Testimonials

May 23rd 2004

To Aisling & Robert, Iseult & Various inhabitants of Rossnaree & grounds:

Wherever you find yourselves, when the winter shadows lengthen, and darkness falls early this December, on Solstice Eve, please light the candle and remember-
A beautiful shining May morning in this sunny enchanted valley when the whitethorn bloomed in overflowing abundance,
And soft, blue-eyed kittens tumbled in the grass while their good mother hovered worriedly.
The dogs lay basking in the golden warmth while a beautiful young girl on a white pony galloped thundering down the drive.
Emerald capped, the Brugh na Boinne sparkled across the river as the Boyne itself rushed tumbling through the glen.
Two ageing travellers half a world away will light a candle and remember, too, grateful that you shared this world with us.

A poem sent by Jim & Susan Mueller (who slept 2 nights beneath the old owls gaze and awoke in a blue & blossoming glen of colourful birds)


"Give an eye for a moment
At the vale o' Rossnaree
Where Boyne waves half reluctant creep
Athwart their Mother sea"

From Francis Ledwidge


"This is Ros na Righ, the Wood of the Kings, believed in legend to be the burial place of King Cormaic MacAirt, who had wished to be buried here, his face to the east and the rising sun... On a summer's day, time invariably appears to stand still. But there is nothing quite like a period house with rolling lawns and old trees to evoke the romance of the past..."

from "The Manor Boyne", Eileen Battersby, The Irish Times Magazine 14/8/04


"Bury me at Rossnaree and face me to the Rising Sun"

from Elizabeth Hickey


"The Man did not realise that the really interesting thing about the house was the giant black and tawny pig tethered in the kitchen garden by a rope around its belly...he took me on a long walk through fields of barley and talked about 'patches of gold dappling the greenest landscape in the world'..."

from The Ruff Guide to Ireland by Buster the Dog (as told to Lord Hattersley), Daily Mail 9/7/05