After a couple of days' rest, our English party started by the

railroad for Cairo. This journey was not as commonplace as it sounds;

for at each station the train was besieged by Arabs, clamoring for

passages, between 300 and 400 at a time; so that it required all the

efforts of the guards and their dragoman to prevent their carriage

being taken from them by main force. The beauty of Cairo is the theme

of every writer on Egypt and the Nile; but it would be impossible to

exaggerate its extreme picturesqueness, the exquisite carving of its

mosques and gateways; the oriental character of its narrow streets and

bazaars and courts; the beauty of the costumes, and of the fretted

lattice casements overhanging the streets; the gorgeous interior

fittings of the mosques, one of which is entirely lined with oriental

alabaster; the magnificent fountains in the outer courts of each; the

graceful minarets--all seen in the clearness and beauty of this

perfectly cloudless sky, leave a picture in one's mind which no

subsequent travel can efface. Outside the town is a perfect "city of

the dead;" all the pashas and their families are interred there, and

people "live among the tombs," as described in the Gospels; while on

Fridays the Mohammedans have services there for their dead, "that they

may be loosed from their sins;" one of those curious fragments of

Christianity which are continually cropping out of this strange

Mohammedan worship.

One of the most interesting expeditions made by our travellers was to

Heliopolis. They passed through a sandy plain full of cotton,

date-palms, and bananas, and by a succession of miserable native huts,

(which consist of mud walls, with a roof of Indian corn, and a hole

left in the wall for light,) until they came to an obelisk, and from

thence to a garden, in the centre of which is a sycamore tree,

carefully preserved, under which the Blessed Virgin and St. Joseph are

said to have rested with the infant Saviour on their flight into

Egypt. It is close to a well of pure water, and surrounded with the

most beautiful roses and Egyptian jasmine. The Mohammedans have the

greatest veneration for the "Sitt Miriam," as they call the Blessed

Virgin. They proof her immaculate conception from the Koran, and keep

a fast of fifteen days before the Assumption; therefore no surprise

was felt at seeing the care with which this grand old tree is tended

and watered by them.

Another expedition made by the travellers was to Old Cairo, where,

near the famous Nilometer, is the Coptic convent and chapel built over

the house of the Blessed Virgin and St. Joseph, where they are said to

have lived for two years with our Blessed Lord. There are some very

beautiful ancient marble columns and fine olive-wood carvings, inlaid

with ivory, in this church, and a staircase leads down to the Virgin's

House, which is now partly under water from the rise of the Nile. It

is curious how persistently all early tradition points to this spot as

the site of our Saviour's Egyptian sojourn, and it was with a feeling

of simple faith in its authenticity that one of the party knelt and

strove to realize this portion of the sacred infancy.

There are three Catholic churches in Cairo, the cathedral being a fine

large building. The sisters of "the Good Shepherd" have also a large

convent near the cathedral, and an admirable day-school and orphanage.

Many dark-eyed young girls whom our travellers saw kneeling at

benediction there had been rescued by the kind Mother from worse than

Egyptian slavery. The condition of the "fellahs," or lower orders, in

Egypt, is appalling from its misery and degradation; and the good

sisters have very uphill work to humanize as well as christianize

these poor children. {770} Nothing can be more wretched than the

position of the women, especially throughout Egypt. If at all

good-looking, they are brought up for the harems; if not, they are

kept as "hewers of wood and drawers of water;" and the idea of their

having _souls_ seems as little believed by the Mohammedan as by the

Chinese, whose incredulity on the subject the Abbé Hue mentions so

amusingly in his missionary narrative.

Before leaving Cairo the English ladies were invited to spend an

evening in the royal harem, and accordingly at eight o'clock found

themselves in a beautiful garden, with fountains, lit by a multitude

of variegated lamps, and conducted by black eunuchs through

trellis-covered walks to a large marble-paved hall, where about forty

Circassian slaves met them and escorted them to a saloon fitted up

with divans, at the end of which reclined the pasha's wives. One of

them was singularly beautiful, and exquisitely dressed, in pink velvet

and ermine, with priceless jewels. Another very fine figure was that

of the mother, a venerable old princess, looking exactly like a

Rembrandt just come out of its frame. Great respect was paid to her,

and when she came in, every one rose. The guests being seated, or

rather squatted, on the divan, each was supplied with long pipes,

coffee in exquisite jewelled cups, and sweetmeats, the one succeeding

the other, without intermission, the whole night. The Circassian

slaves, with folded hands and downcast eyes, stood before their

mistresses, to supply their wants. Some of them were very pretty, and

dressed with great richness and taste. Then began a concert of Turkish

instruments, which sounded unpleasing to English ears, followed by a

dance, which was graceful and pretty; but this again followed by a

play, in which half the female slaves were dressed up as men, and the

coarseness of which it is impossible to describe. The wife of the

foreign minister kindly acted as interpreter for the English ladies,

and through her means some kind of conversation was kept up. But the

ignorance of the ladies in the harem is unbelievable. They can neither

read nor write; their whole day is employed in dressing, bathing,

eating, drinking, and smoking. The soirée lasted till two in the

morning, when the royalty withdrew, and the English ladies returned

home, feeling the whole time as if they had been seeing a play acted

from a scene in the Arabian Nights, so difficult was it to realize

that such a way of existence was possible in the present century.

The Sunday before they left, curiosity led them after mass to witness

the gorgeous ceremonial of the Coptic Church. The men sat on the

ground with bare feet, the women in galleries above the dome, behind

screens. The patriarch--who calls himself the successor of St. Mark,

and is the leader of a sect whose opinions are almost identical with

those condemned by the council of Chalcedon as the Eutychian

heresy--was gorgeously attired in a chasuble of green and gold, with a

silver crosier in one hand, (St. George and the dragon being carved on

the top,) and in the other a beautiful gold crucifix, richly jewelled,

wrapped in a gold-colored handkerchief, which every one stooped to

kiss, after the reading of the gospel and the creed, the people joined

with great fervor in the litanies; and then began the consecration of

the sacred species, which lasted a very long time. The holy eucharist

was given in a spoon to each communicant, the bread being dipped in

the wine, and the patriarch laying his hand on the forehead of each

person while he gave the blessing. At the same time, blessed bread

stamped with a cross, and with the name of Christ, was handed round to

the rest of the congregation, like the _pain bénit_ in village

churches in France. The Copts boast that there has never been the

slightest alteration in their religious rites since the fourth

century, and they are undoubtedly the only descendents of the ancient

Egyptians.

{771}

The following morning a portion of our travellers started by train for

Suez, across a waving, billowy-looking tract of interminable sand.

Except the "half-way house," (a miserable shed,) there is no human

habitation all the way, and nothing to be seen but long files of

camels slowly wending their way across the desert. After enjoying for

a few minutes the first sight of the Red Sea, the consul obligingly

lent them horses to ride to the Lesseps Canal, which was then

completed to within six miles of Suez. Upward of 5000 Arabs had been

pressed into the service by the pasha, and the poor creatures were

toiling under the burning sun, with no pay and wretched food, and,

when night came, sleeping under the banks. The mortality among them

was frightful; but it was in this way that the pasha paid for his

shares! Our travellers tasted the water, the first that had ever been

brought to Suez, except by camels, or, of late, by the _water-train_.

It is difficult to realize the fact of a town of this size being

entirely without fresh water until now, which accounts for the absence

of the least kind of vegetation. The next morning a steamer took our

party early to the wells of Moses, about nine miles up the gulf, where

they landed, being carried through the surf by the Chinese rowers.

Each of the wells is enclosed in a little fence, and belongs to a Suez

merchant. It is a wonderful spot, so green and so lovely in the midst

of such utter desolation. There are dates and banians, roses and

pomegranates, salads and other vegetables, all growing in the greatest

luxuriance. Long strings of camels filed across the sand on their way

to Mount Sinai, and the coloring of the mountains was exquisite. The

shore was covered with coral and shells. After spending an hour or two

there, and reading the Bible account of the spot, our travellers

returned to the ship, and went across the gulf to see the exact place

where the Israelites crossed the Red Sea when pursued by Pharaoh. The

view was beautiful, and the Hill of Barda stood out brightly with its

jagged points dear and purple against the glowing sky. The Catholics

have a small church at Suez, but are building a larger one, as their

mission is greatly on the increase.

Our travellers returned that evening to Cairo and for the first time

slept on board their boats, or daha-biéh. The first sensation was of

discomfort at the smallness of the cabins; but soon they got used to

their floating homes, and the beauty of the weather enabled them to

live all day long on the awning-covered poop; so that they soon ceased

to feel cramped and uncomfortable. The following day, the wind being

contrary, Latifa Pasha, the head of the Admiralty, gave them a steamer

to tow them up to Gizeh, from whence they were to visit the Pyramids.

The excessive depth of each stone makes the ascent an arduous one for

women; but the view amply repays one for the exertion. On one side is

the interminable desert; on the other, the fertile "Land of Goshen."

Owing to the recent inundations, the party had continually to dismount

from their donkeys and be carried across the water on men's backs. The

next few days passed quickly, our travellers landing every morning to

walk and sketch, while the men were "tracking" along the shore, and

making acquaintance with all the people and places of interest as they

passed. At El-Atfeh was a remarkable dervish of the tribe they had

seen "dancing" in Cairo, who showed them his house, in the court of

which was the tomb of his predecessor, hung with ostrich-eggs, canoes

and other votive offerings, but hideously painted in bright green. At

Bibbeh there was a very fine Coptic church, with a picture of St.

George and the Dragon, who is the favorite saint throughout the East,

and venerated alike by Christian and Moslem. Again, on their way to

Minieh, they passed by a fine Coptic convent on the top of a {772}

cliff, and two of the monks swam to the boats to ask for alms and

offerings, which are never refused them. On the 20th December they

reached Sawada, which is a village somewhat inland, but containing a

large Coptic convent and church, served by six priests, and with a

congregation of upwards of 1000 Christians. It was also an important

burial-place, and there were multitudes of little domes looking like

children's sand-basins reversed, but each surmounted with a cross. One

of the ladies was sketching this picturesque village from a palm-grove

at the entrance of the principal gateway, when a venerable priest

approached her and made that sign which in the East is the freemasonry

of brotherhood--the sign of the Cross. The lady instantly responded,

and the old priest, joyfully clapping his hands, led her into the

church, showing her all its carious carvings and decorations, and

several very ancient MSS. There are some fine mountains at the back,

in which the gentlemen of the party discovered some wolves. The next

day brought them to Beni-Hassan. The caves, which are about three

miles from the shore, were originally used as tombs by the ancient

Egyptians, and are covered with paintings and hieroglyphics; but their

chief interest arises from their having been the great hiding-place of

the Christians during the persecutions, and also used as cells by St.

Anthony, St. Macarius, and other anchorites. A little farther on, near

Manfaloot, is the cave of St. John the Hermit, venerated to this hour

as such by the natives. On Christmas-day our travellers arrived at

Sioot, and found there a Catholic church served by the Franciscan

mission, which is under the special protection of the Emperor of

Austria, who has sent some very good pictures for the altars there.

The mass was reverently and well sang, and about 150 Catholics were

present. After mass, the Italian padre gave them coffee. He had been

educated at the "Propaganda," but had been twenty-four years in Egypt;

so that he had almost forgotten every language except Arabic. He said

that they had now obtained a union with the Copts, and a Coptic mass

followed the Latin one. The mission had been established at Sioot four

years before, by the intervention of Said Pasha, but had encountered

great opposition at first from the Moslems. Two bodies of Christian

saints with all the signs of martyrdom had been lately discovered in

the caves above the town; but the Mohammedans would not allow the

Christians to have them. The good old Franciscan had studied medicine,

and thus first made his way among the people. Now he seems to be

universally respected and beloved.

