the inn.
"Look at him," said Mr. Mahony, breaking out at last--"look at him in
his ould green coat! Look at him with the ould whip undher his arm, and
the boots on his feet not paid for, and him struttin' about as if he was
the Marqus of Waterford! Holy Mary! did yiz ever see such an objick! Mr.
Mullins!"
"Halloo!" replied Mr. Mullins, the cobbler across the way, who, with his
window open owing to the mildness of the weather, was whaling away at a
shoe-sole, the only busy man in the village.
"Did y' hear the news?"
"What news?"
"Shan's going to get a new coat."
"Faith, thin, I hope he'll pay first for his ould shoes."
"How much does he owe you?"
"Siven and six--bad cess to him!"
"He'll pay you to-night, if he doesn't drink the money first, for
there's a Mimber of Parlymint goin' to the meet, and he'll most like put
a suverin in the poor box."
Mr. Mullins made no reply, but went on whaling away at his shoe, and Bob
Mahony, having stepped into his cottage for a light for his pipe, came
back and took up his post again at the door.
The crowd round the inn was growing bigger and bigger. Sneer as he
might, Mr. Mahony could not but perceive that Shan was having the centre
of the stage, a worshipping audience, and free drinks.
Suddenly he turned to his offspring, who were crowding behind him, and
singling out Billy, the eldest:
"Put the dunkey to," said Mr. Mahony.
"Sure, daddy," cried the boy in astonishment, "it's only the tarriers."
"Put the dunkey to!" thundered his father, "or it's the end of me belt
I'll be brightenin' your intellects with."
"There's two big bags of sut in the cart and the brushes," said Billy,
as he made off to do as he was bidden.
"Lave them in," said Mr. Mahony; "it's only the tarriers."
In a few minutes the donkey, whose harness was primitive and composed
mainly of rope, was put to, and the vehicle was at the door.
"Bob!" cried his wife as he took his seat.
"What is it?" asked Mr Mahony, taking the reins.
"Won't you be afther givin' your face the lick of a tow'l?"
"It's only the tarriers," replied Mr. Mahony; "sure, I'm clane enough
for them. Come up wid you, Norah."
Norah, the small donkey, whose ears had been cocking this way and that,
picked up her feet, and the vehicle, which was not much bigger than a
costermonger's barrow, started.
At this moment, also, Shan and the dogs and the crowd were getting into
motion, making down the road for Glen Druid gates.
"Hulloo! hulloo! hulloo!" cried Mr. Mahony, as he rattled up behind in
the cart, "where are yiz off to?"
"The meet of the baygles," replied twenty voices; whilst Shan, who had
heard his enemy's voice, stalked on, surrounded by his dogs, his old,
battered hunting horn in one hand, and his whip under his arm.
"And where are they going to meet?" asked Mr. Mahony.
"Glen Druid gate," replied the camp followers. "There's a Mimber of
Parlymint comin', and all the quality from the Big House."
"Faith," said Mr. Mahony, "I thought there was somethin' up, for, by the
look of Shan, as he passed me house this mornin', I thought he'd
swallowed the Lord Liftinant, Crown jew'ls and all. Hulloo! hulloo!
hulloo! make way for me carridge! Who are you crowdin'? Don't you know
the Earl of Leinsther when y' see him? Out of the way, or I'll call me
futman to disparse yiz."
Shan heard it all, but marched on. He could have killed Bob Mahony, who
was turning his triumph into a farce, out he contented himself with
letting fly with his whip amongst the dogs, and blowing a note on his
horn.
"What's that nize?" enquired Mr. Mahony, with a wink at the delighted
crowd tramping beside the donkey cart.
"Shan's blowin' his harn," yelled the rabble.
"Faith, I thought it was Widdy Finnegan's rooster he was carryin in the
tail pockit of his coat," said the humourist.
The crowd roared at this conceit, which was much more pungent and
pointed as delivered in words by Mr. Mahony; but Shan, to all
appearances, was deaf.
