Produced by David Widger
THE BLACK BARONET;
OR, THE CHRONICLES OF BALLYTRAIN.
By William Carleton
CONTENTS:
CHAPTER
I.--A Mail Coach by Night, and a Bit
of Moonshine
II.--The Town and its Inhabitants
III.--Paudeen Gair's Receipt how to
make a Bad Dinner a Good One
--The Stranger finds Fenton as
Mysterious as Himself
IV.--An Anonymous Letter--Lucy Gourlay
Avows a Previous Attachment
V.--Sir Thomas Gourlay Fails in Unmasking
the Stranger--Mysterious Conduct of Fenton
VI.--Extraordinary Scene between Fenton
and the Stranger
VII.--The Baronet attempts by Falsehood
to urge his Daughter into
an Avowal of her Lover's Name.
VIII.--The Fortune-Teller--An Equivocal
Prediction
IX. --Candor and Dissimulation
X. --A Family Dialogue--and a Secret
nearly Discovered
XI.--The Stranger's Visit to Father
MacMahon
XII.--Crackenfudge Outwitted by Fenton
--The Baronet, Enraged at
his Daughter's Firmness, strikes Her
XIII.--The Stranger's Second Visit to
Father MacMahon--Something
like an Elopement
XIV.--Crackenfudge put upon a Wrong
Scent--Miss Gourlay takes Refuge
with an Old Friead
XV.--Interview between Lady Gourlay
and the Stranger--Dandy Dulcimer
makes a Discovery--The
Stranger Receives Mysterious
Communications
XVI.--Conception and Perpetration of a
Diabolical Plot against Fenton
XVII.--A Scene in Jemmy Trailcudgel's
--Retributive Justice, or the Robber
Robbed
XVIII. --Dunphy visits the County Wicklow
--Old Sam and his Wife
XIX.--Interview between Trailcudgel
and the Stranger--A Peep at
Lord Dunroe and his Friend
XX.--Interview between Lords Cullamore,
Dunroe, and Lady Emily
--Tom Norton's Aristocracy
fails him--His Reception by
Lord Cullamore
XXI.--A Spy Rewarded--Sir Thomas
Gourlay Charged Home by the
Stranger with, the Removal and
Disappearance of his Brother's Son
XXII.--Lucy at.Summerfield Cottage
XXIII.-- A Lunch in Summerfield Cottage.
XXIV.--An Irish Watchhouse in the time
of the “Charlies”
XXV.--The Police Office -- Sir Spigot
Sputter and Mr. Coke--An “Unfortunate
Translator--Decision in “a Law Case”
XXVI.-- The Priest Returns Sir Thomas's
Money and Pistols--A Bit of
Controversy--A New Light Begins
to Appear
XXVII. --Sir Thomas, who Shams Illness,
is too sharp for Mrs. Mainwaring,
who visits Him--Lucy calls upon
Lady Gourlay, where she meets her
Lover--Affecting Interview between
Lucy and Lady Gourlay
XXVIII.--Innocence and Affection
overcome by Fraud and Hypocrisy--Lucy
yields at Last
XXIX.--Lord Dunroe's Affection for his
Father--Glimpse of a new Character
--Lord Cullamore's Rebuke to his Son,
who greatly Refuses to give up his Friend
XXX.--A Courtship on Novel Principles
XXXI.--The Priest goes into Corbet's
House very like a Thief--a Sederunt,
with a Bright look up for Mr. Gray
XXXII.--Discovery of the Baronet's Son
--Who, however, is Shelved for a Time
XXXIII.--The Priest asks for a Loan of
Fifty Guineas, and Offers “Freney
the Robber” as Security
XXXIV.--Young Gourlay's Affectionate
Interview with His Father--Risk
of Strangulation -- Movements
of M'Bride
XXXV.--Lucy's Vain but Affecting
Expostulation with her Father--Her
Terrible Denunciation of
Ambrose Gray
XXXVI.--Which contains a variety of
Matters, some to Laugh and some
to Weep at
XXXVII.--Dandy's Visit to Summerfield
Cottage, where he Makes a most Ungallant
Mistake -- Return with Tidings of both
Mrs. Norton and Fenton--and Generously
Patronizes his Master
XXXVIII.--Anthony Corbet gives Important
Documents to the Stranger--An
Unpleasant Disclosure to Dunroe
--Norton catches a Tartar
XXXIX.--Fenton Recovered--The Mad-House
XL.--Lady Gourlay sees her Son
XLI.--Denouement
PREFACE.