Our party rode through the dirty bazaars of this so-called capital of

Upper Egypt, and ascended to the caves. But the "City of the Dead", a

little beyond the town, is mournfully beautiful and silent. It is

composed of streets of tombs, of white stone or marble, the only sign

of life being the jar of water left in front of each, to water the

aloes planted in picturesque vases at the gate of each tomb. A whole

poem might be written on the thoughts suggested by those silent

streets. It was this "City of the Dead" which is said to have

occasioned the valuable lesson given by St. Macarius to the young man

who had asked him "how he could best learn indifference to the world's

opinion?" He directed him to go to this place, and first upbraid and

then flatter the dead. The young man did as he was bid. When he came

back, the saint asked him "what answer they had made?" The young man

replied, "None at all." Then said St. Macarius: "Go and learn from

them neither to be moved by injuries or flatteries. If you thus die to

the world and to yourself, you will begin to live to Christ."

{773}

Here for the first time our travellers realized the horrors of an

Egyptian conscription. A number of villagers coming in to the Sunday's

market were at once seized, chained together, and thrown on the ground

like so much "dead stock" to be packed off on board a government

vessel, when the fall complement had been secured. The screams and

howls of their wives and daughters, throwing dirt on their heads and

tearing their hair, in token of despair, when their frantic efforts to

release them from the recruiting-sergeants were found ineffectual,

were most piteous to hear. The poor fellows rarely survive to return

to their homes; and their pay and food are so miserably small and

scanty, that to be made a soldier is looked upon as worse than death.

They maim themselves in every way to escape it--cutting off their

forefingers, putting out their eyes, and the like. Scarcely a man on

board the boats is not mutilated in this manner. In the evening, being

Christmas-day, all the boats were illuminated with Chinese lanterns

and avenues of palms; while the sailors made crosses and stars of

palm-leaves, to hang over the cabin-doors. A beautiful moon-light

night added to the effect of these decorations, as the party rowed

round the different _dahabièhs_, and the "Adeste fidelis" sounded

softly across the water. The following morning, after early mass, a

favorable wind carried them on to Ekhnim, where there is also a

Catholic Franciscan missionary and church. The priest was a

Neapolitan, and had begun his labors at Suez. His only companion was a

native Copt, who had been educated at the Propaganda. They had about

five hundred Catholics in their congregation, and a school of about

fifty children. The church was of the fifteenth century, and under the

protection of a Christian sheik, to whom our travellers were

introduced, and who courteously invited them into his house. The

courtyard of the Catholic church was crowded with native Christians

who had escaped from the conscription, and were safe under the roof of

the priest. The sheik conducted his guests to his house, the only good

one in Ekhnim, and furnished more or less in European style, as he had

been at Cairo, and attached to the household of the late viceroy. They

sat on the divan, with pipes and coffee, talking Italian with the

priest, when the sheik, as a great honor, allowed them to see his

wife, and afterward his daughter, a bride of thirteen, married to the

son of the Copt bishop. She was dressed in red, as a bride, with a red

veil and a profusion of gold ornaments and coins strung round her neck

and arms. The sheik and the whole population escorted our travellers

back to their boats with every demonstration of respect, and then the

principal chiefs with the priests were invited to come on board and

have coffee, which they accepted. The Franciscan father had been for

seven years at Castellamare, and felt the change terribly, but said

that the climate was good, and that the comfort of feeling he was

working for God strengthened his hands when he was inclined to

despond. He complained of the lamentable ignorance of the Coptic

priests, who knew nothing of the history of their interesting old

churches and convents, and only tell you "they were built before their

fathers were born!" The two large Coptic convents formerly existing in

the mountains above the town are deserted; but their church at Ekhnim

is the oldest now remaining in Egypt, and full of curious carving and

very ancient pillars.

On New Year's day our travellers arrived at Denderah, and spent it in

the wonderful temple of Athor. The heat was very great, and it

required some courage to attempt to sketch. At five the following

morning the boats arrived at Keneh, and some of the party went on

shore to mass, that being also a Franciscan station. The church is

small, but very nicely kept; the place is, however, unhealthy, and the

good Franciscan father was very low at the mortality among his

comrades. He has lately started a school and has about twenty

children; but his life is a very desolate one, having {774} no

European to speak to, or any one to sympathize in his work. After mass

he took our travellers to see the making of the _goolehs_, or

water-bottles, which are so famous throughout Egypt, and are made

solely in this place, of the peculiar clay of the district, mixed with

the ashes of the halfeh grass. They are beautiful in form, and keep

the water deliciously cool. After a breakfast of coffee and excellent

dates at the sheik's house, the party reëmbarked, and arrived that

evening at Negaddi. Here again they found a Catholic mission. The

superior, Padre Samuele, had been laboring there for twenty-three

years. He was of the Lyons mission, and was the only one who had

survived the climate. Four of his brethren had died within the last

twelvemonth, and he had just dug a grave for the last. They had a

large and devout congregation, and a school of one hundred and fifty

children, and had been building a new church of very fine and good

proportions. But now the good father has to labor and live alone. He

said, however, that he had written to Europe for fresh workers, whom

he was anxiously expecting. Negaddi is remarkable for its turreted

pigeon-houses, painted white and red, which form an amusing contrast

to the miserable mudholes in which the inhabitants live. The following

evening found our travellers at Thebes. The town itself is a surprise

and disappointment. There are literally no shops, no bazaar, no houses

but the two or three belonging to the consuls, and built in the midst

of the temples. But the said temples are unrivalled for interest and

beauty. Karnac, either by daylight or moonlight, is a thing apart from

all others in the world for vastness of conception and magnificence of

design. "There were giants in those days." The same may be said of the

Tombs of the Kings, of the Vocal Memnon, of the Memnouium, of Medemet

Haboo, and the rest. The marvel is, what has become of the people who

created such things; who had brought civilization, arts, and

manufactures to such perfection that nothing modern can surpass them.

Is it not a lesson to our pride and our materialism, when we think of

them and of ourselves, and then see the degraded state of the modern

Egyptian, the utter extinction of the commonest art or even handicraft

among them, so that it is scarcely possible, even in Cairo, to get an

ordinary deal table made with a drawer in it? There is no Catholic

mission at Thebes, but a Coptic bishop, who received our travellers

very kindly, showed them his church, and gave them coffee on a terrace

overlooking the Nile. This evening was "twelfth-night," and the boats

were again illuminated and decorated with palms, the whole having a

beautiful effect reflected in the water.

After spending a week at Thebes, Our travellers sailed on to Assouan,

visiting the temples of Esneh, Edfoo, and Komom-Boo on their way, and

coming into the region of crocodiles and pelicans, and of the Theban

or dom palm--less graceful than the date palm, but still beautiful,

and bearing a large, nut-like fruit in fine hanging clusters. Between

Edfoo and Thebes are shown some caves, in one of which St. Paul, the

first hermit, passed so many years of penitence and prayer. He was

discovered by St. Antony in his old age, when tempted to vain-glory,

God having revealed to him that there was a recluse more perfect than

himself, whom he was to go into the desert and seek. A beautiful

picture in the gallery at Madrid by Velasquez represents the meeting

of the two venerable saints, the dinner brought to them by the raven,

and the final interment of St. Paul by St. Antony in the cloak of St.

Athanasius, the lions assisting to dig the grave!

Assouan is, as it were, the gate of the Cataracts, and is on the

borders of Nubia, the great desert of Syene being to the left of the

village. The Nubian caravans were tented on the shore, and tempting

the Europeans with daggers, knives, {775} ostrich-eggs, poisoned

arrows, rhinoceros hide shields, lances and monkeys. The climate was

delicious. There is no country in the world to be compared with Egypt

at this time of the year, because, in spite of the heat, there is a

lightness and exhilaration in the air which makes every one well and

hungry. To an artist the coloring is equally perfect. No one who has

not been there can imagine what the sunrises and sunsets are,

especially the after-glow at sunset. No artificial red, orange, or

purple can approach it. Then the gracefulness of the palms on the

banks, the rosy color of the mountains, the picturesque sakeels or

water-wheels, and the still prettier shadoof, with its mournful sound,

which seems as the wail of the patient slave who works it day and

night, and thereby produces the exquisite tender green vegetation on

the banks of the river, due to this artificial irrigation alone--all

are a continual feast to the eye of the painter. And if all this is

felt below Assouan, what can be said of Philae--beautiful Philae--that

"dream of loveliness," as a modern writer justly calls it?

Our travellers, while waiting for the interminable arrangements with

the Reis of the Cataracts, took the road along the shore; and after

passing through a succession of curious and picturesque villages,

arrived at one called Mahatta, where they hired a little boat to take

them across to the beautiful island. Rocks of the most fantastic

shapes are piled up on both sides of the shore; but when once you have

emerged from these into the deep water, "Pharaoh's Bed" and the other

temples stand out against the sky in all their wonderful beauty.

Philae was the burial-place of Osiris, and "By him who sleeps in

Philae" was the common oath of the old Egyptians. The temples are too

well known by drawings to need description; but what is less often

mentioned by travellers is that the larger one, originally dedicated

to the sun, was used for a long time by the Christians as a church.

Consecration crosses are deeply engraved on every one of these grand

old pillars; and at one end is an altar, with a cross in the centre,

in white marble, and a piscina at the side, with a niche for the

sacred elements; and above this recess is a beautiful cross deeply cut

in the stone, together with the emblem of the vine. The cross is also

let into the principal gateways. There was an Italian inscription

commemorating the arrival of the first Roman mission sent by Gregory

XVI., and a tablet in French recording the arrival of the French army

there under Napoleon in 1799, signed by General Davoust.

The gentlemen of the party decided to pitch their tents in the island

till the question of the passing of the Cataracts was decided; and

while this operation was going on, one of the ladies sat down to

sketch. She was quietly painting, luxuriating in the beauty and

silence around her, and watching the sun setting gloriously behind the

temple, when all of a sudden a deep bell boomed across the water and

was repeated half-a-dozen times. It was the "Angelus." Even the least

Catholic of the party was struck and impressed by this unexpected

sound, so unusual in a country where bells are unknown, and the only

call for prayer is from the minaret top. Instinctively they knelt, and

then arose the question "Where could the bell come from?" There was no

sign of habitation or human beings either on the island itself or on

the opposite shores, and the dragoman himself was equally at fault. At

last, on questioning the boatmen, they found that behind some hills a

short distance off was a convent--sort of "convalescent home" for the

sick monks of the Barri mission. The English lady decided at once to

go and see it, and on arriving at the long low stone building, found

that the Franciscan father, who was almost its solitary occupant, had

just returned from the White Nile, being one of a mission to the

blacks in the Barri country, a month's journey south of Khartoun.

{776} He had been at death's door from fever; and on leaving Khartoun

for Philae, an eighteen days' ride on camels, had been attacked by

dysentery, and left for dead in the burning desert by the caravan;

only a faithful black convert remained by his side, and he felt that

his last hour was come; when the arrival of poor Captain Speke, on his

way home from one of his last explorations, changed the state of

things. With true Christian charity our countryman at once ordered a

halt, and devoted himself to the nursing and doctoring of the dying

monk; so that in a few days he was so far recovered as to be able to

resume his journey, and arrived safely at Philae. He said he owed his

life, under God, entirely to the kindness of this Englishman; and his

only anxiety seemed to be to show his gratitude by doing everything he

could for those of his nation. He invited our travellers to take up

their abode in the convent, and gave them a most interesting account

of the missionary work of his order. They have chartered a small

vessel, which they have called the "Stella Matutina," and which plies

up and down the river, and enables them to visit their stations on

each bank. But they have every kind of hardship to encounter from the

treachery or stupidity or positive hostility of the different tribes,

from the intense heat, and above all, from the deadly malaria which

had carried off seventy of their brothers in three years. But there

are ever fresh soldiers of this noble army ready and eager to fill up

the ranks.