The road opposite the park gates was broad and shadowed by huge elm
trees, which gave the spot in summer the darkness and coolness of a
cave. Here Shan halted, the crowd halted, and the donkey-cart drew up.
Mr. Mahony tapped the dottle out of his pipe carefully on the rail of
his cart, filled the pipe, replaced the dottle on the top of the
tobacco, and drew a whiff.
The clock of Glen Druid House struck ten, and the notes came floating
over park and trees; not that anyone heard them, for the yelping of the
dogs and the noise of the crowd filled the quiet country road with the
hubbub of a fair.
"What's that you were axing me?" cried Mr. Mahony to a supposed
interrogator in the crowd. "Is the Prince o' Wales comin'? No, he ain't.
I had a tellygrum from him this mornin' sendin' his excuzes. Will some
gintleman poke that rat-terrier out that's got under the wheels of me
carridge--out, you baste!" He leaned over and hit a rabbit-beagle that
had strayed under the donkey-cart a tip with his stick. The dog, though
not hurt, for Bob Mahony was much too good a sportsman to hurt an
animal, gave a yelp.
Shan turned at the sound, and his rage exploded.
"Who are yiz hittin'? cried Shan.
"I'm larnin' your dogs manners," replied Bob.
The huntsman surveyed the sweep, the cart, the soot bags, and the
donkey.
"I beg your pardin'," said he, touchin his hat, "I didn't see you at
first for the sut."
Mr. Mahony took his short pipe from his mouth, put it back upside down,
shoved his old hat further back on his head, rested his elbows on his
knees, and contemplated Shan.
"But it's glad I am," went on Shan, "you've come to the meet and brought
a mimber of the family with you."
Fate was against Bob Mahony, for at that moment Norah, scenting another
of her species in a field near by, curled her lip, stiffened her legs,
projected her head, rolled her eyes, and "let a bray out of her" that
almost drowned the howls of laughter from the exulting mob.
But Shan Finucane did not stir a muscle of his face, and Bob Mahony's
fixed sneer did not flicker or waver.
"Don't mention it, mum," said Shan, taking off his old cap when the last
awful, rasping, despairing note of the bray had died down into silence.
Another howl from the onlookers, which left Mr. Mahony unmoved.
"They get on well together," said he, addressing an imaginary
acquaintance in the crowd.
"Whist and hould your nize, and let's hear what else they have to say to
wan another."
Suddenly, and before Shan Finucane could open his lips, a boy who had
been looking over the rails into the park, yelled:
"Here's the Mimber of Parlyment--here they come--Hurroo!"
"Now, then," said the huntsman, dropping repartee and seizing the
sweep's donkey by the bridle, "sweep yourselves off, and don't be
disgracin' the hunt wid your sut bags and your dirty faces--away wid
yiz!"
"The hunt!" yelled Mahony, with a burst of terrible laughter. "Listen to
him and his ould rat-tarriers callin' thim a hunt! Lave go of the
dunkey!"
"Away wid yiz!"
"Lave go of the dunkey, or I'll batter the head of you in wid me stick!
Lave go of the dunkey!"
Suddenly seizing the long flue brush beside him, and disengaging it from
the bundle of sticks with which it was bound, he let fly with the
bristle end of it at Shan, and Shan, catching his heel on a stone, went
over flat on his back in the road.
In a second he was up, whip in hand; in a second Mr. Mahony was down, a
bag half-filled with soot--a terrible weapon of assault--in his fist.
"Harns! harns!" yelled Mahony, mad with the spirit of battle, and
unconsciously chanting the fighting cry of long-forgotten ancestors.
"Who says cruckeder than a ram's harn!"
"Go it, Shan!" yelled the onlookers. "Give it him, Bob--sut him in the
face--Butt-end the whip, y'idgit--Hurroo! Hurroo! Holy Mary! he nearly
landed him then--Mind the dogs--"
Armed with the soot-bag swung like a club, and the old hunting-whip
butt-ended, the two combatants formed the centre of a circle of yelling
admirers.
"Look!" said Miss Lestrange, as the party from the house came in view of
the road. "Look at the crowd and the two men!"
