A few nights after the conversation I have briefly alluded to, and
pretty much about the same hour, I aroused myself from the depression of
nearly thirty hours' sea-sickness, on hearing that at length we were in
the bay of Dublin. Hitherto I had never left the precincts of the narrow
den denominated my berth; but now I made my way eagerly on deck, anxious
to catch a glimpse, however faint, of that bold coast I had more than
once heard compared with, or even preferred to, Naples. The night,
however, was falling fast, and, worse still, a perfect down-pour of rain
was falling with it; the sea ran high, and swept the little craft
from stem to stern; the spars bent like whips, and our single topsail
strained and stretched as though at every fresh plunge it would part
company with us altogether. No trace or outline of the coast could
I detect on any side; a deep red light appearing and disappearing at
intervals, as we rode upon or sank beneath the trough of the sea, was
all that my eye could perceive: this the dripping helmsman briefly
informed me was the “Kish,” but, as he seemed little disposed for
conversation, I was left to my unassisted ingenuity to make out whether
it represented any point of the capital we were approaching or not.
The storm of wind and rain increasing at each moment, drove me once more
back to the cabin, where, short as had been the period of my absence,
the scene had undergone a most important change. Up to this moment my
sufferings and my seclusion gave me little leisure or opportunity to
observe my fellow travellers. The stray and scattered fragments of
conversation that reached me, rather puzzled than enlightened me. Of the
topics which I innocently supposed occupied all human attention, not a
word was dropped; Carlton House was not once mentioned; the St. Leger
and the Oaks not even alluded to; whether the Prince's breakfast was to
come off at Knights-bridge or Progmore, no one seemed to know, or even
care; nor was a hint dropped as to the fashion of the new bearskins
the Guards were to sport at the review on Hounslow. The price of
pigs, however, in Ballinasloe, they were perfect in. Of a late row
in Kil--something, where one half of the population had massacred the
other, they knew everything, even to the names of the defunct. A few
of the better dressed chatted over country matters, from which I
could glean that game and gentry were growing gradually scarcer; but a
red-nosed, fat old gentleman, in rusty black and high boots, talked
down the others by an eloquent account of the mawling that he, a
certain Father Tom Loftus, had given the Reverend Paul Strong, at a late
controversial meeting in the Rotunda.
[Illustration: 2-0044]
Through all this “bald, disjointed chat,” unceasing demands were made
for bottled porter, “matarials,” or spirits and wather, of which, were
I to judge from the frequency of the requests, the consumption must have
been awful.
There would seem something in the very attitude of lying down that
induces reflection, and, thus stretched at full length in my berth, I
could not help ruminating upon the land I was approaching, in a spirit
which, I confess, accorded much more with my mother's prejudices than my
father's convictions. From the few chance phrases dropped around me,
it appeared that even the peaceful pursuits of a country market, or
the cheerful sports of the field, were followed up in a spirit of
recklessness and devilment; so that many a head that left home without
a care, went back with a crack in it. But to return once more to the
cabin. It must be borne in mind that some thirty odd years ago the
passage between Liverpool and Dublin was not, as at present, the rapid
flight of a dozen hours, from shore to shore; where, on one evening,
you left the thundering din of waggons, and the iron crank of cranes
and windlasses, to wake the next morning with the rich brogue of Paddy
floating softly around you. Far from it! the thing was then a voyage.
You took a solemn leave of your friends, you tore yourself from the
embraces of your family, and, with a tear in your eye and a hamper on
your arm, you betook yourself to the pier to watch, with an anxious and
a beating heart, every step of the three hours' proceeding that
heralded your departure. In those days there was some honour in being
a traveller, and the man who had crossed the Channel a couple of times
became a kind of Captain Cook among his acquaintances.
The most singular feature of the whole, however, and the one to which
I am now about to allude, proceeded from the fact that the steward in
those days, instead of the extensive resources of the present period,
had little to offer you, save some bad brandy and a biscuit, and
each traveller had to look to his various wants with an accuracy and
foresight that required both tact and habit. The mere demands of hunger
and thirst were not only to be considered in the abstract, but a point
of far greater difficulty, the probable length of the voyage, was to be
taken into consideration; so that you bought your beefsteaks with your
eye upon the barometer, and laid in your mutton by the age of the moon.