The ladies rode home by the way of the desert, and reached their boats

in safety. The next morning, at five o'clock, the same road was

resumed by two of the party who were anxious to to reach the convent

in time for the early mass. They met nothing on their seven-miles'

ride but a hyaena, who was devouring a camel which they had left dying

the night before. The little convent chapel was very nice; and among

the vestments sent by the _oeuvre apostolique_ and worked by the

ladies of the Leopoldstadt mission, one of the party recognized a

court-dress which had been presented for the purpose by a Hungarian

friend of hers at Rome. It was strange to find it again in the depths

of Nubia. The mass was served by two little woolly-haired negro boys

from the good old father's school, whose attachment to him was like

that of a dog to its master. He was in some trouble as to finding

clothes for them. The Nubians dispense with every thing of the kind

except a fringed leathern girdle round the loins, decorated with

shells. The children have not even that. However, in the _dahabièh_ a

piece of rhododendron-patterned chintz was found, carefully sent from

England for the covering of the divans; and with that, certain

articles of dress were manufactured, gorgeous in coloring, and

therefore perfect in native eyes, however ludicrous and incongruous

they might appear to Europeans. The following day was fixed for one of

the boats to go up the cataracts, and the party started early for what

is called the "first gate," to see the operation. No one who has not

lived for some months with this "peuple criard," as Lamartine calls

them, can imagine the din and screaming of the Arabs as each dangerous

rapid is passed; the Reis all the time shouting and storming and

leaping from one stone to the other like one possessed. But the ascent

is child's play compared to the descent. So many accidents have

happened in the latter, and so many boats have been swamped, that the

captains now insist on the passengers landing on an island near, while

their boats rush down the rapids. It is a beautiful sight, the way

those apparently unwieldy vessels are steered, and clear the rocks as

it were with a bound, amidst the frantic yells and cheers of the whole

population. A number of men, for a trifling baksheesh, swam down the

current on logs; one with his little child before him; but an

Englishman, attempting {777} to do it a year or two ago, was caught in

the whirlpool and instantly drowned. After watching this exciting

operation, the party dined together at Philae in their tent, and then

rowed round and round the island by moonlight, which exceeded in

loveliness all they had hitherto seen; the vividness of the

reflections were beyond belief; and reading or writing was easy in the

brilliant light.

Our traveller availed herself of the kind Father Michael Angelo's

proposal, and slept at the convent. He gave them some curious arms,

and hippopotamus-teeth from the White Nile, and some ostrich-eggs

arranged as drinking-vessels, with shells and leather strips: his sole

furniture in his native tent. The English, in return, gave him a

quantity of medicines, which he eagerly accepted for his mission, to

which he was hoping to return. After early mass the next day, he

escorted them to see the Island of Biggeh with its picturesque temple,

and then to the quarries of Syene, where an uncut obelisk of great

size still remains embedded in the sand. Some idea was entertained in

England of using it for Prince Albert's monument; but the difficulty

of carriage and the distance from the river would make its transfer

almost impossible. Far simpler would be the proposal of taking the

Luxor obelisk, already given to the English by Mehemet Ali, the sister

one to that successfully transported to Paris by the French. It is a

thousand pities to leave it where it is, and to miss the occasion of

adding so unique and valuable a monument to our art-treasures.

This, the last day of our traveller's stay at Assouan, was spent in

making a few last purchases, visiting the old castle overlooking the

river, and exploring the island of Elephantine, which offers beautiful

sketching. But the inhabitants are even more importunate as beggars

than their confraternity at Thebes; and it required all the eloquence

of the good priest to prevent their appropriating the contents of the

traveller's paint-box. She purchased from them many strings of bright

beads, which constitute their sole idea of female dress. A curious

funeral took place in the evening, an empty boat being carried for the

dead man, who was buried with his arms and his spear; while a funeral

dirge was sung over him by his tribe. It was curious, as being

identical with the hieroglyphics of similar scenes in the tombs of the

kings. Many of the customs of these people are purely pagan; for

instance, when an Arab makes his coffee, he pours out the first three

cups on the ground as a libation to the sheik, who first invented the

beverage. The slave-trade, though nominally abolished by the viceroy,

is carried on vigorously at Assouan. The governor goes through the

form of confiscating the cargo and arresting the owners of the ship;

but, after a few days, a handsome baksheesh on the part of the

slave-owner and captain settles the matter; and their live cargo is

transported to Cairo, there to be disposed of in the harems or

elsewhere.

To the Catholic traveller in this country nothing can be more

melancholy than the utterly degraded condition of the people, who are

really very little removed from the brute creation. Years of

ill-usage, hardship, and wrong have ground down the Fellah to the

abject condition of a slave; and the utter extinction of Christianity

among them seems to preclude all hope of their rising again. Yet Egypt

was once the home of saints. From Alexandria, the seat of all that was

most learned and refined, the see of St. Athanasius, and St.

Alexander, and St. Cyril, and St. John the Almoner, and a whole string

of holy patriarchs, bishops, and martyrs, up to the very desert of

Syene, peopled with anchorites, the whole land teemed with saints. And

now, the little handful of Franciscan fathers, scattered here and

there, sowing once more the good seed at the cost of their lives, is

all that remains to bear witness to the truth.

------

{778}

[ORIGINAL.]

THY WILL BE DONE

I.

My soul a little kingdom is,

Where God's most holy will

Shall reign in undivided sway,

Potent and grand and still.

I'll kneel before the crystal throne,

And kiss the golden rod;

O peace unspeakable, to bow

Before the will of God!

What though my weary feet should fail.

My tongue refuse to praise,

God knows my soul will steadfastly

Still follow in his ways.

II.

The time has come, my soul, the time has come

To prove the depth of thy oft-vaunted love;

A sullen gloom hangs round us like a fog,

And lowering clouds are drooping from above.

Would it were light, or dark, not this grey gloom;

Would that the terror of some sudden crash

Might break this stifling, dumb monotony!

O for some deafening peal or blinding flash!

Weary and old and sick, like ancient Job,

I crouch in haggard woe and scan the past,

Or drag the leaden moments at my heels,

Mocking wise fools who say that life runs fast.

{779}

Nothing to conquer now--no call for strength;

Naught to contend with--only to wait and bear,

And see my withering powers and blighted gifts--

No room to act--nothing to do or dare:

Speak now, my soul, if thou hast aught to say

If thou seest light or any hope of day.

III.

Fret not this holy stillness with thy cries--

Patience, perturbed clay!

Lest thou should'st drown the voice of the All-wise

With clamorous dismay.

Thinkest thou that clouds and mists are less God's work,

Than sun or moon or stars?

His will is good, whether it bind the free

Or sunder prison bars.

His hand has measured out each feather's weight

Of this most grievous load;

He bore the cross we bear, his heart, like ours,

Once in life's furnace glowed.

We shall in heaven sing a psalm of joy

For every earth-wrung moan;

One little hour more, the work well done.

And we are all God's own.

--------

CONTRASTS

There is no sound of anguish in the air,

Bees hum, birds sing, the breeze is balmy-sweet

And from the blooming hawthorn overhead

A rosy shower droppeth at my feet.

No matter! God be praised--some untried heart,

Sweet with the dewy freshness of life's dawn,

Is gathering a glad presage of success

From this bright, pitiless, resplendent morn.

------

{780}

[From the Irish Industrial Magazine.]

THE INDUSTRIAL ARTS OF OUR ANCESTORS.

BY M. HAVERTY, ESQ.

ARTS OF CONSTRUCTION.

In considering the building arts, as practised by the inhabitants of

this country in past ages, we must necessarily divide the subject

according to epochs. The ethnologist would of course begin with his

favorite scientific classification of the Stone, the Bronze and the

Iron periods; but this division is, to say the least of it, a very

arbitrary, very indefinite, and very doubtful one. It leaves much too

wide a scope for imagination, and offers no satisfactory explanation

of social development; and the following obvious and natural order of

periods, in the present instance, will answer our purpose, namely:

1. The Pre-Christian period, extending from some indefinite epoch of

the pre-historic ages, down to the establishment of Christianity in

Ireland, in the fifth century; 2. The early Christian period,

extending from the last-mentioned epoch to the commencement of the

Danish wars, in the beginning of the ninth century; 3. The period of

obscurity and barbarism into which this country was plunged by those

fierce and long-protracted wars, and from which it began to emerge in

the reign of Brian, and after the battle of Clontarf, in 1014; 4. The

period which followed that just mentioned, and which extends beyond

the Anglo-Norman invasion until the native Irish ceased to act as a

distinct people; and, [sic--no 5.] 6. The period which was inaugurated

by the aforesaid Anglo-Norman epoch, and descended to modern times,

embracing the ages, first of noble Gothic abbeys, and feudal keeps of

Norman barons, and walled towns; and then of the fortified bawns and

strong solitary towers of new proprietors, in the Tudor, Stuart, and

Williamite times.

In the first of these periods there was no stone and mortar masonry

known in Ireland, nor was there any knowledge of the arch. Of

cyclopean masonry--masonry in which huge stones were frequently

employed, but never any cement--some stupendous and wonderful examples

belonging to this first period still remain; but there was no cemented

work. This we may take as absolutely certain, notwithstanding the

notions of some modern antiquaries about the supposed pre-Christian

origin of the round towers. This pagan theory of the round towers is a

pure creation of what we may call the conjectural school of Irish

antiquaries. The ancient Irish never dreamt of it. It was suggested at

a time when scarcely anything was known of the original native source

of Irish history; and it has seldom been advocated except by those who

are either still unacquainted with these sources of our history, or

else who are carried away by false ideas of early Irish civilization,

and visionary theories of ancient Irish fire-worship and Orientalism;

for all which there is not the slightest foundation in the actual

history of the country. It is right that this should be distinctly

understood: without entering into lengthened arguments on the subject,

which would be out of place here, it ought to be quite sufficient for

any rational person to know, that the character of all the remains of

undoubted pagan buildings in Ireland is utterly inconsistent with the

{781} supposition that the same people who built them also built the

round towers; and that such knowledge as we actually possess of the

manners and customs of the pagan Irish shows the absurdity of the

notion that the round towers were built by them. The passages of

ancient Irish writings which may be adduced to show that the round

towers were built by Christians are extremely numerous, while there is

not one single iota of evidence in the written monuments of Irish

history, either printed or MS., for their pagan origin--nothing, in

fact, but wild, unsupported conjecture and imagination. And such being

the case, and all the writings and researches of such distinguished

Irish historical scholars as Petrie, O'Donovan, and O'Curry, who have

passed away, and of Wilde and Todd, and Graves and Reeves, and

Ferguson, etc., tending to overturn the visionary theories of Irish

antiquities, of which the round tower phantasy has been the most

noted, it is time to abandon this last remnant of a false and exploded

system.

