Personal sketches of his own times, Vol. 1 (of 3)
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Title: Personal sketches of his own times, Vol. 1 (of 3)
Author: Sir Jonah Barrington
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PERSONAL SKETCHES OF HIS OWN TIMES, VOL. 1 (OF 3) ***
Personal Sketches of His Own Times, Vol. I.
[Illustration:
_Engraved by J. Heath, from a drawing from life by Commerford._
SIR JONAH BARRINGTON, K.C.
_London. Pub^d by Colburn & Bentley New Burlington Str.^t 1830._
]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
PERSONAL SKETCHES
OF
HIS OWN TIMES,
BY
SIR JONAH BARRINGTON,
JUDGE OF THE HIGH COURT OF ADMIRALTY IN IRELAND,
&c. &c. &c.
IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
SECOND EDITION,
REVISED AND IMPROVED.
LONDON:
HENRY COLBURN AND RICHARD BENTLEY,
NEW BURLINGTON STREET.
1830.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
PRINTED BY A. J. VALPY, RED LION COURT, FLEET STREET.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
TO
THE RIGHT HONOURABLE
CHARLES KENDAL BUSHE,
CHIEF JUSTICE OF IRELAND,
This trifle, the pastime of a winter’s evening, is presented—to a person
of whom I have long held the highest opinion among the circle of my
friends and the crowd of my contemporaries, and for whom my regards have
been disinterested and undeviating.
The work is too trivial to be of any weight, and I offer it only as a
_Souvenir_, which may amuse one who can be constant to friendship at all
periods, and knows how to appreciate a gift, not by its value, but by
the feelings of the heart which sends it.
JONAH BARRINGTON, K. C.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
INTRODUCTION
TO THE FIRST EDITION.
The compilation by me of a medley of this description may appear rather
singular. Indeed, I myself think it so, and had got nearly half-way
through it before I could reasonably account for the thing;—more
especially as it was by no means commenced for mercenary purposes. The
fact is, I had long since engaged my mind and time on a work of real
public interest; and so far as that work was circulated, my literary
ambition was _more_ than gratified by the approbation it received. But
it has so happened, that my publishers, one after another, have been
wanting in the qualification of stability; and hence, my “Historic
Memoirs of Ireland” have been lying fast asleep, in their own sheets, on
the shelves of three successive booksellers or their assignees; and so
ingeniously were they scattered about, that I found it impossible for
some years to collect them. This was rather provoking, as there were
circumstances connected with the work, which (be its merits what they
may) would, in my opinion, have ensured it an extensive circulation.
However, I have at length finished the Memoirs in question, which I
verily believe are now about to be published in reality,[1] and will
probably excite sundry differences of opinion and shades of praise or
condemnation (both of the book and the author) among His Majesty’s liege
subjects.
-----
Footnote 1:
See the Prospectus, published with the present work.
-----
For the purpose of completing that work, I had lately re-assumed my
habit of writing; and being tired of so serious and responsible a
concern as “Memoirs of Ireland and the Union,” I began to consider what
species of employment might lightly wear away the long and tedious
winter evenings of a demi-invalid; and recollecting that I could neither
live for ever nor was _sure_ of being the “last man,” I conceived the
idea of looking over and burning a horse-load or two of letters, papers,
and fragments of all descriptions, which I had been carrying about in
old trunks (not choosing to leave them at any body’s mercy), and to
which I had been perpetually adding.
The execution of this _inflammatory_ project I immediately set about
with vast assiduity and corresponding success; and doubtless, with very
great advantage to the literary reputation of an immense number of my
former correspondents as well as my own. After having made considerable
progress, I found that some of the fragments amused myself, and I
therefore began to consider whether they might not also amuse other
people. I was advised to make selections from my store, particularly as
I had, for near half a century, kept—not a diary—but a sort of rambling
chronicle, wherein I made notes of matters which, from time to time,
struck my fancy. Some of these memoranda were illegible; others just
sufficient to set my memory working; some were sad, and some were
cheerful; some very old, others recent. In fine, I began to _select_:
but I soon found that any thing like a _regular_ series was out of the
question; so I took a heap indiscriminately, picked out the subjects
that amused me most, wrote a list of their several headings, which were
very numerous; and, as his Majesty pricks for sheriffs, so did I for
subjects, and thereby gathered as many as I conceived would make two or
three volumes. My next process was to make up _court-dresses_ for my
Sketches and Fragments, such as might facilitate their introduction into
respectable company, without observing strict _chronological sequence_,
to which I am aware light readers have a rooted aversion.
This laudable occupation served to amuse me and to fill up the blanks of
a winter’s evening; and being finished, the residue of the papers
re-deposited, and the trunks locked again, I requested the publisher of
my “Historic Memoirs” also to set my “Personal Sketches” afloat. This he
undertook to do: and they are now sent out to the public—the _world_, as
it is called; and the reader (_gentle_ reader is too hackneyed a term,
and far too confident an anticipation of good temper) will of course
draw from them whatever deductions he pleases, without asking my
permission. All I have to say is, that the several matters contained
herein are neither fictions nor essays, but relate to real matters of
fact, and personages composed of flesh and blood. I have aimed at no
display of either fancy or imagination; nor have I set down long
dialogues or soliloquies which could not possibly be recorded except
when heroes and heroines carried short-hand writers in their pockets,
which must have been peculiarly inconvenient. In speaking of _fanciful_
matters, I may as well except my own opinions on certain subjects here
and there interspersed, which I freely leave to the mercy of any one who
is disposed to esteem them visionary.
However, be it understood, that I by no means intend this disclaimer as
an assault on—but on the contrary as a distinguished compliment
to—writers and works of pure imagination—of improbability and
impossibility!—inasmuch as such works prove an unlimited range of
intellect and talent, on the part of the authors, for inventing _matters
of fact_ that never could have occurred, and _conversations_ that never
could have taken place;[2] a talent which, when duly cultivated and
practised for the use of friends and private families, seldom fails to
bring an author’s name into most _extensive circulation_; and if
perchance he should get himself into any scrape by it, nothing is so
likely as the exercise of the same talent of _invention_ to get him out
of it again.
-----
Footnote 2:
I have seen in a new novel a minute recital of a very affecting
_soliloquy_ pronounced with appropriate gesticulation by a fine young
man while he was “pacing about” a large room in a castle; the thunder
meanwhile roaring, and the rain pattering at the casements. In this
castle there was at the time no other living person; and the soliloquy
was so spoken as his dying words immediately before he shot himself.
As there was nobody else in the castle during the catastrophe, his
affecting words were never divulged till this novel made its
appearance—leaving the ingenious reader to infer the many invisible
spies and tell-tales that survey our most secret movements.
-----
On the other hand, I must own (even against myself) that the writing of
mere common-place truths requires no talent whatsoever! it is quite a
_humdrum_, straight-forward, dull custom, which any person may attain.
Besides, matter of fact is not at all in vogue just now: the disrepute
under which truth in general at present labours, in all departments and
branches of literature, has put it quite out of fashion even among the
_savans_:—so that chemistry and mathematics are almost the only
subjects, on the certainty of which the “nobility, gentry, and public at
large,” appear to place any very considerable reliance.
Having thus, I hope, proved my candour at my own cost, the deduction is
self-evident—namely, that the unfortunate authenticity of these sketches
must debar them from any competition with the tales and tattle of
unsophisticated invention: when, for instance, _scandal_ is _true_, it
is (as some ladies have assured me) considered by the whole sex as
scarcely worth listening to, and actually requiring at least very
considerable exaggeration to render it at all amusing! I therefore
greatly fear I may not, in this instance, experience so much of their
favour as I am always anxious to obtain: my only consolation is, that
when their desire to indulge an amiable appetite for scandal is very
ardent, they may find ample materials in every bookseller’s shop and
_haut-ton_ society to gratify the passion.
I feel now necessitated to recur to another point, and I do it at the
risk of being accused of egotism. I hope, however, I can advance a good
reason for my proceeding; namely, that, on reading over some of the
articles whereof this _mélange_ is composed, I freely admit, that if I
were not _very_ intimately acquainted with myself, I might be led at
least into a puzzle as to the writer’s genuine sentiments on many points
of theology and politics. Now, I wish, seriously speaking, to avoid, on
these subjects, all ambiguity; and therefore, as responsible for the
opinions put forth in the following Sketches, I beg to state, that I
consider myself strictly orthodox both in politics and theology: that is
to say, I profess to be a sound Protestant, without bigotry; and an
hereditary royalist, without ultraism. Liberty I love—Democracy I hate:
Fanaticism I denounce! These principles I have ever held and avowed, and
they are confirmed by time and observation. I own that I have been what
is generally called a _courtier_, and I have been also what is generally
called a _patriot_; but I never was either _unqualifiedly_. I always
thought, and I think still, that they never should, and never need be
(upon fair principles) opposed to each other. I can also see no reason
why there may not be patriot kings as well as patriot subjects—a patriot
_minister_, indeed, may be more problematical.
In my public life, I have met with but one transaction that even
_threatened_ to make my _patriotism_ overbalance my _loyalty_: I allude
to the purchase and sale of the Irish Parliament, _called_ a Union,
which I ever regarded as one of the most flagrant public acts of
corruption on the records of history, and certainly the most mischievous
to this empire. I believe very few men sleep the sounder for having
supported the measure; though some, it is true, _went to sleep_ a good
deal sooner than they expected when they carried it into execution.
* * * * *
I must also observe that, as to the _detail_ of politics, I feel now
very considerable apathy. My day for actual service is past; and I shall
only further allude, as a simple casuist, to the slang terms in which it
has become the fashion to dress up the most important subjects of
British statistics—subjects on which certain of these Sketches appear to
have a remote bearing, and on which my ideas might possibly be
misunderstood.
I wish it therefore to be considered as my humble opinion, that what, in
political slang, is termed _Radical Reform_, is, in reality, _proximate
revolution_:—_Universal Suffrage, inextinguishable uproar_:—and _Annual
Parliaments, periodical bloodshed_.[3] My doubts as a casuist, with
these impressions on my mind, must naturally be, how the orderly folks
of Great Britain would relish such _pastimes_?—I do not extend the query
to the natives of my own country, because, since His Majesty was there,
nobody has taken much notice of them: besides, the _poor_ people in
Ireland having very little to eat and no amusement at all, the aforesaid
entertainments might _divert_ them, or at least their _hunger_, and of
course be extremely acceptable to a great body of the population.
-----
Footnote 3:
I apprehend that there were more persons killed at the late elections
in Ireland than there were members elected at the contested places;
and I have no doubt that annual parliaments would give more employment
to the coroners in Ireland than any species of riot that has yet been
invented for that pugnacious population. In truth, what I have
mentioned in another work as being the proofs of _pleasure_ in
Ireland, were also generally the termination of contested elections:
the gradation was always the same: viz. “an illumination, a bonfire, a
_riot_,” and “_other_ demonstrations of _joy_!”—N.B. Where candles to
illuminate with were not to be had, _burning a house_ was not
unfrequently substituted!
-----
As I also perceive some articles in these Sketches touching upon matters
relative to Popes, Cardinals, Catholics, &c.; lest I may be misconstrued
or misrepresented on that head, I beg to observe, that I meddle not at
all in the controversy of Catholic Emancipation. The _Doctors_ employed
_differ_ so essentially in opinion, that, as it frequently falls out on
many other consultations, they may lose their patient while debating on
the prescription:—in truth, I don’t see how the Doctors _can_ ever
agree, as the prescribers must necessarily take the _assay_; and one
half of them verily believe that they should be poisoned thereby!—“Among
ye be it, blind harpers!”
I apprehend I have now touched on most of the topics which occurred to
me as requiring a word of explanation. I repeat that this book is only
to be considered as a desultory _mélange_—the whim of a winter’s
evening—a mere chance-selection. I shall therefore make no sort of
apology for inaccuracies as to unity of time, for defective connexion,
or the like. It amused my leisure hours; and if it fortunately amuses
those of other people, I shall receive a great deal of satisfaction.
JONAH BARRINGTON.
May 28th, 1827.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONTENTS
OF
THE FIRST VOLUME.
MY FAMILY CONNEXIONS.
Family mansion described—Library—Garden—Anecdotes of my
family—State of landlord and tenant in 1760—The gout—Ignorance of
the peasantry; extraordinary anomaly in the loyalty and
disloyalty of the Irish country gentlemen as to James I., Charles
I., Charles II., James II., and William—Ancient toasts—My
great-grandfather, Colonel John Barrington, hanged on his own
gate; but saved by Edward Doran, trooper of King James—Irish
customs, anecdotes, &c. p. 1
ELIZABETH FITZGERALD.
My great-aunt, Elizabeth—Besieged in her castle of Moret—My uncle
seized and hanged before the walls—Attempted abduction of
Elizabeth, whose forces surprise the castle of Reuben—Severe
battle 19
IRISH GENTRY AND THEIR RETAINERS.
Instances of attachment formerly of the lower orders of Irish to
the gentry—A field of corn of my father’s reaped in one night
without his knowledge—My grandfather’s servants cut a man’s ears
off by misinterpretation—My grandfather and grandmother tried for
the fact—Acquitted—The colliers of Donane—Their fidelity at my
election at Ballynakill, 1790 43
MY EDUCATION.
My godfathers—Lord Maryborough—Personal description and
extraordinary character of Mr. Michael Lodge—My early education;
at home; at school—My private tutor, Rev. P. Crawley,
described—Defects of the University course—Lord Donoughmore’s
father—Anecdote of the Vice-Provost—A country sportsman’s
education 52
IRISH DISSIPATION IN 1778.
The huntsman’s cottage—Preparations for a seven days’ carousal—A
cock-fight—Welsh main—Harmony—A cow and a hogshead of wine
consumed by the party—Comparison between former dissipation and
that of the present day—A dandy at dinner in Bond-street—Captain
Parsons Hoye and his nephew—Character and description of both—The
nephew disinherited by his uncle for dandyism—Curious anecdote of
Dr. Jenkins piercing Admiral Cosby’s fist 65
MY BROTHER’S HUNTING-LODGE.
Waking the piper—Curious scene at my brother’s hunting-lodge—Joe
Kelly’s and Peter Alley’s heads fastened to the wall—Operations
practised in extricating them 77
CHOICE OF PROFESSION.
The Army—Irish volunteers described—Their military ardour—The
author inoculated therewith—He grows cooler—The Church—The
Faculty—The Law—Objections to each—Colonel Barrington removes his
establishment to the Irish capital—A country gentleman taking up
a city residence 89
MURDER OF CAPTAIN O’FLAHERTY.
Murder of Captain O’Flaherty by Mr. Lanegan, his son’s tutor, and
Mrs. O’Flaherty—The latter, after betraying her accomplice,
escapes—Trial of Lanegan—He is hanged and quartered at
Dublin—Terrific appearance of his supposed ghost to his pupil,
David Lauder, and the author, at the Temple in London—Lauder
nearly dies of fright—Lanegan’s extraordinary escape; not even
suspected in Ireland—He gets off to France, and enters the
Monastery of La Trappe—All-Hallow Eve—A church-yard anecdote—My
own superstition nearly fatal to me 97
ADOPTION OF THE LAW.
Marriage of my eldest brother—The bridemaid, Miss D. W.—Female
attractions not dependent on personal beauty—Mutual
attachment—Illustration of the French phrase _je ne sais
quoi_—Betrothal of the author, and his departure for London, to
study for the Bar 114
A DUBLIN BOARDING-HOUSE.
Sketch of the company and inmates—Lord Mountmorris—Lieut. Gam
Johnson, R.N.—Sir John and Lady O’Flaherty—Mrs. Wheeler—Lady and
Miss Barry—Memoir and character of Miss Barry, afterward Mrs.
Baldwin—Ruinous effects of a dramatic education exemplified—Lord
Mountmorris’s duel with the Honourable Francis Hely Hutchinson at
Donnybrook—His lordship wounded—Marquis of Ely, his second 121
IRISH BEAUTIES.
Strictures on change of manners—Moral influence of dress—The
three beauties—Curious trial respecting Lady M—— —Termination
favourable to her ladyship—Interesting and affecting incidents of
that lady’s life—Sir R— M——, his character, and cruelty—Lady M——
married against her will—Quits her husband—Returns—Sir R.
mistakes her for a rebel in his sleep, and nearly strangles her 132
PATRICIANS AND PLEBEIANS.
The three classes of gentlemen in Ireland described—Irish
poets—Mr. Thomas Flinter and D. Henesey—The bard—Peculiarities of
the peasants—Their ludicrous misinformation as to distances
accounted for—Civility of a waiter—Equivocation of the peasants,
and their misdirection of travellers to different places 149
IRISH INNS.
Their general character—Objections commonly made to them—Answer
thereto—Sir Charles Vernon’s mimicry—Moll Harding—Accident nearly
of a fatal nature to the author 161
FATAL DUEL OF MY BROTHER.
Duel of my brother, William Barrington, with Mr. M‘Kenzie—He is
killed by his antagonist’s second, General Gillespie—The
general’s character—Tried for murder—Judge Bradstreet’s
charge—Extraordinary incidents of the trial—The jury arranged—The
high sheriff (Mr. Lyons) challenged by mistake—His hair cut off
by Henry French Barrington—Exhibited in the ball-room—The Curl
Club formed—The sheriff quits the country, and never
returns—Gillespie goes to India—Killed there—Observations on his
cenotaph in Westminster Abbey 167
ENTRANCE INTO PARLIAMENT.
My first entrance into the Irish House of Commons—Dinner at Sir
John Parnell’s—Commencement of my intimacy with public men of
celebrity—Maiden speech—I attack Grattan and Curran—Suicide of
Mr. Thoroton—Lord De Blacquiere—His character 182
SINGULAR CUSTOMS IN THE IRISH PARLIAMENT.
Anecdote of Tottenham _in his boots_—Interesting trial of the
Earl of Kingston for murder—Description of the forms used on that
occasion 195
THE SEVEN BARONETS.
Sir John Stuart Hamilton—Sir Richard Musgrave—Sir Edward
Newnham—Sir Vesey Colclough—Sir Frederick Flood—Sir John
Blacquiere—Sir Boyle Roche, and his curious bulls—Their
characters and personal description—Anecdotes and
bon-mots—Anecdote of the Marquess of Waterford 205
ENTRANCE INTO OFFICE.
The author first placed in office by Lord Westmoreland—Made
king’s counsel by Lord Clare—Jealousy of the bar—Description of
Kilkenny Castle—Trial of the Earl of Ormonde for outrage at
Kilkenny—Acquitted—Author’s conduct—Distinguished and liberal
present from the Earl of Ormonde to the author, of a gold box,
and his subsequent letter 222
DR. ACHMET BORUMBORAD.
Singular anecdotes of Dr. Achmet Borumborad—He proposes to erect
baths in Dublin, in the Turkish fashion—Obtains grants from
Parliament for that purpose—The baths well executed—The Doctor’s
banquet—Ludicrous anecdote of nineteen noblemen and members of
Parliament falling into his grand salt-water bath—The accident
nearly causes the ruin of the Doctor and his establishment—He
falls in love with Miss Hartigan, and marries her—Sudden
metamorphosis of the Turk into Mr. Patrick Joyce 233
ALDERMEN OF SKINNERS’ ALLEY.
The institution of Orangemen—United Irishmen—Protestant
ascendancy—Dr. Duigenan—Origin, progress, and customs of the
aldermen of Skinners’ Alley described—Their revels—Orange toast,
never before published—The aldermen throw Mr. M‘Mahon, an
apothecary, out of a window for striking the bust of King
William—New association—Anecdotes of Sir John Bourke and Sir
Francis Gould—The Pope’s bull of absolution to Sir Francis G.—Its
delivery suspended till he had taken away his landlady’s
daughter—His death 246
PROCESSION OF THE TRADES.
Dublin corporation anecdote—Splendid triennial procession of the
Dublin corporation, called _Fringes_ (franchises), described 259
IRISH REBELLION.
Rebellion in Ireland, in 1798—Mr. Waddy’s castle—A priest cut in
two by the portcullis, and partly eaten by Waddy—Dinner-party at
Lady Colclough’s—Names and characters of the company, including
Mr. Bagenal Harvey, Captain Keogh, &c.—Most of them executed soon
after—Tour through and state of County Wexford, after the battles
and storming of the town—Colonel Walpole killed and his regiment
defeated at Gorey—Unaccountable circumstance of Captain Keogh’s
head not decaying 267
WOLF TONE.
Counsellor Theobald Wolf Tone—His resemblance to Mr. Croker—He is
ordered to be hanged by a military court—General Craig attached
in the court of Common Pleas—Tone’s attempt at suicide—Cruel
suggestion respecting him 281
DUBLIN ELECTION.
My contest for Dublin city—Supported by Grattan, Ponsonby,
Plunkett, and Curran—Singularity of a canvass for Dublin—The
election—Curious incidents—Grattan’s famous philippic, never
before published—Memoirs of Mr. John Giffard, called the “dog in
office”—Horish the chimney-sweeper’s bon-mot 287
ELECTION FOR COUNTY WEXFORD.