"They're fighting!" cried the general. "I believe the ruffians dared to
have the impudence to start fighting!"
At this moment came the noise of wheels from behind, and the "tub,"
which had obtained permission to go to the meet, drew up, with Patsy
driving the children.
"Let the children remain here," said the General. "You stay with them,
Violet. Come along, Boxall, till we see what these ruffians mean."
So filled was his mind with the objects in view that he quite forgot
Dicky Fanshawe.
"You have put on the short skirt," said Dicky, who at that moment would
scarcely have turned his head twice or given a second thought had the
battle of Austerlitz been in full blast beyond the park palings.
"And my thick boots," said Violet, pushing forward a delightful little
boot to speak for itself.
The children were so engaged watching the proceedings on the road that
they had no eyes or ears for their elders.
"Have you ever been beagling before?" asked Dicky.
"Never; but I've been paper-chasing."
"You can get through a hedge?"
"Rather!"
"That'll do," said Dicky.
"Mr. Fanshawe," cried Lord Gawdor from the "tub," "look at the chaps in
the road--aren't they going for each other!"
"I see," said Mr. Fanshawe, whose back was to the road--"Violet--"
"Yes."
"No one's looking--"
"That doesn't matter--No--not here--Dicky, if you don't behave, I'll get
into the tub--Gracious! what's that?"
"He's down!" cried Patsy, who had been standing up to see better.
"Who?" asked Mr. Fanshawe.
"The Mimber of Parlyment--Misther Boxall--Bob Mahony's grassed him--"
"They're all fighting!" cried Violet. "Come, Mr. Fanshawe--Patsy--" She
started for the gates at a run.
When the General had arrived on the scene, Shan had just got in and
landed his antagonist a drum-sounding blow on the ribs with the butt of
his whip.
"Seize the other chap, Boxall!" cried General Grampound, making for
Mahony.
He was just half a second too late; the soot bag, swung like a club,
missed Shan, and, catching Mr. Boxall fair and square on the side of the
face, sent him spinning like a tee-totum across the road, and head over
heels into the ditch.
That was all.
A dead silence took the yelling crowd.
"He's kilt!" came a voice.
"He isn't; sure, his legs is wavin'."
"Who is he?"
"He's the Mimber of Parlyment! Run for your life, and don't lave off
runnin' till you're out of the country."
"Hold your tongue!" cried General Grampound. "Boxall--hullo! Boxall! are
you hurt?"
"I'm all right," replied Mr. Boxall, who, from being legs upwards, was
now on hands and knees in the ditch. "I've lost something--dash it!"
"What have you lost?"
"Watch."
"Come out and I'll get some of these chaps to look."
Mr. Boxall came out of the ditch with his handkerchief held to the left
side of his forehead.
"Why, your watch and chain are on you!" cried the General.
"So they are," said Mr. Boxall, pulling the watch out with his left
hand, and putting it back. "I'm off to the house--I want to wash."
"Sure, you're not hurt?"
"Not in the least, only my forehead scratched."
"What's up?" cried Dicky Fanshawe, who had just arrived.
"Nothing," replied his uncle. "Fellow hit him by mistake--no bones
broken. Will you take the governess cart back to the house, Boxall?"
"No, thanks--I'll walk."
"His legs is all right," murmured the sympathetic crowd, as the injured
one departed still with his handkerchief to his face, "and his arums.
Sure, it's the mercy and all his neck wasn't bruck."
"Did yiz see the skelp Bob landed him?"
"Musha! Sure, I thought it would have sent his head flying into Athy,
like a gulf ball."
Patsy, who had pulled the governess cart up, rose to his feet; his sharp
eye had caught sight of something lying on the road.
"Hould the reins a moment, Mr. Robert," said he, putting them into Lord
Gawdor's hands. He hopped out of the cart, picked up the object in the
road, whatever it was, put it in his trousers' pocket, and then stood
holding the pony's head; whilst the Meet, from which Bob Mahony had
departed as swiftly as his donkey could trot, turned its attention to
the business of the day, and Shan, collecting his dogs, declared his
intention of drawing the Furzes.