What, then, are the remains which we have of the buildings or

structures of the ancient Irish belonging to the first, or pagan,

period? They are various, and exceedingly numerous. In the first

place, there are the _raths_, or earthen forts, with which the whole

face of the country is still absolutely dotted. These raths were the

dwelling-places of the Irish, not only indeed, in pagan times, but

much more recently. They were originally rather steep earthworks,

surrounded by a ditch, and topped by a strong paling or stockade;

sometimes there was a double or treble line of intrenchment, and

within the inner fence the family or families of the occupants dwelt

in timber or hurdle houses, of which, from the perishable nature of

the materials, no traces of course remain. The cattle, too, were

driven for safety within the inclosure, when it was known that an

enemy was abroad; and it is probable that the position of a great many

of the raths on a sloping surface was selected for purposes of

drainage, seeing that the cattle were so frequently to be inclosed. It

is also worthy of note, that these earthen forts were always

polygonal, generally octagonal, and we have never seen one of them

actually round; although it would have been much easier to describe

the plain circle than the regular polygonal figure adopted.

When the inclosures were constructed of stone; they were called

_cahirs_ or _cashels_. It has been stated by antiquaries that the

stone forts were built by the early Irish colonists, called Firbolgs,

and the earthen forts by the subsequent colony of Tuath de Danaans;

but it is probable that each colony built their strongholds of the

materials which they found most convenient. In the rich plains of

Meath, where there are very few surface stones that could have been

employed for the purpose, we find none but earthen forts; and in the

Isles of Arran, where there is little indeed besides solid rock, the

Firbolgs necessarily constructed their famous duns of stone. These

vast Firbolg duns of Arran must have been impregnable in those days,

if defended by sufficient garrison; and their size and number in a

place so small and barren show that almost the whole remnant of the

race must have been compelled by hard necessity to seek shelter there

against their pressing foes. It would also appear that the abundant

supply of stone induced the occupants of those Arran forts to

substitute stone houses in their interior for the habitations of

timber and wattles used elsewhere; as we here find numerous remains of

the small beehive houses, called _cloghanes_, formed by the

overlapping of flat stones, laid horizontally, until they meet at top,

thus roofing in the house without an arch. Both cloghanes and forts

are built, of course, without cement; and no one could for a moment

imagine that the Round Tower, of which a portion still {782} remains

in the largest island, could possibly have been the work of the same

masons.

The style of building is the same in the Duns of Aran; in Staig Fort,

in Kerry; in the Greenan of Aileach, in Donegal; and in general in any

of the primitive _cahirs_ or _cashels_, wherever they exist in

Ireland; nor is there any material difference between these and the

similar structures to be found in Wales--such as the Castell-Caeron

over Dolbenmaen, in Caernarvonshire.

The same Irish word, Saor, (pronounced Seer,) originally signified

both a carpenter and a mason; and in an Irish poem, at least eight

hundred and fifty years old, we have a list of the ancient builders,

who erected the principal strongholds of pagan times in Ireland: such

as--"Casruba, the high-priced cashel-builder, who employed quick axes

to smoothen stones;" and "Rigriu and Garvon, son of Ugarv, the

cashel-builders of Aileach," and "Troiglethan, who sculptured images,

and was the rath-builder of the Hill of Tara;" while every one

familiar with the native Irish traditions has heard the name of

Grubban-Saor, to whose skill half the ancient castles of Ireland were,

without any reference to chronology, supposed to owe their strength.

An Irish antiquary of the seventeenth century, who enjoyed the

friendship of Sir James Ware, writes as if he believed that the

ancient pagan Irish understood the use of cement, although, as he

confesses, no vestige of stone and mortar work by them remained in his

day. But his mode of arguing, as it will be perceived, is very

inconclusive. After enumerating several of the ancient raths and

cashels of Ireland, he writes: "We have evidence of their having been

built like the edifices of other kingdoms of the times in which they

were built; and why should they not? for there came no colony into

Erin but from the eastern world, as from Spain, etc.; and it would be

strange if such a deficiency of intellect should mark the parties who

came into Ireland, as that they should not have the sense to form

their residences and dwellings after the manner of the countries from

which they went forth, or through which they travelled." [See

Introduction to Dudley Mac Firbis's great "Book of Genealogies,"

translated in "O'Curry's Lectures," pp. 222, etc.] It is quite certain

that the early colonizers of Ireland, to whom Mac Firbis thus alludes,

were a portion of that great Celtic wave of population which passed

from East to West over Europe, leaving the same earthern mounds and

cyclopean stone structures behind as monuments wherever they went; but

it is equally certain, that if these ancient colonies visited Assyria,

and Egypt, and Greece in their peregrinations, as Mac Firbis believed

they did, they did not carry with them Assyrian, or Egyptian, or

Grecian masonry or architecture into Ireland. The raths and cashels

which they constructed were exceedingly simple in their character, and

in very few indeed of the former is there the slightest grace of

stonework to be discovered. Caves were very often formed under the

raths; and Mac Firbis states that under the rath of Bally O Dowda, in

Tireragh, he himself had seen "nine smooth stone cellars," and that

its walls were still of the height of "a good cow-keep." Nor were the

contents of the ancient Irish dwellings less simple than the buildings

themselves; for we find by the Brehon Laws that "the Seven valuables

of the house of a chieftain were--a caldron, vat, goblet, mug, reins,

horse-bridle, and pin;" the first-mentioned articles indicating

clearly the usages of hospitality, which always formed the

predominating institution of the Irish. The same book of Brehon Laws

refers to "a house with four doors, and a stream through the centre,

to be provided for the sick"--such, apparently, being the ideas at

that time of what a hospital should be.

{783}

It is hard to say when the popular notion originated which attributes

the ancient raths and mounds to the Danes. It is quite dear that Mac

Firbis knew very well they were not Danish, though the idea must have

prevailed when he wrote, (A.D. 1650;) for his contemporary, Lord

Castlehaven, speaks of withdrawing his troops, during the civil war of

1645, within one of the "Danish forts," which were so numerous in the

country; and such was the fashion of attributing all our antiquities

to a people who had impressed the memory of the nation with such

terrible and indelible traditions of themselves, that even Archdeacon

Lynch, the author of "Cambrensis Eversus," supposes the Danes to have

been the builders of the round towers. Dr. Molyneux, who wrote toward

the close of the same century, treats us to a whole book about "the

Danish Forts and Mounds;" but we know perfectly well that the Danes of

Ireland resided only in the seaport towns and their vicinities, and

had no dwellings, and consequently no raths or mounds in the interior

of the country.

Besides the earthen and stone forts, which, it must be remembered,

were inhabited in the early Christian as well as in the pagan times,

and down to a period which it is impossible now to define, we have

several remains of the early Irish habitations, called _cranogues_.

These were small stockaded and generally artificial islands, in the

smaller lakes, and were only accessible by means of boats, ancient

specimens of which, hewn out of a single tree, have been found in the

vicinity of the cranogues in recent times. Some of these cranogues are

known to have been occupied in comparatively modern times; and the

strong timber stakes by which they were generally surrounded are, in a

few instances, still found singularly fresh, and with indications of

having been connected by a strong framework.

Of the state of the building arts in Ireland during the early

Christian period we are enabled to form a tolerably accurate idea,

both by the large number of remains still existing, and by the notices

on the subject which we find in historical documents. Many of the very

earliest Christian edifices devoted to religion in Ireland were built

of stone; but it is clear, nevertheless, that the national fashion was

to construct them of timber; and this fashion the Irish had in common

with the Britons, or, we should rather say, with the Celtic nations

generally. Strabo says the houses of the Gauls were constructed of

poles and wattle work; and we learn from Bede, that among the Britons

building with stone was regarded as a characteristic Roman practice.

We know that both in Ireland and Britain there was a national

prejudice in favor of the custom of employing timber to construct

their churches. The first three churches erected in Ireland--those,

namely, constructed by St. Palladius in his unsuccessful mission

immediately before St Patrick--were of oak. Long after this time, in

the sixth century, St. Columba lived in a wooden cell in the island of

Hy, as his biographer, St. Adamnan, relates; and the use of timber for

their religious edifices was much in favor with the Columbian monks

wherever they settled. So late as the year 1142, when St. Malachy was

building the church of the famous Cistercian Abbey of Mellifont, in

Louth, he received some opposition from one of the local magnates,

because he had undertaken to erect it in an expensive and solid manner

of stone; the argument of this person being, that "they were Scots,

not Frenchmen," and that a wooden oratory in the old Irish fashion

would have sufficed.

It is a curious circumstance connected with this Abbey of Mellifont,

that it is the only Irish edifice of a date older than the

Anglo-Norman period in the ruins of which Dr. Petrie discovered any

bricks to have been used; and we know that it was erected by monks

whom St. Malachy had sent to study in the monastery of St. Bernard, in

France; whence the allusion to {784} Frenchmen made by the Irishman

who had objected to the style of the building. Still it is plain that

the ecclesiastical edifices of stone were very numerous in the country

at that very time; for a few years after St. Gelasius, the Archbishop

of Armagh, caused a limekiln of vast dimensions to be constructed, in

order, as the annalists say, to make lime for the repairs of the

churches of Armagh which had been allowed to fall into decay.

The primitive wooden churches were, at least in some instances,

constructed of planed boards, and were thatched with reeds, the walls

being also frequently protected by a covering of reeds, for which, in

later times, a sheeting of lead was sometimes substituted. This use of

lead sheeting became very general in England; but we may presume that

it was employed in comparatively few cases in Ireland. Sometimes,

instead of boards or hewn timber, wattles were employed, and these

were plastered with mud, the wattles being formed of strong twigs

interlaced. We shall presently see that the use of wattles for

building purposes was in vogue in Ireland up to comparatively modern

times. It is stated in the life of St. Patrick, that when that apostle

visited Tyrawley, in the county of Sligo, finding that timber was not

abundant, he erected a church of mud--so ancient is the custom of

employing that material for building in Ireland--a material, however,

which never could be rendered as suitable for the purpose in our moist

climate, as it is found to be in some of the southern portions of

Europe.

From the very introduction of Christianity, we repeat, stone and

mortar were frequently employed for the building of churches in

Ireland. A building of this description was always called in Irish

_Damhliag_, a word literally signifying "stone church." This term is

still preserved in the name of Duleek in the county of Meath, where

the old stone church so called, and which is supposed, on good

authority, to have been the very first such edifice erected in

Ireland, is still in good preservation; it was built by St. Kienan, a

disciple of St. Patrick, who died in 490; and its age is thus

established beyond any doubt. The stone building, or _Damhliag_, as

Dr. Petrie has remarked, is always latinized by the old Irish writers

_templum, ecclesia_, or _basilica_; while the wooden building is

simply called oratorium.

The ancient Irish churches are almost invariably small, seldom

exceeding 80 feet in length, and not usually being more than 60 feet.

The great church or cathedral of Armagh was originally 140 feet long;

but this was almost a solitary exception. The smaller churches are

simple oblong quadrangles, while in the larger ones there is a second

and smaller quadrangle at the east end, which was the chancel or

sanctuary, and which is separated from the nave by a large

semicircular arch. The entrance door was always originally in the west

end, and square-headed, the top lintel being generally formed of a

single very large flat stone; but in every instance the square-headed

western doorway was in process of time built up, and another doorway,

in the pointed style, opened in the south wall, near its western

extremity. The windows are extremely small, and very few, generally

not more than three, two of which are in the sanctuary, and all being

in the south wall; they are frequently triangular-headed, formed by

two flat stones leaning against each other; and it is probable that in

many cases they were never glazed. The sides of the doorways and

windows are inclined, in the manner of the cyclopean buildings--a

style of architecture with which they have more than one point in

common; for enormous stones are frequently used, the single stone

being made to form both faces of the wall. Polygonal stones are

employed, without any attempt to build in courses; and even flat

stones are often placed at angles, when, with the aid of very little

skill, they might have {785} been placed horizontally; while another

singular feature often to be observed in the oldest Irish stone

churches is, that the side walls and ends are built up independently,

and not bound together at the corners by any interlapping stones. All

these peculiarities are to be found, in a very marked degree, in the

extremely curious specimens of seventh and eighth century buildings in

the South Islands of Arran; and, with the exception of some Christian

_cloghanes_, and some stone-roofed oratories like those near Dingle,

all these early Christian edifices have been built with lime cement.