The incidents upon which this book is founded seem to be extraordinary
and startling, but they are true; for, as Byron says, and as we all
know, “Truth is strange--stranger than Fiction.” Mr. West, brother to
the late member from Dublin, communicated them to me exactly as they
occurred, and precisely as he communicated them, have I given them
to the reader, at least, as far as I can depend upon my memory. With
respect, however, to his facts, they related only to the family which is
shadowed forth under the imaginary name of Gourlay; those connected with
the aristocratic house of Cullamore, I had from another source, and they
are equally authentic. The Lord Dunroe, son to the Earl of Cullamore, is
not many years dead, and there are thousands still living, who can bear
testimony to the life of profligacy and extravagance, which, to the very
last day of his existence, he persisted in leading. That his father was
obliged to get an act of Parliament passed to legitimize his children,
is a fact also pretty well known to many.
At first, I had some notion of writing a distinct story upon each class
of events, but, upon more mature consideration, I thought it better to
construct such a one as would enable me to work them both up into the
same narrative; thus contriving that the incidents of the one house
should be connected with those of the other, and the interest of both
deepened, not only by their connection, but their contrast. It is
unnecessary to say, that the prototypes of the families who appear upon
the stage in the novel, were, in point of fact, personally unknown
to each other, unless, probably, by name, inasmuch as they resided
in different and distant parts of the kingdom. They were, however,
contemporaneous. Such circumstances, nevertheless, matter very little
to the novelist, who can form for his characters whatsoever connections,
whether matrimonial or otherwise, he may deem most proper; and of this,
he must be considered himself as the sole, though probably not the best,
judge. The name of Red Hall, the residence of Sir Thomas Gourlay, is
purely fictitious, but not the description of it, which applies very
accurately to a magnificent family mansion not a thousand miles from
the thriving little town of Ballygawley. Since the first appearance,
however, of the work, I have accidentally discovered, from James
Frazer's admirable. “Hand-book for Ireland,” the best and most correct
work of the kind ever published, and the only one that can be relied
upon, that there actually is a residence named Red Hall in my own native
county of Tyrone. I mention this, lest the respectable family to whom it
belongs might take offence at my having made it the ancestral property
of such a man as Sir Thomas Gourlay, or the scene of his crimes and
outrages. On this point, I beg to assure them that the coincidence of
the name is purely accidental, and that, when I wrote the novel, I had
not the slightest notion that such a place actually existed. Some of
those coincidences are very odd and curious. For instance, it so happens
that there is at this moment a man named Dunphy actually residing on
Constitution Hill, and engaged in the very same line of life which I
have assigned to one of my principal characters of that name in the
novel, that of a huckster; yet of this circumstance I knew nothing. The
titles of Cullamore and Dunroe are taken from two hills, one greater
than the other, and not far asunder, in my native parish; and I have
heard it said, by the people of that neighborhood, that Sir William
Richardson, father to the late amiable Sir James Richardson Bunbury,
when expecting at the period of the Union to receive a coronet instead
of a baronetcy, had made his mind up to select either one or the other
of them as the designation of his rank.
I think I need scarcely assure my readers that old Sam Roberts, the
retired soldier, is drawn from life; and I may add, that I have scarcely
done the fine old fellow and his fine old wife sufficient justice. They
were two of the most amiable and striking originals I ever met. Both
are now dead, but I remember Sam to have been for many years engaged in
teaching the sword exercise in some of the leading schools in and about
Dublin. He ultimately gave this up, however, having been appointed to
some comfortable situation in the then Foundling Hospital, where his
Beck died, and he, poor fellow, did not, I have heard, long survive her.
