I have spent pleasanter, but I greatly doubt if I ever knew busier days,
than those I passed at the Bishop’s Palace at Killala; and now, as I
look upon the event, I cannot help wondering that we could seriously
have played out a farce so full of absurdity and nonsense! There was a
gross mockery of all the usages of war, which, had it not been for the
serious interests at stake, would have been highly amusing.
Whether it was the important functions of civil government, the details
of police regulation, the imposition of contributions, the appointment
of officers, or the arming of the volunteers, all was done with a
pretentious affectation of order that was extremely ludicrous. The very
institutions which were laughingly agreed to overnight, as the wine went
briskly round, were solemnly ratified in the morning, and, still more
strange, apparently believed in by those whose ingenuity devised them;
and thus the ‘Irish Directory,’ as we styled the imaginary government,
the National Treasury, the Pension Fund, were talked of with all the
seriousness of facts! As to the commissariat, to which I was for the
time attached, we never ceased writing receipts and acknowledgments
for stores and munitions of war, all of which were to be honourably
acquitted by the Treasury of the Irish Republic.
No people could have better fallen in with the humour of this delusion
than the Irish. They seemed to believe everything, and yet there was a
reckless, headlong indifference about them, which appeared to say, that
they were equally prepared for any turn fortune might take, and if the
worst should happen, they would never reproach us for having misled
them. The real truth was--but we only learned it too late--all those
who joined us were utterly indifferent to the great cause of Irish
independence; their thoughts never rose above a row and a pillage. It
was to be a season of sack, plunder, and outrage, but nothing more! That
such were the general sentiments of the volunteers, I believe none will
dispute. We, however, in our ignorance of the people and their language,
interpreted all the harum-scarum wildness we saw as the buoyant
temperament of a high-spirited nation, who, after centuries of
degradation and ill-usage, saw the dawning of liberty at last.
Had we possessed any real knowledge of the country, we should at once
have seen that, of those who joined us, none were men of any influence
or station. If, now and then, a man of any name strayed into the camp,
he was sure to be one whose misconduct or bad character had driven
him from associating with his equals; and, even of the peasantry, our
followers were of the very lowest order. Whether General Humbert was
the first to notice the fact, I know not; but Charost, I am certain,
remarked it, and even thus early predicted the utter failure of the
expedition.
I must confess the volunteers were the least imposing of allies. I think
I have the whole scene before my eyes this moment, as I saw it each
morning in the palace garden.
The inclosure, which, more orchard than garden, occupied a space of a
couple of acres, was the headquarters of Colonel Charost; and here, in
a pavilion formerly dedicated to hoes, rakes, rolling-stones, and
garden-tools, we were now established to the number of fourteen. As the
space beneath the roof was barely sufficient for the colonel’s personal
use, the officers of his staff occupied convenient spots in the
vicinity. My station was under a large damson-tree, the fruit of which
afforded me, more than once, the only meal I tasted from early morning
till late at night; not, I must say, from any lack of provisions, for
the palace abounded with every requisite of the table, but that, such
was the pressure of business, we were not able to leave off work even
for half an hour during the day.
A subaltern’s guard of grenadiers, divided into small parties, did duty
in the garden; and it was striking to mark the contrast between these
bronzed and war-worn figures, and the reckless tatterdemalion host
around us. Never was seen such a scarecrow set! Wild-looking, ragged
wretches, their long lank hair hanging down their necks and shoulders,
usually barefooted, and with every sign of starvation in their features;
they stood in groups and knots, gesticulating, screaming, hurrahing, and
singing, in all the exuberance of a joy that caught some, at least, of
its inspiration from whisky.
It was utterly vain to attempt to keep order amongst them; even the
effort to make them defile singly through the gate into the garden was
soon found impracticable, without the employment of a degree of force
that our adviser, Kerrigan, pronounced would be injudicious. Not only
the men made their way in, but great numbers of women, and even children
also; and there they were, seated around fires, roasting their potatoes
in this bivouac fashion, as though they had deserted hearth and home to
follow us.
Such was the avidity to get arms--of which the distribution was
announced to take place here--that several had scaled the wall in their
impatience, and as they were more or less in drink, some disastrous
accidents were momentarily occurring, adding the cries and exclamations
of suffering to the ruder chorus of joy and revelry that went on
unceasingly.
The impression--we soon saw how absurd it was--the impression that
we should do nothing that might hurt the national sensibilities, but
concede all to the exuberant ardour of a bold people, eager to be led
against their enemies, induced us to submit to every imaginable breach
of order and discipline.
‘In a day or two, they ‘ll he like your own men; you ‘ll not know them
from a battalion of the line. Those fellows will be like a wall under
fire.’
Such and such like were the assurances we were listening to all day,
and it would have been like treason to the cause to have refused them
credence.