From the rudeness of the masonry in the buildings of the early

Christian period, a very curious argument has been adduced in favor of

the Pagan origin of the Round Towers. Some persons, in fact, do not

hesitate to argue that, as the Round Towers frequently exhibit a

better style of masonry than the ruined churches in their

neighborhood, they must have been erected by some _earlier_ race of

builders, thus adopting the very opposite to the correct and natural

conclusion which the premises would suggest. Such persons must have a

very misty idea of Irish history; they do not appear to be aware that

there is no country in Europe, except Greece and Rome, of which the

ancient history can boast of such a clear and consecutive series of

written and traditional annals as that of Ireland. This is the

acknowledged opinion of the most learned investigators. There is,

then, no room whatever for any such conjectural race or epoch as that

which the theory in question would suppose in Irish history; there is

no room for such wild hypotheses as may be framed, for instance, to

account for the remains of extinct civilized races in the interior of

North America. Any one who has the singularly distinct chain of

ancient Irish chronicles present to his mind must be aware of this

fact, and must know perfectly well that there was no mysterious

unknown race in Ireland before the introduction of Christianity who

could have built the round towers--even if it were probable that such

a race would have built these, and left no other fragment of stone and

mortar work in the land! As to the disparity sometimes to be observed

in the masonry of the towers and the ancient churches beside them, it

can be explained without any such absurd hypothesis. It is clear from

the mouldings of the windows, and other architectural details, and

even from the statements of our annalists, that some of the Round

Towers are not older than the eleventh or twelfth century, and

consequently their masonry might well be superior to that of churches

built some four or five hundred years before them. But, even when the

builders were contemporary, they were not such dull craftsmen as not

to have understood perfectly well that a more careful style of

workmanship was required in an edifice which they should carry to a

height of 120 or 130 feet than in one of which the walls would not

exceed 10 or 14 feet in elevation. In fact, a little consideration

must show any enlightened man that the theory to which we have

referred is utterly untenable.

Mr. Parker, a high authority on questions of architectural antiquity,

has, in his valuable series of papers on the subject in the

"Gentleman's Magazine," thrown considerable light on Irish mediaeval

architecture. One point, of which he has been decidedly the first

observer, is, that all the details of an ancient building in Ireland

seldom or never belong to the period at which the building was,

according to record, erected. This is an extremely carious fact; and

there can be no doubt of Mr. Parker's accuracy on the point; but it

appears to us that he invariably finds his remark verified in castles

and abbeys of the Anglo-Norman period in Ireland. To what, then, is

the peculiarity to be attributed? Could the architects have been

Irish, and could they have adopted their principles from the study of

older edifices {786} in England? On this point we are not aware that

he comes to any conclusion; but, in describing the interesting details

of Cormac's Chapel, on the Rock of Cashel--one of the most valuable

remains of mediaeval architecture in the empire, and which was built

some fifty years before the Anglo-Norman invasion--he says, "It is

neither earlier nor later in style than buildings of the same date in

England; and with the exception of a few particulars, agrees in detail

with them." From this we may conclude, that before the arrival of the

Anglo-Normans the Irish architects were fully up to the contemporary

state of their art, though subsequently the Anglo-Irish fell into the

anachronisms which Mr. Parker so frequently points out.

When Henry II. resolved on spending the Christmas of 1171 in Dublin,

there was no building in that old capital of the Ostmen sufficiently

spacious to accommodate his court; and a pavilion was accordingly

constructed for the purpose of plastered wattles, in the Irish

fashion, on a site at the south side of the present Dame street This

mode of constructing houses must have been very convenient in times

when the face of a country was liable every other year to be

devastated by war, and when it would have been folly to erect a

habitation intended to be permanent. The destruction of all the

dwellings in a territory at that time, was not quite so ruinous a

catastrophe as it might seem to us, especially as it was a very usual

thing to have the granaries under ground.

The employment of wattles for one purpose or other, in the

construction of buildings, appears to have been very long retained in

Ireland; and they seem to have been constantly used by the masons as

centering in the building of arches, as may be seen from an

examination of any of the ruined abbeys or castles throughout the

country, where the impression of the interwoven twigs will always be

found in the mortar of the vaulted roofs and arches. Mr. Parker

appears to have been particularly struck by this circumstance, which,

however, is familiar to every Irish antiquary; but he tells us that he

has found the same thing in a few instances in England.

A French gentleman, who travelled through Ireland in 1644, has left us

a curious account of the mode of constructing their habitations

employed at that time by the rural population. He writes: "The towns

are built in the English fashion, but the houses in the country are in

this manner: two stakes are fixed in the ground, across which is a

transverse pole, to support two rows of rafters on the two sides,

which are covered with leaves and straw. The cabins are of another

fashion. There are four walls the height of a man, supporting rafters,

over which they thatch with straw and leaves; they are without

chimneys, and make the fire in the middle of the hut, which greatly

incommodes those who are not fond of smoke."

The writer goes on to describe the fortified domiciles of the gentry.

He says: "The castles or houses of the nobility consist of four walls

extremely high, thatched with straw; but, to tell the truth, they are

nothing but square towers without windows, or, at least, having such

small apertures as to give no more light than there is in a prison;

they have little furniture, and cover their room with rushes, of which

they make their beds in summer, and of straw in winter; they put the

rushes a foot deep on their floors, and on their windows, and many of

them ornament the ceilings with branches." (The Tour of M. De la

Boullaye le Gouz.)

This description is applicable to those numerous, solitary, and gloomy

buildings called castles, the ruins of which are so conspicuous in

every part of the country, and a considerable number of which were

erected by the Undertakers, in the reign of James I.; while it must be

confessed that the mode of constructing the hovels of the peasantry,

as described in the preceding extract, has not undergone much

improvement, up to the present day, in many parts of Ireland.

------

{787}

Translated from the Spanish.

PERICO THE SAD; OR, THE ALVAREDA FAMILY.

CHAPTER XIII.

A tempestuous night covered the sky with flying clouds, which were

rushing further on to discharge their torrents. Sometimes they

separated in their flight, and the moon appeared between them, mild

and tranquil, like a herald of concord and peace in the midst of the

strife.

In the short intervals, during which this placid light illumined earth

and heaven, a pale and emaciated man might have been seen making his

way along a solitary road. The uncertainty of his manner, his

apprehensive eyes, and the agitation of his face, would have shown

clearly that he was a fugitive.

A fugitive indeed! for he fled from inhabited places; fled from his

fellow-men; fled from human justice; fled from himself and from his

own conscience. This man was an assassin, and no one who had seen him

fleeing, as the clouds above were fleeing before the invisible force

which pursued them, would have recognized the honorable man, the

obedient son, the loving husband and devoted father of a few days

since, in this miserable being, now fallen under the irremissible

sentence of the law of expiation.

Yes, this man was Perico, not seeking a peace now and for ever lost,

but fleeing from the present and in dread of the future.

He had passed days of despair and nights of horror in the most

solitary places, sustaining himself on acorns and roots; shrinking

from the light of day, which accused, and from the eyes of men, that

condemned him. But no darkness could hide the images that were always

before him, no silence awe their clamors. His unhappy sister; his

disconsolate mother; the bereaved old man, his father's friend,

haunted his vision; the reprobation of his honorable race oppressed

his soul; and more appalling than all these, the solemn, mournful, and

warning note of the passing bell, which he had heard calling to Heaven

for mercy upon his victim, sounded continually in his ears. In vain

pride insinuated, through its most seductive organ, worldly honor,

that he had, and that not to vindicate himself would have been a

reproach; that the injuries were greater than the reprisal.

A voice which the cries of passion had silenced, but which became more

distinct and more severe in proportion as they, like all that is

human, sank and failed--the eternal voice of conscience, said to him,

"O that thou hadst never done it!"

There came, borne upon the wind, an extraordinary sound, now hoarser,

now failing and fainter, as the gusts were more or less powerful. What

could it be? Everything terrifies the guilty soul. Was it the roar of

the wind, the pipe of an organ, or a voice of lamentation? The nearer

Perico approached it, the more inexplicable it seemed. The road the

unhappy man was following led toward the point from whence the sound

proceeded. He reaches it, and his terror is at his height when, unable

to distinguish anything--for a black cloud has covered the moon--he

hears directly above his bead the portentous wail, so sad, so vague,

so awful!

{788}

At this moment the clouds are broken, and over all the moonlight

falls, clear and silvery, like a mantle of transparent snow. Every

object comes out of the mystery of shadows. He sees _reija_ asleep in

its valley like a white bird in its nest. He lifts his eyes to

discover the cause of the sound. O horror! Upon five posts he sees

five human heads! From these proceed the doleful lamentation, a

warning from the dead to the living. [Footnote 185]

[Footnote 185: Various witnesses have testified to this frightful

phenomenon, which is naturally explained, the sound being caused by

the wind passing through the throat, month, and ears of heads placed

as located above.]

Perico starts back aghast, and perceives, for the first time, that he

is not alone. A man is standing near one of the posts. He is tall and

vigorous, and his bearing is manly and erect. He is dressed richly

after the manner of contrabandists. His bronzed face is hard, bold,

and calm. He holds his hat in his hand, inclining uncovered before

these posts of ignominy a head which never was uncovered in human

respect; for it is that of an outlaw, of a man who has broken all ties

with society, and respects nothing in the world. But this man,

although impious, believes in God, and although criminal, is a

Christian, and is praying.

When from an energetic and indomitable nature, emancipated from all

restrain, there issue a few drops of adoration, as water oozes from a

rock, what do you call it unbelievers? Is it superstitious fear? To

this man fear is a word without a meaning. Is it hypocrisy? Only the

heads of five dead men witness it. Is it moral weakness? He has

strength of soul unknown in society, where all lean upon something; he

stands alone. Is it a remembrance of infancy, a tribute to the mother

who taught him to pray?

There exists no such memory for the abandoned orphan, who grew up

among the savage bulls he guarded.

What is it then that bends his neck and detains him to pray in the

presence of the dead?

After some moments the man concluded his prayer, replaced his hat, and

turning to Perico said,

"Where are you going, sir?"

Perico neither wished nor was able to answer. A vertigo had seized

him.

"Where are you going, I say?" again asked the unknown.

Perico remained silent.

"Are you dumb?" proceeded the questioner, "or is it because you do not

choose to answer? If it is the last," he added, pointing to his gun,

"here is a mouth which obtains replies when mine fails."

Perico's situation rendered him too desperate for reflection, and the

brand of cowardice which had been stamped upon his forehead, still

burned like a recent mark of the ignominious iron. He therefore

answered instantly, seizing his firelock.

"And here is another that replies in the tone in which it is

questioned."

The intentions of the unknown were not hostile, nor had he any idea of

carrying out his threat, though he did not lack the courage to do it.

Another so daring as he did not tread the soil of Andalucia. But the

arrogance of the poor worn youth pleased instead of offending him.

