Up in the hills of County Cavan there is a bubbling pool, called the Shannon Pot. This is the source of Ireland's famous river.

"When the river leaves the Pot, it is only a little river, just wide enough for a brown-legged boy or a small black-calf to jump over," Nora Nowlan writes in this book. But soon the river broadens into a series of lakes, and when it finally reaches Limerick the Shannon carries freighters of 10,000 tons.

The story of the Shannon is the story of Ireland, and the author tells it as only an Irishwoman could. She explains why Lough (Lake) Derg is called "the lake of the bloody eye," and she reports on the recent meeting of three priests with the monster of Lough Ree.

If you want to know the origin of the Little People of Ireland, or how Saint Patrick was kidnapped in his youth or why the potato famine took its terrible toll, you will find the answers in this book. You will find not only history and legend, but a portrait of Ireland today: how the people live, how peat is used to make electricity, how the salmon ride an elevator at a Shannon dam.

Nora Nowlan has a warm understanding of human and animal nature. Witness her remark on donkeys: "When a donkey decides to stop, he stops. That donkey, and nobody else, decides what is going to happen next.

From the dust jacket