Mr. Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s contest for County Wexford,
omitted by all his pseudo-biographers—Duel of Mr. Alcock and Mr.
Colclough (candidates), on a question respecting Mr. Sheridan’s
poll—Colclough killed—A lamentable incident—Mr. Alcock’s trial—He
afterward goes mad and dies—His sister, Miss Alcock, also dies
lunatic in consequence—Marquess of Ely tried for an outrage at
Wexford, and fined 302
WEDDED LIFE.
Lord Clonmel, chief justice of the Irish Court of King’s
Bench—His character—Lady Tyrawly’s false charge against
him—Consequent duel between him and Lord
Tyrawly—Eclaircissement—Lord Tyrawly and Miss Wewitzer—Lord
Clonmel’s hints “How to rule a wife”—Subsequent conversation with
his lordship at Sir John Tydd’s 313
DUKE OF WELLINGTON AND MARQUESS OF LONDONDERRY.
My first acquaintance with the Duke of Wellington and the late
Marquess of Londonderry, at a dinner at my own house—Some memoirs
and anecdotes of the former as a public man—My close connexion
with government—Lord Clare’s animosity to me
suspended—Extraordinary conference between Lord Castlereagh, Mr.
Cooke, and me, in August 1798—Singular communication—Offers made
to me for succession as solicitor-general—I decline the terms
proposed—Lord Castlereagh’s letter to me—Character of Mr. Pelham,
now Earl of Chichester 323
LORD NORBURY.
Quarrel between Lord Norbury and the author in the House of
Commons—Curran’s bon-mot—Dinner at Lord Redesdale’s, who attempts
being agreeable, but is annoyed by Lord Norbury (then Mr.
Toler)—Counsellor O’Farrell—Mr. (now Lord) Plunkett and Lord
Redesdale—Lord Norbury and young Burke—His lordship presides at
Carlow assizes in the character of _Hawthorn_ 337
HENRY GRATTAN.
Mr. Grattan in his sedan-chair—The “point of honour”—Mr. Egan’s
gift of second-sight—The guillotine and executioner—Colonel Burr,
vice-president of the United States, and Mr. Randolph—Mr. Grattan
in masquerade—Death of that illustrious patriot, and strictures
on his interment in Westminster Abbey—Letter from the author to
his son, Henry Grattan, Esq. 349
HIGH LIFE IN NEWGATE.
Lord Aldborough quizzes the Lord Chancellor—Voted a libeller by
the House of Peers—His spirited conduct—Sentenced to imprisonment
in Newgate by the Court of King’s Bench—Memoirs of Mr.
Knaresborough—His extraordinary trial—Sentenced to death, but
transported—Escapes from Botany Bay, returns to England, and is
committed to Newgate, where he seduces Lady Aldborough’s
attendant—Prizes in the lottery—Miss Barton dies in misery 362
JOHN PHILPOT CURRAN.
Sketch of his character—Personal description—Lodgings at
Carlow—Mr. Curran and Mr. Godwin—Scenes in the “Cannon”
coffee-house—_Liberality_ of mine host—Miss H * * * in
heroics—Precipitate retreat—Lord Clancarty—Mr. Curran’s notion of
his own prowess—The disqualifications of a wig—Lord and Lady
Carleton—Curran in 1812—An attorney turned cobbler—Curran’s
audience of the present king of France—Strictures on his
biographers 375
THE LAW OF LIBEL.
Observations on the law of libel, particularly in Ireland—“Hoy’s
Mercury”—Messrs. Van Trump and Epaphroditus Dodridge—Former
leniency regarding cases of libel contrasted with recent
severity—Lord Clonmel and the Irish bar—Mr. Magee, of the “Dublin
Evening Post”—Festivities on “Fiat Hill”—Theophilus Swift and his
two sons—His duel with the Duke of Richmond—The “Monster!”—Swift
libels the Fellows of Dublin University—His curious
trial—Contrast between the English and Irish bars—Mr. James
Fitzgerald—Swift is found guilty, and sentenced to Newgate—Dr.
Burrows, one of the Fellows, afterward libels Mr. Swift, and is
convicted—Both confined in the same apartment at Newgate 398
PULPIT, BAR, AND PARLIAMENTARY ELOQUENCE.
Biographical and characteristic sketch of Dean Kirwan—His
extraordinary eloquence—The peculiar powers of Sheridan, Curran,
and Grattan contrasted—Observations on pulpit, bar, and
parliamentary oratory 423
QUEEN CAROLINE.
Reception of the late Queen Caroline (then Princess of Wales) at
the drawing-room held after the “delicate investigation”—Her
depression and subsequent levity—Queen Charlotte and the Princess
compared and contrasted—Reflections on the incidents of that day
and evening—The Thames on a Vauxhall night 433
LORD YELVERTON AND THE BAR.
Characteristic and personal sketches of three Irish barristers:
Mr. William Fletcher (afterward chief justice of the Court of
Common Pleas), Mr. James Egan (afterward judge of Dublin county),
and Mr. Bartholomew Hoare, king’s counsel—Lord Yelverton’s dinner
party—The author’s parody—Mr. Egan right by _mistake_! 440
MR. NORCOT’S ATTEMPT AT SUICIDE.
The hollowness of interested popularity illustrated in the
example of Mr. Norcot—The dilemma of a gamester—The last
resource—The “faithful” valet—Mr. Norcot turns Mahometan—His
equivocal destiny 445
ANECDOTES OF IRISH JUDGES.
Baron Monckton—Judge Boyd—Judge Henn—Legal blunder of a judge,
and Curran’s bon-mot thereon—Baron Power—His suicide—Crosby
Morgal’s spirit of emulation—Judge William Johnson—Curious
anecdote between him and the author—Judge Kelly—His character and
bon-mots—Lord Kilwarden—His character—Murder of him and his
nephew the Rev. Mr. Wolfe—Mr. Emmet executed—Memoir of that
person—Judge Robert Johnson—Arrested in Ireland, and tried in
London, for a libel written on Lord Redesdale in Ireland and
published by Cobbett—Doubts of the legality of his lordship’s
trial—He is found guilty 452
------------------------------------------------------------------------
PERSONAL SKETCHES.
MY FAMILY CONNEXIONS.
Family mansion described—Library—Garden—Anecdotes of my family—State of
landlord and tenant in 1760—The gout—Ignorance of the peasantry;
extraordinary anomaly in the loyalty and disloyalty of the Irish
country gentlemen as to James I., Charles I., Charles II., James II.,
and William—Ancient toasts—My great-grandfather, Colonel John
Barrington, hanged on his own gate; but saved by Edward Doran, trooper
of King James—Irish customs, anecdotes, &c.
I was born at Knapton, near Abbeyleix, in the Queen’s County,—at that
time the seat of my father, but now of Sir George Pigott. I am the third
son and fourth child of John Barrington, who had himself neither brother
nor sister; and at the period of my birth, my immediate connexions were
thus circumstanced.
My family, by ancient patents, by marriages, and by inheritance from
their ancestors, possessed very extensive landed estates in Queen’s
County, and had almost unlimited influence over its population,
returning two members to the Irish Parliament for Ballynakill, counties
of Kilkenny and Galway.
Cullenaghmore, the mansion where my ancestors had resided from the reign
of James the First, was then occupied by my grandfather, Colonel Jonah
Barrington. He had adopted me as soon as I was born, brought me to
Cullenaghmore, and with him I resided until his death.
That old mansion (the Great House as it was called) exhibited altogether
an uncouth mass, warring with every rule of symmetry in architecture.
The original castle had been demolished, and its materials converted to
a much worse purpose: the edifice which succeeded it was particularly
ungraceful; a Saracen’s head (our crest) in coloured brick-work being
its only ornament. Some of the rooms inside were wainscoted with brown
oak, others with red deal, and some not at all. The walls of the large
hall were decked (as was customary) with fishing-rods, fire-arms, stags’
horns, foxes’ brushes, powder-flasks, shot-pouches, nets, and
dog-collars; here and there relieved by the extended skin of a kite or a
king-fisher, nailed up in the vanity of their destroyers: that of a
monstrous eagle, (which impressed itself indelibly on my mind,)
surmounted the chimney-piece, accompanied by a card announcing the name
of its assassin—“Alexander Barrington;”—who, not being a _rich_
relation, was subsequently entertained in the Great House two years, as
a compliment for his present. A large parlour on each side of the hall,
the only embellishments of which were some old portraits, and a
multiplicity of hunting, shooting, and racing prints, with red tape
nailed round them by way of frames, completed the reception-rooms; and
as I was the only child in the house, and a most inquisitive brat, every
different print was explained to me.
I remained here till I was near nine years old; I had no play-fellows to
take off my attention from whatever I observed or was taught; and so
strongly do those early impressions remain engraven on my memory,
(naturally most retentive,) that even at this long distance of time I
fancy I can see the entire place as it stood then, with its old
inhabitants moving before me:—their faces I most clearly recollect.
The library was a gloomy closet, and rather scantily furnished with
every thing but dust and cobwebs: there were neither chairs nor tables;
but I cannot avoid recollecting many of the principal books, because I
read such of them as I could comprehend, or as were amusing; and looked
over all the prints in them a hundred times. While trying to copy these
prints, they made an indelible impression upon me; and hence I feel
confident of the utility of embellishments in any book intended for the
instruction of children. I possessed many of the books long after my
grandfather’s death, and have some of them still. I had an insatiable
passion for general reading from my earliest days, and it has occupied
the greater proportion of my later life. Gulliver’s Travels, Robinson
Crusoe, Fairy Tales, and The History of the Bible, all with numerous
plates, were my favourite authors and constant amusement: I believed
every word of them except the fairies, and was not entirely sceptical as
to those “good people” neither.
I fancy there was then but little variety in the libraries of most
country gentlemen; and I mention as a curiosity, the following volumes,
several of which, as already stated, I retained many years after my
grandfather and grandmother died:—The Journals of the House of Commons;
Clarendon’s History; The Spectator and Guardian; Killing no Murder; The
Patriot King; Bailey’s Dictionary; some of Swift’s Works; George
Falkner’s Newspapers; Quintus Curtius in English; Bishop Burnet; A
Treatise on Tar-water, by some other bishop; Robinson Crusoe; Hudibras;
History of the Bible, in folio; Nelson’s Fasts and Feasts; Fairy Tales;
The History of Peter Wilkins; Glums and Gouries; somebody’s Justice of
Peace; and a multiplicity of Farriery, Sporting, and Gardening Books,
&c. which I lost piecemeal, when making room for law-books—probably not
half so good, but at least much more experimental.
Very few mirrors in those days adorned the houses of the country
gentlemen:—a couple or three shaving-glasses for the gentlemen, and a
couple of pretty large dressing-glasses, in black frames, for the
ladies’ use, composed, I believe, nearly the entire stock of reflectors
at my grandfather’s, except tubs of spring water, which answered for the
maid-servants.
A very large and productive, but not dressed-up garden, adjoined the
house. The white-washed stone images; the broad flights of steps up and
down; the terraces, with the round fish-pond,—rivetted my attention, and
gave an impressive variety to this garden, which I shall ever remember,
as well as many curious incidents which I witnessed therein.
At the Great House, where the Courts Leet and Baron were duly held, all
disputes among the tenants were then settled,—quarrels reconciled,—old
debts arbitrated: a kind Irish landlord then reigned despotic in the
ardent affections of the tenantry, their pride and pleasure being to
obey and to support him.
But there existed a happy reciprocity of interests. The landlord of
_that_ period protected the tenant by his influence—any wanton injury to
a tenant being considered as an insult to the lord; and if the
landlord’s sons were grown up, no time was lost by them in demanding
satisfaction from any gentleman for maltreating even their father’s
blacksmith.
No gentleman of this degree ever distrained a tenant for rent: indeed
the parties appeared to be quite united and knit together. The greatest
abhorrence, however, prevailed as to tithe proctors, coupled with no
great predilection for the clergy who employed them. These certainly
were, in principle and practice, the real country tyrants of that day,
and first caused the assembling of the White Boys.
I have heard it often said that, at the time I speak of, every estated
gentleman in the Queen’s County was _honoured_ by the gout. I have since
considered that its extraordinary prevalence was not difficult to be
accounted for, by the disproportionate quantity of acid contained in
their seductive beverage, called rum-shrub—which was then universally
drunk in quantities nearly incredible, generally from supper-time till
morning, by all country gentlemen—as they said, to keep _down their
claret_.
My grandfather could not refrain, and therefore he suffered well:—he
piqued himself on procuring, through the interest of Batty Lodge, (a
follower of the family who had married a Dublin grocer’s widow,) the
very first importation of oranges and lemons to the Irish capital every
season. Horse-loads of these, packed in boxes, were immediately sent to
the Great House of Cullenaghmore; and no sooner did they arrive, than
the good news of _fresh fruit_ was communicated to the Colonel’s
neighbouring friends, accompanied by the usual invitation for a
fortnight.
Night after night the revel afforded uninterrupted pleasure to the
joyous gentry; the festivity being subsequently renewed at some other
mansion, till the gout thought proper to put the whole party _hors de
combat_; having the satisfaction of making cripples for a few months
such as he did not kill.
Whilst the convivials bellowed with only toe or finger agonies, it was a
mere bagatelle; but when _Mr. Gout_ marched up the country, and invaded
the head or the stomach, it was then called _no joke_; and Drogheda
usquebaugh, the hottest-distilled drinkable liquor ever invented, was
applied to for aid, and generally drove the tormentor in a few minutes
to his former quarters. It was, indeed, counted a specific; and I allude
to it the more particularly, as my poor grandfather was finished by
over-doses thereof.
It was his custom to sit under a very large branching bay-tree in his
arm-chair, placed in a fine sunny aspect at the entrance of the garden.
I particularly remember his cloak, for I kept it twelve years after his
death: it was called a _cartouche_ cloak, from a famous French robber
who, it was said, invented it for his gang for the purposes of evasion.
It was made of very fine broad-cloth; of a bright blue colour on one
side, and a bright scarlet on the other: so that on being turned, it
might deceive even a vigilant pursuer.
There my grandfather used to sit of a hot sunny day, receive any rents
he could collect, and settle any accounts which his indifference on that
head permitted him to think of.
At one time he suspected a young rogue of having slipped some money off
his table when paying rent; afterward, when the tenants began to count
out their money, he threw the focus of his large reading-glass upon
their hands:—the smart, without any visible cause, astonished the
ignorant creatures!—they shook their hands, and thought it must be the
_devil_ who was scorching them. The priest was let into the secret: he
seriously told them all it _was_ the devil sure enough, who had mistaken
them for the boy that stole the money from the Colonel; but that if he
(the priest) was _properly considered_, he would say as many masses as
would _bother fifty devils_, were it necessary. The priest got his fee;
and another farthing never was taken from my grandfather.
My grandfather was rather a short man, with a large red nose—strong
made; and wore an immense white wig, such as the portraits give to Dr.
Johnson. He died at eighty-six years of age, of shrub-gout and
usquebaugh, beloved and respected. I cried heartily for him; and then
became the favourite of my grandmother, the best woman in the world, who
went to reside in Dublin, and prepare me for college.
Colonel John Barrington, my great-grandfather, for some time before his
death, and after I was born, resided at Ballyroan. My grandfather having
married Margaret, the daughter of Sir John Byrne, Bart., had taken the
estates and mansion, and given an annuity to my great-grandfather, who
died, one hundred and four years old, of a fever, having never shown any
of the usual decrepitudes or defects of age: he was the most respectable
man by tradition of my family, and for more than seventy years a
parliament man.
Sir Daniel Byrne, Bart. my great grandfather, lived at his old castle of
Timogrie, almost adjoining my grandfather Barrington: his domains, close
to Stradbally, were nearly the most beautiful in the Queen’s County. On
his decease, his widow, Lady Dorothea Byrne, an Englishwoman, whose name
had been Warren, (I believe a grand-aunt to the late Lady Bulkley,)
resided there till her death; having previously seen her son give one of
the first and most deeply to be regretted instances of what is called
forming _English connexions_. Sir John Byrne, my grand-uncle, having
gone to England, married the heiress of the Leycester family:—the very
name of Ireland was then odious to the English gentry; and previous
terms were made with him, that his children should take the cognomen of
Leycester, and drop that of Byrne; that he should quit Ireland, sell all
his paternal estates there, and become an _Englishman_. He assented; and
the last Lord Shelburne purchased, for less than half their value, all
his fine estates, of which the Marquis of Lansdown is now proprietor.
After the father’s death, his son, Sir Peter Leycester, succeeded, and
the family of Byrne, descended from a long line of Irish princes and
chieftains, condescended to become little amongst the rank of English
Commoners; and so ended the connexion between the Byrnes and
Barringtons.
My mother was the only daughter of Patrick French, of Peterwell, county
Galway, wherein he had large estates: my grandmother (his wife) was one
of the last remaining to the first house of the ancient O’Briens. Her
brother, my great-uncle, Donatus, also emigrated to England, and died
fifteen or sixteen years since, at his mansion, Blatherwick, in
Cheshire, in a species of voluntary obscurity, inconsistent with his
birth and large fortune. He left great hereditary estates in both
countries to the enjoyment of his mistress and natural children,
excluding the legitimate branches of his family from all claims upon the
manors or demesnes of their ancestors. The law enabled him to do what a
due sense of justice and pride would have interdicted.
The anomaly of political principles among the country gentlemen of
Ireland at that period was very extraordinary. They professed what they
called “_unshaken loyalty_;” and yet they were unqualified partisans of
Cromwell and William, two decided usurpers—one of them having dethroned
his father-in-law, and the other decapitated his king.
The fifth of November was always celebrated in Dublin for the
preservation of James, a Scottish king, (after Queen Elizabeth had cut
his mother’s head off) from Guy Fawkes and a barrel of gunpowder in
London; then the thirtieth of January was highly approved of by a great
number of Irish, as the anniversary of making Charles the First, the son
and heir of the said James, shorter by his head. Then the very same
Irish celebrated the restoration of Charles the Second, the son of the
_shortened_ king, and who was twice as bad as his father; and whilst
they rejoiced in putting a crown upon the head of the son of the king
who could not keep his own head on, they never failed to drink bumpers
to the memory of _Old Noll_, who had cut that king’s head off; and in
order to commemorate the whole story, and make their children remember
it, they dressed up a fat _calf’s-head_, whole and white, on every
anniversary of King Charles’s _throat being cut_, and with a red-smoked
ham, which they called “Bradshaw,” placed by the side of it, all parties
partook thereof most happily; washing down the emblem and its
accompaniment with as much claret as they could hold, in honour of _Noll
the regicide_!
Having thus proved their loyalty to James the First, and their
attachment to his son’s murderer, and then their loyalty to the eldest
of his grandsons, they next proceeded to celebrate the birth-day of
William of Orange, a Dutchman, who had kicked their king, (his
father-in-law) the second grandson, out of the country, and who in all
probability would have given the Irish another _calf’s head_ for their
celebration, if the said king, his father-in-law, had not got out of the
way with the utmost expedition, and gone to live upon charity in France,
the _then_ mortal enemy of the British nation; and as they dressed a
calf’s head for the son’s murder, so they dressed _sheeps’ trotters_
every first of July, to commemorate the grandson’s running away at the
Boyne Water, in the year 1690.
One part of the Irish people then invented a toast, called, “_The
glorious, pious, and immortal memory of William, the Dutchman_;” whilst
another raised a counter-toast, called “_The memory of the chesnut
horse_,” _that broke the neck of the same King William_.[4] But in my
mind, (if I am to judge of past times by the corporation of Dublin) it
was only to coin an excuse for getting loyally drunk as often as
possible, that they were so enthusiastically fond of _making
sentiments_, as they called them.[5]
-----
Footnote 4:
King William’s _neck_ was not broken, only his _collar-bone_; his fall
from a chesnut horse, however, hastened his dissolution.
Footnote 5:
Could his majesty, King William, learn in the other world that he has
been the cause of more broken heads and drunken men, since his
departure, than all his predecessors, he must be the proudest ghost
and most conceited skeleton that ever entered the gardens of Elysium.
-----
As to the politics of my family, we had (no doubt) some very substantial
reasons for being both Cromwellians and Williamites; the one confirmed
our grants, and the other preserved them for us; my family, indeed, had
certainly not only those, but other very especial reasons to be pleased
with King William; and though he gave them nothing, they kept what they
had, which might have been lost but for his usurpation.
During the short reign of James the Second in Ireland, those who were
not _for_ him were considered to be _against_ him, and of course were
subjected to the severities and confiscations usual in all civil wars.
Amongst the rest, my great-grandfather, Colonel John Barrington, being a
Protestant, and having no predilection for King James, was ousted from
his mansion and estates at Cullenaghmore by one O’Fagan, a Jacobite
wig-maker and violent partizan, from Ballynakill. He was,
notwithstanding, rather respectfully treated, and was allowed forty
pounds a year by his said wig-maker, so long as he behaved himself.
However, he only behaved well for a couple of months; at the end of
which time, with a party of his faithful tenants, he surprised the
wig-maker, drove him out of possession in his turn, and repossessed
himself of his mansion and estates.