Owing to painful and peculiar circumstances, with which it would be
impertinent to trouble the reader, there were originally only five
hundred copies of this work published. The individual for whom it was
originally written, but who had no more claim upon it than the Shah
of Persia, misrepresented me, or rather calumniated me, so grossly to
Messrs. Saunders & Otley, who published it, that he prevailed upon them
to threaten me with criminal proceedings for having disposed of my own
work, and I accordingly received an attorney's letter, affording me
that very agreeable intimation. Of course they soon found they had been
misled, and that it would have been not only an unparalleled outrage,
but a matter attended with too much danger, and involving too severe a
penalty to proceed in. Little I knew or suspected at the time, however,
that the sinister and unscrupulous delusions which occasioned me and
my family so much trouble, vexation, and embarrassment, were only the
foreshadowings of that pitiable and melancholy malady which not long
afterwards occasioned the unhappy man to be placed apart from society,
which, it is to be feared, he is never likely to rejoin. I allude to
those matters, not only to account for the limited number of the work
that was printed, but to satisfy those London publishers to whom the
individual in question so foully misrepresented me, that my conduct in
every transaction I have had with booksellers has been straightforward,
just, and honorable, and that I can publicly make this assertion,
without the slightest apprehension of being contradicted. That the book
was cushioned in this country, I am fully aware, and this is all I
shall say upon that part of the subject. Indeed it was never properly
published at all--never advertised--never reviewed, and, until now, lay
nearly in as much obscurity as if it had been still in manuscript. A few
copies of it got into circulating libraries, but, in point of fact,
it was never placed before the public at all. What-ever be its merits,
however, it is now in the hands of a gentleman who will do it justice,
if it fails, the fault will not at least be his.
My object in writing the book was to exhibit, in contrast, three of the
most powerful passions that can agitate the human heart--I mean love,
ambition, and revenge. To contrive the successive incidents, by which
the respective individuals on whose characters they were to operate
should manifest their influence with adequate motives, and without
departing from actual life and nature, as we observe them in action
about us, was a task which required a very close study of the human mind
when placed in peculiar circumstances. In this case the great struggle
was between love and ambition. By ambition, I do not mean the ambition
of the truly great man, who wishes to associate it with truth and
virtue, and whose object is, in the first place, to gratify it by
elevating his country and his kind; no, but that most hateful species
of it which exists in the contrivance and working out of family
arrangements and insane projects for the aggrandizement of our
offspring, under circumstances where we must know that they cannot be
accomplished without wrecking the happiness of those to whom they are
proposed. Such a passion, in its darkest aspect--and in this I
have drawn it--has nothing more in view than the cruel, selfish
and undignified object of acquiring some poor and paltry title
or distinction for a son or daughter, without reference either to
inclination or will, and too frequently in opposition to both. It
is like introducing a system of penal laws into domestic life, and
establishing the tyranny of a moral despot among the affections of the
heart. Sometimes, especially in the case of an only child, this ambition
grows to a terrific size, and its miserable victim acts with all the
unconscious violence of a monomaniac.
In Sir Thomas Gourlay, the reader will perceive that it became the great
and engrossing object of his life, and that its violence was strong in
proportion to that want of all moral restraint, which resulted from
the creed of an infidel and sceptic. And I may say here, that it was my
object to exhibit occasionally the gloomy agonies and hollow delusions
of the latter, as the hard and melancholy system on which he based
his cruel and unsparing ambition. His character was by far the most
difficult to manage. Love has an object; and, in this case, in the
person of Lucy Gourlay it had a reasonable and a noble one. Revenge has
an object; and in the person of Anthony Corbet, or Dunphy, it also
had, according to the unchristian maxims of life, an unusually strong
argument on which to work and sustain itself. But, as for Sir Thomas
Gourlay's mad ambition, I felt that, considering his sufficiently
elevated state of life, I could only compensate for its want of all
rational design, by making him scorn and reject the laws both civil and
religious by which human society is regulated, and all this because he
had blinded his eyes against the traces of Providence, rather than take
his own heart to task for its ambition. Had he been a Christian, I
do not think he could have acted as he did. He shaped his own creed,
however, and consequently, his own destiny. In Lady Edward Gourlay, I
have endeavored to draw such a character as only the true and obedient
Christian can present; and in that of his daughter, a girl endowed with
the highest principles, the best heart, and the purest sense of honor--a
woman who would have been precisely such a character as Lady Gourlay
was, had she lived longer and been subjected to the same trials.