Perhaps I might have been longer a believer in this theory, had I not
perceived signs of a deceptive character in these our worthy allies;
many who, to our faces, wore nothing but looks of gratitude and delight,
no sooner mixed with their fellows than their downcast faces and dogged
expression betrayed some inward sense of disappointment.
One very general source of dissatisfaction arose from the discovery,
that we were not prepared to pay our allies! We had simply come to arm
and lead them, to shed our own blood, and pledge our fortunes in their
cause; but we certainly had brought no military chest to bribe their
patriotism, nor stimulate their nationality; and this I soon saw was a
grievous disappointment.
In virtue of this shameful omission on our part, they deemed the
only resource was to be made officers, and thus crowds of uneducated,
semi-civilised vagabonds were every hour assailing us with their claims
to the epaulette. Of the whole number of these, I remember but three who
had ever served at all; two were notorious drunkards, and the third
a confirmed madman, from a scalp wound he had received when fighting
against the Turks. Many, however, boasted high-sounding names, and were,
at least so Kerrigan said, men of the first families in the land.
Our general-in-chief saw little of them while at Killala, his principal
intercourse being with the bishop and his family; but Colonel Charost
soon learned to read their true character, and from that moment
conceived the most disastrous issue to our plans. The most trustworthy
of them was a certain O’Donnell, who, although not a soldier, was
remarked to possess a greater influence over the rabble volunteers
than any of the others. He was a young man of the half-squire class, an
ardent and sincere patriot, after his fashion; but that fashion, it must
be owned, rather partook of the character of class-hatred and
religious animosity than the features of a great struggle for national
independence. He took a very low estimate of the fighting qualities of
his countrymen, and made no secret of declaring it.
‘You would be better without them altogether,’ said he one day to
Charost; ‘but if you must have allies, draw them up in line, select
one-third of the best, and arm them.’
‘And the rest?’ asked Charost. ‘Shoot them,’ was the answer.
This conversation is on record--indeed, I believe there is yet one
witness living to corroborate it.
I have said that we were very hard worked, but I must fain acknowledge
that the real amount of business done was very insignificant, so many
were the mistakes, misconceptions, and interruptions, not to speak of
the time lost by that system of conciliation of which I have already
made mention. In our distribution of arms there was little selection
practised or possible. The process was a brief one, but it might have
been briefer.
Thomas Colooney, of Banmayroo, was called, and not usually being
present, the name would be passed on, from post to post, till it swelled
into a general shout of Colooney.
‘Tom Colooney, you’re wanted; Tom, run for it, man, there’s a price bid
for you! Here’s Mickey, his brother, maybe he ‘ll do as well.’
And so on: all this accompanied by shouts of laughter, and a running
fire of jokes, which, being in the vernacular, was lost to us.
At last the real Colooney was found, maybe eating his dinner of
potatoes, maybe discussing his poteen with a friend---sometimes engaged
in the domestic duties of washing his shirt or his small-clothes,
fitting a new crown to his hat, or a sole to his brogues--whatever his
occupation, he was urged forward by his friends and the public, with
many a push, drive, and even a kick, into our presence, where, from the
turmoil, uproar, and confusion, he appeared to have fought his way by
main force, and very often, indeed, this was literally the fact, as his
bleeding nose, torn coat, and bare head attested.
‘Thomas Colooney--are you the man?’ asked one of our Irish officers of
the staff.
‘Yis, yer honour, I ‘m that same!’
‘You’ve come here, Colooney, to offer yourself as a volunteer in the
cause of your country?’
Here a yell of ‘Ireland for ever!’ was always raised by the bystanders,
which drowned the reply in its enthusiasm, and the examination went
on:--
‘You’ll be true and faithful to that cause till you secure for your
country the freedom of America and the happiness of France? Kiss the
cross. Are you used to firearms?’
‘Isn’t he?--maybe not! I’ll be bound he knows a musket from a mealy
pratie!’
Such and such like were the comments that rang on all sides, so that the
modest ‘Yis, sir,’ of the patriot was completely lost.
‘Load that gun, Tom,’ said the officer.
Here Colooney, deeming that so simple a request must necessarily be only
a cover for something underhand--a little clever surprise or so--takes
up the piece in a very gingerly manner, and examines it all round,
noticing that there is nothing, so far as he can discover, unusual nor
uncommon about it.
‘Load that gun, I say.’
Sharper and more angrily is the command given this time.
‘Yis, sir, immadiately.’
And now Tom tries the barrel with the ramrod, lest there should be
already a charge there--a piece of forethought that is sure to be loudly
applauded by the public, not the less so because the impatience of the
French officers is making itself manifest in various ways.