The wig-maker, having escaped to Dublin, laid his complaint before the
authorities; and a party of soldiers were ordered to make short work of
it, if the colonel did not submit on the first summons.
The party demanded entrance, but were refused; and a little firing from
the windows of the mansion took place. Not being, however, tenable, it
was successfully stormed—the old gamekeeper, John Neville, killed, and
my great-grandfather taken prisoner, conveyed to the drum-head at
Raheenduff, tried as a rebel by a certain Cornet M‘Mahon, and in due
form ordered to be hanged in an hour.
At the appointed time, execution was punctually proceeded on; and so far
as tying up the colonel to the cross-bar of his own gate, the sentence
was actually put in force. But at the moment the first haul was given to
elevate him, Ned Doran, a tenant of the estate, who was a trooper in
King James’s army, rode up to the gate—himself and horse in a state of
complete exhaustion. He saw with horror his landlord strung up, and
exclaimed,—
“Holloa! holloa! blood and ouns, boys! cut down the colonel! cut down
the colonel! or ye’ll be all hanged yeerselves, ye villains of the
world, ye! I am straight from the Boyne Water, through thick and thin:
Ough, by the hokys! we’re all cut up and kilt to the devil and back
agin—Jemmy’s scampered, bad luck to him, without a ‘good bye to
yees!’—or, ‘kiss my r—p!’—or the least civility in life!”
My grandfather’s hangmen lost no time in getting off, leaving the
colonel slung fast by the neck to the gate-posts. But Doran soon cut him
down, and fell on his knees to beg pardon of his landlord, the holy
Virgin, and King William from the Boyne Water.
The colonel obtained the trooper’s pardon, and he was ever after a
faithful adherent. He was the grandfather of Lieutenant-colonel Doran,
of the Irish brigade, afterward, (if I recollect right,) of the 47th
regiment—the officer who cut a German colonel’s _head clean off_ in the
mess-room at Lisbon, after dinner, with one stroke of his sabre.[6] He
dined with me repeatedly at Paris about six years since, and was the
most disfigured warrior that could possibly be imagined. When he left
Cullenagh for the continent, in 1784, he was as fine, clever-looking a
young farmer as could be seen; but he had been blown up once or twice in
storming batteries, which, with a few sabre-gashes across his features,
and the obvious aid of numerous pipes of wine, or something not weaker,
had so spoiled his beauty, that he had become of late absolutely
frightful.
-----
Footnote 6:
Sir Neil O’Donnel, _who was present_, first told me the anecdote. They
fought with sabres: the whole company were intoxicated, and nobody
minded them _much_ till the German’s head came spinning like a top on
the mess-table, upsetting their bottles and glasses. He could not
remember what they quarrelled about. Colonel Doran himself assured me
that he had very little recollection of the particulars. The room was
very gloomy:—what he best remembered was, a tolerably effective gash
which he got on his left ear, and which nearly eased him of that
appendage:—it was very conspicuous.
-----
This occurrence of my great-grandfather fixed the political creed of my
family. On the 1st of July, the orange lily was sure to garnish every
window in the mansion: the hereditary patereroes scarcely ceased
cracking all the evening, to glorify the victory of the Boyne Water,
till one of them burst, and killed the gardener’s wife, who was tying an
orange ribbon round the mouth of it, which she had _stopped_ for fear of
_accidents_.
The tenantry, though to a man Papists, and at that time nearly in a
state of slavery, joined heart and hand in these rejoicings, and forgot
the victory of their enemy while commemorating the rescue of their
landlord. A hundred times have I heard the story repeated by the
“_Cotchers_,”[7] as they sat crouching on their hams, like Indians,
around the big turf fire. Their only lament was for the death of old
John Neville, the game-keeper. His name I should well remember; for it
was his grandson’s wife, Debby Clarke, who nursed me.
-----
Footnote 7:
A corruption of “_Cottager_;” the lowest grade of the Irish peasants,
but the most cheerful, humorous, and affectionate. The word is spelt
differently and _ad libitum_. Though the poorest, they were formerly
the most happy set of vassals in Europe.
-----
This class of stories and incidents was well calculated to make
indelible impression on the mind of a child, and has never left
mine.—The old people of Ireland (like the Asiatics) took the greatest
delight in repeating their legendary tales to the children, by which
constant, unvarying repetition, their old stories became hereditary, and
I dare say neither gained nor lost a single sentence in the recital, for
a couple of hundred years. The massacres of Queen Elizabeth and Cromwell
were quite familiar to them; and by an ancient custom of every body
throwing a stone on the spot where any celebrated murder had been
committed, upon a certain day every year, or whenever a funeral passed
by, it is wonderful what mounds were raised in numerous places, which no
person, but such as were familiar with the customs of the poor
creatures, would ever be able to account for.
I have often thought that people, insulated and shut out from society
and external intercourse, ignorant of letters and all kinds of legends
save their own local traditions, are as likely to be faithful historians
as the plagiarists and compilers of the present day.
I have heard the same stories of old times told in different parts of
the country by adverse factions and cotchers, with scarcely a syllable
of difference as to time or circumstance. They denote their periods, not
by “the year of our Lord,” or reigns, or months; but by seasons and
festivals, and celebrated events or eras,—such as “the Midsummer after
the _great frost_”—“the All-hallow eve before the _Boyne Water_”—“the
Candlemas that Squire Conolly had _all the hounds_ at Bally
Killeavan”—“the time the _English Bishop_[8] was hanged,” &c. &c.
-----
Footnote 8:
Arthur, Bishop of Waterford, was hung at Dublin for an unnatural
crime—a circumstance which the prejudiced Irish greatly rejoiced at,
and long considered as forming an epocha.
-----
ELIZABETH FITZGERALD.
My great-aunt, Elizabeth—Besieged in her castle of Moret—My uncle seized
and hanged before the walls—Attempted abduction of Elizabeth, whose
forces surprise the castle of Reuben—Severe battle.
A great-aunt of mine, Elizabeth Fitzgerald, was married to Stephen
Fitzgerald, who possessed the castle of Moret, near Bally-Brittis, not
very far from Cullenagh.[9] She and her husband held their castle firmly
during the troubles. They had above forty good warders; their local
enemies had no cannon, and but few guns. The warders, protected by the
battlements, pelted their adversaries with large stones, when they
ventured to approach the walls; and in front of each of that description
of castle, there was a hole perpendicularly over the entrance, wherefrom
any person, himself unseen, could drop down every species of defensive
material upon assailants.
-----
Footnote 9:
I have heard the _battle of Moret_ told a hundred times, and never
with one variation of fact or incident. It was a favourite legend with
the old people, and affords a good idea of the habits and manners of
those lawless times.
-----
About the year 1690, when Ireland was in a state of great disorder, and
no laws were regarded, numerous factious bodies were formed in every
part of the country to claim old rights, and re-take possession of
forfeited estates, by mere force, when their factions were strong
enough.
My uncle and aunt, or rather my aunt and uncle (for she was said to be
far the most effective of the two), at one time suffered the enemy, who
were of the faction of the O’Cahils of Timagho, and who claimed my
uncle’s property, (which they said—very truly—Queen Elizabeth had turned
them out of,) to approach the gate in the night-time. There were neither
outworks nor wet fosse; the assailants therefore, counting upon victory,
brought fire to consume the gate, and so gain admittance. My aunt, aware
of their designs, drew all her warders to one spot, large heaps of great
stones being ready to their hands at the top of the castle.
When the O’Cahils, in great numbers, had got close to the gate, and were
directly under the loop-hole, on a sudden streams of boiling water,
heated in the castle coppers, came showering down upon the heads of the
crowd below: this extinguished their fire, and cruelly scalded many of
the besiegers.
The scene may be conceived which was presented by a multitude of scalded
wretches, on a dark night, under the power and within the reach of all
sorts of offensive missiles. They attempted to fly; but whilst one part
of the warders hurled volleys of weighty stones beyond them, to deter
them from retreating, another party dropped stones more ponderous still
on the heads of those who, for protection, crouched close under the
castle-walls: the lady of the castle herself, meantime, and all her
maids, assisting the chief body of the warders in pelting the Jacobites
with every kind of destructive missile, till all seemed pretty still;
and wherever a groan was heard, a volley of stones quickly ended the
troubles of the sufferer.
The old traditionists of the country say, that at day-break there were
lying one hundred of the assailants under the castle-walls—some scalded,
some battered to pieces, and many lamed so as to have no power of moving
off; but my good aunt kindly ordered them all to be put out of their
misery, as fast as ropes and a long gallows, erected for their sakes,
could perform that piece of humanity:—her faithful old partizan, Keeran
Karry, always telling them how sorry the lady was that she had no doctor
in the castle, she being so _tender-hearted_ that she could not bear to
hear their groaning under the castle-walls, and so had them hanged out
of _pure good-nature_.
After the victory, the warders had a feast on the castle-top, whereat
each of them recounted his own feats. Squire Fitzgerald, who was a quiet
easy man, and hated fighting, and who had told my aunt, at the
beginning, that they would surely kill him, having seated himself all
night peaceably under one of the parapets, was quite delighted when the
fray was over. He walked out into his garden outside the walls to take
some tranquil air, when an ambuscade of the hostile survivors surrounded
and carried him off. In vain his warders sallied—the squire was gone
past all redemption!
It was supposed he had paid his debts to Nature—if any he owed—when,
next day, a large body of the O’Cahil faction appeared near the castle.
Their force was too great to be attacked by the warders, who durst not
sally; and the former assault had been too calamitous to the O’Cahils to
warrant them in attempting another. Both were therefore standing at bay,
when, to the great joy of the garrison, Squire Fitzgerald was produced,
and one of the assailants, with a white cloth on a pike, advanced to
parley.
The lady on the castle-top attended his proposals, which were very
laconic. “I am a truce, lady!—Look here, (showing the terrified squire)
we have your husband in hault—yee’s have yeer castle _sure_ enough. Now
we’ll change, if you please: we’ll render the squire, and you’ll render
the keep; and if yees won’t do that same, the squire will be _throttled_
before your two eyes in half an hour.”
“Flag of truce!” said the heroine, with due dignity and without
hesitation; “mark the words of Elizabeth Fitzgerald, of Moret Castle:
they may serve for your own wife upon some future occasion.—Flag of
truce! I _won’t_ render my keep, and I’ll tell you why: Elizabeth
Fitzgerald _may_ get another _husband_, but Elizabeth Fitzgerald may
never get another _castle_; so I’ll keep what I have; and if you don’t
get off faster than your legs can readily carry you, my warders will try
which is hardest, your skull or a stone bullet.”
The O’Cahils kept their word, and old Squire Stephen Fitzgerald, in a
short time, was seen dangling and performing various evolutions in the
air, to the great amusement of the Jacobites, the mortification of the
warders, and chagrin (which however was not without a spice of
_consolation_) of my great-aunt, Elizabeth.
This magnanimous lady, after Squire Stephen had been duly cut down,
waked, and deposited in his garden, conceived that she might enjoy her
castle with tranquillity; but, to guard against every chance, she
replenished her stony magazine; had a wide trench dug before the gate of
the castle; and pit-falls, covered with green sods, having sharp stakes
driven within, scattered round it on every side—the passage through
these being only known to the faithful warders. She contrived, besides,
a species of defence that I have not seen mentioned in the Pacata
Hibernia, or any of the murderous annals of Ireland: it consisted of a
heavy beam of wood, well loaded with iron at the bottom, and suspended
by a pulley and cord from the top of the castle, and which, on any
future assault, she could let down through the projecting hole over the
entrance;—alternately, with the aid of a few strong warders above,
raising and letting it drop smash among the enemy who attempted to gain
admittance below,—thereby pounding them as if with a pestle and mortar,
without the power of resistance on their part.
The castle-vaults were well victualled, and at all events could safely
defy any attacks of hunger; and as the enemy had none of those despotic
engines called cannon, my aunt’s garrison were at all points in
tolerable security. Indeed, fortunately for Elizabeth, there was not a
single piece of ordnance in the country, except those few which were
mounted in the Fort of Dunrally, or travelled with the king’s army; and,
to speak truth, fire-arms then would have been of little use, since
there was not sufficient gunpowder among all the people to hold an
hour’s fighting.
With these and some interior defences, Elizabeth imagined herself well
armed against all marauders, and quietly awaited a change of times and a
period of general security.
Close to the castle there was, and I believe still remains, a shallow
swamp and a dribbling stream of water, in which there is a stone with a
deep indenture on the top. It was about three feet high—very like a
short joint of one of the pillars of the Giant’s Causeway. This stone
was always full of limpid water, called St. Bridget’s water,—that holy
woman having been accustomed daily to kneel in prayer on one knee, till
she wore a hole in the top of the granite by the cap of her pious joint.
She then filled it with water, and _vanished_ from that country. It took
the saint a full month, however, to bore the hole to her satisfaction.
To this well, old Jug Ogie, the oldest piece of furniture in Moret
Castle, (she was an hereditary cook,) daily went for the purpose of
drawing the most sacred crystal she could, wherewith to boil her
mistress’s dinner; and also, as the well was _naturally_ consecrated, it
saved the priest a quantity of trouble in preparing holy water for the
use of the warders. It was _then_ also found to boil vastly quicker, and
ten times hotter, than any common water, with a very small modicum of
any kind of fuel. But the tradition ran that it would not boil _at all_
for a year and a day after Madam Elizabeth died. It was believed, also,
that a cow was poisoned, which had the presumption to drink some of it,
as a just judgment for a _beast_ attempting to turn _Christian_.
On one of these sallies of old Jug, some fellows (who, as it afterward
appeared, had with a very deep design lain in ambush) seized and were
carrying her off, when they were perceived by one of the watchmen from
the tower, who instantly gave an alarm, and some warders sallied after
them. Jug was rescued, and the enemy fled through the swamp; but not
before one of them had his head divided into two equal parts by the
hatchet of Keeran Karry, who was always at the head of the warders, and
the life and soul of the whole garrison.
The dead man turned out to be a son of Andrew M‘Mahon, a faction-man of
Reuben; but nobody could then guess the motive for endeavouring to carry
off old Jug, the most ancient hag in that country. However, the matter
soon became developed.
Elizabeth was accounted to be very rich,—the cleverest woman of her
day,—and she had a large demesne into the bargain: and finding the
sweets of independence, she refused matrimonial offers from many
quarters; but as her castle was, for those days, a durably safe
residence, such as the auctioneers of the present time would denominate
_a genuine undeniable mansion_, the country squires determined she
_should_ marry one of them, since marry willingly she would not—but they
nearly fell to loggerheads who should _run away_ with her. Almost every
one of them had previously put the question to her by _flag of truce_,
as they all stood in too much awe of the lady to do it personally: till
at length, teased by their importunities, she gave notice of her fixed
intention to _hang_ the next flag of truce who brought any such impudent
proposals of marriage.
Upon this information, it was finally agreed to decide by lot, at a full
meeting of her suitors, who should be the hero to surprise and carry off
Elizabeth by force, which was considered a matter of danger on account
of the warders, who would receive no other commandant, were well fed,
and very ferocious.
Elizabeth got wind of their design and place of meeting, which was to be
in the old castle of Reuben, near Athy. Eleven or twelve of the squires
privately attended at the appointed hour, and it was determined, that
whoever should be the lucky winner was to receive the aid and assistance
of the others in bearing away the prize, and gaining her hand. To this
effect, a league offensive and defensive was entered into between
them—one part of which went to destroy Elizabeth’s warders root and
branch; and to forward their object, it was desirable, if possible, to
procure some inmate of the castle, who, by fair or foul means, might be
induced to inform them of the best mode of entry: this caused the
attempt to carry off old Jug Ogie.
However, they were not long in want of a spy; for Elizabeth, hearing of
their plan from the gossoon[10] of Reuben (a nephew of Jug’s),
determined to take advantage of it. “My lady,” said Jug Ogie, “pretend
to turn me adrift in a dark night, and give out that my gossoon here was
found robbing you—they’ll soon get wind of it, and I’ll be the very
person the squires want—and then you’ll hear all.”
-----
Footnote 10:
A gossoon was then, and till very lately, an indispensable part of a
country gentleman’s establishment;—a dirty, bare-legged boy, who could
canter six miles an hour on all sorts of errands and messages—carry
turf—draw water—light the fires—turn the spit, when the dog was
absent, &c. tell lies, and eat _any thing_. One of these gossoons took
a _run_ (as they call it) of ten miles and back for some person, and
only required a large dram of whiskey for his payment.
-----
The matter was agreed on, and old Jug Ogie and the gossoon were turned
out, as thieves, to the great surprise of the warders and the country.
But Jug was found and hired, as she expected; and soon comfortably
seated in the kitchen at Castle Reuben, with the gossoon, whom she took
in as kitchen-boy. She gave her tongue its full fling,—told a hundred
stories about her “_devil_ of a mistress,”—and undertook to inform the
squires of the best way to get to her apartment.
Elizabeth was now sure to learn every thing so soon as determined on.
The faction had arranged all matters for the capture:—the night of its
execution approached: the old cook prepared a good supper for the
_quality_:—the squires arrived, and the gossoon had to run only three
miles to give the lady the intelligence. Twelve cavaliers attended, each
accompanied by one of the ablest of his faction—for they were all afraid
of each other, whenever the wine should rise upwards; and they did not
take more for fear of discovery.
The lots, being formed of straws of different lengths, were held by
M‘Mahon, the host, who was disinterested; and the person of Elizabeth,
her fortune, and Moret castle, fell to the lot of M‘Carthy O’Moore, one
of the Cremorgan squires, and, according to tradition, as able-bodied,
stout a man as any in the whole country. The rest all swore to assist
him till death; and one in the morning was the time appointed for the
surprise of Elizabeth and her castle—while in the mean time they began
to enjoy the good supper of old Jug Ogie.
Castle Reuben had been one of the strongest places in the county,
situated on the river Barrow, in the midst of a swamp, which rendered it
nearly inaccessible. It had belonged to a natural son of one of the
Geraldines, who had his throat cut by Andy M‘Mahon, a game-keeper of his
own; and nobody choosing to interfere with the _sportsman_, he, with his
five sons, (all rapparees well-armed and wicked) remained peaceably in
possession of the castle, and now accommodated the squires during their
plot against Elizabeth.
That heroic dame, on her part, was not inactive; she informed her
warders of the scheme to force a new master on her and them; and many a
round oath she swore (with corresponding gesticulations, the description
of which would not be over agreeable to modern readers,) that she never
would grant her favours to mortal man, but preserve her castle and her
chastity to the last extremity.
The warders took fire at the attempt of the squires. They always
detested the _defensive_ system; and probably to that hatred may be
attributed a few of the robberies, burglaries, and burnings, which in
those times were considered in that neighbourhood as little more than
occasional pastimes.
“Arrah! lady,” said Keeran Karry, “how many rogues ’ill there be at
Reuben, as you larn, to-night?—arrah!”
“I hear four-and-twenty,” said Elizabeth, “besides the M‘Mahons.”
“Right, a’nuff,” said Keeran: “the fish in the Barrow must want
food this hard weather; and I can’t see why the rump of a rapparee
may not make as nice a tit-bit for them as any thing else:
four-and-twenty!—phoo!”
All then began to speak together, and join most heartily in the
meditated attack on Reuben.
“Arrah! run for the priest,” says Ned Regan; “maybe yee’d like a touch
of his reverence’s office first, for fear there might be any _sin_ in
it.”
“I thought you’d like him with your brandy, warders,” said Elizabeth
with dignity: “I have him below: he’s _praying_ a little, and will be up
directly. The whole plan is ready for you, and Jug Ogie has the signal.
Here, Keeran,” giving him a green ribbon with a daub of old Squire
Fitzgerald, (who was hanged,) dangling therefrom, “if you and the
warders do not bring me the captain’s _ear_, you have neither the
courage of a weazel, nor—nor” (striking her breast hard with her able
hand) “even the revenge of a woman in yees.”
“Arrah, be asy, my lady!” said Keeran, “be asy! by my sowl, we’ll bring
you _four-and-twenty pair_, if your ladyship have any longing for the
ears of such villains, my lady!”
“Now, warders,” said Elizabeth, who was too cautious to leave her castle
totally unguarded, “as we are going to be just, let us also be generous;
only twenty-four of them, besides five or six of the M‘Mahons, will be
there. Now it would be an eternal disgrace to Moret, if we went to
overpower them by _numbers_: twenty-four chosen warders, Father Murphy
and the corporal, the gossoon and the piper, are all that shall leave
this castle to-night; and if Reuben is not a big bonfire by day-break
to-morrow, I hope none of you will come back to me again.”
The priest now made his appearance; he certainly seemed _rather_ as if
he had not been idle below during the colloquy on the leads; and the
deep impressions upon the bottle which he held in his hand, gave ground
to suppose that he had been very busy and earnest in his devotions.
“My flock!” said Father Murphy,—somewhat lispingly,—“my flock”—
“Arrah!” said Keeran Karry, “we’re not _sheep_ to-night: never mind your
flocks just now. Father! give us a couple of glasses a piece!—time
enough for _mutton-making_.”
