THE REASON WHY FATHER TOM WAS NOT MADE A CARDINAL.
Hurroo, my darlings!--didn't I tell you it 'ud never do? Success to
bould John Tuam and the old siminary of Firdramore! Oh, more power
to your Grace every day you rise, 'tis you that has broken their
Boord into shivers undher your feet! Sure, and isn't it a proud day
for Ireland, this blessed feast ov the chair ov Saint Pether? Isn't
Carlisle and Whately smashed to pieces, and their whole college ov
swaddling teachers knocked into smidhereens. John Tuam, your sowl, has
tuck his pasthoral staff in his hand and beathen them out o' Connaught
as fast ever Pathrick druve the sarpints into Clew Bay. Poor ould
Mat Kavanagh, if he was alive this day, 'tis he would be the happy
man. "My curse upon their g'ographies and Bibles," he used to say;
"where's the use ov perplexing the poor childer wid what we don't
undherstand ourselves?" no use at all, in troth, and so I said from
the first myself. Well, thank God and his Grace, we'll have no more
thrigonomethry nor scripther in Connaught. We'll hould our lodges every
Saturday night, as we used to do, wid our chairman behind the masther's
desk, and we'll hear our mass every Sunday morning wid the blessed
priest standing afore the same. I wisht to goodness I hadn't parted
wid my Seven Champions ov Christendom and Freney the Robber; they're
books that'll be in great requist in Leithrim as soon as the pasthoral
gets wind. Glory be to God! I've done wid their lecthirs--they may
all go and be d----d wid their consumption and production. I'm off to
Tullymactaggart before daylight in the morning, where I'll thry whether
a sod or two o' turf can't consume a cartload ov heresy, and whether a
weekly meeting ov the lodge can't produce a new thayory ov rints. But
afore I take my lave ov you, I may as well finish my story about poor
Father Tom that I hear is coming up to whale the heretics in Adam and
Eve during the Lint.
The Pope--and indeed it ill becomes a good Catholic to say anything
agin him--no more would I, only that his Riv'rence was in it--but you
see that the fact ov it is, that the Pope was as envious as ever he
could be, at seeing himself sacked right and left by Father Tom, and
bate out o' the face, the way he was, on every science and subjec'
that was started. So, not to be outdone altogether, he says to his
Riv'rence, "You're a man that's fond ov the brute crayation, I hear,
Misther Maguire?"
"I don't deny it," says his Riv'rence; "I've dogs that I'm willing to
run agin any man's, ay, or to match them agin any other dogs in the
world for genteel edication and polite manners," says he.
"I'll hould you a pound," says the Pope, "that I've a quadhruped in my
possession that's a wiser baste nor any dog in your kennel."
"Done," says his Riv'rence, and they staked the money.
"What can this larned quadhruped o' yours do?" says his Riv'rence.
"It's my mule," says the Pope, "and if you were to offer her goolden
oats and clover off the meadows o' Paradise, sorra taste ov aither
she'd let pass her teeth till the first mass is over every Sunday or
holiday in the year."
"Well, and what 'ud you say if I showed you a baste of mine," says his
Riv'rence, "that, instead ov fasting till first mass is over only,
fasts out the whole four-and-twenty hours ov every Wednesday and Friday
in the week as reg'lar as a Christian?"
"Oh, be aisy, Misther Maguire," says the Pope.
"You don't b'lieve me, don't you?" says his Riv'rence; "very well, I'll
soon show you whether or no," and he puts his knuckles in his mouth,
and gev a whistle that made the Pope stop his fingers in his ears. The
aycho, my dear, was hardly done playing wid the cobwebs in the cornish,
when the door flies open, and in jumps Spring. The Pope happened to be
sitting next the door, betuxt him and his Riv'rence, and, may I never
die, if he didn't clear him, thriple crown and all, at one spang.
"God's presence be about us!" says the Pope, thinking it was an evil
spirit come to fly away wid him for the lie that he had tould in
regard ov his mule (for it was nothing more nor a thrick that consisted
in grasing the brute's teeth): but, seeing it was one ov the greatest
beauties ov a grayhound that he'd ever laid his epistolical eyes on, he
soon recovered ov his fright, and began to pat him, while Father Tom
ris and went to the sideboord, where he cut a slice ov pork, a slice
ov beef, a slice ov mutton, and a slice ov salmon, and put them all on
a plate thegither. "Here, Spring, my man," says he, setting the plate
down afore him on the hearthstone, "here's your supper for you this
blessed Friday night." Not a word more he said nor what I tell you;
and, you may believe it or not, but it's the blessed truth that the
dog, afther jist tasting the salmon, and spitting it out again, lifted
his nose out o' the plate, and stood wid his jaws wathering, and his
tail wagging, looking up in his Riv'rence's face, as much as to say,
"Give me your absolution, till I hide them temptations out o' my sight."