Throughout the whole work, however, I trust that I have succeeded in
the purity and loftiness of the moral, which was to show the pernicious
effects of infidelity and scepticism, striving to sustain and justify an
insane ambition; or, in a word, I endeavored
“To vindicate the ways of God to man.”
A literary friend of mine told me, a few days ago, that the poet
Massinger had selected the same subject for his play of. “A New Way to
pay Old Debts,” the same in which Sir Giles Overreach is the prominent
character. I ought to feel ashamed to say, as I did say, in reply
to this, that I never read the play alluded to, nor a single line of
Massinger's works; neither have I ever seen Sir Giles Overreach even
upon the stage. If, then, there should appear any resemblance in the
scope or conduct of the play or novel, or in the character of Sir
Thomas Gourlay and Overreach, I cannot be charged either with theft or
imitation, as I am utterly ignorant of the play and of the character of
Sir Giles Overreach alluded to.
I fear I have dwelt much too long on this subject, and I shall therefore
close it by a short anecdote.
Some months ago I chanced to read a work--I think by an American
writer--called, as well as I can recollect, “The Reminiscences of
a late Physician.” I felt curious to read the book, simply because I
thought that the man who could, after, “The Diary of a late Physician,”
come out with a production so named, must possess at the least either
very great genius or the most astounding assurance. Well, I went on
perusing the work, and found almost at once that it was what is called a
catchpenny, and depended altogether, for its success, upon the fame and
reputation of its predecessor of nearly the same name. I saw the trick
at once, and bitterly regretted that I, in common I suppose with others,
had been taken in and bit. Judge of my astonishment, however, when, as I
proceeded to read the description of an American lunatic asylum, I found
it to be _literatim et verbatim_ taken--stolen--pirated--sentence by
sentence and page by page, from my own description of one in the third
volume of the first edition of this book, and which I myself took from
close observation, when, some years ago, accompanied by Dr. White, I was
searching in the Grangegorman Lunatic Asylum and in Swift's for a case
of madness arising from disappointment in love. I was then writing.
“Jane Sinclair,” and to the honor of the sex, I have to confess that
in neither of those establishments, nor any others either in or about
Dublin, could I find such a case. Here, however, in the Yankee's book,
there were neither inverted commas, nor the slightest acknowledgment of
the source from which the unprincipled felon had stolen it.
With respect to mad-houses, especially as they were conducted up until
within the last thirty years, I must say with truth, that if every fact
originating in craft, avarice, oppression, and the most unscrupulous
ambition for family wealth and hereditary rank, were known, such a dark
series of crime and cruelty would come to light as time public mind
could scarcely conceive--nay, as would shock humanity itself. Nor has
this secret system altogether departed from us. It is not long since
the police offices developed some facts rather suspicious, and pretty
plainly impressed with the stamp of the old practice. The Lunatic
Commission is now at work, and I trust it will not confine its
investigations merely to public institutions of that kind, but will,
if it possess authority to do so, strictly and rigidly examine every
private asylum for lunatics in the kingdom.
Of one other character, Ginty Cooper, I have a word to say. Any person
acquainted with the brilliant and classical little capital of Cultra,
lying on the confines of Monaghan and Cavan, will not fail to recognize
the remains of grace and beatty, which once characterized that
celebrated, and well-known individual.