“You are right, my chickens!” bellowed forth Father Murphy, throwing his
old black surtout over his shoulder, leaving the empty sleeves dangling
at full liberty, and putting a knife and fork in his pocket for ulterior
operations:—“I forgive every mother’s babe of you _every_ thing you
choose to do till sun-rise: but if you commit any sin after that time,
as big even as the blacks of my nele, I can’t take charge of yeer sowls,
without a chance of disappointing you.”
All was now in a bustle:—the brandy circulated merrily, and each warder
had in his own mind made mince-meat of three or four of the Reuben
faction, whose ears they fancied already in their pockets. The priest,
spitting on his thumb, marked down the “_De profundis_” in the leaves of
his double manual, to have it ready for the burials:—every man took his
long skeen in his belt—had a thick _club_, with a strong spike at the
end of it, slung with a stout leather thong to his wrist; and under his
coat, a sharp broad hatchet with a black blade and a crooked handle. And
thus, in silence, the twenty-five Moret warders, commanded by Keeran
Karry, set out with their priest, the piper, and the gossoon with a
copper pot slung over his shoulders as a drum, and a piece of a poker in
his hand, to beat it with, on their expedition to the castle of Reuben.
Before twelve o’clock, the warders, the priest, Keeran Karry, and the
castle piper, had arrived in the utmost silence and secrecy. In that
sort of large half-inhabited castle, the principal entrance was through
the farm-yard, which was, indeed, generally the only assailable quarter.
In the present instance, the gate was half open, and the house lights
appeared to have been collected in the rear, as was judged from their
reflection in the water of the Barrow, which ran close under the
windows. A noise was heard, but not of drunkenness;—it was a sound as of
preparation for battle. Now and then a clash of steel, as if persons
were practising at the sword or skeen for the offensive, was going
forward in the back hall; and a loud laugh was occasionally heard. The
warders foresaw it would not be so easy a business as they had
contemplated, and almost regretted that they had not brought a less
chivalrous numerical force.
It was concerted that ten men should creep upon their hands and feet to
the front entrance, and await there until, by some accident, it might be
sufficiently open for the ferocious rush which was to surprise their
opponents.
But Keeran, always discreet, had some forethought that more than usual
caution would be requisite. He had counted on dangers which the others
had never dreamt of, and his prudence, in all probability, saved the
lives of many of the warders. He preceded his men, crawling nearly on
his breast; he had suspected that a dog overheard them, and a bark soon
confirmed the truth of that suspicion, and announced the possibility of
discovery. Keeran, however, was prepared for this circumstance; he had
filled his pockets with pieces of bacon impregnated with a concentrated
preparation of nux vomica, then, and at a much later period, well known
to the clergy and spirituals on the continent.[11] Its fatal effect on
dogs was instantaneous; and the savoury bacon having rendered them quite
greedy to devour it, it had now an immediate influence on two great
mastiffs and a wolf-dog who roamed about the yard at nights. On taking
each a portion, they resigned their share of the contest without further
noise.
-----
Footnote 11:
It was formerly used by nuns, monks, &c. in the warm climates to
_temper their blood_ withal. There is a sort of cooling root sold at
the herbalists in Paris at present, of which the young _religieuses_
of both sexes are said to make a cheap, palatable, and powerful
_anti-satanic ptisan_. It is displayed in the shops on strings, like
dried lemon-peel.
-----
Keeran thus advanced crawling to the door; he found it fast, but on
listening, soon had reason to conjecture that the inmates were too
numerous and well armed to make the result of the battle at all certain.
He crept back to the hedge; and having informed the warders of the
situation in which they were placed, one and all swore that they would
enter or die. The priest had lain himself down under a hay-stack in the
outer yard, and the piper had retired nobody knew where, nor in fact did
any body care much about him, as he was but a very indifferent chanter.
Keeran now desired the warders to handle their hatchets, and be prepared
for an attack so soon as they should see the front door open, and hear
three strokes on the copper kettle. The gossoon had left that machine on
a spot which he had described near the gate, and Keeran requested that,
in case of any fire, they should not mind it till the kettle sounded. He
then crawled away, and they saw no more of him.
The moments were precious, and seemed to advance too fast. At one
o’clock, a body armed possibly better than themselves, and probably much
more numerous, would issue from the castle on their road to Moret,
prepared for combat. The result in such a case might be very precarious.
The warders by no means felt pleased with their situation; and the
absence of their leader, priest, and piper gave no additional ideas of
conquest or even security. In this state of things near half an hour had
elapsed, when of a sudden they perceived, on the side of the hay-yard
toward their own position, a small blaze of fire issue from a
corn-stack—in a moment another, and another! The conflagration was most
impetuous; it appeared to be devouring every thing, but as yet was not
perceived by the inmates at the rear of the house. At length volumes of
flame illuminated by reflection the waters of the river under the back
windows. The warders now expecting the sally, rubbed their hands well
with bees’ wax, and grasped tightly their hatchets, yet moved
not:—breathless, with a ferocious anxiety, they awaited the event in
almost maddening suspense. A loud noise now issued from the interior of
the house; the fire was perceived by the garrison—still it might be
accidental—the front door was thrown open, and above thirty of the
inmates poured out, some fully, others not fully armed. They rushed into
the hay-yard—some cried out it was “treachery!” whilst others
vociferated “accident! accident!”—All was confusion, and many a stout
head afterward paid for its incredulity.
At that moment the copper kettle was beaten rapidly and with force:—a
responsive sound issued from the house—the garrison hesitated, but
hesitation was quickly banished; for on the first blow of the kettle,
the warders, in a compact body, with hideous yells, rushed on the
astonished garrison, who had no conception who their enemies could be.
Every hatchet found its victim; limbs, features, hands, were chopped off
without mercy—death or dismemberment followed nearly every blow of that
brutal weapon, whilst the broad sharp skeens soon searched the bodies of
the wounded, and almost half the garrison were annihilated before they
were aware of the foe by whom they had been surprised. The survivors,
however, soon learned the cause (perhaps merited) of their comrades’
slaughter. The war cry of “A Gerald!—a Gerald!—a Gerald!”—which now
accompanied every crash of the murderous hatchet, or every plunge of the
broad-bladed skeen, informed them who they were fighting with:—fifteen
or sixteen still remained unwounded of the garrison—their case was
desperate. Keeran Karry now headed his warders. The gossoon rapidly and
fiercely struck the copper, in unison with the sound of the fatal
weapons, whilst the old and decrepit Jug Ogie, within the castle,
repeated the same sound, thereby leading the garrison to believe that to
retreat inside the walls would only be to encounter a fresh enemy.
The affair, however, was far from being finished;—the survivors rapidly
retired, and got in a body to the position first occupied by Keeran’s
warders. They were desperate—they knew they must die, and determined not
to go alone to the other regions. The flames still raged with
irresistible fury in the hay-yard. It was Keeran who had set fire to the
corn and hay, which materials produced an almost supernatural height of
blaze and impetuosity of conflagration. The survivors of the garrison
were at once fortified, and concealed from view, by a high holly hedge,
and awaited their turn to become assailants:—it soon arrived.
From the midst of the burning ricks in the hay-yard a shrill and
piercing cry was heard to issue, of “Ough, murther—murther!—the
devil—the devil! ough Holy Virgin, save me! if there is any marcy, save
me!” The voice was at once recognised by the warriors of Moret as that
of their priest Ned Murphy, who had fallen asleep under a hay-stack, and
never awakened till the flames had seized upon his cloak. Bewildered, he
knew not how to escape, being met, wherever he ran, by crackling masses.
He roared and cursed to the full extent of his voice; and gave himself
up for lost, though fortunately, as the materials of his habit did not
associate with flame, he was not dangerously burned, although suffering
somewhat in his legs. No sooner did they perceive his situation, than
the warders, each man forgetting himself, rushed to save their _clergy_,
on whom they conceived the salvation of their souls entirely to depend.
They imagined that the fight was ended, and prepared to enjoy themselves
by the plunder of Castle Reuben.
This was the moment for the defeated garrison:—with a loud yell of “a
Moore! a Moore! a Moore!” they fell in their turn upon the entangled
warders in the hay-yard, five of whose original number had been wounded,
and one killed, in the first fray; whilst many had subsequently thrown
down their hatchets, to rescue their pastor, and had only their spikes
and skeens wherewith to defend themselves. The battle now became more
serious, because more doubtful, than at its commencement. Several of the
warders were wounded, and four more lay dead at the entrance to the
hay-yard; their spirit was dashed, and their adversaries laid on with
the fury of desperation. Keeran Karry had received two sword-thrusts
through his shoulder, and could fight no more; but he could do better—he
could command. He called to the warders to retreat and take possession
of the castle, which was now untenanted: this step saved them; they
retired thither with all possible rapidity, pursued by the former
garrison of the place, who however were not able to enter with them, but
killed another man before the doors were fast closed. Keeran directed
the thick planks and flag-stones to be torn up, thereby leaving the hall
open to the cellar beneath, as had been done at Moret. The enemy were at
bay at the door, and could not advance, but, on the other hand, many of
the warders having, as we before stated, flung away their hatchets, were
ill armed. The moment was critical: Keeran, however, was never at a loss
for some expedient; he counted his men; five had been killed in the
hay-yard, and one just outside the walls; several others were wounded,
amongst whom was the piper, who had been asleep. Keeran told the warders
that he feared the sun might rise on their total destruction, if
something were not immediately done. “Are there,” said he, “five among
ye, who are willing to swap your lives for the victory?” Every man cried
out at once—and, I!—I!—I!—echoed through the hall. “It is well!” said
Keeran, who without delay directed five men, and the gossoon with the
copper kettle, to steal out at the back of the castle, creep through the
hedges, and get round directly into the rear of the foe before they
attacked; having succeeded in which, they were immediately to advance,
beating the vessel strongly.—“They will suppose,” said the warlike
Keeran, “that it is a reinforcement, and we shall then return the sound
from within. If they believe it to be a reinforcement, they will submit
to mercy: if not, we’ll attack them front and rear—and as our numbers
are pretty equal, very few of us on either side will tell the story to
our childer! but we’ll have as good a chance, at any rate, as them
villains.”
This scheme was carried into immediate execution, and completely
succeeded. The enemy, who were now grouped outside the door, hearing the
kettle in their rear, supposed that they should be at once attacked by
sally and from behind. Thinking they had now only to choose between
death and submission, the mercy, which was offered, they accepted; and
peep-o’day being arrived, the vanquished agreed to throw their arms into
the well,—to swear before the priest that they never would disturb, or
aid in disturbing, Lady Elizabeth or the castle of Moret,—that no man on
either side should be called upon by law for his fighting that night;
and finally, that the person who had succeeded in drawing the lot for
Elizabeth, should deliver up the lock of his hair that grew next his
ear, to testify his submission: this latter clause, however, was
stipulated needlessly, as M‘Carthy O’Moore was discovered in the
farm-yard, with nearly all his face sliced off, and several skeen wounds
in his arms and body. Early in the morning, the dead were buried without
noise or disturbance in a consecrated gravel-pit, and both parties
breakfasted together in perfect cordiality and good-humour: those who
fell were mostly tenants of the squires. The priest, having had his
burnt legs and arm dressed with _chewed herbs_[12] by Jug Ogie, said a
full mass, and gave all parties double absolution, as the affair was
completed by the rising of the sun. The yard was cleared of blood and
havock; the warders and garrison parted in perfect friendship; and the
former returned to Moret Castle, bringing back Jug Ogie to her impatient
mistress. Of the warders, thirteen returned safe; six remained behind
badly wounded, and six were dead. Keeran’s wounds were severe, but they
soon healed; and Elizabeth afterward resided at Moret to a very late
period in the reign of George the First. Reuben soon changed its
occupant, M‘Mahon, who, in the sequel, was hanged for the murder of his
master; and that part of the country has since become one of the most
civilized of the whole province.
-----
Footnote 12:
I believe that most countries produce simple herbs, of a nature
adapted to the cure of diseases prevalent in their respective
climates. The old Irishwomen formerly had wonderful skill in finding
and applying such remedies; they chewed the herbs into a sort of pap,
and then extracted the juice, for the patient to take inwardly—whilst
the substance was applied as a poultice.
Many of the rebels told me, after 1798, that having no doctors, the
country bone-setters and the “_Colloughs_” (old women) soon cured
their flesh-wounds and broken limbs: “but,” added they, “when a _boy’s
skull_ was _smash’d_, there was no more _good_ in him.”
-----
I have given the foregoing little history in full, inasmuch as it is but
little known—is, I believe, strictly matter of fact, and exhibits a
curious picture of the state of Irish society and manners in or about
the year 1690. A small part of Moret castle is still standing, and
presents a very great curiosity. One single ivy tree has, for a period
beyond the memory of man, enveloped the entire ruins; has insinuated its
tendrils through the thick walls; penetrated every seam and aperture;
and now contributes to display one solid mass of combined masonry and
foliage. It stands on the old Byrne (now Lansdowne) estate, about a mile
from the great heath, Queen’s County.
IRISH GENTRY AND THEIR RETAINERS.
Instances of attachment formerly of the lower orders of Irish to the
gentry—A field of corn of my father’s reaped in one night without his
knowledge—My grandfather’s servants cut a man’s ears off by
misinterpretation—My grandfather and grandmother tried for the
fact—Acquitted—The colliers of Donane—Their fidelity at my election at
Ballynakill, 1790.
The numerous and remarkable instances, which came within my own
observation, of mutual attachment between the Irish peasantry and their
landlords in former times, would, were I to detail them, fill volumes. A
few only will suffice, in addition to what has already been stated, to
show the nature of that reciprocal good-will, which, on many occasions,
was singularly useful to both parties; and in selecting these instances
from such as occurred in my own family, I neither mean to play the vain
egotist, nor to determine generals by particulars, since good landlords
and attached peasantry were then spread over the entire face of Ireland,
and bore a great proportion to the whole country. Were that the case at
present, Ireland would be an aid, and a substantial friend, instead of a
burthen and a troublesome neighbour to her sister island. He must be a
good prophet that can even now foresee the final results of the Union.
I remember that a very extensive field of corn of my father’s had once
become too ripe, inasmuch as all the reapers in the country were
employed in getting in their own scanty crops before they shedded. Some
of the servants had heard my father regret that he could not by
possibility get in his reapers without taking them from these little
crops, and that he would sooner lose his own.
This field was within full view of our windows. My father had given up
the idea of being able to cut his corn in due time. One morning, when he
rose, he could not believe his sight:—he looked—rubbed his eyes—called
the servants, and asked them if they saw _any thing odd_ in the
field:—they certainly did—for, on our family retiring to rest the night
before, the whole body of the peasantry of the country, after their hard
labour during the day, had come upon the great field, and had reaped and
stacked it before dawn! None of them would even tell him who had a hand
in it. Similar instances of affection repeatedly took place; and no
tenant on any of the estates of my family was ever distrained, or even
pressed, for rent. Their gratitude for this knew no bounds; and the only
individuals who ever annoyed them were the parsons, by their proctors,
and the tax-gatherers for hearth-money; and though hard cash was scant
with both landlord and tenant, and no small bank-notes had got into
circulation, provisions were plentiful, and but little inconvenience was
experienced by the peasantry from want of a circulating medium. There
was constant residence and work—no banks and no machinery; and though
the people might not be quite so refined, most undoubtedly they were
vastly happier.
But a much more characteristic proof than the foregoing of the
extraordinary devotion of the lower to the higher orders of Ireland, in
former times, occurred in my family, and is publicly on record.
My grandfather, Mr. French, of County Galway, was a remarkably small,
nice little man, but of extremely irritable temperament. He was an
excellent swordsman, and proud to excess: indeed, of family pride,
Galway County was at that time the focus, and not without some reason.
Certain relics of feudal arrogance frequently set the neighbours and
their adherents together by the ears:—my grandfather had conceived a
contempt for, and antipathy to, a sturdy _half-mounted_ gentleman, one
Mr. Dennis Bodkin, who, having an independent mind, entertained an equal
aversion to the arrogance of my grandfather, whom he took every possible
opportunity of irritating and opposing.
My grandmother, an O’Brien, was high and proud—steady and sensible—but
disposed to be rather violent at times in her contempts and animosities;
and entirely agreed with her husband in his detestation of Mr. Dennis
Bodkin.
On some occasion or other, Mr. Dennis had outdone his usual outdoings,
and chagrined the squire and his lady most outrageously. A large company
dined at my grandfather’s, and my grandmother launched out in her abuse
of Dennis, concluding her exordium by an hyperbole of hatred expressed,
but not at all meant, in these words:—“I wish the fellow’s ears were cut
off! _that_ might quiet him.”
It passed over as usual: the subject was changed, and all went on
comfortably till supper; at which time, when every body was in full
glee, the old butler, Ned Regan (who had drunk enough), came in:—joy was
in his eye; and whispering something to his mistress which she did not
comprehend, he put a large snuff-box into her hand. Fancying it was some
whim of her old domestic, she opened the box and shook out its
contents:—when, lo! a considerable portion of a pair of bloody ears
dropped upon the table!—The horror and surprise of the company may be
conceived: on which Ned exclaimed—“Sure, my lady, you wished that Dennis
Bodkin’s ears were cut off; so I told old Gahagan (the game-keeper), and
he took a few boys with him, and brought back Dennis Bodkin’s ears—and
there they are; and I hope you are plazed, my lady!”
The scene may be imagined;—but its results had like to have been of a
more serious nature. The sportsman and the _boys_ were ordered to get
off as fast as they could; but my grandfather and grandmother were held
to heavy bail, and tried at the ensuing assizes at Galway. The evidence
of the entire company, however, united in proving that my grandmother
never had an idea of any such order, and that it was a misapprehension
on the part of the servants. They were, of course, acquitted. The
sportsman never re-appeared in the county till after the death of Dennis
Bodkin, which took place three years subsequently, when old Gahagan was
reinstated as game-keeper.
This anecdote may give the reader an idea of the devotion of servants,
in those days, to their masters. But the order of things is reversed—and
the change of times cannot be better illustrated than by the propensity
servants now have to rob (and, if convenient, murder) the families from
whom they derive their daily bread. Where the remote error lies, I know
not; but certainly the ancient fidelity of domestics seems to be totally
out of fashion with those gentry at present.
A more recent instance of the same feeling as that indicated by the two
former anecdotes,—namely, the devotion of the country people to old
settlers and families,—occurred to myself; and, as I am upon the
subject, I will mention it. I stood a contested election, in the year
1790, for the borough of Ballynakill, for which my ancestors had
returned two members to Parliament during nearly 200 years. It was
usurped by the Marquis of Drogheda, and I contested it.
On the day of the election, my eldest brother and myself being
candidates, and the business preparing to begin, a cry was heard that
the whole _colliery_ was coming down from Donane, about eight miles off.
The returning officer, Mr. Trench, lost no time: six voters were polled
against me; mine were refused generally in mass; the books were
repacked, and the result of the poll declared—the election ended, and my
opponents just retiring from the town,—when seven or eight hundred
colliers were seen entering it with colours flying and pipers playing;
their faces were all blackened, and a more tremendous assemblage was
scarce ever witnessed. After the usual shoutings, they all rushed into
the town with loud cries of “A Barrinton! a Barrinton! Who dares say
_black_ is the _white_ of his eye? Down with the Droghedas!—We don’t
forget Ballyragget yet!—Oh, cursed Sandy Cahill!—High for Donane!” &c.
The chief captain came up to me:—“Counsellor, dear!” said he, “we’re all
come from Donane to help your honour against the villains that oppose
you:—we’re the boys that can _tittivate_!—Barrinton for ever!
hurra!”—Then coming close to me, and lowering his tone, he
added,—“Counsellor, jewel! _which_ of the villains shall we _settle
first_?”
To quiet him, I shook his black hand, told him nobody should be hurt,
and that the gentlemen had all left the town.
“Left the town?” said he, quite disappointed: “Why then, counsellor,
we’ll be after overtaking them. Barrinton for ever!—Donane, boys!—Come
on, boys! we’ll be after the Droghedas.”
I feared that I had no control over the riotous humour of the colliers,
and knew but one mode of keeping them quiet. I desired Billy Howard, the
innkeeper, to bring out all the ale he had; and having procured many
barrels in addition, together with all the bread and cheese in the
place, I set them at it as hard as might be. I told them I was sure of
being elected in Dublin, and “_to stay azy_” (their own language); and
in a little time I saw them as tractable as lambs. They made a bonfire
in the evening, and about ten o’clock I left them as happy and merry a
set of colliers as ever existed. Such as were able strolled back in the
night; the others next morning; and not the slightest injury was done to
any body or any thing.
The above was a totally unexpected and voluntary proof of the
disinterested and ardent attachment of the Irish country people to all
who they thought would protect or procure them justice.[13]
-----
Footnote 13:
Here I wish to observe the distinction which occurs to me as existing
between the attachment of the Scottish Highlanders to their lairds and
the ardent love of the Irish peasantry to their landlords—(I mean, in
my early days, when their landlords loved them.)