"Comrade," he said, "I always like to take off my hat before drawing

my sword, but it suits me to know with whom I speak and whom I meet on

the road. You must have courage to be walking here; for they say that

Diego and his band are in this neighborhood, and you know, for all

Spain knows, who Diego is; where he puts his eye he puts his ball. The

leaves tremble upon the trees at sight of him, and the dead in their

graves at the sound of his name."

All this was said without that Andalucian boastfulness, so grotesquely

exaggerated in these days, but with the naturalness of conviction, and

the serenity of one who states a simple truth.

"What do I care for Diego and his band?" exclaimed Perico, not with

bravado, but with the most profound dejection.

{789}

As with failing voice he pronounced these words, he tottered and

leaned his head upon his gun.

"What has taken you? What is the matter?" asked the stranger, noticing

his weakness.

Perico did not reply, for so great was his exhaustion and such the

effect of his recent emotions that he fell down senseless.

The unknown knelt down beside him and lifted his head. The moon shone

full upon that face, beautiful notwithstanding its mortal paleness,

and the traces of passion, anguish, and grief which marred it.

"He is dead," said the stranger to himself, placing his rough hand

upon Perico's heart. The heart which, a few days before, was as pure

as the sky of May. "No," he continued, "he is not dead, but will die

here, like a dog, if he is not taken care of."

And he looked at him again, for he felt awakening in his heart that

noble attraction which draws the strong toward the weak, the powerful

toward the helpless; for let skeptics say what they will, there is a

spark of divinity in the breast of every human creature. He rose to

his feet and whistled.

He is answered by the sound of a brisk gallop, and a beautiful young

horse, with arched neck and rolling mane, comes up and stops before

his master, turning his fine head and brilliant eyes as if to offer

him the stirrup.

The unknown raises the inanimate Perico in his robust arms, throws him

across the horse, springs up beside him, presses his knees gently to

the animal's flanks, and the noble creature darts away, gayly and

lightly, as if unconscious of the double weight.

CHAPTER XIV.

In a solitary hostel, standing like a beggar beside the highway, the

innkeeper and his wife were seated before their fire, in the dull

tranquillity of persons as accustomed to the alternations of noisy

life by day and complete isolation by night as the inhabitants of

marshy places are to their intermittent fevers.

"May evil light on that hard-skulled sailor who took it into his head

that there must be a new world, and never stopped till he ran against

it," said the woman. "Had not the king already cities enough in this?

What good has it done? Taken our sons off there, and sent us the

epidemic. Do say, Andres, and don't sit sleeping there like a mole, if

it has been of any other use."

"Yes, wife, yes," answered the innkeeper, half' opening his eyes, "the

silver comes from there."

"Plague take the silver!" exclaimed the woman.

"And the tobacco," added the husband, slowly and lazily, again closing

his eyes,

"A curse upon the tobacco!" said the wife angrily. "Do you think, you

unfeeling father, that the silver or the tobacco are worth the lives

they cost and the tears? Son of my soul! God knows what will become of

him in that land where they kill men like chinches, and where

everything is venomous, even the air!"

They heard at this moment a peculiar whistle. The innkeeper, springing

to his feet, caught up the light and ran toward the door, exclaiming,

"The captain!"

As he presented himself on the threshold, the rays of the lamp fell

upon a man on horseback, with another man that looked like a corpse

lying across the horse in front of him.

"Help me take this fellow down," said the rider, in the rough tone of

a man of few words.

The innkeeper handed the lamp to his wife, who had approached, and

made haste to obey.

"Mercy to us! A dead man!" said she. "For the love of the Blessed

Mother, sir, do not leave him in our house!"

{790}

"He is not dead," said the horseman, "he is sick; nurse him up--that

is what women ore good for. Here is money to pay for the cure."

Saying this, he threw down a piece of gold, and disappeared, the

resounding and measured gallop of his horse dying away gradually in

the distance.

"If this is not a cool proceeding!" grumbled Martha. "What will you

bet that he, with his own hands, has not put the man in this state?

and he takes himself off and leaves him on ours! 'You cure him!' as if

it were nothing to cure a man who is dead or dying! As if this inn

were an hospital! The bully thinks he has only to command, as if he

were the king!"

"Hush!" exclaimed the innkeeper, alarmed, "_will_ you be still,

long-tongue! Talk that way of Diego! Women are the very devil! What is

the use of grumbling, since you know there is nothing for it but to do

as these people tell us! Besides, this is a work of charity, so let's

be about it."

They prepared, as well as they could, a bed in a garret.

"He has no sign of blow or wound," said Andres, as he was undressing

the patient; "so you see, wife, it is a sickness like any other."

"Look, look, Andres!" exclaimed Martha; "he has the scapular of our

Lady of Carmel around his neck."

And as if the sight or influence of the blessed object had awakened in

her all the gentle sentiments of Christian humility, or as if the

sacred precept, "Thy neighbor as thyself," uttered by the brotherhood

in united devotion, had resounded clearly, she began to exclaim: "You

were right, Andres, it is a work of charity to assist him, poor

fellow! How young he is, and how forsaken! His poor mother! Come,

come, Andres, what are you doing, standing there like a post? Go!

hurry! bring me some wine to rub his temples; and kill a hen, for I am

going to make him some broth."

"So it is," soliloquized Andres, as he went out--"at first, wouldn't

have him in the house; now she will turn the house out of the windows

for him. That's the way with women. It is hard to understand them."

On the following night, a man of evil face and repugnant aspect came

to the inn. This man had been in the penitentiary, and was nicknamed

the convict.

"God be with you, sir," said the innkeeper, with more fear than

cordiality, "what might be your pleasure?"

"A whim of the captain's, curse him! for haven't I come to ask after

the sick, like the porter of a convent?"

"He is not doing very well," answered the innkeeper; "he is in a

raging fever, is out of his mind, and talks of a murder he has

done--of dead men's heads."

"Ho! so then he is a man that can handle arms," said the convict.

"Let's have a look at him."

They mounted to the garret, and the innkeeper continued:

"All day long I have been in a cold sweat with fear. There have been

people in the house, and even soldiers--if they had heard him!"

The convict, who had been examining the delicate and wasted form of

Perico, interrupted with a movement of disdain.

"Well, if he makes too much noise for you, quarter him upon the king."

[Footnote 186]

[Footnote 186: Put him into the street.]

"No, indeed!" cried Martha, "poor unfortunate! I have a son in America

who may be at this very hour in the same condition, abandoned by every

one, and calling, as this one calls, for his mother. No, no, sir, we

shall not desert him. Neither Our Lady, whose scapular he wears, nor

I."

"Buy him sweetmeats," said the convict, and went down.

"What news?' he asked of the innkeeper.

"They say that a reward is to be offered for Diego's head."

{791}

"What?" asked the convict again, with quick and unusual interest. The

innkeeper repeated what he had said. The convict considered a moment,

and then continued,

"Where do they think we are?"

"Near Despenaperros."

"Are they after us?"

"Yes, there is a cavalry company at Sevilla, one of infantry at

Cordoba, and another of the mountain soldiery at Utrera."

"There will be some shoes worn out before they see our faces, and if

they do get to see them it will cost them dear."

"Yes, yes," Andres replied; "we know that whoever puts himself in

Diego's way may as well look for his grave; but then--there may be so

many of them . . ."

"Perhaps you would like to get a crack of my fist on your bugle?" said

the bandit.

"Not at all," said Andres, retreating a step or two.

"Put more ballast in your tongue then--and hurry up with the bread

--quick now!"

Andres hastened to obey. The bandit was going away when he heard

Martha's voice calling after him.

"It slipped my mind--you take this money," she said, handing him the

piece of gold. "Give it to the captain, and tell him that what I do

for this lad I do for charity, and not for interest."

"I shall be sure to give him such a reason. He accepts 'No' neither

when he says give, nor when he says take; but to settle it between

you, I will keep the money;" and setting spurs to his horse, he

disappeared.

"You have done a wise thing!" said the innkeeper impatiently. "Will

the money, you foolish good-for-nothing, be better in the hands of

that big thief than in ours? Women!--ill hap to them! Only the devil

understands them."

"I understand myself and God understands me," said the good woman,

returning to the garret.

CHAPTER XI.

The care of the innkeeper's wife and the youth and robust constitution

of Perico vanquished the fever. At the end of a fortnight he was able

to rise.

Perico evinced all his gratitude to Martha in a manner more heartfelt

than fluent.

"You must not thank me" said the good woman, "for truly, the face I

put on when I saw you brought was not one of welcome; but I have taken

a liking to you because I see that you are a good son and a good

Christian."

Perico hung his head in deep grief and humiliation. His physical

weakness had deadened in him the blind and furious impulse which had

exalted him, as such impulse does sometimes exalt gentle and timid

natures to a point past the limit which strong-minded and even violent

men respect.

All that effervescence which caused such a surging of his passions, as

gas causes the juice of the grape to ferment, had ceased, as the foam

subsides upon the wine, leaving reflection, which, without diminishing

the greatness of his wrongs, condemned his method of redressing them.

All the horror which the future inspired returned to Perico with

returning strength, and it was not lessened when Andres, taking the

occasion one day when his wife was about her work, said to him:

"My friend, now that you are recovered you must seek your living

somewhere else, for--the more friendship, the more frankness,

sir--when you were out of your head you talked of a murder you had

committed. If it is true, and they find you here, we shall suffer for

it, and that will not be right; the just ought not to pay for sinners;

well-regulated charity, let Martha, who pretends to know better, say

what she will, begins at home. Nobody but that pumpkin-headed wife of

mine is capable of sustaining that Christian charity begins with one's

neighbor. As to me, I tell you the truth, I want nothing to do with

justice, for she has a heavy hand."

{792}

Perico did not reply, but went with tearful eyes to take leave of

Martha. The good soul felt his departure, for she had become fond of

him. The memory of her son had attached Martha to the unfortunate

young man, and the memory of his own mother had drawn Perico toward

the woman who acted toward him a mother's part.

He took his gun, and was going out when he met the convict.

"Which way?" said the robber. "Do you clear out in this fashion,

without so much as May God reward you! to the compassionate soul who

picked you up? This isn't the right thing, comrade. Besides, where can

you go hereabouts? Are you in a hurry to be put in the lock-up?"

Perico remained silent; he neither thought nor reasoned--had no will

of his own. "Courage! and come along," proceeded the convict. "Here we

are taking more trouble to help you than you will take to let yourself

be helped." Perico followed him mechanically.

"Look, Martha," said Andres, seeing Perico at a distance in company

with the robber, "look at your pet--and what a jewel he is, to be

sure! There he goes with the convict."

"And what of it?" responded Martha. "I tell you, Andres, that he is a

good son and a good Christian."

"An impostor and a vagabond, that has eaten up my hens--and you see

where he is going, and yet say that he is good! The devil only

understands women!"

Perico and the convict, making their way through thickets and

difficult places, came at last to an elevation, upon which stood the

captain leaning on his gun, and guarding the slumbers of eight men,

who were lying around him on the slope. Near him grazed his beautiful

horse, which lifted its head from time to time to regard its master.

"Here is this young man," said the convict as they drew near.

Without changing his position, the captain slowly turned his eyes and

examined the new arrival from head to foot. His scrutiny finished, he

asked,

"Are you a fugitive from justice?"

Perico inclined his head, but did not answer.

"There is no cause for fear," proceeded his questioner, and presently,

in brief phrases, added,

"Men have fatal hours, and of these some are as red as blood and some

as black as darkness itself. One is enough to destroy a man, and turn

his heart to a stone which has neither pulse nor feeling, only weight.

He remains lost, for the past is past, and there is nothing to do but

bear it with pluck. Life is a fight, in which one must look before

him, like a brave man, and not behind, like a poltroon."

