_By Lady Morgan._
(_Continued from page_ 318).
Meantime Father Flynn, with a Jesuit's adroitness, was endeavouring to
gain his object, as I afterwards learned; but on alluding to his works
and celebrity, he discovered that the ambassador had never so much
as heard of him, though he had heard wonders of his parrot, which he
requested might be sent for. I was immediately ushered into the cabinet,
as the superior went out, and I never saw my dear master more. Perhaps
he could "bear no rival near the throne;" perhaps, in his preoccupation,
he forgot to reclaim me. Be that as it may, he sailed that night, in
a Portuguese merchantman, for Lisbon; and I became the property of
the representative of his British Majesty. After the first few days of
favouritism, I sensibly lost ground with his excellency; for he was too
deeply occupied, and had too many resources of his own, to find his
amusement in my society. During the few days I sat at his table, I
entertained his diplomatic guests with cracking nuts, extracting the
kernels, peeling oranges, talking broad Scotch and Parisian French,
chanting the "Gloria," dancing "Gai Coco," and, in fact, exhibiting all
my accomplishments. I was, however, soon sent to the secretary's office
to be taught a new jargon, and to be subjected to tricks from the
underlings of the embassy.
Here I picked up but little, for there was but little to pick up.
I learned, however, to call for "Red tape and sealing-wax"--to cry
"What a bore!" "Did you ever see such a quiz?"--to call "Lord Charles,"
"Mr. Henry," and pronounce "good for nothing"--a remark applied by the
young men to the pens, which they flung away by hundreds, and which the
servants picked up and sold, with other perquisites of office incidental
to their calling. Whenever I applied these acquisitions with effect, it
was always attributed to chance; but I was so tormented and persecuted
by Lord Charles and Mr. Henry, who being unpaid _attachés_, had
nothing to do, and helped each other to do it, that I took every
opportunity to annoy them. One day, when the ante-room was filled with
young officers of the British frigate, one of the boobies, pointing to
Lord Charles, called to me, "Poll, who is that?" I answered, "Red tape
and sealing-wax;" and raised a general shout at the expense of the
little diplomatic pedant. An Irish midshipman present, a Mr. O'Gallagher,
pointing to Mr. Henry, asked me, "Who is that, Poll?" "Good for
nothing," I replied; and Mr. Henry flew at me in a rage, swore I had
been taught to insult him, and that he would wring my neck off. This he
would have done but for the protection of the chaplain, to whose breast
I flew, and who carried me away to his own room. In a few days I was
consigned to Mr. O'Gallagher, the midshipman, as a present to the
chaplain's patroness, a lady of high rank and celebrated sanctity in
Ireland, near to whose Propaganda the family of O'Gallagher resided. I
was the bearer of a letter of introduction, in which my pious education
and saintly acquirements were set forth, my knowledge of the Creed
exposed, and myself recommended as a means of aiding her ladyship's
proselyting vocation, as animals of less intelligence had done before.
I embarked therefore on board the British frigate--an honour which
had been refused my old master, and was treated with great care and
attention during the voyage. On arriving in a British port, my young
protector got leave of absence, and took a passage in a vessel bound
for Dublin. On the morning of our coming to anchor, my cage was put on
shore on the quay, while O'Gallagher returned to look after his luggage.
Thus left to myself, I soon attracted the attention of a wretched,
squalid-looking animal, something between a scare-crow and a long-armed
gibbon. His melancholy visage dilated into a broad grin the moment he
saw me; and coming up, and making me a bow, he said, "Ah! thin, Poll,
agrah, you're welcome to ould Ireland. Would you take a taste of potato,
just to cure your say-sickness?" and he put a cold potato into my cage,
which he had been gnawing with avidity himself. The potato was among the
first articles of my food in my native paradise, and the recollection of
it awakened associations which softened me towards the poor, hospitable
creature who presented it. Still I hesitated, till he said, "Take it,
Miss, and a thousand welcomes,--take it, agrah, from poor Pat." I took
it with infinite delight; and holding it in my claws, and peeling it
with my beak, began to mutter "Poor Pat! poor Pat!" "Oh, musha, musha!