With respect to the watch-house scene, and that in the police office,
together with the delineation of the. “Old Charlies,” as the guardians
of the night were then called; to which I may add the portraits of the
two magistrates; I can confidently refer to thousands now alive for
their truth. Those matters took place long before our present admirable
body of metropolitan police were established. At that period, the police
magistracies were bestowed, in most cases, from principles by no means
in opposition to the public good, and not, as now, upon gentlemen
perfectly free from party bias, and well qualified for that difficult
office by legal knowledge, honorable feeling, and a strong sense of
public duty, impartial justice, and humanity.
W Carleton.
(Dublin, October 26, 1857.)
CHAPTER I. A Mail-coach by Night, and a Bit of Moonshine.
It has been long observed, that every season sent by the Almighty has
its own peculiar beauties; yet, although this is felt to be universally
true--just as we know the sun shines, or that we cannot breathe without
air--still we are all certain that even the same seasons have brief
periods when these beauties are more sensibly felt, and diffuse a
more vivid spirit of enjoyment through all our faculties. Who has not
experienced the gentle and serene influence of a calm spring evening?
and perhaps there is not in the whole circle of the seasons anything
more delightful than the exquisite emotion with which a human heart,
not hardened by vice, or contaminated by intercourse with the world, is
softened into tenderness and a general love for the works of God, by the
pure spirit which breathes of holiness, at the close of a fine evening
in the month of March or April.
The season of spring is, in fact, the resurrection of nature to life and
happiness. Who does not remember the delight with which, in early youth,
when existence is a living poem, and all our emotions sanctify the
spirit-like inspiration--the delight, we say, with which our eye rested
upon a primrose or a daisy for the first time? And how many a long and
anxious look have we ourselves given at the peak of Knockmany, morning
after morning, that we might be able to announce, with an exulting
heart, the gratifying and glorious fact, that the snow had disappeared
from it--because we knew that then spring must have come! And that
universal song of the lark, which fills the air with music; how can we
forget the bounding joy with which our young heart drank it in as we
danced in ecstacy across the fields? Spring, in fact, is the season
dearest to the recollection of man, inasmuch as it is associated with
all that is pure, and innocent, and beautiful, in the transient annals
of his early life. There is always a mournful and pathetic spirit
mingled with our remembrances of it, which resembles the sorrow that we
feel for some beloved individual whom death withdrew from our affections
at that period of existence when youth had nearly completed its allotted
limits, and the promising manifestations of all that was virtuous
and good were filling the parental hearts with the happy hopes which
futurity held out to them. As the heart, we repeat, of such a parent
goes back to brood over the beloved memory of the early lost, so do
our recollections go back, with mingled love and sorrow, to the tender
associations of spring, which may, indeed, be said to perish and pass
away in its youth.
These reflections have been occasioned, first, by the fact that its
memory and associations are inexpressibly dear to ourselves; and,
secondly, because it is toward the close of this brief but beautiful
period of the year that our chronicles date their commencement.
One evening, in the last week of April, a coach called the “Fly” stopped
to change horses at a small village in a certain part of Ireland, which,
for the present, shall be nameless. The sun had just sunk behind the
western hills; but those mild gleams which characterize his setting at
the close of April, had communicated to the clouds that peculiarly soft
and golden tint, on which the eye loves to rest, but from which its
light was now gradually fading. When fresh horses had been put to, a
stranger, who had previously seen two large trunks secured on the
top, in a few minutes took his place beside the guard, and the coach
proceeded.
“Guard,” he inquired, after they had gone a couple of miles from the
village, “I am quite ignorant of the age of the moon. When shall we have
moonlight?”
“Not till it's far in the night, sir.”
“The coach passes through the town of Ballytrain, does it not?”
“It does, sir.”
“At what hour do we arrive there?”
“About half-past three in the morning sir.”
The stranger made no reply, but cast his eyes over the aspect of the
surrounding country.
The night was calm, warm, and balmy. In the west, where the sun had
gone down, there could still be noticed the faint traces of that subdued
splendor with which he sets in spring. The stars were up, and the whole
character of the sky and atmosphere was full of warmth, and softness,
and hope. As the eye stretched across a country that seemed to be rich
and well cultivated, it felt that dream-like charm of dim romance, which
visible darkness throws over the face of nature, and which invests
her groves, her lordly mansions, her rich campaigns, and her white
farm-houses, with a beauty that resembles the imagery of some delicious
dream, more than the realities of natural scenery.
