On 26 April 1927 a station was opened in Cork with 1.5 kw, known as 6CK. Seán Neeson was the director; his wife Geraldine became station accompanist – the circumstances are described in her autobiography In My Mind´s Eye: The Cork I Knew and Loved, Dublin 2001, page 111, where she gives an amusing account of the station´s activities. It was closed down in 1930 for ‘economic reasons’. In 1933 a station with 100 kw opened in the middle of the country, in Athlone.)) It would mean ₤300 extra a year, but nevertheless I am glad she is not getting it, and she is too, as it were. Low for her high classical position. Mr. Neeson, however, as director, will get her engagements all over England soon, so that will be much better.
Miss O’Brien has arrived home suddenly as Fr. O’Brien is very ill and she has not come to us or any of her friends. Very strange!
