'See where Mononia's heroes lie, proud Owen More's
descendants,--
'Tis they that won the glorious name and had the grand
attendants!'
James Clarence Mangan.
It was a charming thing for us when Dr. La Touche gave us introductions
to the Colquhouns of Ardnagreena; and when they, in turn, took us to tea
with Lord and Lady Killbally at Balkilly Castle. I don't know what there
is about us: we try to live a sequestered life, but there are certain
kind forces in the universe that are always bringing us in contact with
the good, the great, and the powerful. Francesca enjoys it, but secretly
fears to have her democracy undermined. Salemina wonders modestly at her
good fortune. I accept it as the graceful tribute of an old civilisation
to a younger one; the older men grow the better they like girls of
sixteen, and why shouldn't the same thing be true of countries?
As long ago as 1589, one of the English 'undertakers' who obtained some
of the confiscated Desmond lands in Munster wrote of the 'better sorte'
of Irish: 'Although they did never see you before, they will make you
the best cheare their country yieldeth for two or three days, and take
not anything therefor.... They have a common saying which I am persuaded
they speake unfeinedly, which is, 'Defend me and spend me.' Yet many doe
utterly mislike this or any good thing that the poor Irishman dothe.'
This certificate of character from an 'undertaker' of the sixteenth
century certainly speaks volumes for Irish amiability and hospitality,
since it was given at a time when grievances were as real as plenty;
when unutterable resentment must have been rankling in many minds; and
when those traditions were growing which have coloured the whole texture
of Irish thought, until, with the poor and unlettered, to be 'agin the
government' is an inherited instinct, to be obliterated only by time.
We supplement Mrs. Mullarkey's helter-skelter meals with frequent
luncheons and dinners with our new friends, who send us home on our
jaunting-car laden with flowers, fruit, even with jellies and jams. Lady
Killbally forces us to take three cups of tea and a half-dozen marmalade
sandwiches whenever we go to the Castle; for I apologised for our
appetites, one day, by confessing that we had lunched somewhat frugally,
the meal being sweetened, however, by Molly's explanation that there was
a fresh sole in the house, but she thought she would not inthrude on it
before dinner!
We asked, on our arrival at Knockarney House, if we might breakfast at
a regular hour,--say eight thirty. Mrs. Mullarkey agreed, with
that suavity which is, after her untidiness, her distinguishing
characteristic; but notwithstanding this arrangement we break our fast
sometimes at nine forty, sometimes at nine twenty, sometimes at nine,
but never earlier. In order to achieve this much, we are obliged to
rise early and make a combined attack on the executive and culinary
departments. One morning I opened the door leading from the hall into
the back part of the establishment, but closed it hastily, having
interrupted the toilets of three young children, whose existence I had
never suspected, and of Mr. Mullarkey, whom I had thought dead for many
years. Each child had donned one article of clothing, and was apparently
searching for the mate to it, whatever it chanced to be. Mrs. Mullarkey
was fully clothed, and was about to administer correction to one of the
children who, unhappily for him, was not. I retired to my apartment to
report progress, but did not describe the scene minutely, nor mention
the fact that I had seen Salemina's ivory-backed hairbrush put to
excellent if somewhat unusual and unaccustomed service.
Each party in the house eats in solitary splendour, like the MacDermott,
Prince of Coolavin. That royal personage of County Sligo did not,
I believe, allow his wife or his children (who must have had the
MacDermott blood in their veins, even if somewhat diluted) to sit at
table with him. This method introduces the last element of confusion
into the household arrangements, and on two occasions we have had our
custard pudding or stewed fruit served in our bedrooms a full hour after
we had finished dinner. We have reasons for wishing to be first to enter
the dining-room, and we walk in with eyes fixed on the ceiling, by
far the cleanest part of the place. Having wended our way through an
underbrush of corks with an empty bottle here and there, and stumbled
over the holes in the carpet, we arrive at our table in the window.
It is as beautiful as heaven outside, and the table-cloth is at least
cleaner than it will be later, for Mrs. Waterford of Mullinavat has an
unsteady hand.
When Oonah brings in the toast rack now she balances it carefully,
remembering the morning when she dropped it on the floor, but picked up
the slices and offered them to Salemina. Never shall I forget that
dear martyr's expression, which was as if she had made up her mind to
renounce Ireland and leave her to her fate. I know she often must wonder
if Dr. La Touche's servants, like Mrs. Mullarkey's, feel of the potatoes
to see whether they are warm or cold!
