A bright sun was lighting up the dingy walls of Duncannon Fort  as we paddled under them. There was Cheek Point off the left, towering grandly over the woods of Faithlegg.  Further on, at the confluence of the Barrow and the Suir, were the ruins of Dunbrody Abbey - an old servant, with torn livery, at the gateway of the noble avenue.  Further on the grounds and stately Mansion of Snow Hill, the birthplace of Richard Sheil.  Then the Little Island, with its fragment of Norman castle and its broad cornfields and kingly trees.  Beyond this Gaul's Rock, closing in upon, and overlooking, the old city.  Last of all, Reginald's Tower - a massive hinge of stone connecting the two great outspread wings, the Quay and Mall, within which lay the body of the city - Broad Street, the cathedral, the barracks, the great Chapel, the jail, the Ballybricken Hill, with its circular stone steps and bull-post. 

    The William Penn stopped her paddles, let off her steam, hauled in close to the hulk, and made fast.  I was at home once more.  Twelve months had passed since I bid good-bye to it.  Everything was just as I had left it.  The same policeman, chewing a straw, was dawdling up and down the flag-way opposite where the steamer came to anchor.  The same old Tramore jingle was lazily jingling by.  The good old Dean of the Protestant Cathedral, in his black knee-breeches and long black gaiters, his episcopal hat and ebony cane, was still pattering and puffing along the smooth broad side-walk from the Mayor's office to Mrs. M'Cormac's confectionery, and back again. The same casks, the same bales of soft goods, the same baulks of timber I had seen there ten years ago, were still lying on the Quay, between the river and the iron chains and the pillars.  The same rueful, wild haggard face seemed to be pressed against the rusty bars of the second window from the basement of the Ring Tower - the same I had seen as I drove past in her Majesty's mail coach on my way to Dublin the summer before.  And there was the spire of the cathedral right up against me; and there was Cromwell's Rock right behind me; and the Abbey church; and Grubb's steam-mills; and White's dockyard; and the glorious wooden bridge, built by Cox, of Boston, a mile up the river from where I stood; and the shipping; and the big butter market; and the shops, and stores along the Quay - an awkward squad of various heights and uniforms, several hundred yards in length. 

   Waterford never appeared to me to change. For a century at least, it has not gained a wrinkle nor lost a smile.  In every season, and for a thousand seasons, it has been and will be, the same old tree. If no fresh leaf springs no dead leaf drops from it.  The Danes planted it, Strongbow put his name and that of Eva, his Irish bride, deep into its bark: and King John held court beneath its boughs; James the Second hid his crown into the crevices of its roots, and fled from it to France.  It has witnessed many other events, many other familiarities have been taken with it. Many worse blows have been given it, since the Earl of Pembroke hacked it with his sword.  But it has suffered nothing.  The dews, and the storms, and the frost, and the summer heat come and pass away, hurting nothing; improving nothing; leaving it, at the end of ages, the same, old, dusty, quiet, hearty, bounteous, venerable tree.  Heaven bless it!  And may the sweet birds long fill its shady trellisses with music; and the noble stream, with full breast, nourish the earth where it has root!         

   But a great Change had taken place in Waterford since I had last been in it, though appearance gave no intimation of it.  The old corporation or city council had been displaced and a new one, installed in the ancient seats, had been talking and voting, and in a small way governing for the last six months.  The former - an irresponsible, self-elected, self-conceited, bigoted body - closed its existence amid the jeers, and jokes, and groans of the people.  The Bill of parliament under which this change took place like every other Bill of remedial tendency emanating from the same place was illiberal and grievously defective.  It authorised the election of the city council by the people, but curtailed its powers.  It was the enunciation of a principle – the principle of a popular government – with careful provisions annexed so that the clauses should defeat the preamble. 

    It looked well.  Apparently worked well.  It was a glorious thing, the people thought, to see some of their own sort in possession of the Town Hall; to see the Mayor going to Mass; to see him presiding at a public dinner given to O’Connell; to see Larry Mullowney, the Repeal Warden from Mount Misery, an Alderman; to see some other political friend and favourite constable of the fish market.  It was a blessed thing, they thought, to have the repairing of the streets, of nuisances, and the government of the Holy Ghost and Leper hospitals, all in their own hands; and sure they never thought to see Felix the basket-maker, the bitterest Orangeman of them all, carrying the white wand before his Catholic Worship, as his Worship, with the gold chain about his neck, went up to Ballybricken to preside at Petty Sessions.