"Was that a marble you picked up, Patsy?" asked Lord Gawdor, as the
red-headed one, hearing Shan's declaration, climbed into the "tub" again
and took the reins.
Patsy grinned.
* * * * *
Meanwhile Mr. Fanshawe had been writing three important letters in the
library. When he had finished and carefully sealed them, he placed them
one on top of the other, and looked at his watch.
The three letters he had just written would make everything all right at
the other end. This was the hot end of the poker, and it had to be
grasped.
Patsy was the person who would help him to grasp it. Patsy he felt to be
a tower of strength and 'cuteness, if such a simile is permissible. And,
rising from the writing-table and putting the letters in his pocket, he
went to find Patsy. He had not far to go, for as he came into the big
hall Patsy was crossing it with a tray in hand.
"Patsy," said Mr. Fanshawe, "when does the post go out?"
"If you stick your letters in the letter box by the hall door, sir,"
said Patsy, "it will be cleared in half-an-hour. Jim Murphy takes the
letter-bag to Castle Knock."
"Right!" said Mr. Fanshawe. "And, see here, Patsy!"
"Yes, sir?"
"I'm in a bit of a fix, Patsy, and you may be able to help."
"And what's the fix, sir?" asked Patsy.
"You know the young lady you gave the note to this morning--by the way,
how did you give it?"
"I tried to shove it undher her door, sir."
"Yes?"
"It wouldn't go, so I give a knock. 'Who's there?' says she. 'No one,'
says I; 'it's only hot wather I'm bringin' you,' for, you see, sir, the
ould missis, her ladyship, was in the next room, and she's not as deaf
as she looks, and it's afraid I was, every minnit, her door'd open, and
she and her ear-trumpet come out in the passidge. 'I have hot wather,'
says she. 'Niver mind,' says I, 'this is betther. Open the door, for the
love of God, for I can't get it under the door, unless I rowl it up and
shove it through the keyhole.' Wid that she opens the door a crack and
shoves her head out. 'Who's it from?' she says. 'I don't know,' says I;
'it's just a letther I found on the stairs I thought might belong to
you.' 'Thanks,' says she, 'it does,' and wid that she shut the door, and
I left her."
"Well, see here, Patsy!"
"Yes, sir?"
"I'm going to marry Miss Lestrange."
"Faith, and I guessed that," said Patsy; "and it's I that'd be joyful to
dance at your weddin', sir."
"There won't be any dancing in the business," said Mr. Fanshawe, grimly.
"You know Mr. Boxall, Patsy?"
"The Mimber of Parlymint?"
"Yes. Well, he wants to marry Miss Lestrange; and the worst of it is,
Patsy, that my uncle, General Grampound, wants him to marry her, too."
"Yes, sir," said Patsy. "And, Mr. Fanshawe?"
"Yes."
"I forgot to tell you, sir, you needn't be afear'd of Mr. Boxall for the
next few days."
"How's that?"
"When Bob Mahony hit him the skelp on the head wid the sut bag, his eye
popped out of his head on the road."
"His what?--Oh, I remember--"
"Finders is keepers, sir," said Patsy, with a grin.
"Why, good heavens--you don't mean to say--"
"I've got his eye in my pocket, sir," said Patsy, in a hoarse whisper.
"He's sint a telygram for another wan but till it comes he's tethered to
his bed like a horse to a--"
"That's enough--that's enough," said Mr. Fanshawe. "Here's half a crown
for you, Patsy, for--carrying my cartridges."
The Ballygullion Creamery Society, Limited.
_From "Ballygullion."_
BY LYNN DOYLE.
'Twas the man from the Department of Agriculture comin' down to give a
lecture on poultry an' dairy-farmin', that set the ball a-rollin'.
The whole farmers av the counthry gathered in to hear him, an' for days
afther it was over, there was no talk at all barrin' about hens an'
crame, an' iverybody had a schame av their own to propose.