With the Highlanders—consanguinity, a common name, and the
prescriptive authority of the Scottish chief over his military clan,
(altogether combining the ties of blood and feudal obedience) exerted
a powerful and impetuous influence on the mind of the vassal. Yet
their natural character—fierce though calculating—desperate and
decisive—generated a sort of independent subserviency, mingled with
headstrong propensities which their lairds often found it very
difficult to moderate, and occasionally impossible to restrain when
upon actual service.
The Irish peasantry, more witty and less wise, thoughtless,
enthusiastically ardent, living in an unsophisticated way but at the
same time less secluded than the Highlanders, entertained an
hereditary, voluntary, uninfluenced love for the whole family of their
landlords. Though no consanguinity bound the two classes to each
other, and no feudal power enforced the fidelity of the inferior one,
their chiefs resided in their very hearts:—they obeyed because they
loved them: their affection, founded on gratitude, was simple and
unadulterated, and they would count their lives well lost for the
honour of their landlords. In the midst of the deepest poverty, their
attachment was more cheerful, more free, yet more cordial and
generous, than that of any other peasantry to any chiefs in Europe.
The Irish modes of expressing fondness for any of the family of the
old landlords (families which, alas! have now nearly deserted their
country) are singular and affecting. I witnessed, not long since, a
genuine example of this, near the old mansion of my family.—“Augh
then! Musha! Musha! the owld times!—the owld times!—Ough! then my owld
eyes see a B—— —before I die. ’Tis I that loved the breed of
yees—ough! ’tis myself that would kiss the track of his honour’s feet
in the guther, if he was alive to lead us! Ough! God rest his sowl!
any how! Ough! a-vourneen! a-vourneen!”
Yet these peasants were all papists, and their landlords all
protestants:—religion, indeed, was never thought of in the matter. If
the landlords had continued the same, the tenantry would not have
altered. But under the present system, the populace of Ireland will
never long remain tranquil, whilst at the same time it is increasing
in number—an increase that cannot be got rid of:—hang, shoot, and
exile five hundred thousand Irish, the number will scarcely be missed,
and in two years the country will be as full as ever again.
It is not my intention to enumerate the several modes recommended for
reducing the Irish population, by remote and recent politicians; from
Sir William Petty’s project for _transporting the men_,—to Dean
Swift’s scheme of _eating the children_, and the modern idea of
_famishing the adults_. A variety of plans may yet, I conceive, be
devised, without applying to either of these _remedies_.
-----
MY EDUCATION.
My godfathers—Lord Maryborough—Personal description and extraordinary
character of Mr. Michael Lodge—My early education—At home—At school—My
private tutor, Rev. P. Crawley, described—Defects of the University
course—Lord Donoughmore’s father—Anecdote of the Vice-Provost—A
country sportsman’s education.
A christening was, formerly, a great family epocha:—my godfathers were
Mr. Pool of Ballyfin, and Captain Pigott of Brocologh Park; and I must
have been a very pleasant infant, for Mr. Pool, having no children,
desired to take me home with him, in which case I should probably have
cut out of feather a very good person and a very kind friend—the present
Lord Maryborough, whom Mr. Pool afterwards adopted whilst a midshipman
in the navy, and bequeathed him a noble demesne and a splendid estate
near my father’s. My family have always supported Lord Maryborough for
Queen’s County, and his lordship’s tenants supported me in my
hard-contested election for Maryborough in 1800.
No public functionary could act more laudably than Mr. Pool did whilst
secretary in Ireland; and it must be a high gratification to him to
reflect that, in the year 1800, he did not sell his vote, nor abet the
degradation of his country.
Captain Pigott expressed the same desire to patronise me as Mr.
Pool;—received a similar refusal, and left his property, I believe, to a
parcel of hospitals: whilst I was submitted to the guardianship of
Colonel Jonah Barrington, and the instructions of Mr. Michael Lodge, a
person of very considerable consequence in my early memoirs, and to
whose ideas and eccentricities I really believe I am indebted for a
great proportion of my own, and certainly not the worst of them.
Mr. George Lodge had married a love-daughter of old Stephen Fitzgerald,
Esq. of Bally Thomas, who by affinity was a relative of the house of
Cullenaghmore, and from this union sprang Mr. Michael Lodge.
I never shall forget his figure!—he was a tall man with thin legs and
great hands, and was generally biting one of his nails whilst employed
in teaching me. The top of his head was half bald: his remaining hair
was clubbed with a rose-ribbon; a tight stock, with a large silver
buckle to it behind, appeared to be almost choking him: his chin and
jaws were very long: and he used to hang his under jaw, shut one eye,
and look up to the ceiling, when he was thinking, or trying to recollect
any thing.
Mr. Michael Lodge had been what is called a Matross in the artillery
service. My grandfather had got him made a gauger; but he was turned
adrift for letting a poor man do something wrong about distilling. He
then became a land-surveyor and architect for the farmers:—he could
farry, cure cows of the murrain, had numerous secrets about cattle and
physic, and was accounted the best bleeder and bone-setter in that
county—all of which healing accomplishments he exercised gratis. He was
also a famous brewer and accountant—in fine, was every thing at
Cullenagh: steward, agent, caterer, farmer, sportsman, secretary, clerk
to the colonel as a magistrate, and also clerk to Mr. Barret as the
parson: but he would not sing a stave in church, though he’d chant
indefatigably in the hall. He had the greatest contempt for women, and
used to beat the maid-servants; whilst the men durst not vex him, as he
was quite despotic! He had a turning-lathe, a number of grinding-stones,
and a carpenter’s bench, in his room. He used to tin the saucepans,
which act he called _chymistry_; and I have seen him, like a tailor,
putting a new cape to his riding-coat! He made all sorts of nets, and
knit stockings; but above all, he piqued himself on the variety and
depth of his _learning_.
Under the tuition of this Mr. Michael Lodge, who was surnamed the “wise
man of Cullenaghmore,” I was placed at four years of age, to learn as
much of the foregoing as he could teach me in the next five years: at
the expiration of which period he had no doubt of my knowing as much as
himself, and then (he said) I should go to school “_to teach the
master_.”
This idea of teaching the master was the greatest possible incitement to
me; and as there was no other child in the house, I never was idle, but
was as inquisitive and troublesome as can be imagined. Every thing was
explained to me; and I not only got on surprisingly, but my memory was
found to be so strong, that Mr. Michael Lodge told my grandfather _half
learning_ would answer me as well as _whole learning_ would another
child. In truth, before my sixth year, I was making a very great hole in
Mr. Lodge’s stock of information (fortification and gunnery excepted),
and I verily believe he only began to learn many things himself when he
commenced teaching them to me.
He took me a regular course by Horn-book, Primer, Spelling-book,
Reading-made-Easy, Æsop’s Fables, &c.: but I soon aspired to such of the
old library books as had pictures in them; and particularly, a very
large History of the Bible with cuts was my constant study. Hence I knew
how every saint was murdered; and Mr. Lodge not only told me that each
martyr had a painter to take his portrait before death, but also fully
explained to me how they had all sat for their pictures, and assured me
that most of them had been murdered by the Papists. I recollect at this
day the faces of every one of them at their time of martyrdom; so
strongly do youthful impressions sink into the mind, when derived from
objects which at the time were viewed with interest.[14]
-----
Footnote 14:
Formerly the chimneys were all covered with tiles, having
scripture-pieces, examples of natural history, &c. daubed on them; and
there being a great variety, the father or mother (sitting of a
winter’s evening round the hearth with the young ones) explained the
meaning of the tiles out of the Bible, &c.; so that the impression was
made without being called a lesson, and the child acquired knowledge
without thinking that it was being taught. So far as it went, this was
one of the best modes of instruction.
-----
Be this as it may, however, my wise man, Mr. Michael Lodge, used his
heart, head, and hands, as zealously as he could to teach me most things
that he did know, and many things he did not know; but with a skill
which none of our schoolmasters practise, he made me think he was only
amusing instead of giving me a task. The old man tried to make me
inquisitive, and inclined to ask about the thing which he wanted to
explain to me; and consequently, at eight years old I could read prose
and poetry,—write text,—draw a house, a horse, and a game-cock,—tin a
copper saucepan, and turn my own tops. I could do the manual exercise
with my grandfather’s crutch; and had learnt, besides, how to make
bullets, pens, and black-ball; to dance a jig, sing a _cronaune_,[15]
and play the Jew’s harp. Michael also showed me, out of scripture, how
the world stood stock still whilst the sun was galloping round it; so
that it was no easy matter at college to satisfy me as to the Copernican
system. In fact, the old Matross gave me such a various and whimsical
assemblage of subjects to think about, that my young brain imbibed as
many odd, chivalrous, and puzzling theories as would drive some children
out of their senses; and, truly, I found it no easy matter to get rid of
several of them when it became absolutely necessary, whilst some I shall
certainly retain till my death’s day.
-----
Footnote 15:
The _Cronaune_ had _no words_; it was a curious species of song, quite
peculiar, I believe, to Ireland, and executed by drawing in the
greatest possible portion of breath, and then making a sound like a
humming-top:—whoever could _hum_ the longest, was accounted the best
Cronauner. In many country gentlemen’s houses, there was a fool kept
for the express purpose, who also played the trump, or Jews’-harp;
some of them in a surprising manner.
-----
This course of education I most sedulously followed, until it pleased
God to suspend my learning by the death of my grandfather, on whom I
doted. He had taught me the broad-sword exercise with his cane, how to
snap a pistol, and shoot with the bow and arrow; and had bespoken a
little quarter-staff, to perfect me in that favourite exercise of his
youth, by which he had been enabled to knock a gentleman’s brains out
for a wager, on the ridge of Maryborough, in company with the great
grandfather of the present Judge Arthur Moore, of the Common Pleas of
Ireland. It is a whimsical gratification to me, to think that I do not
at this moment forget much of the said instruction which I received
either from Michael Lodge, the Matross, or from Colonel Jonah
Barrington,—though after a lapse of nearly sixty years!
A new scene was now to be opened to me. I was carried to Dublin, and put
to the famous schoolmaster of that day, Dr. Ball, of St.
Michael-a-Powell’s, Ship-street;—one of the old round towers still
stands in the yard—towers which defy all tradition. Here my puzzling
commenced in good earnest. I was required to learn the _English_ Grammar
in the _Latin_ tongue; and to translate languages without understanding
any of them. I was taught prosody without verse, and rhetoric without
composition; and before I had ever heard any oration, except a sermon, I
was flogged for not minding my emphasis in recitation. To complete my
satisfaction,—for fear I should be idle during the course of the week,
castigation was regularly administered every Monday morning, to give me,
by anticipation, a sample of what the _repetition day_ might produce.
However, notwithstanding all this, I worked my way, got two premiums,
and at length was reported fit to be placed under the hands of a private
tutor, by whom I was to be _finished_ for the University.
That tutor was well known many years in Digges-street, Dublin, and cut a
still more extraordinary figure than the Matross. He was the Rev.
Patrick Crawly, Rector of Killgobbin, whose son was hanged a few years
ago for murdering two old women with a shoemaker’s hammer. My tutor’s
person was, in my imagination, of the same genus as that of Caliban. His
feet covered a considerable space of any room wherein he stood, and his
thumbs were so large that he could scarcely hold a book without hiding
more than half the page of it:—though bulky himself, his clothes doubled
the dimensions proper to suit his body; and an immense frowzy wig,
powdered once a week, covered a head which, for size and form, might vie
with a quarter-cask.
Vaccination not having as yet plundered horned cattle of their
disorders, its predecessor had left evident proofs of attachment to the
rector’s countenance. That old Christian malady, the small-pox, which
had resided so many centuries amongst our ancestors, and which modern
innovations have endeavoured to undermine, had placed his features in a
perfect state of compactness and security—each being sewed quite tight
to its neighbour, every seam appearing deep and gristly, so that the
whole visage appeared to defy alike the edge of the sharpest scalpel and
the skill of the most expert anatomist.
Yet this was as good-hearted a parson as ever lived:—affectionate,
friendly, and, so far as Greek, Latin, Prosody, and Euclid went,
excelled by few: and under him I acquired, in one year, more classical
knowledge than I had done during the former six,—whence I was enabled,
out of thirty-six pupils, to obtain an early place in the University of
Dublin, at entrance.
The college course, at that time, though a very learned one, was ill
arranged, pedantic, and totally out of sequence. Students were examined
in “Locke on the Human Understanding,” before their own had arrived at
the first stage of maturity; and Euclid was pressed upon their reason
before any one of them could comprehend a single problem. We were set to
work at the most abstruse sciences before we had well digested the
simpler ones, and posed ourselves at optics, natural philosophy, ethics,
astronomy, mathematics, metaphysics, &c. &c. without the least relief
from belles-lettres, modern history, geography, or poetry; in short,
without regard to any of those acquirements—the classics excepted,—which
form essential parts of a gentleman’s education.[16]
-----
Footnote 16:
Mr. Hutchinson, a later provost, father of Lord Donoughmore, went into
the opposite extreme; a most excellent classical scholar himself,
polished and well read, he wished to introduce every elegant branch of
erudition:—to cultivate the modern languages,—in short, to adapt the
course to the education of men of rank as well as men of science. The
plan was most laudable, but was considered not monastic enough:
indeed, a polished gentleman would have operated like a ghost among
those pedantic Fellows of Trinity College. Dr. Waller was the only
Fellow of that description I ever saw.
Mr. Hutchinson went too far in proposing a riding-house. The scheme
drew forth from Dr. Duigenan a pamphlet called “Pranceriana,” which
turned the project and projector into most consummate, but very coarse
and ill-natured ridicule.
Doctor Barrett, late vice-provost, dining at the table of the new
provost, who lived in a style of elegance attempted by none of his
predecessors, helped himself to what he thought a peach, but which
happened to be a shape made of ice. On taking it into his mouth, never
having tasted ice before, he supposed, from the pang given to his
teeth and the shock which his tongue and mouth instantly received,
that the sensation was produced by heat. Starting up, therefore, he
cried out (and it was the only oath he ever uttered), “I’m _scalded_,
by G—d!”—ran home, and sent for the next apothecary!
-----
Nevertheless, I jogged on with _bene_ for the classics—_satis_ for the
sciences—and _mediocriter_ for mathematics. I had, however, the
mortification of seeing the stupidest fellows I ever met, at school or
college, beat me out of the field in some of the examinations, and very
justly obtain premiums for sciences which I could not bring within the
scope of my comprehension.
My consolation is, that many men of superior talent to myself came off
no better; and I had the _satisfaction_ of hearing that some of the most
erudite, studious, and pedantic of my contemporary collegians, who
entertained an utter contempt for me, went out of their senses; and I do
believe that there are at this moment some of the most eminent of my
academic rivals amusing themselves in mad-houses. One of them I lamented
much—he still lives; his case is a most extraordinary one, and I shall
mention it hereafter:—’twill puzzle the doctors.
Whenever, indeed, I seek amusement by tracing the fate of such of my
school and college friends as I can get information about, I find that
many of the most promising and conspicuous have met untimely ends; and
that most of those men whose great talents distinguished them first in
the university and afterward at the bar, had entered, as sizers, for
provision as well as for learning:—indigence and genius were thus
jointly concerned in their merited elevation; and I am convinced that
the finest abilities are frequently buried alive in affluence and in
luxury: _revolutions_ are sometimes their hot-bed, and at other times
their grave.
The death of my grandmother, which now took place, made a very
considerable change in my situation, and I had sense enough, though
still very young, to see the necessity of turning my mind toward a
preparation for some lucrative profession—either law, physic, divinity,
or war.
I debated on all these, as I thought, with great impartiality:—the
pedantry of the book-worms had disgusted me with clericals; wooden legs
put me out of conceit with warfare; the horrors of death made me shudder
at medicine; the law was but a lottery-trade, too precarious for my
taste; and mercantile pursuits were too humiliating for my ambition.
Nothing, on the other hand, could induce me to remain a _walking
gentleman_: and so, every occupation that I could think of having its
peculiar disqualification, I remained a considerable time in a state of
uncertainty and disquietude.
Meanwhile, although my choice had nothing to do with the matter, by
residing at my father’s I got almost imperceptibly engaged in that
species of _profession_ exercised by young sportsmen, whereby I was
initiated into a number of _accomplishments_ ten times worse than the
negative ones of the walking gentleman:—namely,—riding, drinking,
dancing, carousing, hunting, shooting, fishing, fighting, racing,
cock-fighting, &c. &c.
After my grandmother’s death, as my father’s country-house was my home,
so my two elder brothers became my _tutors_—the rustics my
_precedents_—and a newspaper my _literature_. However, the foundation
for my propensities had been too well laid to be easily rooted up; and
whilst I certainly, for awhile, indulged in the habits of those around
me, I was not at all idle as to the pursuits I had been previously
accustomed to. I had a pretty good assortment of books of my own, and
seldom passed a day without devoting some part of it to reading or
letter-writing; and though I certainly somewhat mis-spent, I cannot
accuse myself of having lost, the period I passed at Blandsfort—since I
obtained therein a full insight into the manners, habits, and
dispositions of the different classes of Irish, in situations and under
circumstances which permitted nature to exhibit her traits without
restraint or caution: building on which foundation, my greatest pleasure
has ever been that of decyphering character, adding to and embellishing
the superstructure which my experience and observation have since
conspired to raise.
It is quite impossible I can give a better idea of the dissipation of
that period, into which I was thus plunged, than by describing an
incident I shall never forget, and which occurred very soon after my
first _entrée_ into the sporting sphere.—It happened in the year 1778,
and was then no kind of novelty:—wherever there were hounds, a kennel,
and a huntsman, there was the same species of _scena_, (with variations,
however, _ad libitum_,) when the frost and bad weather put a stop to
field avocations.
IRISH DISSIPATION IN 1778.
The huntsman’s cottage—Preparations for a seven days’ carousal—A
cock-fight—Welsh main—Harmony—A cow and a hogshead of wine consumed by
the party—Comparison between former dissipation and that of the
present day—A dandy at dinner in Bond-street—Captain Parsons Hoye and
his nephew—Character and description of both—The nephew disinherited
by his uncle for dandyism—Curious anecdote of Dr. Jenkins piercing
Admiral Cosby’s fist.
Close to the kennel of my father’s hounds, he had built a small cottage,
which was occupied solely by an old huntsman, (Matthew Querns,) his
older wife, and his nephew, a whipper-in. The chase, the bottle, and the
piper, were the enjoyments of winter; and nothing could recompense a
suspension of these enjoyments.
My elder brother, justly apprehending that the frost and snow of
Christmas might probably prevent their usual occupation of the chase, on
St. Stephen’s day, (26th Dec.) determined to provide against any
listlessness during the shut-up period, by an uninterrupted match of
what was called _hard going_, till the weather should break up.
A hogshead of superior claret[17] was therefore sent to the cottage of
old Querns the huntsman; and a fat cow, killed, and plundered of her
skin, was hung up by the heels. All the windows were closed, to keep out
the light. One room, filled with straw and numerous blankets, was
destined for a bed-chamber in common; and another was prepared as a
kitchen for the use of the servants. Claret,—cold, mulled, or
buttered,[18]—was to be the beverage for the whole company; and in
addition to the cow above mentioned, chickens, bacon, and bread were the
only admitted viands. Wallace and Hosey, my father’s and my brother’s
pipers, and Doyle, a blind but famous fiddler, were employed to enliven
the banquet, which it was determined should continue till the cow became
a skeleton, and the claret should be on its stoop.
-----
Footnote 17:
Claret was at that time about 18_l._ the hogshead, if sold for _ready
rhino_; if on credit, the law, before payment, generally mounted it to
200_l._; besides bribing the sub-sheriff to make his return, and swear
that Squire * * * * had “neither _body_ nor _goods_.” It is a
remarkable fact, that formerly scarce a hogshead of claret crossed the
bridge of Banaghu, for a country gentleman, without being followed,
within two years, by an attorney, a sheriff’s officer, and a _receiver
of all his rents_, who generally carried back securities for 500_l._
Footnote 18:
Buttered claret was then a favourite beverage—viz. claret boiled with
spice and sugar, orange-peel, and a glass of brandy; four eggs, well
beat up, were then introduced, and the whole poured in a foaming state
from one jug into another, till all was frothy and cream-coloured.
’Twas “very _savoury_!”
-----
My two elder brothers;—two gentlemen of the name of Taylor (one of them
afterward a writer in India);—Mr. Barrington Lodge, a rough
songster;—Frank Skelton, a jester and a butt;—Jemmy Moffat, the most
knowing sportsman of the neighbourhood;—and two other sporting gentlemen
of the county,—composed the _permanent_ bacchanalians. A few visitors
were occasionally admitted.
As for myself, I was too unseasoned to go through more than the first
ordeal, which was on a frosty St. Stephen’s day, when the _hard goers_
partook of their opening banquet, and several neighbours were invited,
to honour the commencement of what they called their _shut-up
pilgrimage_.