At length he rams down the cartridge, and returns the ramrod; which
piece of adroitness, if done with a certain air of display and flourish,
is unfailingly saluted by another cheer. He now primes and cocks the
piece, and assumes a look of what he believes to be most soldierlike
severity.
As he stands thus for scrutiny, a rather lively debate gets up as to
whether or not Tom bit off the end of the cartridge before he rammed it
down. The biters and anti-biters being equally divided, the discussion
waxes strong. The French officers, eagerly asking what may be the
disputed point, laugh very heartily on hearing it.
‘I’ll lay ye a pint of sperits she won’t go off,’ cries one.
‘Done! for two naggins, if he pulls strong,’ rejoins another.
‘Devil fear the same gun,’ cries a third; ‘she shot Mr. Sloan at fifty
paces, and killed him dead.’
‘Tisn’t the same gun--that’s a Frinch one--a bran-new one!’
‘She isn’t.’
‘She is.’
‘No, she isn’t.’
‘Yes, but she is.’ ‘What is’t you say?’ ‘Hould your prate.’
‘Arrah, teach your mother to feed ducks.’
‘Silence in the ranks. Keep silence there. Attention, Colooney!’
‘Yis, sir.’
‘Fire!’
‘What at, sir?’ asks Tom, taking an amateur glance of the company, who
look not over satisfied at his scrutiny.
‘Fire in the air!’
[Illustration: 260]
Bang goes the piece, and a yell follows the explosion, while cries of
‘Well done, Tom,’ ‘Begorra, if a Protestant got that!’ and so on, greet
the performance.
‘Stand by, Colooney!’ and the volunteer falls back to make way for
another and similar exhibition, occasionally varied by the humour of the
blunders of the new candidate.
As to the Treasury orders, as we somewhat ludicrously styled the cheques
upon our imaginary bank, the scenes they led to were still more absurd
and complicated. We paid liberally, that is to say in promises, for
everything, and our generosity saved us a good deal of time, for it was
astonishing how little the owners disputed our solvency when the price
was left to themselves. But the rations were indeed the most difficult
matter of all; it being impossible to convince our allies of the fact
that the compact was one of trust, and the ration was not his own to
dispose of in any manner that might seem fit.
‘Sure, if I don’t like to ate it--if I haven’t an appetite for it--if
I’d rather have a pint of sperits, or a flannel waistcoat, or a pair of
stockings, than a piece of mate, what harm is that to any one?’
This process of reasoning was much harder of answer than is usually
supposed, and even when replied to, another difficulty arose in its
place. Unaccustomed to flesh diet, when they tasted they could not
refrain from it, and the whole week’s rations of beef, amounting to
eight pounds, were frequently consumed in the first twenty-four hours.
Such instances of gormandising were by no means unfrequent, and,
stranger still, in no one case, so far as I knew, followed by any ill
consequences.
The leaders were still more difficult to manage than the people. Without
military knowledge or experience of any kind, they presumed to dictate
the plan of a campaign to old and distinguished officers like Humbert
and Serasin, and when overruled by argument or ridicule, invariably fell
back upon their superior knowledge of Ireland and her people, a defence
for which, of course, we were quite unprepared, and unable to oppose
anything. From these and similar causes it may well be believed that
our labours were not light, and yet somehow, with all the vexations and
difficulties around us, there was a congenial tone of levity, an easy
recklessness, and a careless freedom in the Irish character that suited
us well There was but one single point whereupon we were not thoroughly
together, and this was religion. They were a nation of most zealous
Catholics; and as for us, the revolution had not left the vestige of a
belief amongst us.
A reconnaissance in Ballina, meant rather to discover the strength
of the garrison than of the place itself, having shown that the royal
forces were inconsiderable in number, and mostly militia, General
Humbert moved forward, on Sunday morning the 26th, with nine hundred men
of our own force, and about three thousand ‘volunteers,’ leaving Colonel
Charost and his staff, with two companies of foot, at Killala, to
protect the town, and organise the new levies as they were formed.
We saw our companions defile from the town with heavy hearts. The small
body of real soldiers seemed even smaller still from being enveloped
by that mass of peasants who accompanied them, and who marched on the
flanks or in the rear, promiscuously, without discipline or order--a
noisy, half-drunken rabble, firing off their muskets at random, and
yelling as they went, in savage glee and exultation. Our sole comfort
was in the belief, that, when the hour of combat did arrive, they would
fight to the very last. Such were the assurances of their own officers,
and made so seriously and confidently, that we never thought of
mistrusting them.
‘If they be but steady under fire,’ said Charost, ‘a month will make
them good soldiers. Ours is an easy drill, and soon learned; but I own,’
he added, ‘they do not give me this impression.’
Such was the reflection of one who watched them as they went past, and
with sorrow we saw ourselves concurring in the sentiment.