oh, by the powers!" He cried, "but that's a great bird, any how--just
like a Christian--look here, boys." A crowd now gathered round my
cage, and several exclamations, which recalled my old friends of the
Propaganda, caught my attention. "Oh! queen of glory!" cried one; "Holy
Moses!" exclaimed another; "Blessed rosary!" said a third. I turned
my head from side to side, listening; and excited by the excitement
I caused, I recited several scraps of litanies in good Latinity,--There
was first an universal silence, then an universal shout, and a general
cry of "A miracle! a miracle!" "Go to Father Murphy," said one; "Off
with ye, ye sowl, to the Counsellor," said a second; "Bring the baccah
to him," cried an old woman; "Mrs. Carey, where is your blind son?" said
a young one. Could faith have sufficed, I should indeed have worked
miracles. In the midst of my triumphs, Mr. O'Gallagher returned, carried
me off, put me in a carriage, and drove away, followed by the shouting
multitude.--That night we put up at an hotel in Sackville-street, and
the next morning the street re-echoed with cries of "Here is a full
account of the miraculous parrot just arrived in the city of Dublin,
with a list of his wonderful cures, for the small charge of one
halfpenny." Shortly after we set off by the Ballydangan heavy fly, for
Sourcraut Hall. I was placed on the top of the coach, to the delight
of the outside passengers; where I soon made an acquaintance with the
customary oratory of guards and coachmen, which produced much laughter.
I rapidly added to my vocabulary many curious phrases, among which the
most distinct were--"Aisy, now, aisy," "Get along out of that," "All's
right," &c. &c. &c. with nearly a verse of "The night before Larry was
stretched," tune and all, and the air of "Polly put the kettle on,"
which the guard was practising on his bugle, to relieve the tedium of
the journey. Like all nervous animals, I am extremely susceptible to
external impressions; and the fresh air, movement, and company, had all
their usual exhilarating effects on my spirits. Our lady of Sourcraut
Hall, Lady C----, received myself and my protector with a ceremonious
and freezing politeness; asked a few questions concerning my treatment,
gentleness, and docility; and desiring my kind companion to put me on
the back of a chair, she bowed him out of the room. When he was gone,
the lady turned to a gloomy-looking man, who sat reading at a table,
and who looked so like one of the Portuguese brothers of the Propaganda,
that I took him for a _frate_--"What a poor benighted creature that
young man seems to be!" she said. The grave gentleman, who I afterwards
found was known in the neighbourhood by the title of her ladyship's
"moral agent," replied, "What, madam, would you have of an
O'Gallagher--a family of the blackest Papists in the county?" My lady
shook her head, and threw up her devout eyes.--Dinner was now announced,
and the moral agent giving his hand to the lady, I was left to sleep
away the fatigue of my journey.
I awoke very hungry, and consequently disposed to be very talkative, but
was silenced by finding myself surrounded by a crowd of persons of both
sexes, who were eagerly gazing on me. A certain prostrate look of sly,
shy humility, lengthened their pale faces, to the exclusion of all
intellectual expression. They formed a sort of religious meeting, called
a tea-and-tract party; but the open door discovered preparations for a
more substantial conclusion to the _obbligato_ prayers and lectures
of the evening. My new mistress was evidently descanting on my merits,
and read that paragraph from the chaplain's letter which described my
early associations, my knowledge of the Creed, and announced me as
a source of edification to her servants. Two or three words of this
harangue operating on my memory, I put forth my profession of faith with
a clearness of articulation and fidelity really wonderful for a bird.
What exclamations! what turning-up of eyes! I was stifled with caresses,
intoxicated with praises, and crammed with sweetmeats. The moral agent
grew pale with jealousy, when Doctor Direful was announced. He rushed
into the room like a whirlwind, but stood aghast at beholding the devout
crowd that encircled me. Instead of the usual apophthegms, and serious
discourse, he heard nothing but "Pretty Poll," "Scratch a poll," "What
a dear bird," &c. The malicious moral agent chuckled, and explained
that the bird had, for the moment, usurped the attention which should
exclusively belong to his reverence, who had taken the pains to come so
far to enlighten the dark inmates of Sourcraut Hall. Dr. Direful stood
rolling his fierce eye (he had but one) on the abashed assembly; and,
pushing me off my perch, drove me with his handkerchief into the dense
crowd which filled the bottom of the room, and consisted of all the
servants of the house, with some recently converted Papists from
among the Sourcraut tenantry. All drew back in horror, to let one
so anathematised pass without contact. I coiled myself up near a
droll-looking little postilion, who, while turning up the whites of his
eyes, was coaxing me to him with a fragment of plumb-cake, which he had
stolen from the banquet-table. Dr. Direful returned to the centre of the
room, and mounted a desk to commence his lecture. The auditory crowded
and cowered timidly round him, while he, looking down on them with a
wrathful and contemptuous glance, was about to pour forth the pious