The old huntsman was the only male attendant; and his ancient spouse,
once a kitchen-maid in the family, (now somewhat resembling the amiable
Leonarda in Gil Blas,) was the cook; whilst the drudgery fell to the lot
of the whipper-in. A long knife was prepared, to cut collops from the
cow; a large turf fire seemed to court the gridiron on its cinders; the
pot bubbled up as if proud of its contents, whilst plump white chickens
floated in crowds upon the surface of the water; the simmering potatoes,
just bursting their drab surtouts, exposed the delicate whiteness of
their mealy bosoms; the claret was tapped, and the long earthen
wide-mouthed pitchers stood gaping under the impatient cock, to receive
their portions. The pipers plied their chants; the fiddler clasped his
cremona; and never did any feast commence with more auspicious
appearances of hilarity and dissipation—anticipations which were not
doomed to be falsified.
I shall never forget the attraction this novelty had for my youthful
mind. All thoughts but those of good cheer were for the time totally
obliterated. A few curses were, it is true, requisite to spur on old
Leonarda’s skill, but at length the banquet entered: the luscious smoked
bacon, bedded on its cabbage mattress, and partly obscured by its own
savoury steam, might have tempted the most fastidious of epicures;
whilst the round trussed chickens, ranged by the half dozen on hot
pewter dishes, turned up their white plump merry-thoughts exciting
equally the eye and appetite: fat collops of the hanging cow, sliced
indiscriminately from her tenderest points, grilled over the clear
embers upon a shining gridiron, (half drowned in their own luscious
juices, and garnished with little pyramids of congenial shalots,) smoked
at the bottom of the well-furnished board. A prologue of cherry-bounce
(brandy) preceded the entertainment, which was enlivened by hob-nobs and
joyous exclamations.
Numerous toasts, as was customary in those days, intervened to prolong
and give zest to the repast: every man shouted forth the name of his
fair favourite, and each voluntarily surrendered a portion of his own
reason, in bumpers to the beauty of his neighbour’s mistress. The pipers
jerked from their bags appropriate planxties to every jolly sentiment:
the jokers cracked the usual jests and ribaldry: one songster chanted
the joys of wine and women; another gave, in full glee, “stole away” and
“the pleasures of the fox-chase:” the fiddler sawed his merriest jigs:
the old huntsman sounded his long cow’s horn, and thrusting his
fore-finger into his ear (to aid the quaver,) gave the _view holloa!_ of
nearly ten minutes’ duration; to which melody _tally ho!_ was responded
by every stentorian voice. A fox’s brush stuck into a candlestick, in
the centre of the table, was worshipped as a divinity! Claret
flowed—bumpers were multiplied—and chickens, in the garb of spicy
spitchcocks, assumed the name of _devils_ to whet the appetites which it
was impossible to conquer.
For some hours my jollity kept pace with that of my companions: but at
length reason gradually began to lighten me of its burden, and in its
last efforts kindly suggested the straw-chamber as an asylum. Two couple
of favourite hounds had been introduced to share the joyous pastime of
their friends and master; and the deep bass of their throats, excited by
the shrillness of the huntsman’s tenor, harmonized by two rattling
pipers, a jigging fiddler, and twelve voices, in twelve different keys,
all bellowing in one continuous unrelenting chime—was the last point of
recognition which Bacchus permitted me to exercise: my eyes now began to
perceive a much larger company than the room actually contained;—the
lights were more than doubled, without any _real_ increase of their
number; and even the chairs and tables commenced dancing a series of
minuets before me. A faint _tally ho!_ was attempted by my reluctant
lips; but I believe the effort was unsuccessful, and I very soon lost,
in the straw-room, all that brilliant consciousness of existence, in the
possession of which the morning had found me so happy.
Just as I was closing my eyes to a twelve hours’ slumber, I
distinguished the general roar of “stole away!” which seemed almost to
raise up the very roof of old Matt Querns’s cottage.
At noon, next day, a scene of a different nature was exhibited. I found,
on waking, two associates by my side, in as perfect insensibility as
that from which I had just aroused. Our pipers appeared indubitably
_dead_! but the fiddler, who had the privilege of age and blindness, had
taken a hearty nap, and seemed as much alive as ever.
The room of banquet had been re-arranged by the old woman: spitchcocked
chickens, fried rashers, and broiled marrowbones appeared struggling for
precedence. The clean cloth looked fresh and exciting: jugs of mulled
and buttered claret foamed hot upon the refurnished table; and a better
or heartier breakfast I never enjoyed in my life.
A few members of the jovial crew had remained all night at their posts;
but I suppose alternately took some rest, as they seemed not at all
affected by their repletion. Soap and hot water restored at once their
spirits and their persons; and it was determined that the rooms should
be ventilated and cleared out for a cock-fight, to pass time till the
approach of dinner.
In this battle-royal, every man backed his own bird; twelve of which
courageous animals were set down together to fight it out—the survivor
to gain all. In point of principle, the battle of the Horatii and
Curiatii was re-acted; and in about an hour, one cock crowed out his
triumph over the mangled body of his last opponent;—being himself,
strange to say, but little wounded. The other eleven lay dead; and to
the victor was unanimously voted a _writ of ease_, with sole monarchy
over the hen-roost for the remainder of his days; and I remember him,
for many years, the proud and happy commandant of his poultry-yard and
seraglio. They named him “Hyder Ally;”—and I do not think a more
enviable two-legged animal existed.
Fresh visitors were introduced each successive day, and the seventh
morning had arisen before the feast broke up. As that day advanced, the
cow was proclaimed to have furnished her full quantum of good dishes;
the claret was upon its stoop; and the last gallon, mulled with a pound
of spices, was drunk in tumblers to the next merry meeting!—All now
retired to their _natural_ rest, until the evening announced a different
scene.
An early supper, to be partaken of by all the young folks, of both
sexes, in the neighbourhood, was provided in the dwelling-house, to
terminate the festivities. A dance, as usual, wound up the
entertainment; and what was then termed a “raking pot of tea,”[19] put a
finishing stroke, in jollity and good-humour, to such a revel as I never
saw before, and, I am sure, shall never see again.
-----
Footnote 19:
A _raking pot of tea_ always wound up an Irish jollification. It
consisted of a general meeting about day-break, in the common hall, of
all the “young people” of the house—mothers and old aunts of course
excluded; of a huge hot cake well buttered—strong tea—brandy, milk,
and nutmeg, amalgamated into syllabubs—the fox-hunter’s jig,
thoroughly danced—a kiss all round, and a sorrowful “_good_-morning.”
-----
When I compare with the foregoing the habits of the present day, and see
the grandsons of those joyous and vigorous sportsmen mincing their fish
and tit-bits at their favourite box in Bond-street; amalgamating their
ounce of salad on a silver saucer; employing six sauces to coax one
appetite; burning up the palate to make its enjoyments the more
exquisite; sipping their acid claret, disguised by an olive or
neutralized by a chesnut; lisping out for the scented waiter, and paying
him the price of a feast for the modicum of a Lilliputian, and the pay
of a captain for the attendance of a blackguard;—it amuses me extremely,
and makes me speculate on what their forefathers would have done to
those admirable Epicenes, if they had had them at the “Pilgrimage” in
the huntsman’s cottage.
To these extremes of former roughness and modern affectation, it would
require the pen of such a writer as Fielding to do ample justice. It
may, however, afford our reader some diversion to trace the degrees
which led from the grossness of the former down to the effeminacy of the
latter; and these may, in a great measure, be collected from the various
incidents which will be found scattered throughout these sketches of
sixty solar revolutions.
Nothing indeed can better illustrate the sensation which the
grandfathers, or even aged fathers, of these slim lads of the
Bond-street and St. James’s-street establishments, must have felt upon
finding their offspring in the elegant occupations I have just
mentioned, than an incident relating to Captain Parsons Hoye, of County
Wicklow, who several years since met with a specimen of the kind of lad
at Hudson’s, in Covent-Garden.
A nephew of his, an effeminate young fellow, who had been either on the
Continent or in London a considerable time, and who expected to be the
Captain’s heir, (being his sister’s son) accidentally came into the
coffee-room. Neither uncle nor nephew recollected each other; but old
Parsons’ disgust at the dandified manners, language, and dress of the
youth, gave rise to an occurrence which drew from the bluff seaman
epithets wonderfully droll, but rather too coarse to record:—the end of
it was, that, when Parsons discovered the relationship of the stranger,
(by their exchanging cards in anger,) he first kicked him out of the
coffee-room, and then struck him out of a will which he had made,—and
died very soon after, as if on purpose to mortify the macaroni!
Commodore Trunnion was a civilized man, and a beauty (but a fool),
compared to Parsons Hoye,—who had a moderate hereditary property near
Wicklow; had been a captain in the royal navy; was a bad farmer, a worse
sportsman, and a blustering justice of peace: but great at _potation_!
and what was called, “in the main, a capital fellow.” He was nearly as
boisterous as his adopted element: his voice was always as if on the
quarter-deck; and the whistle of an old boatswain, who had been
decapitated by his side, hung as a memento, by a thong of leather, from
his waistcoat button-hole. It was frequently had recourse to, and,
whenever he wanted a _word_, supplied the deficiency.
In form, the Captain was squat, broad, and coarse: a large purple nose,
with a broad crimson chin to match, were the only features of any
consequence in his countenance, except a couple of good-enough bloodshot
eyes, screened by most exuberant grizzle eye-brows. His powdered wig had
behind it a queue in the form of a hand-spike,—and a couple of rolled-up
paste curls, like a pair of carronades, adorned its broad-sides; a blue
coat, with slash cuffs and plenty of navy buttons, surmounted a scarlet
waistcoat with tarnished gold binding—the skirts of which, he said, he
would have of their enormous length because it assured him that the
tailor had put _all the cloth in it_; a black Barcelona adorned his
neck; while a large old round hat, bordered with gold lace, pitched on
his head, and turned up on one side, with a huge cockade stuck into a
buttonless loop, gave him a swaggering air. He bore a shillelagh, the
growth of his own estate, in a fist which would cover more ground than
the best shoulder of wether mutton in a London market.[20] Yet the
Captain had a look of generosity, good nature, benevolence, and
hospitality, which his features did their very best to conceal, and
which none but a good physiognomist could possibly discover.
-----
Footnote 20:
I once saw the inconvenience of that species of fist strongly
exemplified. The late Admiral Cosby, of Stradbally Hall, had as large
and as brown a fist as any admiral in His Majesty’s service. Happening
one day unfortunately to lay it on the table during dinner, at Colonel
Fitzgerald’s, Merrion Square, a Mr. Jenkins, a half-blind doctor, who
chanced to sit next to the admiral, cast his eye upon the fist: the
imperfection of his vision led him to believe it was a roll of French
bread, and, without further ceremony, the doctor thrust his steel fork
plump into the admiral’s fist. The confusion which resulted may be
easily imagined:—indeed, had the circumstance happened any where but
at a _private_ table, the doctor would probably never have had
occasion for another _crust_. As it was, a sharp fork, sticking a
sailor’s fist to the table, was rather too irritating an accident for
an admiral of the blue to pass over very quietly.
-----
MY BROTHER’S HUNTING-LODGE.
Waking the piper—Curious scene at my brother’s hunting-lodge—Joe Kelly’s
and Peter Alley’s heads fastened to the wall—Operations practised in
extricating them.
I met with another ludicrous instance of the dissipation of even later
days, a few months after my marriage. Lady B— and myself took a tour
through some of the southern parts of Ireland, and among other places
visited Castle Durrow, near which place my brother, Henry French
Barrington, had built a hunting cottage, wherein he happened to have
given a house-warming the previous day.
The company, as might be expected at such a place and on such an
occasion, was not the most select:—in fact, they were _hard-going_
sportsmen, and some of the half-mounted gentry were not excluded from
the festival.
Amongst others, Mr. Joseph Kelly, of unfortunate fate, brother to Mr.
Michael Kelly, (who by the bye does not say a word about him in his
Reminiscences,) had been invited, to add to the merriment by his
pleasantry and voice, and had come down from Dublin solely for the
purpose of _assisting_ at the banquet.
It may not be amiss to say something here of this remarkable person. I
knew him from his early youth. His father was a dancing-master in
Mary-street, Dublin; and I found in the newspapers of that period a
number of puffs, in French and English, of Mr. O’Kelly’s abilities in
that way—one of which, a certificate from a French _artiste_ of Paris,
is curious enough.[21] What could put it into his son’s head, that he
had been _Master of the Ceremonies at Dublin Castle_ is rather
perplexing! He became a wine-merchant latterly, dropped the O which had
been placed at the beginning of his name, and was a well-conducted and
respectable man.[22]
-----
Footnote 21:
Mr. O’Kelly is just returned from Paris. Ladies and gentlemen, who are
pleased to send their commands to No. 30, Mary-street, will be most
respectfully attended to.
* * * * *
Je certifie que M. Guillaume O’Kelly est venu à Paris pour prendre de
moi leçons, et qu’il est sorti de mes mains en état de pouvoir
enseigner la danse avec succès.
GARDEL, Maître à Danser de la Reine,
et Maître des Ballets du Roi.
À Paris, le 20ème Août, 1781.
Footnote 22:
But as he was a Roman Catholic, and as no Roman Catholic could then
hold any office in the vice-regal establishment of Dublin Castle, Mr.
M. Kelly must have been misinformed on that point as to his father,
whom I have often seen. Mr. Gofton, a dancing-master of Anne-street,
Linen Hall, and uncle to Doctor Barrett, the late extraordinary
vice-provost of Trinity College, was a friend of Mr. O’Kelly’s, and
taught me to the day of his death, which was sudden. Under his
tuition, I beat time and danced minuets for four years. Doctor Barrett
used to carry his uncle’s _kit_ till he entered Dublin College, of
which he died vice-provost. He had two brothers; the most promising
one was _eaten by a tiger_ in Dublin, the other died a pawnbroker.
-----
Joe was a slender young man, remarkably handsome; but what, in that part
of the country, they emphatically styled “the _devil_!” I recollect his
dancing a hornpipe upon the stage in a sailor’s costume most admirably.
He also sang the songs of Young Meadows, in “Love in a Village,”
extremely well, as likewise those of Macheath and other parts; but he
could never give the acting any effect. He was, strictly speaking, a
bravura singer;—there was no deep pathos—nothing _touchant_ in his
cadences;—but in drinking-songs, &c. he was unrivalled. As his brother
has not thought proper to speak about him, it might be considered out of
place for me to go into his history, all of which I know, and many
passages whereof might probably be both entertaining and instructive.
Some parts of it however are already on record, and others I hope will
_never_ be recorded. The Duke of Wellington knew Joe Kelly extremely
well; and if he had merited advancement, I dare say he would have
received it. The last conversation I had with him was on the Boulevard
Italien, in Paris. I was walking with my son, then belonging to the 5th
Dragoon Guards. Kelly came up and spoke to us. I shook him by the hand,
and he talked away:—spoke to my son—no answer;—he tried him again—no
reply. Kelly seemed surprised, and said, “Don’t you know me, Barrington?
why don’t you speak to me?”—“’Tis because I _do_ know you that I do
_not_ speak to you,” replied my son.—Kelly blushed, but turned it off
with a laugh. I could not then guess the reason for this cut direct; and
my son refused to tell me: I have since, however, become acquainted with
it, and think the sarcasm well merited. It was indeed the bitterer, from
its being the only one I ever heard my son utter. Joe Kelly killed his
man in a duel, for which he was tried, and narrowly escaped. According
to his own account indeed, he killed plenty at the battle of Waterloo,
and in other actions. He was himself shot at Paris by a commissary with
whom he had quarrelled, and the Irish humorists remarked thereupon that
Joe had “died a _natural death_.”
Of this convivial assemblage at my brother’s, he was, I take it, the
very life and soul. The dining-room (the only good one) had not been
finished when the day of the dinner-party arrived, and the lower parts
of the walls having only that morning received their last coat of
plaster, were, of course, totally wet.
We had intended to surprise my brother; but had not calculated on the
scene I was to witness. On driving to the cottage-door, I found it open,
whilst a dozen dogs, of different descriptions, showed themselves ready
to receive us not in the most polite manner. My servant’s whip, however,
soon sent them about their business, and I ventured into the parlour to
see what cheer. It was about ten in the morning: the room was strewed
with empty bottles—some broken—some interspersed with glasses, plates,
dishes, knives, spoons, &c.—all in glorious confusion. Here and there
were heaps of bones, relics of the former day’s entertainment, which the
dogs, seizing their opportunity, had cleanly picked. Three or four of
the Bacchanalians lay fast asleep upon chairs—one or two others on the
floor, among whom a piper lay on his back, apparently dead, with a
table-cloth spread over him, and surrounded by four or five candles,
burnt to the sockets; his chanter and bags were laid scientifically
across his body, his mouth was quite open, and his nose made ample
amends for the silence of his drone. Joe Kelly, and a Mr. Peter Alley,
from the town of Durrow, (one of the half-mounted gentry,) were fast
asleep in their chairs, close to the wall.
Had I never viewed such a scene before, it would have almost terrified
me; but it was nothing more than the ordinary custom which we called
_waking the piper_.[23]
-----
Footnote 23:
_Waking the piper_ was an ancient usage. When he had got too drunk to
play any more, he was treated as a corpse—stretched out, and candles
placed round him: while in this insensible state, they put the drone
of his pipe into his mouth, and blew the bellows till he was bloated.
This was called _blowing-up_ the piper with _false music_. It did him
no bodily harm, as burnt whiskey and plenty of pepper soon sent the
wind about its business, to the no small amusement of the company.
-----
I sent away my carriage and its fair inmate to Castle Durrow, whence we
had come, and afterward proceeded to seek my brother. No servant was to
be seen, man or woman. I went to the stables, wherein I found three or
four more of the goodly company, who had just been able to reach their
horses, but were seized by Morpheus before they could mount them, and so
lay in the mangers awaiting a more favourable opportunity. I apprehend
some of the horses had not been as considerate as they should have been
to tipsy gentlemen, since two or three of the latter had their heads cut
by being kicked or trampled on. Returning hence to the cottage, I found
my brother, also asleep, on the only bed which it then afforded: he had
no occasion to put on his clothes, since he had never taken them off.
I next waked Dan Tyron, a wood-ranger of Lord Ashbrook, who had acted as
maître d’hôtel in making the arrangements, and providing a horse-load of
game to fill up the banquet. I then inspected the parlour, and insisted
on breakfast. Dan Tyron set to work: an old woman was called in from an
adjoining cabin, the windows were opened, the room cleared, the floor
swept, the relics removed, and the fire lighted in the kitchen. The
piper was taken away senseless, but my brother would not suffer either
Joe or Alley to be disturbed till breakfast was ready. No time was lost;
and, after a very brief interval, we had before us abundance of fine
eggs, and milk fresh from the cow, with brandy, sugar and nutmeg in
plenty;—a large loaf, fresh butter, a cold round of beef, (which had not
been produced on the previous day,) red herrings, and a bowl-dish of
potatoes roasted on the turf ashes;—in addition to which, ale, whiskey,
and port made up the refreshments. All being duly in order, we at length
awakened Joe Kelly, and Peter Alley, his neighbour: they had slept
soundly, though with no other pillow than the wall; and my brother
announced breakfast with a _view holloa!_[24]
-----
Footnote 24:
The shout of hunters when the game is in view.
-----
The twain immediately started and roared in unison with their host most
tremendously! it was however in a very different tone from the _view
holloa_,—and continued much longer.
“Come boys,” says French, giving Joe a pull—“come!”
“Oh, murder!” says Joe, “I can’t!”—“Murder!—murder!” echoed Peter.
French pulled them again, upon which they roared the more, still
retaining their places. I have in my lifetime laughed till I nearly
became spasmodic; but never were my risible muscles put to greater
tension than upon this occasion. The wall, as I said before, had but
just received a coat of mortar, and of course was quite soft and
yielding when Joe and Peter, having no more cellarage for wine, and
their eyesight becoming opake, thought proper to make it their pillow;
it was nevertheless setting fast from the heat and lights of an eighteen
hours’ carousal; and, in the morning, when my brother awakened his
guests, the mortar had completely set, and their hair being the thing
best calculated to amalgamate therewith, the entire of Joe’s stock,
together with his queue, and half his head, was thoroughly and
irrecoverably bedded in the greedy and now marble cement;—so that if
determined to move, he must have taken the wall along with him, for
separate it would not. One side of Peter’s head was in the same state of
imprisonment, so as to give his bust the precise character of a
bas-relief. Nobody could assist them, and there they both stuck fast.