Ould Miss Armitage ap at the Hall was on for encouragin'
poultry-farmin'; an' give a prize for the best layin' hen in
Ballygullion, that riz more scunners in the counthry than the twelfth av
July itself. There was a powerful stir about it, an' near iverybody
enthered.
Deaf Pether of the Bog's wife was an easy winner if her hen hadn't died,
an' nothin' would satisfy her but it was poisoned; though divil a all
killed it but the gorges of Indian male the ould woman kept puttin'
intil it.
Ivery time the hen laid she give it an extra dose of male, "to encourage
the crather," as she said; an' wan day it laid a double-yolked wan, she
put a charge intil it that stretched it out stiff in half-an-hour.
Afther that there was no doubt but Larry Thomas's wife would win the
prize; for, before the end av the month Miss Armitage had allowed for
the test, her hen was above a dozen ahead av iverybody else's.
Howiver, when it came to the countin' there was a duck-egg or two here
an' there among the lot that nayther Mrs. Thomas nor the hen could well
account for, so the both of thim was disqualified.
An' whin it came to the bit, an' Mrs. Archy Doran won the prize, she
counted up an' made out that between corn an' male, she had paid away
double the value of it, so she wasn't very well plazed; an' thim that
had spent near as much on feedin'-stuff, an' had got no prize, was worse
plazed still.
The only one that came out av it well was Miss Armitage herself; for she
kept all the eggs, an' made above twice the prize-money out av thim. But
there was nobody else as well plazed about that as she was.
So all round the hen business was a failure; an' it looked as if there
was nothin' goin' to come of the lecture at all.
However, iverybody thought it would be a terrible pity if Ballygullion
should be behind the other places; an' at last there was a move made to
start a cramery, an' a committee was got up to set things goin'.
At first the most av us thought they got the crame in the ould-fashioned
way, just be skimmin'; but presently it begin to be talked that it was
all done be machinery. Some av us was very dubious about that; for
sorrow a bit could we see how it was to be done Thomas McGorrian
maintained it would be done wi' blades like the knives av a
turnip-cutter, that it would just shave the top off the milk, an' sweep
it intil a pan; but then he couldn't well explain how they'd avoid
shavin' the top off the milk-dish, too.
Big Billy Lenahan swore it was done with a worm like a still; but,
although we all knowed Billy was well up on potheen, there was few had
iver seen him havin' much to do wi' milk; so nobody listened to him.
At last the Committee detarmined they'd have a dimonsthration; and they
trysted the Department man to bring down his machine an' show how it was
done; for all iv thim was agin spendin' money on a machine till they
were satisfied it would do its work.
The dimonsthration was to be held in Long Tammas McGorrian's barn, an'
on the night set above forty av us was there. We all sat round in a
half-ring, on chairs an' stools, an' any other conthrivance we could
get, for all the world like the Christy Minstrels that comes to the
Market House av a Christmas.
The dimonsthrator had rigged up a belt to Tammas's threshin'-machine,
an' run it from that to the separator, as he called it.
The separator itself was a terrible disappointin' conthrivance at the
first look, an' no size av a thing at all for the money they said it
cost. But whin the dimonsthrator begin to tell us what it would do, an'
how by just pourin' the milk intil a metal ball an' bizzin' it round, ye
could make the crame come out av one hole, an' the milk out av another,
we began to think more av it.
Nobody liked to spake out wi' the man there, but there was a power av
whisperin'.
"It's a mighty quare conthrivance," sez wan.
"Did ye iver see the like av it?" sez another.
"Boy-a-boys," sez James Dougherty, "the works av man is wonderful. If my
ould grandmother could see this, it would break her heart. 'Twas herself
was the handy dairy-woman, too; but what'd she be till a machine?"
But most av thim wouldn't say one thing or another till they seen it
workin'; an', 'deed, we were all wishin' he'd begin. We had to thole,
though; for the dimonsthrator was a bumptious wee man, an' very fond av
the sound av his own voice, an' kept talkin' away wi' big, long words
that nobody knowed the manin' av but himself, till we were near deaved.