"I cannot do it," exclaimed Perico vehemently. "If you knew--"

The captain, with an imperative gesture, extended his arm to silence

him, and continued.

"Here, each one carries his own secrets within himself, a sealed

packet, without awakening in the others either curiosity or interest.

If you have nowhere to go, stay with us; here we defend all we have

left, our life. Mine I do not guard because I value it, but to keep it

from the headsman."

"But you rob?" said Perico.

"We must do something," responded the bandit, returning, like a

tortoise, into his hard and impenetrable shell.

Perico neither accepted nor refused the proposition, he remained

without volition, an inert body; chance disposed of his wretched

existence, as the winds dispose of the dry and heavy sands of the

desert.

{793}

CHAPTER XVI.

But while Perico, after the occurrences which we have related, was

dragging out a miserable existence among a band of criminals, what

became of the other individuals of this family? To what extremes had

they been carried by resentment, grief, despair, and revenge?

Pedro, from the fatal day on which he lost his son, had shut himself

in his own house with his sorrow. The parish priest and some of his

friends went from time to time to keep him company--not to console

him, that was impossible, but to talk with him about his trouble, like

those who relieve vessels of the bitter water of the sea, not to right

them but to keep them from sinking. They had tried to persuade him to

renew his intercourse with the family of Perico, but without success.

"No, no," he would answer on such occasions. "I have forgiven him

before God and men; but have to do with his people as though it had

not been, I cannot."

"Pedro, Pedro, that is not forgiveness," said the priest. "It is the

letter but not the spirit of the law."

"Father," replied the poor man, "God does not ask what is impossible."

"No, but what he requires is possible."

"Sir, you want me to be a saint, and I am not one; it is enough for me

to be a good Christian, and forgive. Have I molested them? Have I

sought justice? What more can I do?"

"Pedro, returning good for evil, wise men walk in peace."

"Mercy, mercy, father! why shave so close as to lay bare the brains?

God help and favor them; but each in his own house, and God with us

all."

Maria had hidden herself with her daughter in the retirement of her

cottage, covering the despair and shame of the latter with the sacred

mantle of maternal love, her only refuge from the unanimous

disapproval and condemnation which she justly merited. The unfortunate

victims, Anna and Elvira, remained alone, but sustained in their

immense affliction by their religion and their conscience. Many months

passed in this way. At length two Capuchins came to the village to

hold a mission. These missions were instituted for the conversion of

the wicked, the awakening of the luke-warm, the encouragement of the

good, and the consolation of the sorrowful.

The missionaries preached at night, and the church was filled with

people who came to hear the word of God, which teaches men to be pious

and humble.

The good Maria succeeded in persuading her daughter to go to the

missions, and Rita, hard, bitter, and selfish, in her shame and

desperation, found in them repentance, with tears for the past,

penance and humiliation for the present, and for the future the divine

hand, which lifts the fallen one, who, bathed in tears, and prostrate

in ashes, implores its help. One night the subject of the sermon was

the forgiveness of injuries. Magnificent theme! Holy and sublime

beyond all others! The earnest preacher knew how to improve it, and

the believing people how to understand it.

At the conclusion the good missionary knelt before the crucifix, and

with fervent zeal and ardent charity promised the Lord of mercy, in

the name of that multitude kneeling at his feet, that on the

succeeding night there should not be in the temple a single hard and

unreconciled heart. A burst of exclamations and tears confirmed the

promise of the devoted apostle.

The day which followed was one of peace and love, according to the

spirit of the evangel. The most deeply-rooted enmities were ended; the

most irreconcilable foes embraced each other in the streets; the

angels in heaven had cause for rejoicing.

Pedro went to see Anna. Terrible to the unhappy man was the entering

into that house. He approached Anna and embraced her in silence. The

afflicted mother shook, and tried in vain to overcome her emotion. But

when Pedro turned toward Elvira, as she stood wringing her thin hands,

worn to a shadow and bathed in tears--when {794} he pressed to his

paternal heart her whom he had looked upon and loved as a daughter,

all his grief broke forth in the cry: "Daughter! daughter! you and I

loved him!"

Rita, also, went to Anna's to beg for that which Pedro went to carry.

When she found herself in the presence of the mother-in-law she had

outraged, she fell upon her knees. "I," she exclaimed, beating her

breast, "have been the cause of all! I have not come to ask a

forgiveness I do not deserve, but to beg of you to reprimand without

cursing me." When she turned to Elvira, it was not enough to remain on

her knees, she bent her face to the floor, moaning amidst her sobs.

"Since you are an angel, forgive!"

Maria supported her prostrate child, and implored Anna with her looks

and tears. Anna and Elvira, without a word of reproach, raised and

embraced her who had done so much to injure them; striving all they

could from that day to reanimate her, for she was the most wretched of

the three, because the guilty one.

All the people looked with charity upon the woman who had sincerely

and publicly repented, for although the society called cultivated

finds in religious demonstrations another cause for vituperation,

adding to the condemnation of faults which it never forgets the

reproach of hypocrisy upon those who turn to God, the people, more

generous and more just, honor the open evidence of penitence and

humiliation. Therefore, when they saw Rita abase herself and weep,

their indignation was exchanged for compassion, and the _epithet_

"infamous!" for the pitiful words "poor child!"

This was because the common people, though they know not what

philanthropy means, know well, because religion teaches them, what is

Christian charity.

CHAPTER XVII.

To Perico, the life into which he found himself drawn by necessity,

and by the vigorous influence Diego exercised over him, was one of

misery; Diego also had been drawn into a life of crime by a terrible

misfortune; but having entered, he adopted it as a warrior does his

iron armor, without heeding either its hardness or its oppressive

weight. Perico followed his wicked companions while he detested them.

He was like the silver fish of some peaceful inland lake which, caught

by some fatal current, is carried away into the bitter and restless

waters of the sea, where it agonizes without the power to escape. At

times, when a crime was committed under his eyes, he wished in his

desperation to end his torments at once, by giving himself up to

justice; but shame, and want of energy to overcome it, held him back.

The others hated him, and surnamed him "The Sad," but he was sustained

by Diego's powerful protection. Diego felt attracted toward the man

whose life he had saved, and who was, he felt, good and honest. For

the rough and austere Diego was of a strong and noble nature that had

not yet descended to the lowest grade of evil, which is hatred of the

good.

In one of their raids, when the band had approached Tas Yentas, near

Alocaz, a spy arrived in breathless haste from Utrera, telling them

that a company of mountain soldiery had just left the latter place in

the direction of Tas Yentas, informed of their whereabouts by some

travellers they had lately pillaged.

They made haste to take refuge in an olive grove, but had hardly

entered it when they were surprised by a troop of cavalry. A deadly

contest then commenced, sustained by these men, who were fighting for

their lives with terrible bravery.

{795}

"Perico," said Diego, "now or never is the occasion to prove that you

do not eat your bread without earning it. This is a fair fight. At

them, if you are a man!"

On hearing these words, Perico, confused, and like a drunken man,

threw himself in the way of the balls, firing upon the poor

soldiers--men who were sacrificing everything for the good of society,

which, in its egotism, does not even thank them; for it happens to

them as to the confessors and doctors, who are laughed at in health,

and anxiously called upon when there is any danger. One of the bandits

was killed, two of the soldiers wounded, and a ball of Perico's, fired

at a great distance, killed the commander of the troop. The

consternation which followed this catastrophe gave the robbers an

opportunity to escape. They fled beyond Utrera, passed through the

haciendas of La Chaparra and Jesus-Maria, and arrived exhausted at

nightfall in Valobrega. This valley, not far from Alcalá is surrounded

by ridges and olive slopes. In the most retired part of it, on the

margin of a brook, are still standing the ruins of a Moorish castle

called Marchenilla. Men and horses threw themselves upon the turf at

the base of these solitary ruins. They quenched their thirst in the

brook, and when night set, in lighted a fire, and all except Diego and

Perico lay down to sleep.

"An evil day, Corso," said Diego, caressing his horse, which lowered

and then lifted his beautiful head as if to assent to his master's

words, and say to him, "What matter since I have saved you?"

"I treat thee shamefully, my son," continued the chief, who loved his

horse the more fondly because he loved no other creature. The horse,

as if he had understood, neighed gaily, and, rising on his hind feet,

balanced himself, and then dropped down upon all four beside his

master, presenting his head to be caressed.

"What will become of thee if l am taken?" said the robber, leaning his

head against the neck of the animal, which now stood motionless.

"Truly," said Diego, seating himself by the fire in front of Perico,

"it is to you we owe our escape to-day with so little loss."

"To me?" asked Perico surprised.

"Yes," answered the captain; "the troop was commanded by a brave

officer, who knew the country, and did not mean child's play. The son

of the Countess of Villaoran. He would have given us work if you had

not killed him."

"God have mercy on me!" exclaimed Perico, springing to his feet and

raising his clasped hands to heaven. "What are you saying? The son of

the countess was there, and I killed him?"

"What shocks you?" replied Diego.

"Perhaps you thought we were firing sugar-plums? Heavens!" he added

impatiently, "you exasperate me! One would take you for a travelling

player, with all your attitudes and extravagances. By all that's

sacred, the convict is right. You missed your vocation; instead of

choosing a life of freedom you should have turned friar. Come! keep

watch," he added, wrapping himself in his mantle, and lying down with

a stone under his head and his carbine between his knees.

His words were lost upon Perico. The unhappy man tore his hair and

cursed himself in his despair. He had killed the son of the mistress

and benefactress of his uncles, his own companion of childhood.

CHAPTER XVIII.

How vividly, during that gloomy night did the tranquil scenes of his

lost domestic happiness present themselves to Perico! And for what had

he exchanged them? His present frightful existence. All around him was

motionless. He saw in the sad monotony of the night the changeless

monotony of his misery; in the fire {796} burning before him, his

consuming conscience; and in the cold and impenetrable obscurity

beyond, his dark and cheerless future.

"Power of God!" he cried, "can I see and remember, and feel all this,

and yet live?"

The red and wavering flame threw from time to time a glare of light

across the strange wild forms of the ruins, presently leaving them in

deep shadow, appearing to take refuge within, as a dying memory

flashes up and then buries itself in the oblivion of the past. He

heard his own breathing exaggerated by the silence, he saw horrible

shapes in the obscurity. Fingers threatened him--eyes glared at

him--reproachful voices accused him. And no, he was not mistaken, by

the clearer light of the flames, now blown by the wind, he saw, beyond

a remnant of wall, a pair of hard black eyes fixed upon him. Startled,

and doubtful between the imaginary and the real, Perico did not know

whether he ought to put himself under the protection of heaven, by

making the sign of the cross, or to call for earthly help by giving

the signal of alarm.

Before he could act, there came from behind the stone ruin a ruin of

humanity; from behind the degradation of time, a wreck of human

degradation--an old, filthy, and disgusting gipsy woman. The tint of

the brown woollen skirts which covered her fleshless limbs blended

with that of the ruin; she wore about her neck a kerchief, and over

her faded locks a black cloth mantilla.

Perico was struck motionless as a stone, or as if the repulsive face

had been that of the Medusa.

"Don't be uneasy," said the vision, approaching, "there is nothing to

be afraid of. I have not come with bad motive, and you need not be on

the watch. I knew that you were here, and have caused it to be rumored

that you were making your way in the direction of the Sierra de Ronda,

and that people had seen you near Espera and Villa-Martin."

"But why have you come here?" exclaimed Perico, instinctively alarmed

at the aspect of the woman.

