CLONTARF a maritime parish and extensive village in Coolock barony, Dublin county, three miles E N.E. from he General Post Office? Dublin comprising an area or 1,190 acres, of which 38 occupy the village and sheds of Clontarf Population of parish 2,664 ; of village and sheds 818, inhabiting 110 houses.

It is a memorable place in Irish history, as the scene of a great battle fought by King Brian Boromh or Boru, on Good Friday 1014, to put an end to the Danish power in Ireland the details of which are variously and diffusively narrated by the native historians, and form, it is said, the subject of Gray's ode of thee "Fatal sisters." The village was formerly a fishing town of some importance l, but with the exception Of so me extensive and profitable Oyster beds, off the sheds, has long lost that character. The central portion is a street that runs from the shore inland from the gate of the castle, but the greater and more diversified part faces the strand in continuos rows or clusters of houses, out many of which are handsome buildings besides numerous small cottages, suited to, sea bathers, that line the green lanes and avenues of the village. Marino, the beautiful Wilt of the Earl Of' Charlemont, in a line with the strand and contiguous to the village, in noticed in Drumcondra parish, to which it belongs. The castle of' Clontarf one of the first within the English pale, was taken down in 1835, and the present mansion with a Norman tower erected theron.

The Church, dedicated to St. John, is a small edifice. The Roman Catholic Chapel is a large and handsome structure. There is a Widows' Alms House, a Parochial and Roman Catholic Free School, and County and District Constabulary Police Station. It is much frequented in summer for sea bathing by all classes. The old Charter School is now used as cold and hot sea water baths. The Drogheda or Northern Trunk Railway shirts the village, near Marine crescent, where there is a station, the first of the line, where all the ordinary trains stop. Near Dollymount, at the further extremity of Clontarf strand, is an extensive causeway or break-water, called the "Bull wall." created by the Ballast Board, with the view of deepening the channel between it and the Lighthouse on Poolbeg wall. It extends upwards of 1 1/2 miles in a S.S.E. direction, and on which £103,055 was expended in 1826. By it a direct and comparatively broad channel has been formed through the bar, which is now passable by large vessels that could not formerly have entered at high water of the greatest spring tides.

The mail from Dublin arrives at if 8 15, A.M., and 15 minutes past l, P.M., and is despatched at 9 20, A.M., and 4 15 p.m.