A consultation was now held on this pitiful case, which I maliciously
endeavoured to protract as long as I could, and which was every now and
then interrupted by a roar from Peter or Joe, as each made fresh efforts
to rise. At length, it was proposed by Dan Tyron to send for the
stone-cutter, and get him to cut them out of the wall with a chisel. I
was literally unable to speak two sentences for laughing. The old woman
meanwhile tried to soften the obdurate wall with melted butter and new
milk—but in vain. I related the school story how Hannibal had worked
through the Alps with vinegar and hot irons:—this experiment likewise
was made, but to no purpose; the hot irons touching _the raw_, only
added a new octave to the roars of the captives, and the Carthaginian
solvent had no better success than the old crone’s. Peter being of a
more passionate nature, grew ultimately quite outrageous: he bellowed,
gnashed his teeth, and swore vengeance against the mason;—but as he was
only held by one side, a thought at last struck him: he asked for two
knives, which being brought, he whetted one against the other, and
introducing the blades close to his skull, sawed away at cross corners
for half an hour, cursing and crying out during the whole operation,
till at length he was liberated, with the loss only of half his hair,
the skin of one jaw, and a piece of his scalp, which he had sliced off
in zeal and haste for his liberty. I never saw a fellow so extravagantly
happy! Fur was scraped from the crown of a new hat, to stop the
bleeding; his head was duly tied up with the old woman’s _praskeen_;[25]
and he was soon in a state of bodily convalescence. Our solicitude was
now required solely for Joe, whose head was too deeply buried to be
exhumated with so much facility. At this moment Bob Casey, of
Ballynakill, a very celebrated wig-maker, just dropped in, to see what
he could pick up honestly in the way of his profession, or steal in the
way of any thing else; and he immediately undertook to get Mr. Kelly out
of the mortar by a very ingenious but tedious process, namely,—clipping
with his scissors and then rooting out with an oyster knife. He thus
finally succeeded, in less than an hour, in setting Joseph Kelly, Esq.
once more at liberty, at the price of his queue, which was totally lost,
and of the exposure of his raw and bleeding occiput. The operation was,
indeed, of a mongrel description—somewhat between a complete _tonsure_
and an imperfect _scalping_, to both of which denominations it certainly
presented claims. However, it is an ill wind that blows nobody good! Bob
Casey got the making of a skull-piece for Joe, and my brother French had
the pleasure of paying for it, as gentlemen in those days honoured any
order given while enjoying their hospitality, by a guest, to the family
shop-keeper or artizan.
-----
Footnote 25:
A coarse dirty apron, worn by working women in a kitchen, in the
country parts of Ireland, and exhibiting an assemblage of every kind
of filth. Were you to ask a “Collough” why she keeps it so dirty, her
reply would be—“Sure nobody never heard of _washing_ a _praskeen_,
plaze your honor’s honor!”
-----
I ate a hearty breakfast, returned to Durrow, and, having rejoined my
companion, we pursued our journey to Waterford,—amusing ourselves the
greater part of the way with the circumstances just related, which,
however, I do not record merely as an abstract anecdote, but, as I
observed in starting, to show the manners and habits of Irish country
society and sportsmen,[26] even so recently as thirty-five years ago;
and to illustrate the changes of those habits and manners, and the
advances toward civilization, which, coupled with the extraordinary
_want of corresponding prosperity_, present phenomena I am desirous of
impressing upon my reader’s mind, throughout the whole of this
miscellaneous collection of original anecdotes and observations.
-----
Footnote 26:
Pipers at that time formed an indispensable part of every sporting
gentleman’s establishment. My father always had two—the ladies’ piper
for the dance, the gentlemen’s piper for occasions of drinking. These
men rendered that instrument the most expressive imaginable:—with a
piece of buff leather on their thigh, they made the double chanter
almost speak words, and by a humorous mode of jerking the bag, brought
out the most laughable species of chromatic conceivable.
They were in the habit of playing a piece called “the wedding,” in
which words were plainly articulated. The wedding-dinner, the dancing,
drinking, &c. all was expressed in a surprising manner. They also
played “the Hunt, or Hare in the Corn” through all its parts—the
hounds, the horns, the shouts, the chase, the death, &c. If the German
who composed the Battle of Prague had heard an old Irish piper, he
never would have attempted another instrumental imitation of words.
-----
CHOICE OF PROFESSION.
The Army—Irish volunteers described—Their military ardour—The author
inoculated therewith—He grows cooler—The Church—The Faculty—The
Law—Objections to each—Colonel Barrington removes his establishment to
the Irish capital—A country gentleman taking up a city residence.
My veering opinion as to a choice of profession was nearly decided by
that military ardour which seized all Ireland, when the whole country
had entered into a resolution to free itself for ever from English
domination. The entire kingdom took up arms—regiments were formed in
every quarter—the highest, the lowest, and the middle orders, all
entered the ranks of freedom, and every corporation, whether civil or
military, pledged life and fortune to attain and establish Irish
independence, but with the same constitution, and under the same king as
England, inseparably and for ever united. England tried to _evade_, as
she could not _resist_ this; but in 1782 Ireland was pronounced a free
and independent nation.
My father had raised and commanded two corps—a dragoon troop called the
Cullenagh Rangers, and the Ballyroan Light Infantry. My elder brother
commanded the Kilkenny Horse, and the Durrow Light Dragoons. The general
enthusiasm caught me; and before I well knew what I was about, I found
myself a martinet and a red-hot patriot. Having been a university man, I
was also considered to be of course a _writer_, and was accordingly
called on to draw up resolutions for volunteer regiments all over the
county. This was my first attempt at political subjects; and a general
declaration which I wrote being short enough and warm enough to be
comprehended by all the parties, it was unanimously adopted—every man
swearing, as he kissed the blade of his sword, that he would adhere to
these resolutions to the last drop of his blood, which he would by no
means spare, till we had finally achieved the independence of our
country. We were very sincere, and really, I think, determined to
perish, (if necessary) in the cause—at least, I am sure, I was.
The national point was gained, but not without much difficulty and
danger. The Irish parliament had refused to grant supplies to the crown
or pass a mutiny bill for more than six months. The people had entered
into resolutions to prevent the importation of any British merchandise
or manufactures. The entire kingdom had disavowed all English authority
or jurisdiction, external or internal; the judges and magistrates had
declined to act under British statutes:—the flame had spread rapidly,
and had become irresistible.
The British Government saw that either temporising or an appeal to force
would occasion the final loss of Ireland: 150,000 independent soldiers,
well armed, well clothed, and well disciplined, were not to be coped
with,—and England yielded.[27] Thus the volunteers kept their oaths:
they redeemed their pledge, and did not lay down their arms until the
independence of Ireland had been pronounced from the throne, and the
distinctness of the Irish nation promulgated in the government gazette
of London.
-----
Footnote 27:
The Irish patriots demanded 30,000 stand of arms from Government,
which the latter not being so circumstanced as to enable them to
refuse with safety, they were delivered to the volunteers, from the
ordnance stores in Dublin Castle, and distributed among those corps
which were least able to purchase arms.
-----
Having carried our point with the English, and proposed to prove our
independence by going to war with Portugal about our linens, we
completely set up for ourselves, except that Ireland was bound, as I
before said, constitutionally and irrevocably, never to have any king
but the King of Great Britain—whether _de jure_ or _de facto_, however,
was not specified.
We were now, in fact, regularly in a fighting mood; and being quite in
good humour with England, determined to fight the French, who had
threatened to invade us. I recollect a volunteer belonging to one of my
father’s corps, (a schoolmaster of the name of Beal,) proposing a
resolution to the Ballyroan Infantry, which purported, “that they would
never stop fighting the French till they had flogged every _sowl_ of
them into mincemeat!” This magnanimous resolution was adopted with
cheers, and was, as usual, sworn to, each hero kissing the muzzle of his
musket. In truth, the whole nation being well prepared for blows; and
disappointed, as a fellow-countryman gravely observed to me at the
period, of fighting the English, were quite _anxious_ to have a bout
with the French: so long, indeed, as they could get a good meal of
fighting, they were just then no great epicures as to _who_ were _served
up_.
I am not going any further into a history of those times, to which I
have alluded only to show what, for the moment, excited my warlike
ardour, and fixed my determination, although but temporarily, to adopt
the military profession.
On communicating this decision to my father, he procured me, from a
friend and neighbour, General Hunt Walsh, a commission in that officer’s
own regiment, the 30th. The style of the thing pleased me very
well:—but, upon being informed that I should immediately join the
regiment, in America, my heroic tendencies received a serious check. I
had not contemplated transatlantic emigration; and feeling that I could
get my head broken just as well in my own country, I, after a few days’
mature consideration, perceived my military ardour grow cooler and
cooler every hour—until, at length, it was obviously defunct. I
therefore wrote to the General a most thankful letter, at the same time
“begging the favour of him to present my commission in his regiment to
some hardier soldier, who could serve his majesty with more vigour; as
I, having been brought up by my _grandmother_, felt as yet too _tender_
to be any way effective on foreign service—though I had no objection to
fight as much as possible in Ireland, if necessary.” General Walsh
accepted my resignation, and presented my commission to a young friend
of his, (an only son) whose brains were blown out in the very first
engagement.
Having thus rejected the army, I next turned my thoughts to that very
opposite profession—the church. But though preaching was certainly a
much safer and more agreeable employment than bush-fighting, yet a
curacy and a wooden leg being pretty much on a parallel in point of
remuneration, and as I had the strongest objection to be either
dismembered or half starved, in the service of the king or the altar, I
also declined the cassock, assuring my father that “I felt I was not
steady enough to make an ‘exemplary parson;’ and as any other kind of
parson generally did more harm than good in a country, I could not, in
conscience, take charge of the morals of a flock of men, women, and
children, when I should have quite enough to do to manage my own; and
should therefore leave the church to some more orthodox graduate.”
Medicine was next in the list of professions to which I had,
abstractedly, some liking. I had attended several courses of anatomical
lectures at Dublin; and although with very repugnant feelings had
studied that most sublime of all sciences, human organization, by a
persevering attention to the celebrated wax-works of that university.
Yet my horror and disgust of _animal putridity_ in all its branches was
so great, (inclusive even of _stinking venison_, which most people
admire,) that all surgical practice by me was necessarily out of the
question; and medicine, without a touch of surgery, presenting no better
chance of making a fortune, shared a similar fate with the sword and the
pulpit.
Of the liberal and learned professions, there remained but one, namely,
the law. Now, as to this, I was told by several old practitioners, who
had retired into the country, (as I afterward found, from having no
business to do in town,) that if I were even as wise as Alfred, as
learned as Lycurgus, or as vociferous as Serjeant Toler,—nobody would
give me sixpence for all my law (if I had a hundred weight of it), until
I had spent at least ten years in watching the manufacture. However,
they consoled me by saying, that if I could put up with light eating
during that period, I might then have a very reasonable chance of
getting some briefs, particularly after inviting a gang of attorneys to
dine with me.—Here I was damped again! and though I should have broken
my heart if condemned to remain much longer a walking gentleman, I
determined to wait awhile, and see if nature would open my propensities
a little wider, and give me some more decisive indication of what she
thought me fittest for.
While in this comfortless state of indecision, my father, like other
country gentlemen, to gratify his lady under the amiable pretence of
educating the children, gave his consent to be launched into the new
scenes and pleasures of a city residence. He accordingly purchased an
excellent house in Clare-street, Merrion-square; left a steward in the
country to _mis_manage his concerns there; made up new wardrobes for the
servants; got a fierce three-cocked hat, with a gold button and loop to
it, for himself; and removed his establishment (the hounds excepted) to
the metropolis of Ireland.
Here my good and well-bred mother (for such she was) had her Galway
pride revived and gratified; the old green coach _de cérémonie_ was
regilt and regarnished, and four black geldings, with two postilions and
a sixteen-stone footman (in white, scarlet, and laced liveries)
completed her equipage.
I had my _bit of blood_ in the stable; my elder brother, who had been in
the First Horse, had plenty of them:—my father had his old hunter “brown
Jack;” and we set out at what is commonly called a _great rate_—but
which great rates are generally, like a fox-chase, more hot than
durable. However, the thing went on well enough; and during our city
residence many pleasurable and many whimsical incidents occurred to me
and other individuals of my family; one of which was most interesting to
myself, and will form a leading feature in my subsequent Sketches.
Before adverting to this, however, I will mention a lamentable event
which occurred during our stay in Clare-street, to a neighbour of ours,
Captain O’Flaherty, brother to Sir John, whom I shall hereafter notice.
The captain resided nearly facing us; and though the event I speak of,
and the very extraordinary incident which succeeded it, are clearly
digressions, yet the whole story is so singular, that I will, without
further apology, introduce it.
MURDER OF CAPTAIN O’FLAHERTY.
Murder of Captain O’Flaherty by Mr. Lanegan, his sons’ tutor, and Mrs.
O’Flaherty—The latter, after betraying her accomplice, escapes—Trial
of Lanegan—He is hanged and quartered at Dublin—Terrific appearance of
his supposed ghost to his pupil, David Lauder, and the author, at the
Temple, in London—Lauder nearly dies of fright—Lanegan’s extraordinary
escape; not even suspected in Ireland—He gets off to France, and
enters the Monastery of La Trappe—All-Hallow Eve—A church-yard
anecdote—My own superstition nearly fatal to me.
Captain O’Flaherty, a most respectable gentleman, resided in
Clare-street, Dublin, opposite my father’s house. He had employed a
person of the name of Lanegan, as tutor to the late John Burke
O’Flaherty, and his other sons. But after some little time Lanegan
became more attentive to Mrs. O’Flaherty, the mother, than to her boys.
This woman had certainly no charms either of appearance or address,
which might be thought calculated to captivate any one; and there was a
something indescribably repulsive in her general manners, in consequence
whereof all acquaintance between her and our family soon terminated. She
was not satisfied with the occasional society of Mr. Lanegan, whilst he
continued in the house as tutor, but actually proceeded to form a
criminal intercourse with him; and, in order to free herself from all
restraint, meditated the very blackest of human crimes, which she
determined to perpetrate by giving the unfortunate captain a
rice-pudding for his dinner, by virtue whereof she might at any rate be
saved the trouble of ever making another for him.
Mr. Lanegan was with this view sent by her to several apothecaries’
shops; at each of which, to avoid suspicion, he asked for a _very
little_ stuff _to kill the rats_; and thus, by small portions, they
ultimately procured a sufficient quantity to kill not only the rats, but
the husband into the bargain.
The murderous scheme was carried into execution by Mrs. O’Flaherty
herself, and the captain was found dead in his bed! Some misgivings,
however, were generated from the appearance of the body, which swelled
and exhibited black spots: and these, with other unequivocal signs,
conspired to prove that the rats (for they were actually dealt with) had
not been the only sufferers. The Coroner’s Inquest, indeed, soon decided
the matter, by a verdict of “_Poisoned by Arsenic_.”
Mrs. O’Flaherty and Mr. Lanegan began now to suspect that they were in
rather a ticklish situation, and determined to take a private journey
into the country until they should discover how things were likely to
go. The adulterous wife, full of crime and terror, conceived a suspicion
that Lanegan, who had only purchased the poison by her directions, and
had not administered it (except to the rats), might turn king’s
evidence, get the reward, and save himself by convicting her. Such a
catastrophe she therefore determined, if possible, to prevent.
On their journey she told him that, upon full consideration, she
conceived there could be no possibility of bringing conclusive evidence
against them, inasmuch as it would appear most probable that the captain
had, by accident, taken the poison himself—and that she was determined
to surrender and take her trial as soon as possible, recommending Mr.
Lanegan to do the same. In pursuance of this decision, as they passed
near the town of Gowran, County Kilkenny, she said, “There is the gate
of a magistrate: do you go up first, put on a bold face, assure him of
your entire innocence, and say that, as infamous and false reports have
been spread, both of yourself and me, you came expressly to surrender
and take your trial;—for that you could not live in society under such
vile imputations! Say, also, that you hear Mrs. O’Flaherty intends
likewise to surrender herself in the evening, and request that he will
be at home to receive her.”
Lanegan, suspecting no fraud, followed these instructions literally;—he
was secured, though without roughness, and preparations were made for
his being taken to Dublin next day in custody. The magistrate waited for
Mrs. O’Flaherty, but she did not appear: he sent down to his gate-house
to know if any lady had passed by: the porter informed him that a lady
and gentleman had been near the gate in a carriage, in the morning, and
that the gentleman got out and went up the avenue to the house, after
which the lady had driven away.
It now appearing that they had been actually together, and that Lanegan
had been telling falsehoods respecting his companion, strong suspicions
arose in the mind of the magistrate. His prisoner was confined more
closely, sent under a strong guard to Dublin, indicted for murder, and
tried at the ensuing commission.
Positive evidence was given of Lanegan’s criminal connexion with Mrs.
O’Flaherty, coupled with the strongest circumstantial proof against him.
He had not the courage boldly to deny the fact, and being found guilty,
was sentenced to be hanged and quartered; the former part of which
sentence having been carried into execution, his body, after a cut on
each limb, was delivered to his mother for burial.—Mrs. O’Flaherty
escaped beyond sea, and has, I believe, never since been heard of in the
country.
Such is the history which forms the prelude to an occurrence some time
afterward in which I was a party, and which may be regarded as a curious
illustration of stories of supposed ghosts.
A templar and a friend of mine, Mr. David Lauder, a soft, fat,
good-humoured, superstitious young fellow, was sitting in his lodgings,
(Devereux-court, London,) one evening at twilight. I was with him, and
we were agreeably employed in eating strawberries and drinking Madeira.
While chatting away in cheerful mood, and laughing loudly at some remark
made by one of us, my back being toward the door, I perceived my
friend’s colour suddenly change—his eyes seemed fixed and ready to start
out of his head—his lips quivered convulsively—his teeth chattered—large
drops of perspiration flowed down his forehead, and his hair stood
nearly erect.
As I saw nothing calculated to excite these emotions, I naturally
conceived my friend was seized with a fit, and rose to assist him. He
did not regard my movements in the least, but seizing a knife which lay
on the table, with the gait of a palsied man retreated backward—his eyes
still fixed—to a distant part of the room, where he stood shivering, and
attempting to pray; but not at the moment _recollecting_ any prayer, he
began to repeat his _catechism_, thinking it the _next best_ thing he
could do: as—“What is your name? David Lauder! Who gave you that name?
My godfathers and godmothers in my baptism!” &c. &c.
I instantly concluded the man was mad; and turning about to go for some
assistance, was myself not a little startled at sight of a tall,
rough-looking personage, many days unshaved, in a very shabby black
dress, and altogether of the most uncouth appearance. The stranger and I
stood for a moment opposite each other, staring and motionless: at
length he broke silence, and addressing my friend, said, in a low
croaking voice, “_Don’t be frightened_, Mr. Lauder; sure ’tis _me_
that’s here.”
When Davy heard the voice, he fell on his knees, and subsequently flat
upon his face, in which position he lay motionless.
The spectre (as I now began to imagine it was) stalked toward the door,
and I was in hopes he intended to make his _exit_ thereby; instead of
which, however, having deliberately shut and _bolted it_, he sat himself
down in the chair I had previously occupied, with a countenance nearly
as full of _horror_ as that of Davy Lauder himself.
I was now totally bewildered; and scarce knowing what to do, was about
to throw a jug of water over my friend, to revive him if possible, when
the stranger, in his croaking voice, cried—
“For the love of God, give me some of that,—for I am perishing!”—I
hesitated, but at length did so: he took the jug and drank immoderately.
My friend Davy now ventured to look up a little, and perceiving that I
was becoming so familiar with the goblin, his courage somewhat revived,
although his speech was still confused:—he stammered, rose upon his
knees, held up his hands as if in supplication, and gazed at the figure
for some time, but at length made up his mind that it was tangible and
mortal. The effect of this decision on the face of Davy was as ludicrous
as the fright had been. He seemed quite ashamed of his former terror,
and affected to be stout as a lion! though it was visible that he was
not at his ease. He now roared out in the broad, cursing Kerry dialect:
“Why then, blood and thunder! is that you, Lanegan?”
“Ah, Sir, speak low!” said the wretched being.
“How the devil,” resumed Davy, “did you get your four quarters stitched
together again, after the hangman cut them off of you at Stephen’s
Green!”
“Ah, Gentlemen!” exclaimed the poor culprit, “speak low: have mercy on
me, Master Davy; you know it was I taught you your Latin.—I’m starving
to death!”
“You shall not die in _that_ way, you villanous schoolmaster!” said
Davy, pushing toward him a loaf of bread and a bottle of wine that stood
on the table,—but standing aloof himself, as though not yet quite
decided as to the _nature_ of the intruder.
The miserable creature having eaten the bread with avidity, and drunk
two or three glasses of wine, the lamp of life once more seemed to
brighten up. After a pause, he communicated every circumstance relating
to his sudden appearance before us. He confessed having bought the
arsenic at the desire of Mrs. O’Flaherty, and that he was aware of the
application of it, but solemnly protested that it was _she_ who had
seduced _him_; he then proceeded to inform us that after having been
duly hanged, the sheriff had delivered his body to his mother, but not
until the executioner had given a slight cut on each limb, just to _save
the law_; which cuts bled profusely, and were probably the means of
preserving his life. His mother, conceiving that the vital spark was not
extinct, had put him into bed, dressed his wounded limbs, and rubbed his
neck with hot vinegar. Having steadily pursued this process, and
accompanied it by pouring warm brandy and water down his throat, in the
course of an hour he was quite sensible, but experienced horrid pains
for several weeks before his final recovery. His mother filled the
coffin he was brought home in with bricks, and got some men to bury it
the same night in Kilmainham burial-ground, as if ashamed to inter him
in open day. For a long time he was unable to depart, being every moment
in dread of discovery:—at length, however, he got off by night in a
smuggling boat, which landed him on the Isle of Man, and from thence he
contrived to reach London, bearing a letter from a priest at Kerry to
another priest who had lived in the Borough, the purport of which was to
get him admitted into a monastery in France. But finding the Southwark
priest was dead, he then went to Scotland, using various disguises; and
returning to town, was afraid, though possessing some little money sent
him by his mother, even to buy food, for fear of detection! but
recollecting that Mr. Lauder, his old scholar, lived somewhere in the
Temple, he had got directed by a porter to the lodging the night before.