"To put you in the way of securing, at a stroke, a fortune that will

last you your lifetime," she replied.

"That which you are likely to offer does not inspire much confidence,"

said Perico.

"Why should I wish to harm you?" said the gipsy; "and as to my looks,

a poor cloak may cover a hail companion. I bring a treasure to your

very hands; you have only to extend them."

"A treasure," said Perico, in whom the word, instead of exciting

covetousness, only suggested the idea that the woman was mad, "a

treasure, and where is it?"

The old wretch, who saw in the question only what she expected to

find, avidity and thirst for gold, approached Perico as if she feared

the breath of night might intercept her words, and the anathemas of

heaven dissolve them in the air, and whispered in his ear, "In the

church."

Perico, utterly shocked, gave a step backward, but recovering himself,

rushed upon the woman like a tiger, and pushing her with all his

might, exclaimed, "Go!"

"I will not go," she said, unintimidated; "I came to speak with the

captain and the convict, and I will speak with them."

In his anguish lest she should do it, and to force her to go, Perico

drew a dagger and flashed its shining blade in the firelight. The

gipsy shrieked and the robbers woke.

"What is this?" shouted Diego; "what has happened? Perico, are you

going to kill a woman?"

"No, no, I do not want to kill her, only to drive her away."

"And because," said the old woman, "I have come so far, through danger

and fatigue, to put you in a way to leave this slavish life you are

leading, like the Blond of Espera, who committed one robbery so great

that he had enough to go beyond the seas and pass the rest of his days

in comfort."

{797}

The robbers grouped themselves around her; the convict presenting her

with a fragment of the wall as a seat.

"Do not listen! do not listen!" cried Perico, beside himself; "she

purposes a sacrilege!"

"Sir," said the convict to Diego, "oblige that agonizing priest to

hold his tongue, he is like the dog in the manger. Let this good woman

speak, and we shall know what she has to say--a regiment of horse

couldn't silence that dismal screech-owl."

Diego hesitated, but finally turned toward the hag, and Perico,

knowing then that hope was lost, for the bandit always followed his

first impulses, rushed away, running hither and thither among the

olives like a madman.

The gipsy had calculated everything, and her measures were well taken.

The great advantages so exaggerated, the difficulties so easily

overcome, the well-arranged precautions, upon which she amplified so

largely, produced their effect. The temptation which offers flowers

with one hand and with the other hides the thorns, convinced some and

seduced others.

All the plans were settled, and the hours and signals agreed upon, and

before the cocks, day's faithful sentinels, announced his coming, the

band was on its way to the solitary hacienda of "El Cuervo," and the

old witch crawling like a cunning and venomous snake to her den in the

wood of Alcalá, where in the depths of the earth she had conceived the

crime to which amidst darkness and ruins she had persuaded

evil-doers--the crime which was to be perpetrated in the temple of

God.

CHAPTER XIX.

Heavily passed the hours of the succeeding day to the idle guests of

El Cuervo. All Perico's representations and prayers had failed to

dissuade Diego from his impious design. Diego would never turn back;

and this stupid tenacity in pursuing a course which he knew to be

wrong, had cost him respect and honor, and was still to cost him

liberty and life. It had, moreover, at the instigation of the convict,

forced Perico, who had at last resolved to leave the band, to

accompany it on this atrocious expedition--that vile man suggesting to

Diego that there was no other means of preventing the _saint_ from

denouncing them.

All mounted and at midnight reached the ruined castle of Alcalá. Diego

whistled three times. Directly after, the gipsy, holding a dark

lantern, emerged from one of the vaults which open at the base of the

castle. They dismounted and followed her.

Perico would have escaped by flight from the evil pass in which he

found himself, but his companions surrounded him and dragged him with

them whither the woman led. She, after saluting the robbers in a

fawning voice, opened with a picklock the door of a rude court filled

with rubbish and timbers. From the court a postern leads into the

vestry, and through this the sacrilegious band entered the church, not

without dread and trembling even at the sound of their own footsteps.

What a sublime and tremendous spectacle--a deserted temple in the dead

of night! Under its influence even the purest and most pious souls

sink in profound awe and devotion; and no amount of incredulity is

sufficient to sustain the heart of him who presumes to violate it.

How immense appeared those shadowy naves! How far above them the

corbels, which, upheld by giants of stone, seemed almost lost in the

mysterious gloom of a sky without stars! There in a deep and lonesome

niche, stretched prostrate and mute, slept a cold effigy upon a

sepulchre. Its outlines were hardly discernible, but the very

obscurity seemed to lend them motion.

{798}

The high altar, still perfumed with the flowers and incense of the

morning, gleamed through the darkness. The altar, centre of faith,

throne of charity, refuge of hope, shelter of the defenceless,

exhaustless source of consolations, attracting all eyes, all steps,

all hearts. Before the tabernacle burned the lamp, solitary guardian

of the _sacrarium_--burned only to light it, for light is the

knowledge of God.

Holy and mysterious lamp--continual holocaust--aflame, tranquil like

hope--silent, like reverence--ardent, like charity--and enduring like

eternal mercy. The gleams and reflections of this light caught and

relieved the prominent points of the carvings and mouldings of the

gilded altarpiece, giving them the look of eyes keeping religious

watch. There was nothing to distract the mind, the perfect fixedness,

the unbroken stillness, effected as it were a suspension of life,

which was not sleep--which was not death, but the peacefulness of the

one and the deep solemnity of the other.

Such was the interior of the church of Alcalá when the spoilers

entered, lighted by the gipsy's lantern and dragging with them, by

main force, the unfortunate Perico.

"Let him go, and lock that door," said Diego.

"He will shout and betray us," said the others.

"Let him go, I say," retorted the captain. "What can he do?"

"He can shriek," answered Leon, who, assisted by the gipsy, was

stripping the high altar of the silver furniture which adorned it.

"Guard him, then," said the captain. Two of the men approached Perico.

"Off with your hats, for you are in God's house,"' he cried.

"Gag him," commanded the captain, Resistance was useless. They

instantly stopped his mouth with a handkerchief.

But notwithstanding the handkerchief, which suffocated him, when

Perico saw that Leon and the gipsy were breaking open the sacrarium he

made one desperate effort, and falling on his knees shouted,

"Sacrilege! Sacrilege!!!" Terrible was the voice that resounded in the

chapels, that echoed like thunder along the vaults, that awakened the

grand and sonorous instrument which on other occasions accompanies the

imposing _De profundis_ and the glorious _Te Deum_, and died away in

its metal tubes like a doleful wail. It caused a moment of cold terror

to those miserable wretches. Even Diego trembled!

"Have mercy, Lord, have mercy!" moaned the unhappy Perico.

"Make haste," said Diego, "the night is becoming clearer, and we may

be seen going out from here."

In fact, the clouds were breaking away, and a ray of the moon falling

at this moment through a lofty skylight kissed the feet of an image of

our Blessed Lady.

"Curse the moon!" exclaimed the gipsy; and frightened at seeing each

other by the clear and sudden illumination, they hastened the work of

spoliation. At last they left the church, and the gipsy, when she had

seen them ride away loaded with riches, turned and again hid herself

in the earth.

Before the sun brightened the _Giralda_ the robbers reached the

outskirts of _Seville_ with their booty, They left their horses in an

olive grove in charge of the convict, and each entered the city by a

different gate, reuniting in an out-of-the-way place which the gipsy

had indicated, where a silver-smith, who was in the secret, received,

weighed, and paid for the valuables. But when they returned to the

place where they had left the convict with the horses, they found it

deserted.

"That dog has sold us," said one.

"For what?" said Diego, "when his part, which is likely to be worth

more than his treason, is here."

"Perhaps he has seen people, and has gone to hide in El Cuervo," said

another.

They set out in the direction of the hacienda, avoiding roads and

beaten paths, and keeping within the shelter of the trees; but neither

there did they find the convict.

{799}

"My poor Corso!" said Diego, and a bitter tear shone for a moment in

his eyes; but instantly recovering himself he said, "We are sold: but,

courage! and let us save ourselves. Down the river; to the frontier;

to Ayamonte; to Portugal. Some day I shall find him, and on that day

he will wish he had never been born!"

They were leaving, when the gipsy presented herself to claim her share

of the money. All assailed her with questions respecting the

disappearance of the convict; but she knew nothing, and manifested

much uneasiness.

"You are not safe here, and ought to get away as soon as may be," she

said. "The elder son of the Countess of Villaoran has sworn to avenge

his brother. He has got a troop from the captain-general, and is out

after you. I am afraid he has surprised the convict. As for me I am

going, the ground burns under my feet."

"Oh! that it would burn you up!" exclaimed one.

"Oh! that it would swallow you!" exclaimed another.

The old hag silently disappeared among the olives, like a viper which

crawls away, leaving its venom in the bite it has inflicted.

"A robbery in the house of God!" said the first.

"The _sacrarium_ violated!" said the other.

"Come, hold your tongues!" shouted Diego. "Make the best of what can't

be undone. Let's be off."

But now they heard the tramp of horses, and Perico, who had been

stationed to watch, came hastily in and informed them that the convict

was coming. His arrival was greeted with shouts of joy. He said that

he had seen a troop of horsemen, and had hidden himself; that in order

to return he had been obliged to make large circuits. "But, now," he

added, "we have no time to lose, they are on our track. Here, captain,

is Corso, I have taken good care of him for you; I know how fond of

him you are."

Diego joyfully caressed the noble creature vowing within himself never

again to be separated from him.

They hastened their departure, when, suddenly, before them, behind

them, above their heads, resounded a formidable demand, "Surrender to

the king!"

They were surrounded by a party of cavalry. Two pistols were pointed

at Diego's breast, and a man held the bridle of his horse. Diego cast

his eyes around him with no feigned composure! Knowing the ability of

the horse, which he had trained to this end, he drew his dagger with

the quickness of light, and cut the hands which held the reins,

pressed his knees strongly against the animal's sides, and, caressing

his neck, cried, "Hey! Corso, save your master!"

The noble and intelligent creature made one effort, but fell back upon

his haunches powerless. He was hamstrung!

Diego comprehended the blow, and knew the hand that had dealt it.

Frantic with rage, he sprang to the ground, but the traitor had

disappeared among the troop which crowded the pass. They took Diego,

who made no useless resistance. As they left the defile, the bandit

turned his head, and cast a last look upon the horse, that, always

immovable, followed him with his large liquid eyes.

The soldiers disarmed the bandits, and tied their arms behind their

backs. "Which is the one?" asked the Count of Villaoran when he saw

them together--"which is the one that killed my brother?"

The robbers were silent at a look from Diego, who, though a prisoner

and bound, still awed them.

"Which was it?" asked the count again, in a voice choked with rage.

"It was I," said Perico.

The count turned toward the drooping youth, who had not before

attracted his notice; but when he fixed his eyes upon him a cry of

horror escaped his lips.

{800}

"You! Perico Alvareda! Iniquity without name! Perversity without

example! Poor Anna! wretched mother that bore you! Unfortunate little

ones! Unhappy Rita! Know, infamous man," continued the count with

vehemence, "that your wife has worked with incessant zeal and activity

to procure your pardon. She was always at the feet of the judges.

Ventura forgave you before he died. Pedro has forgiven you. My poor

brother was the zealous and tireless agent of your friends. He

obtained your pardon of the king. All were anxiously seeking you, and

he more than all the rest, and I--would to God I had never found you!"

Diego, who saw the immense grief which the coldness and pallor of

death painted upon the changing countenance of Perico, and noticed

that he was tottering, said to the count:

"Sir, do you see that you are killing him?"