So we were powerful glad whin he sez to Mrs. McGorrian: "Now, Madam, if
you'll be good enough to bring in the milk, I will proceed to give an
actual demonstration."
But Mrs. McGorrian is a quiet wee woman, an' wi' all the crowd there,
an' him callin' her Madam, she was too backward to get up out av the
corner she was in; an' she nudges Tammas to go, tellin' him where to get
the milk.
So Tammas goes out, an' presently he staggers in wi' a big crock in his
arms, an' sets it down.
"Now," sez the demonsthrator, "if you'll just get the horses goin', an'
pour the milk into that receptacle, I'll start the separator working."
Tammas in wi' the milk, an' the wee son whips up the horses outside, an'
away goes the separator bizzin' like a hive av bees.
"In a few seconds, gentlemen and ladies," sez the dimonsthrator, "you
will see the milk come out here, an' the cream here. Kindly pay
attention, please."
But he needn't have spoke; for iverybody was leanin' forrard, holdin'
their breath, an' there wasn't a sound to be heard but the hummin' of
the separator.
Presently there comes a sort av a thick trickle out av the milk-hole,
but divil a dhrap av crame.
The dimonsthrator gathered up his brow a bit at that, an' spakes out av
the barn windy to Tammas's wee boy to dhrive faster. The separator hums
harder than iver, but still no crame. Wan begin to look at the other,
an' some av the wimmen at the back starts gigglin'.
The dimonsthrator begin to get very red an' flusthered-lookin'. "Are ye
sure this milk is fresh an' hasn't been skimmed?" he sez to Tammas, very
sharp.
"What do you say, Mary?" sez Tammas, lookin' over at the wife. "Sartin,
sir," sez Mrs. Tammas. "It's just fresh from the cows this very
evenin'."
"Most extraordinary," sez the dimonsthrator, rubbin' his hair till it
was all on end. "I've niver had such an experience before."
"It's the way Tammas feeds his cows," sez Big Billy Lenahan from the
back; "sure, iverybody knows he gives them nothin' but shavin's."
There was a snigger av a laugh at this; for Tammas was well known to be
no great feeder av cattle.
But Tammas wasn't to be tuk down so aisy.
"Niver mind, Billy," sez he; "av you were put on shavin's for a week or
two, ye'd maybe see your boots again before you died."
There was another laugh at this, an' that started a bit av jokin' all
round--a good dale av it at the dimonsthrator; till he was near beside
himself. For, divil a dhrop av crame had put in an appearance yet.
All at wanst he stoops down close to the milk.
"Bring me a candle here," sez he, very sharp.
Tammas reaches over a sconce off the wall. The dimonsthrator bends over
the can, then dips the point av his finger in it, an' puts it in his
mouth.
"What's this?" sez he, lookin' very mad at Tammas. "This isn't milk at
all."
"Not milk," sez Tammas. "It must be milk. I got it where you tould me,
Mary."
The wife gets up an' pushes forward. First she takes a look at the can
av the separator, an' thin wan at the crock.
"Ye ould fool," she sez to Tammas; "ye've brought the whitewash I mixed
for the dairy walls!"
I'll say this for the dimonsthrator, he was a game wee fellow; for the
divil a wan laughed louder than he did, an' that's sayin' something; but
sorrow a smile Tammas cracked, but stood gapin' at the wife wi' his
mouth open; an' from the look she gave him back, there was some av us
thought she was, maybe, more av a tarther than she looked.
Though troth 'twas no wondher she was angry, for the joke wint round the
whole counthry, an' Tammas gets nothin' but "Whitewash McGorrian" iver
since.
Howaniver, they got the machine washed out, an' the rale milk intil it,
an' there was no doubt it worked well. The wee dimonsthrator was as
plazed as Punch, an' ivery body wint away well satisfied, an' set on
havin' a cramery as soon as it could be got started.
First av all they wint round an' got the names av all thim that was
goin' to join in; an' the explainin' of the schame took a dale av a
time. The co-operatin' bothered them intirely.