While thus the agency of the season was made to react upon your stomach,
in a manner doubtless highly conducive to the interests of science, your
part became one of the most critical nicety.
Scarcely were you afloat, and on the high seas, when your appetite was
made to depend on the aspect of the weather. Did the wind blow fresh and
fair, you eat away with a careless ease and a happy conscience, highly
beneficial to your digestion. With a glance through the skylight at
the blue heaven, with a sly look at the prosperous dog-vane, you helped
yourself to the liver wing, and took an extra glass of your sherry.
Let the breeze fall, however, let a calm come on, or, worse still,
a trampling noise on deck, and a certain rickety motion of the craft
betoken a change of wind, the knife and fork fell listlessly from your
hand, the unlifted cutlet was consigned to your plate, the very spoonful
of gravy you had devoured in imagination was dropped upon the dish, and
you replaced the cork in your bottle, with the sad sigh of a man who
felt that, instead of his income, he has been living on the principal of
his fortune.
Happily, there is a reverse to the medal, and this it was to which now
my attention was directed. The trip as occasionally happened, was a
rapid one; and while under the miserable impression that a fourth part
of the journey had not been accomplished, we were blessed with the
tidings of land. Scarcely was the word uttered, when it flew from mouth
to mouth; and I thought I could trace the elated look of proud and happy
hearts, as home drew near. What was my surprise, however, to see the
enthusiasm take another and very different channel. With one accord a
general rush was made upon the hampers of prog. Baskets were burst open
on every side. Sandwiches and sausages, porter bottles, cold punch,
chickens, and hard eggs, were strewn about with a careless and reckless
profusion; none semed too sick or too sore for this general epidemic
of feasting. Old gentlemen sat up in their beds and bawled for beef;
children of tender years brandished a drumstick. Individuals who but a
short half-hour before seemed to have made a hearty meal, testified by
the ravenous exploits of their appetites to their former forbearance and
abstemiousness. Even the cautious little man in the brown spencer, who
wrapped up the remnant of his breakfast in the _Times_, now opened his
whole store, and seemed bent upon a day of rejoicing. Never was such a
scene of riotous noise and tumultuous mirth. Those who scowled at each
other till now, hob-nobbed across the table; and simpering old maids
cracked merry thoughts with gay bachelors, without even a passing fear
for the result. “Thank Heaven,” said I, aloud, “that I see all this with
my sense and my intellects clear about me.” Had I suddenly awoke to such
a prospect from the disturbed slumber of sickness» the chances were ten
to one I had jumped overboard, and swam for my life. In fact, it
could convey but one image to the mind, such as we read of, when some
infuriated and reckless men, despairing of safety, without a hope left,
resolve upon closing life in the mad orgies of drunken abandonment.
Here were the meek, the tranquil, the humble-minded, the solitary, the
seasick, all suddenly converted into riotous and roystering feasters.
The lips that scarcely moved, now blew the froth from a porter cup with
the blast of a Boreas: and even the small urchin in the green face and
nankeen jacket, bolted hard eggs with the dexterity of a clown in a
pantomime. The end of all things (eatable) had certainly come. Chickens
were dismembered like felons, and even jokes and witticisms were bandied
upon the victuals. “What, if even yet,” thought I, “the wind should
change!” The idea was a malicious one, too horrible to indulge in. At
this moment the noise and turmoil on deck apprised me that our voyage
was near its termination.
[Illustration: 2-0049]
The night, as I have said, was dark and stormy. It rained too--as it
knows only how to rain in Ireland. There was that steady persistence,
that persevering monotony of down-pour, which, not satisfied with
wetting you to the skin, seems bent upon converting your very blood into
water. The wind swept in long and moaning gusts along the bleak pier,
which, late and inclement as it was, seemed crowded with people.
