The people have taken advantage of this dry moment to begin the burning of the kelp, and all the islands are lying in a volume of grey smoke.  There will not be a very large quantity this year, as the people are discouraged by the uncertainty of the market, and do not care to undertake the task of manufacture without a certainty of profit.

The work needed to form a ton of kelp is considerable.  The seaweed is collected from the rocks after the storms of autumn and winter, dried on fine days, and then made up into a rick, where it is left till the beginning of June.

It is then burnt in low kilns on the shore, an affair that takes from twelve to twenty-four hours of continuous hard work, though I understand the people here do not manage well and spoil a portion of what they produce by burning it more than is required.

The kiln holds about two tons of molten kelp, and when full it is loosely covered with stones, and left to cool.  In a few days the substance is as hard as the limestone, and has to be broken with crowbars before it can be placed in curaghs for transport to Kilronan, where it is tested to determine the amount of iodine contained, and paid for accordingly.  In former years good kelp would bring seven pounds a ton, now four pounds are not always reached.

In Aran even manufacture is of interest.  The low flame-edged kiln, sending out dense clouds of creamy smoke, with a band of red and grey clothed workers moving in the haze, and usually some petticoated boys and women who come down with drink, forms a scene with as much variety and colour as any picture from the East.

The men feel in a certain sense the distinction of their island, and show me their work with pride.  One of them said to me yesterday, ‘I’m thinking you never saw the like of this work before this day?’

‘That is true,’ I answered, ‘I never did.’

‘Bedad, then,’ he said, ’isn’t it a great wonder that you’ve seen France and Germany, and the Holy Father, and never seen a man making kelp till you come to Inishmaan.’

All the horses from this island are put out on grass among the hills of Connemara from June to the end of September, as there is no grazing here during the summer.

Their shipping and transport is even more difficult than that of the homed cattle.  Most of them are wild Connemara ponies, and their great strength and timidity make them hard to handle on the narrow pier, while in the hooker itself it is not easy to get them safely on their feet in the small space that is available.  They are dealt with in the same way as for the bullocks I have spoken of already, but the excitement becomes much more intense, and the storm of Gaelic that rises the moment a horse is shoved from the pier, till it is safely in its place, is indescribable.  Twenty boys and men howl and scream with agitation, cursing and exhorting, without knowing, most of the time, what they are saying.