My friend Davy, though he did not half like it, suffered this poor devil
to sit in the chamber till the following evening. He then procured him a
place in the night coach to Rye, from whence he got to St. Vallery, and
was received, as I afterward learnt from a very grateful letter which he
sent to Lauder, into the monastery of La Trappe, near Abbeville, where
he lived in strict seclusion, and died, as I heard, some years since.
This incident is not related as a mere isolated anecdote, unconnected
with any serious general considerations; but rather with a view to show
how many deceptions a man’s imagination may hastily subject him to; and
to impress the consideration that nothing should be regarded as
supernatural, which can by _possibility_ be the result of human
interference.
In the present case, if Lanegan had withdrawn before Lauder had arisen
and spoken to him, no reasoning upon earth could ever have convinced the
Templar of the materiality of the vision. As Lanegan’s restoration to
life after execution had not at that time been spoken of, nor even
suspected, Lauder would have willingly deposed, upon the Holy
Evangelists, that he had seen the _actual ghost_ of the schoolmaster who
had been hanged and quartered in Dublin a considerable time before; his
identification of the man’s person being rendered unequivocal from the
circumstance of his having been formerly Lanegan’s pupil. And I must
confess that I should myself have seen no reason to doubt Lauder’s
assertions, had the man withdrawn from the chamber before he spoke to
me—to do which, under the circumstances, it was by no means improbable
fear might have induced him.
Thus one of the “best authenticated ghost stories ever related” has been
lost to the history of supernatural occurrences. The circumstance,
however, did not cure Davy Lauder in the least of his dread of
apparitions, which was excessive.
Nor have I much right to reproach my friend’s weakness in this
particular. I have, on the other hand, throughout my observations
admitted—nay, I fear, occasionally boasted—that I was myself
_superstitious_. The species of reading I adopted and ardently pursued
from my infancy upward may, I admit, have impressed my mind indelibly;
and the consciousness of this fact should have served to render me
rather _sceptical_ than _credulous_ upon any subject that bore a
mysterious character.
My relations, whilst I was a boy, took it into their heads that I was a
decided coward in this way, which though I in round terms denied, I
freely admitted at the same time my coyness with regard to trying any
unnecessary experiments or making any superstitious invocations,
particularly on _Allhallow-eve_,[28] or other mysterious days, whereupon
a sort of bastard witchcraft is always practised in Ireland.
-----
Footnote 28:
The pranks formerly played in Ireland on _Allhallow-eve_, were
innumerable. The _devil_ was supposed to be at large on that night,
and permitted to make what prey he could among the human species, by
bringing them together. His principal occupation was therefore thought
to be match-making, and it was whispered that he got more subjects,
and set more Christians by the ears, through the sacrament of
matrimony, than all his other schemes put together. Matches were then
frequently made by burning nuts, turning shifts, &c.
-----
Hence I was universally ridiculed on those anniversaries for my
timidity; and, one Allhallow-eve, my father proposed to have a
prayer-book, with a £5 bank-note in it, left on a certain tomb-stone in
an old catholic burial-ground quite apart from any road, and covered
with trees. It was two or three fields’ distance from the
dwelling-house; and the proposal was, that if I would go there at twelve
o’clock at night, and bring back the book and a dead man’s bone, (many
of which latter were scattered about the cemetery,) the note should be
mine; and, as an additional encouragement, I was never after to be
charged with cowardice. My pride took fire, and I determined, even
though I might burst a blood-vessel through agitation, or break my neck
in running home again, I would perform the feat, and put an end to the
imputation.
The matter therefore was fully arranged. The night proved very dark; the
path was intricate, but I was accustomed to it. There were two or three
stiles to be crossed; and the Irish always conceive that if a ghost is
any where in the neighbourhood, he invariably chooses a stile at which
to waylay the passengers.
However, at the appointed hour I set out. I dare say most ladies and
gentlemen who may read this know what _palpitation of the heart_ means;
if so, let them be so good as to fancy an excess of that feeling, and
they may then form some idea of the sensations with which I first
touched the cold grave-stones of the dead, who, if they had possessed
any spirit, would have arisen, _en masse_, to defend their bones from
being made the subject of ridiculous experiment.
Having groped for some time in the dark, I found the book, but my hand
refused to lift it, and I sat down panting and starting at every rustle
of the foliage: through the gloom wherewith the trunks and branches of
the trees were invested, my excited imagination conjured up figures and
shapes which I expected, at every glance, would open into skeletons or
shrouded spectres! I would, at that moment, have given the world to be
at home again!—but I really could not stir: my breath had got too short,
and my eyesight too confused, for motion.
By degrees these sensations subsided. I obtained a little confidence;
the moving of a branch no longer startled me, and I should have got on
well enough had not an unlucky goat, which came roaming near the place,
though with a different object, thrown me into a complete relapse. At
the conclusion of about half an hour, however, which appeared to me at
least five-and-twenty years, I secured the book snugly in my pocket,
together with a dead man’s thigh-bone, which I tied up in a cloth
brought with me for the purpose; and, fastening this round my waist,
lest it should drop during my flight, I made a very rapid exit from this
scene of perilous achievement.
Having reached the house in triumph, and taken a large tumbler of wine,
I proceeded to exhibit my book, put the bank-note in my pocket, and with
an affectation of unconcern untied my cloth and flung my huge thigh-bone
upon the supper-table. I had my full revenge! The girls, who had been
amusing themselves by telling each other’s fortunes, tossing coffee,
burning nuts, turning shifts, writing _abracadabras_, &c. &c. &c., were
cruelly shocked—they all set up a loud shriek, and whilst some were half
swooning, others ran headlong out of the room, or rolled over the
chairs. My courage now grew rampant: I laughed at their terrors, saying,
if they pleased, they might leave the bone on the top of my bed till
morning, and that would sufficiently show, who was most in dread of dead
people!—
Confidence was at length restored on all sides. I was half cured of my
superstitious fears, and the family universally admitted that I
certainly should make a brave general if I went into the army. We made
merry till a late hour, when I retired joyously to bed, and sleep very
soon began to make still further amends for my terrors.
While dreaming away most agreeably, I was suddenly aroused by a rustling
noise for which I could not account. I sat up, and, upon listening,
found it to proceed from the top of my bed, whereon something was in
rapid motion. The dead man’s thigh-bone immediately started into my
recollection, and horrible ideas flashed across my mind. A profuse
perspiration burst out at once on my forehead, my hair rose, the cramp
seized both my legs, and just gathering power to call out “Murder,
Murder!—help, help!” I buried my head under the clothes. In this
situation, I could neither hear nor see, and was besides almost
suffocated: after awhile, I began to think I might have been dreaming,
and with that idea thrusting my head fearfully out, the bone (for that
it certainly was) sprang with a tremendous crash from the bed down
beside me upon the floor, where it exhibited as many signs of life
(probably more) than when its original owner was in legal possession of
it. Upon viewing this, my spirits sank again, I shook like a man in an
ague, gave some inarticulate screams, and at length dropped back, nearly
senseless, upon the pillow with my eyes covered.
How long I lay thus, I know not; I only remember that the bone still
continued its movements, and now and then striking a chair or table,
warned me of my probable fate from its justly enraged proprietor, who, I
was apprehensive, would soon appear to demand his undoubted property.
Had the scene continued long, I actually believe I should scarce have
survived it: but at last, paradise seemed all on the sudden to be
regained, though in no very orthodox way. A loud laugh at the door
clearly announced that I had been well played off upon by the ladies,
for my abrupt display of a dead man’s bone on a supper-table. The whole
of the young folks entered my room in a body, with candles; and after
having been reassured, and nourished by a tumbler of buttered white
wine, I obtained, by degrees, knowledge of the trick which had
occasioned a laugh so loud, so long, and so mortifying to my
self-conceit.
The device was simple enough: a couple of cords had been tied to the
bone, and drawn under the door, which was at the bed’s foot; and by
pulling these alternately, the conspirators kept the bone in motion,
until their good-humoured joke had well nigh resulted in the loss of
their kinsman’s reason.
My character for bravery as to supernaturals was thus finally
demolished;—and my general courage was also considered as a doubtful
matter, in consequence of a most plausible piece of argument used by old
Christopher Julian, a retired exciseman, who occasionally came down from
his little cottage to take some shrub-punch at my father’s house. He was
very humourous, and we all liked him.
“Sure, Master Jonah,” said the old gauger, “cowardice is occasioned only
by the fear of death?”
I assented.
“And whether a man comes to that death by another man or by a ghost,
it’s just the same thing to him?”
“Certainly,” said I, very inconsiderately giving in to him.
“Then,” said Kit Julian, triumphantly, “how the devil can a man be stout
as to a man, and afraid of a ghost? If I knew any such shy cocks, they
never should get into the revenue. The devil a smuggler ever they’d
face; and then heigh for the potsheen, and contrabands! If a man’s not
afraid for his own carcass, he’d never dread another man’s winding
sheet!”
“That’s true,” said my father, and the laugh was turned completely
against me.
ADOPTION OF THE LAW.
Marriage of my eldest brother—The bridesmaid, Miss D. W.—Female
attractions not dependent on personal beauty—Mutual
attachment—Illustration of the French phrase _je ne sais
quoi_—Betrothal of the author, and his departure for London, to study
for the Bar.
My father still conceived that the military profession was best suited
to my ardent and volatile spirit. I was myself, however, of a different
opinion; and fortune shortly fixed my determination. An accident
occurred, which, uniting passion, judgment, and ambition, led me to
decide that the Bar was the only road to my happiness or celebrity; and
accordingly I finally and irrevocably resolved that the law should be
the future occupation of my life and studies.
The recollection of the incident to which I have alluded excites, even
at this moment, all the sensibility and regret which can survive a grand
climacteric, and four-and-forty years of vicissitude. I shall not dilate
upon it extensively; and, in truth, were it not that these personal
fragments would be otherwise still more incomplete, I should remain
altogether silent on a subject which revives in my mind so many painful
reflections.
My elder brother married the only daughter of Mr. Edwards, of Old Court,
County Wicklow (niece to Mr. Tennison, M. P. County Monaghan). The
individuals of both families attended that marriage, which was indeed a
public one. The bridemaid of Miss Edwards was the then admired Miss D.
Whittingham. This lady was about my own age: her father had been a
senior fellow of Dublin University, and had retired on large church
preferments. Her uncle, with whom she was at that time residing, was a
very eminent barrister in the Irish capital. She had but one sister, and
I was soon brought to think she had no equal whatever.
They who read this will perhaps anticipate a story of a volatile lad
struck, in the midst of an inspiring ceremony, by the beauty of a lively
and engaging female, and surrendering without resistance his boyish
heart to the wild impulse of the moment. This supposition is, I admit, a
natural one; but it is unfounded. Neither beauty, nor giddy passion, nor
the glare of studied attractions, ever enveloped me in their labyrinths.
Nobody admired female loveliness more than myself; but beauty in _the
abstract_ never excited within me that delirium which has so impartially
made fools of kings and beggars—of heroes and cowards; and to which the
wisest professors of law, physic, and divinity, have from time
immemorial surrendered their liberty and their reason.
Regularity of feature is very distinct from expression of countenance,
which I never yet saw mere symmetry successfully rival. I thank Heaven,
that I never was either the captive or the victim of “perfect beauty;”
in fact, I never loved any handsome woman save one, who still lives, and
I hope will do so long: those whom I admired most (when I was of an age
to admire any) had no great reason to be grateful for her munificence to
creating Nature.
Were I to describe the person of D. Whittingham, I should say that she
had no beauty; but, on the contrary, seemed rather to have been selected
as a foil to set off the almost transparent delicacy of the bride whom
she attended. Her figure was graceful, it is true: her limbs fine, her
countenance _speaking_; yet I incline to think that few ladies would
have envied her perfections. Her dark and deep-sunk, yet animated and
penetrating eyes could never have reconciled their looking-glasses to
the sombre and swarthy complexion which surrounded them; nor the carmine
of her pouting lips to the disproportioned extent of feature which it
tinted. In fine, as I began, so will I conclude my personal
description—she had _no beauty_. But she seems this moment before me as
in a vision. I see her countenance, busied in unceasing converse with
her heart;—now illuminated by wit, now softened by sensibility—the wild
spirit of the former changing like magic into the steadier movements of
the latter;—the serious glance silently commanding caution, whilst the
counteracting smile at the same moment set caution at defiance. But upon
this subject I shall desist, and only remark further, that before I was
aware of the commencement of its passion, my whole heart was hers!
Miss Whittingham was at that time _the fashion_ in high society: many
admired, but I know of none who loved her save myself; and it must have
been through some attractive congeniality of mind that our attachment
became mutual.
It will doubtless appear unaccountable to many, whence the spell arose
by which I was so devoted to a female, from whom personal beauty seems
to have been withheld by Nature. I am unable to solve the enigma. I once
ventured myself to ask D. Whittingham if she could tell me _why_ I loved
her? She _answered_ by _returning the question_; and hence, neither of
us being able to give an explicit reason, we mutually agreed that the
query was _unanswerable_.
There are four short words in the French language which have a power of
expressing what in English is inexplicable—_Je ne sais quoi_; and to
these, in my dilemma, I resorted. I do not now wish the phrase to be
understood in a mere _sentimental_ vein,—or, in the set terms of young
ladies, as “a _nice_ expression!” In my mind it is an _amatory idiom_;
and, in those few words, conveys more meaning than could a hundred
pages: I never recollect its being seriously applied by any man till he
had got into a decided _partiality_.
I have said that the phrase is inexplicable; but, in like manner as we
are taught to aim at perfection whilst we know it to be unattainable, so
will I endeavour to characterise the _Je ne sais quoi_ as meaning a
species of indefinable grace which gives despotic power to a female.
When we praise in detail the abstract beauties or merits of a woman,
each of them may form matter for argument, or a subject for the exercise
of various tastes; but of the _Je ne sais quoi_ there is no
specification, and upon it there can be no reasoning. It is that
fascinating enigma which expresses _all_ without expressing _any thing_;
that mysterious source of attraction which we can neither discover nor
account for; and which nor beauty, nor wit, nor education, nor any
thing, but _nature_, ever can create.
D. Whittingham was the _fashion_:—but she depended solely, as to
fortune, on her father and her uncle. I was the third son of a largely
estated, but not at all prudent family, and was entitled to a younger
child’s portion, in addition to some exclusive property of my own (from
my grandmother): but I had passed twenty-one, and not even fixed on a
profession—therefore, the only probable result of our attachment seemed
to be misery and disappointment. Notwithstanding, when in the same
neighbourhood, we met,—when separate, we corresponded; but her good
sense at length perceived that some end must be put to this state of
clandestine correspondence, from which, although equally condemning it,
we had not been able to abstain. Her father died, and she became
entitled to a third of his estate and effects; but this accession was
insufficient to justify the accomplishment of our union. I saw, and,
with a half-broken heart, acquiesced in, her view of its impossibility
until I should have acquired some productive profession. She suggested
that there was no other course but the Bar, which might conciliate her
uncle. The hint was sufficient, and we then agreed to have a ceremony of
_betrothal_ performed by a clergyman, and to separate the next moment,
never to meet again until Fortune, if ever so disposed, should smile
upon us.
The ceremony was accordingly performed by a clerical person in the
parlour of the post-office at Bray, County Wicklow; and immediately
afterward I went on board a packet for England, determined, if possible,
to succeed in a profession which held out a reward so essential to my
happiness.
I did succeed in that profession: but, alas! she for whose sake my toil
was pleasure had ceased to exist. I never saw her more! Her only sister
still lives in Merrion Square, Dublin, and in her has centred all the
property of both the father and uncle. She is the widow of one of my
warmest friends, Mr. Burne, a king’s counsel.
I hasten to quit a subject to me so distressing. Some very peculiar
circumstances attended, as I learned, the death of that most excellent
of women; but a recital of these would only increase the impression
which I fear I have already given grounds for, that I am deeply
superstitious. However, I have not concealed so important an incident of
my life hitherto not published, and I have done.
A DUBLIN BOARDING-HOUSE.
Sketch of the company and inmates—Lord Mountmorris—Lieut. Gam Johnson,
R. N.—Sir John and Lady O’Flaherty—Mrs. Wheeler—Lady and Miss
Barry—Memoir and character of Miss Barry, afterward Mrs.
Baldwin—Ruinous effects of a dramatic education exemplified—Lord
Mountmorris’s duel with the Honourable Francis Hely Hutchinson at
Donnybrook—His Lordship wounded—Marquis of Ely, his second.
After my return to Dublin from the Temple, before I could suit myself
with a residence to my satisfaction, I lodged at the house of Mr. Kyle,
in Frederick-street, uncle to the present provost of Dublin University.
Mrs. Kyle was a remarkably plain woman, of the most curious figure,
being round as a ball; but she was as good as she was ordinary. This
worthy creature, who was a gentlewoman by birth, had married Kyle, who,
though of good family, had been a trooper. She had lived many years, as
companion, with my grandmother, and, in fact, regarded me as if I had
been her own child.
In her abode so many human curiosities were collected, and so many
anecdotes occurred, that, even at this distance of time, the
recollection amuses me. Those who lodged in the house dined in company:
the table was most plentifully served, and the party generally comprised
from eight to ten select persons. I will endeavour to sketch the leading
members of the society there at the period of which I speak; and first
on the list I will place the late Lord Mountmorris, of celebrated
memory. He was a very clever and well-informed, but eccentric man;—one
of the most ostentatious and at the same time parsimonious beings in the
world. He considered himself by far the greatest orator and politician
in Europe; and it was he who sent a florid speech, which he _intended_
to have spoken in the Irish House of Lords, to the press:—the debate on
which it was to be spoken did not ensue; but his Lordship having
neglected to countermand the publication, his studied harangue appeared
next day in the Dublin newspapers with all the supposititious
_cheerings_, &c. duly interposed! I believe a similar _faux pas_ has
been committed by some English nobleman.
His Lordship, at the period in question, was patronising what is
commonly ycleped a _led captain_—one Lieutenant Ham or Gam Johnson, of
the royal navy, brother to the two judges and the attorney. He was not,
however, a led captain in the _vulgar_ application: he was an
independent-minded man, and a brave officer; but, like many others,
sought for patronage because _he could not get on without it_. Though
not absolutely _disgusting_, Lieut. Johnson was certainly one of the
ugliest men in Christendom. It was said of him that he need never fire a
shot, since his countenance alone was sufficient to frighten the bravest
enemy. His bloated visage, deeply indented by that cruel ravager of all
comeliness, the smallpox, was nearly as large as the body which
supported it, and that was by no means diminutive. Yet he was civil and
mild, and had, withal, a much higher character as an officer than his
captain in the Artois frigate, Lord Charles Fitzgerald, who, it was at
that time thought, conceived that a sound nap was as good as a hard
battle.
Next in the company came Sir John O’Flaherty, Bart. (whose brother had
been poisoned by Lanegan), and Lady O’Flaherty his _sposa_. He was a
plain, agreeable country gentleman. Her Ladyship was to the full as
_plain_, but not quite so agreeable. However, it was (as Mrs. Kyle said)
a very _respectable_ thing, at a boarding-house, to hear—“_Sir John_
O’Flaherty’s health!”—and “_Lady_ O’Flaherty’s health!”—drunk or
hobnobbed across the table.—They formed, indeed, excellent stuffing to
cram in between my Lord Mountmorris and the simple _gentry_.
Lady Barry, widow of the late Sir Nathaniel Barry, Bart., and mother of
Sir Edward, (who was also an occasional guest,) follows in my catalogue,
and was as valuable a _curiosity_ as any of the set.—She, too, was a
good ingredient in the _stuffing_ department.
Mrs. Wheeler, the grandmother of Sir Richard Jonah Denny Wheeler Cuffe,
a cousin of mine, gave up her whole attention to lap-dogs; and neither
she nor the last-mentioned dowager were by any means averse to the
fermented grape—though we never saw either of them “_very_ far gone.”
Lady Barry’s only daughter, afterward Mrs. Baldwin, was also of the
party. Though this young female had not a beautiful face, it was
peculiarly pleasing, and she certainly possessed one of the finest of
figures,—tall, and slender in its proportions, and exquisitely graceful.
Her father, Sir Nathaniel Barry, many years the principal physician of
Dublin, adored his daughter, and had spared neither pains nor expense on
her education. She profited by all the instruction she received, and was
one of the most accompli
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