At ten thirty there is great confusion and laughter and excitement, for
the sportsmen are setting out for the day and the car has been waiting
at the door for an hour. Oonah is carolling up and down the long
passage, laden with dishes, her cheerfulness not in the least impaired
by having served seven or eight separate breakfasts. Molly has spilled
a jug of milk, and is wiping it up with a child's undershirt. The Glasgy
man is telling them that yesterday they forgot the corkscrew, the salt,
the cup, and the jam from the luncheon basket,--facts so mirth-provoking
that Molly wipes tears of pleasure from her eyes with the milky
undershirt, and Oonah sets the hot-water jug and the coffee-pot on the
stairs to have her laugh out comfortably. When once the car departs,
comparative quiet reigns in and about the house until the passing
bicyclers appear for luncheon or tea, when Oonah picks up the napkins
that we have rolled into wads and flung under the dining-table,
and spreads them on tea-trays, as appetising details for the weary
traveller. There would naturally be more time for housework if so large
a portion of the day were not spent in pleasant interchange of thought
and speech. I can well understand Mrs. Colquhoun's objections to the
housing of the Dublin poor in tenements,--even in those of a better
kind than the present horrible examples; for wherever they are
huddled together in any numbers they will devote most of their time to
conversation. To them talking is more attractive than eating; it even
adds a new joy to drinking; and if I may judge from the groups I have
seen gossiping over a turf fire till midnight, it is preferable to
sleeping. But do not suppose they will bubble over with joke and
repartee, with racy anecdote, to every casual newcomer. The tourist
who looks upon the Irishman as the merry-andrew of the English-speaking
world, and who expects every jarvey he meets to be as whimsical as
Mickey Free, will be disappointed. I have strong suspicions that ragged,
jovial Mickey Free himself, delicious as he is, was created by Lever to
satisfy the Anglo-Saxon idea of the low-comedy Irishman. You will live
in the Emerald Isle for many a month, and not meet the clown or the
villain so familiar to you in modern Irish plays. Dramatists have made
a stage Irishman to suit themselves, and the public and the gallery are
disappointed if anything more reasonable is substituted for him. You
will find, too, that you do not easily gain Paddy's confidence. Misled
by his careless, reckless impetuosity of demeanour, you might expect to
be the confidant of his joys and sorrows, his hopes and expectations,
his faiths and beliefs, his aspirations, fears, longings, at the first
interview. Not at all; you will sooner be admitted to a glimpse of the
travelling Scotsman's or the Englishman's inner life, family history,
personal ambition. Glacial enough at first and far less voluble, he
melts soon enough, if he likes you. Meantime, your impulsive Irish
friend gives himself as freely at the first interview as at the
twentieth; and you know him as well at the end of a week as you are
likely to at the end of a year. He is a product of the past, be
he gentleman or peasant. A few hundred years of necessary reserve
concerning articles of political and religious belief have bred caution
and prudence in stronger natures, cunning and hypocrisy in weaker ones.
Our days are very varied. We have been several times into the town and
spent an hour in the Petty Sessions Court with Mr. Colquhoun, who sits
on the bench. Each time we have come home laden with stories 'as good as
any in the books,' so says Francesca. Have we not with our own eyes seen
the settlement of an assault and battery case between two of the most
notorious brawlers in that alley of the town which we have dubbed 'The
Pass of the Plumes.' [*] Each barrister in the case had a handful of hair
which he introduced on behalf of his client, both ladies apparently
having pulled with equal energy. These most unattractive exhibits
were shown to the women themselves, each recognising her own hair,
but denying the validity of the other exhibit firmly and vehemently.
Prisoner number one kneeled at the rail and insisted on exposing the
place in her head from which the hair had been plucked; upon which
prisoner number two promptly tore off her hat, scattered hairpins to
the four winds, and exposed her own wounds to the judicial eye.
Both prisoners 'had a dhrop taken' just before the affair; that soft
impeachment they could not deny. One of them explained, however, that
she had taken it to help her over a hard job of work, and through a
little miscalculation of quantity it had 'overaided her.' The other
termagant was asked flatly by the magistrate if she had ever seen
the inside of a jail before, but evaded the point with much grace and
ingenuity by telling his Honour that he couldn't expect to meet a woman
anywhere who had not suffered a misforchin somewhere betwixt the cradle
and the grave.
*The original Pass of the Plumes is near Maryborough, and
was so called from the number of English helmet plumes that
were strewn about after O'Moore's fight with five hundred of
the Earl of Essex's men.
Even the all too common drunk-and-disorderly cases had a flavour
of their own, for one man, being dismissed with a small fine under
condition that he would sign the pledge, assented willingly; but on
being asked for how long he would take it, replied, 'I mostly take it
for life, your worship.'
We also heard the testimony of a girl who had run away from her employer
before the completion of her six months' contract, her plea being that
the fairies pulled her great toe at night so that she could not sleep,
whereupon she finally became so lame that she was unable to work. She
left her employer's house one evening, therefore, and went home, and
curiously enough the fairies 'shtopped pulling the toe on her as soon as
iver she got there!'
Not the least enlivening of the prisoners was a decently educated person
who had been arrested for disturbing the peace. The constable asserted
that he was intoxicated, but the gentleman himself insisted that he was
merely a poet in a more than usually inspired state.
“I am in the poetical advertising line, your worship. It is true I was
surrounded by a crowd, but I was merely practising my trade. I don't
mind telling your worship that this holiday-time makes things a little
lively, and the tradesmen drink my health a trifle oftener than usual;
poetry is dry work, your worship, and a poet needs a good deal of liquid
refreshment. I do not disturb the peace, your worship, at least not more
than any other poet. I go to a grocer's, and, standing outside, I make
up some rhymes about his nice sweet sugar or his ale. If I want to
please a butcher--well, I'll give you a specimen:--
'Here's to the butcher who sells good meat--
In this world it's hard to beat;
It's the very best that's to be had,
And makes the human heart feel glad.
There's no necessity to purloin,
So step in and buy a good sirloin.'
I can go on in this style, like Tennyson's brook, for ever, your
worship.” His worship was afraid that he might make the offer good, and
the poet was released, after promising to imbibe less frequently when he
felt the divine afflatus about to descend upon him.
These disagreements between light-hearted and bibulous persons who haunt
the courts week after week have nothing especially pathetic about them,
but there are many that make one's heart ache; many that seem absolutely
beyond any solution, and beyond reach of any justice.