venom which hung upon his lips, when a sharp cry of "_Get along out
of that_" struck him dumb. Inquiry was useless, for all were ready
to swear that they had not uttered a word. Dr. Direful called them
"blasphemous liars," and proceeded one and all to empty the vials of his
wrath through the words of a text of awful denunciation, which I dare
not here repeat; but his words were again arrested by the exclamation
of, "Aisy now, aisy--what a devil of a hurry you are in!" uttered in
quick succession.--He jumped down from his altitude; and, in reply to
his renewed inquiries, a serious coachman offered up to the vengeance
of this Moloch of methodism the mischievous postilion, who had that
morning detected the not always sober son of the whip in other devotions
than those to which he professed exclusive addiction. When I saw the
rage of all parties, I thought of the roasted Indians of the Brazils,
and shuddered for the poor lad. After a short, but inquisitorial
examination, in which he in vain endeavoured to throw the blame on me,
he was stripped of his gaudy dress, and in spite of his well-founded
protestations of innocence, turned almost naked from the house. When
peace was restored, a hymn was sung as an exorcism of the evil spirit
that had gotten among the assembly; when, being determined to exculpate
the poor postilion, I joined with all my force in the chorus, with my
Catholic "_Gloria in excelsis_," which I abruptly changed into
"Polly put the kettle on." Thus taken in the fact, I was, without
ceremony, denounced as an emissary from Clongowes, brought to Sourcraut
Hall by the Papist O'Gallagher, with a forged letter, to disturb the
community. I was immediately cross-examined by a religious attorney, as
if I had been a white-boy or a ribbon-man. "Come forward," he said, "you
bird of satan!--speak out, and answer for yourself, for its yourself can
do it, you egg of the devil! What brought you here?" I answered, "It was
all for my sweet sowl's sake, jewel!"--and the answer decided my fate,
without more to do. And now loaded with all the reproaches that the
_odium theologicum_ could suggest, I was cuffed, hunted, and
finally driven out of the gates by the serious coachman, to perish on
the highway. On recovering from my fright, I found myself at the edge
of a dry ditch, where the poor shivering postilion sat lamenting his
martyrdom. I went up to him, cowering and chattering; and at the sight
of me the tears dried on his dirty cheeks--his sobs changed to a laugh
of delight; and when I hopped on his wrist, and cried "Poor Pat," all
his sufferings were forgotten. While thus occupied, a little carriage,
drawn by a superb horse, with the reins thrown loose on his beautiful
neck, ascended the hill. At the sight I screamed out "Get along out of
that!" which so frightened the high-blooded creature that he started,
and flung the two persons in the carriage fairly into the middle of the
road. One of them, in a military dress, sprung at once on his feet, and
laying the whip across the naked shoulders of the postilion, exclaimed,
"I'll teach you, you little villain, to break people's necks." "Oh!
murther! murther!" cried the poor boy, "shure, it was not me, plase
your honour, only the parrot, Captain." "What parrot, you lying rascal?"
"There, Captain, Sir, look forenenst you." The captain did look up, and
saw me perched on the branch of a scrubby hawthorn-tree. Surprised and
amused, he exclaimed, "By Jove! how odd! What a magnificent bird! Why
Poll, what the deuce brought you here?" "Eh, sirs," I replied at random,
"it was aw' for the love of the siller." The captain, and his little
groom Midge, who had picked himself up on the other side of the
cabriolet, shrieked with laughing. "I say, my boy," said the captain,
"is that macaw your's?" "It is," said the little liar. "Would you take
a guinea for it?" asked the captain. "Troth, would I; two," said the
postilion. "Done," said the captain; and pulling out his purse, and
giving the two guineas, I suffered myself to be caught and placed in
the cabriolet. The young officer sprang in after me, and, taking the
reins, pursued his journey. We slept that night at a miserable inn
in a miserable town. The next morning we arrived at my old hotel in
Sackville-street, and shortly after sailed for England.
The Honourable George Fitz-Forward, my new master, was a younger
brother of small means and large pretensions. He had been quartered at
Kil-mac-squabble with a detachment, where he had passed the winter in
still-hunting, quelling _ructions_, shooting grouse and rebels,
spitting over the bridge, and smoking cigars; and having obtained leave
of absence, _pour se d'écrasser_, was on his way to London for the
ensuing season. We travelled in the cab by easy stages, and halted only
at great houses on the road, beginning with Plas Newyd, and ending at
Sion House. My master's rank, and my talents, were as good as board
wages to us; and as the summer was not yet sufficiently advanced for
the London winter, we found every body at home, and had an amazingly
pleasant time. My master was enchanted with his acquisition. I made the
_frais_ of every society; and my repartees and bonmots furnished
the Lord Johns and Lady Louisas with subjects for whole reams of pink
and blue note-paper. My master frequently said, "That bird is wonderful!
he is a great catch!"--and my fame had spread over the whole west end of
the town a full week before our arrival in London.
_The Metropolitan_, No. I.
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