Scarcely was a rope thrown ashore, when we were boarded on every side,
by the rigging, on the shrouds, over the bulwarks, from the anchor to
the taffrail; the whole population of the island seemed to flock in upon
us; while sounds of welcome and recognition resounded on all sides--
“How are you, Mister Maguire?” “Is the mistress with you?” “Is that you,
Mr. Tierney?” “How are you, ma'am?” “And yourself, Tim?” “Beautiful,
glory be to God!” “A great passage, entirely, ma'am.” “Nothing but rain
since I seen you.” “Take the trunks up to Mrs. Tun-stall; and, Tim,
darling, oysters and punch for four.”
“Great mercy!” said I, “eating again!”
“Morrisson, your honour,” said a ragged ruffian, nudging me by the
elbow.
“Reilly, sir; isn't it? It's me, sir--the Club. I'm the man always
drives your honour.”
“Arrah, howld your prate,” said a deep voice, “the gentleman hasn't time
to bless himself.”
“It's me, sir; Owen Daly, that has the black horse.”
“More by token, with a spavin,” whispered another; while a roar of
laughter followed the joke.
“A car, sir--take you up in five minutes.”
“A chaise, your honour--do the thing dacently.”
Now, whether my hesitation at this moment was set down by the crowd of
my solicitors to some doubt of my solvency or not, I cannot say; but
true it is, their tone of obsequious entreaty gradually changed into one
of rather caustic criticism.
“Maybe it's a gossoon you'd like to carry the little trunk.”
“Let him alone; it's only a carpet-bag; he'll carry it himself.”
“Don't you see the gentleman would rather walk; and as the night is
fine, 'tis pleasanter--and--cheaper.”
“Take you for a fipp'ny bit and a glass of sparits,” said a gruff voice
in my ear.
By this time I had collected my luggage together, whose imposing
appearance seemed once more to testify in my favour, particularly the
case of my cocked-hat, which to my ready-witted acquaintances proclaimed
me a military man. A general rush was accordingly made upon my luggage;
and while one man armed himself with a portmanteau, another laid hands
on a trunk, a third a carpet-bag, a fourth a gun-case, and so on until
I found myself keeping watch and ward over my epaulet-case and my
umbrella, the sole remnant of my effects. At the same moment a burst
of laughter and a half shout broke from the crowd, and a huge, powerful
fellow jumped on the deck, and, seizing me by the arm, cried out,
“Come along now, Captain, it's all right. This way--this way, sir.”
“But why am I to go with you?” said I, vainly struggling to escape his
grasp.
“Why is it?” said he, with a chuckling laugh; “reason enough--didn't we
toss up for ye, and didn't I win ye.”
“Win me!”
“Ay; just that same.”
By this time I found myself beside a car, upon which all my luggage was
already placed.
“Get up, now,” said he.
“It's a beautiful car, and a dhry cushion,” added a voice near, to the
manifest mirth of the bystanders.
Delighted to escape my tormentors, I sprang up opposite to him, while
a cheer, mad and wild enough for a tribe of Iroquois, yelled behind us.
Away We rattled over the pavement, without lamp or lantern to guide our
path, while the sea dashed its foam across our faces, and the rain beat
in torrents upon our backs.
“Where to, Captain?” inquired my companion, as he plied his whip without
ceasing.
“The Castle; you know where that is?”
“Faix I ought,” was the reply. “Ain't I there at the levees. But howld
fast, your honour; the road isn't good; and there is a hole somewhere
hereabouts.”
“A hole! For Heaven's sake, take care. Do you know where it is?”
“Begorra! you're in it,” was the answer; and, as he spoke, the horse
went down head foremost, the car after him; away flew the driver on
one side, while I myself was shot some half-dozen yards on the other, a
perfect avalanche of trunks, boxes, and portmanteaus rattling about
my doomed head. A crashing shower of kicks, the noise of the flying
splinters, and the imprecations of the carman, were the last sounds I
heard, as a heavy imperial full of books struck me on the head, and laid
me prostrate.
Through my half-consciousness, I could still feel the rain as it fell in
sheets; the heavy plash of the sea sounded in my ears; but, somehow, a
feeling like sleepiness crept over me, and I became insensible.