"There's a dog that knows his duty," says his Riv'rence; "there's a
baste that knows how to conduct himself aither in the parlor or the
field. You think him a good dog, looking at him here; but I wisht you
seen him on the side ov Slieve-an-Eirin! Be my soul, you'd say the hill
was running away from undher him. Oh I wisht you had been wid me," says
he, never letting on to see the dog at all, "one day, last Lint, that I
was coming from mass. Spring was near a quarther ov a mile behind me,
for the childher was delaying him wid bread and butther at the chapel
door; when a lump ov a hare jumped out ov the plantations ov Grouse
Lodge and ran acrass the road; so I gave the whilloo, and knowing that
she'd take the rise ov the hill, I made over the ditch, and up through
Mullagheashel as hard as I could pelt, still keeping her in view, but
afore I had gone a perch, Spring seen her, and away the two went like
the wind, up Drumrewry, and down Clooneen, and over the river, widout
his being able ons't to turn her. Well, I run on till I came to the
Diffagher, and through it I went, for the wather was low and I didn't
mind being wet shod, and out on the other side, where I got up on a
ditch, and seen sich a coorse as I'll be bound to say was never seen
afore or since. If Spring turned that hare ons't that day, he turned
her fifty times, up and down, back and for'ard throughout and about.
At last he run her right into the big quarryhole in Mullaghbawn, and
when I went up to look for her fud, there I found him sthretched on his
side, not able to stir a foot, and the hare lying about an inch afore
his nose as dead as a door-nail, and divil a mark ov a tooth upon her.
Eh, Spring, isn't that thrue?" says he. Jist at that minit the clock
sthruck twelve, and, before you could say thrap-sticks, Spring had the
plateful ov mate consaled. "Now," says his Riv'rence, "hand me over my
pound, for I've won my bate fairly."
"You'll excuse me," says the Pope, pocketing his money, "for we put the
clock half an hour back, out ov compliment to your Riv'rence," says he,
"and it was Sathurday morning afore he came up at all."
"Well, it's no matther," says his Riv'rence, putting back his
pound-note in his pocket-book, "only," says he, "it's hardly fair
to expect a brute baste to be so well skilled in the science ov
chronology."
In troth his Riv'rence was badly used in the same bate, for he won
it clever; and, indeed, I'm afraid the shabby way he was thrated had
some effect in putting it into his mind to do what he did. "Will your
Holiness take a blast ov the pipe?" says he, dhrawing out his dhudeen.
"I never smoke," says the Pope, "but I haven't the laste objection to
the smell ov the tobaccay."
"Oh, you had better take a dhraw," says his Riv'rence, "it'll relish
the dhrink, that 'ud be too luscious entirely, widout something to
flavor it."
"I had thoughts," said the Pope, wid the laste sign ov a hiccup on him,
"ov getting up a broiled bone for the same purpose."
"Well," says his Riv'rence, "a broiled bone 'ud do no manner ov harm at
this present time; but a smoke," says he, "'ud flavor both the divil
and the dhrink."
"What sort o' tobaccay is it that's in it?" says the Pope.
"Raal nagur-head," says his Riv'rence; "a very mild and salubrious
spacies ov the philosophic weed."
"Then, I don't care if I do take a dhraw," says the Pope. Then Father
Tom held the coal himself till his Holiness had the pipe lit; and they
sat widout saying anything worth mentioning for about five minutes.
At last the Pope says to his Riv'rence: "I dunna what gev me this
plaguy hiccup," says he. "Dhrink about," says he--"Begorra," he says,
"I think I'm getting merrier nor's good for me. Sing us a song, your
Riv'rence," says he.
Father Tom then sung him Monatagrenoge and the Bunch o' Rushes, and
he was mighty well pleased wid both, keeping time wid his hands, and
joining in the choruses, when his hiccup 'ud let him. At last, my dear,
he opens the lower buttons ov his waistcoat, and the top one ov his
waistband, and calls to Master Anthony to lift up one ov the windys. "I
dunna what's wrong wid me, at all at all," says he, "I'm mortial sick."
"I thrust," says his Riv'rence, "the pasthry that you ate at dinner
hasn't disagreed wid your Holiness's stomach."
"Oh my! oh!" says the Pope, "what's this at all?" gasping for
breath, and as pale as a sheet, wid a could swate bursting out over
his forehead, and the palms ov his hands spread out to catch the
air. "Oh my!--oh my!" says he, "fetch me a basin!--Don't spake
to me. Oh!--oh!--blood alive!--Oh, my head, my head, hould my
head!--oh!--ubh!--I'm poisoned!--ach!"
"It was them plaguy pasthries," says his Riv'rence. "Hould his head
hard," says he, "and clap a wet cloth over his timples. If you could
only thry another dhraw o' the pipe, your Holiness, it 'ud set you to
rights in no time."
"Carry me to bed," says the Pope, "and never let me see that wild Irish
priest again. I'm poisoned by his manes--ubplsch!--ach!--ach!--He dined
wid Cardinal Wayld yesterday," says he, "and he's bribed him to take me
off. Send for a confissor," says he, "for my latther end's approaching.
My head's like to split--so it is!--Oh my! oh my!--ubplsch!--ach!"
Well, his Riv'rence never thought it worth his while to make him an
answer; but, when he seen how ungratefully he was used, afther all his
throuble in making the evening agreeable to the ould man, he called
Spring, and put the but-end ov the second bottle into his pocket, and
left the house widout once wishing "Good-night, an' plaisant dhrames
to you;" and, in troth, not one of _them_ axed him to lave them a lock
ov his hair.
That's the story as I heard it tould; but myself doesn't b'lieve over
one-half ov it. Howandiver, when all's done, it's a shame, so it is,
that he's not a bishop this blessed day and hour: for, next to the
goiant ov St. Jarlath's, he's out and out the cleverest fellow ov the
whole jing-bang.