On passing along, they could observe the careless-looking farmer driving
home his cows to be milked and put up for the night; whilst, further
on, they passed half-a-dozen cars returning home, some empty and
some loaded, from a neighboring fair or market, their drivers in high
conversation--a portion of them in friendship, some in enmity, and
in general all equally disposed, in consequence of their previous
libations, to either one or the other. Here they meet a solitary
traveler, fatigued and careworn, carrying a bundle slung over his
shoulder on the point of a stick, plodding his weary way to the next
village. Anon they were passed by a couple of gentlemen-farmers or
country squires, proceeding at a brisk trot upon their stout cobs or
bits of half-blood, as the case might be; and, by and by, a spanking
gig shoots rapidly ahead of them, driven by a smart-looking servant in
murrey-colored livery, who looks back with a sneer of contempt as he
wheels round a corner, and leaves the plebeian vehicle far behind him.
As for the stranger, he took little notice of those whom they met, be
their rank of position in life what it might; his eye was seldom off the
country on each side of him as they went along. It is true, when they
passed a village or small market-town, he glanced into the houses as
if anxious to ascertain the habits and comforts of the humbler classes.
Sometimes he could catch a glimpse of them sitting around a basket of
potatoes and salt, their miserable-looking faces lit by the dim light
of a rush-candle into the ghastly paleness of spectres. Again, he
could catch glimpses of greater happiness; and if, on the one hand, the
symptoms of poverty and distress were visible, on the other there was
the jovial comfort of the wealthy farmer's house, with the loud laughter
of its contented inmates. Nor must we omit the songs which streamed
across the fields, in the calm stillness of the hour, intimating that
they who sang them were in possession, at all events, of light, if not
of happy hearts.
As the night advanced, however, all these sounds began gradually to die
away. Nature and labor required the refreshment of rest, and, as the
coach proceeded at its steady pace, the varied evidences of waking life
became few and far between. One after another the lights, both near and
at a distance, disappeared. The roads became silent and solitary, and
the villages, as they passed through them, were sunk in repose, unless,
perhaps, where some sorrowing family were kept awake by the watchings
that were necessary at the bed of sickness or death, as was evident by
the melancholy steadiness of the lights, or the slow, cautious motion by
which they glided from one apartment to another.
The moon had now been for some time up, and the coach had just crossed a
bridge that was known to be exactly sixteen miles from the town of which
the stranger had made inquiries.
“I think,” said the latter, addressing the guard, “we are about sixteen
miles from Ballytrain.”
“You appear to know the neighborhood, sir,” replied the guard.
“I have asked you a question, sir,” replied the other, somewhat
sternly, “and, instead of answering it, you ask me another.”
“I beg your pardon, sir,” replied the guard, smiling, “it's the
custom of the country. Yes, sir, we're exactly sixteen miles from
Ballytrain--that bridge is the mark. It's a fine country, sir, from this
to that--”
“Now, my good fellow,” replied the stranger, “I ask it as a particular
favor that you will not open your lips to me until we reach the town,
unless I ask you a question. On that condition I will give you a
half-a-crown when we get there.”
The fellow put his hand to his lips, to hint that he was mute, and
nodded, but spoke not a word, and the coach proceeded in silence.
To those who have a temperament fraught with poetry or feeling, there
can be little doubt that to pass, of a calm, delightful spring night,
under a clear, starry sky, and a bright moon, through a country
eminently picturesque and beautiful, must be one of those enjoyments
which fill the heart with a memory that lasts forever. But when we
suppose that a person, whose soul is tenderly alive to the influence of
local affections, and, who, when absent, has brooded in sorrow over the
memory of his native hills and valleys, his lakes and mountains--the
rivers, where he hunted the otter and snared the trout, and who has
never revisited them, even in his dreams, without such strong emotions
as caused him to wake with his eyelashes steeped in tears--when such a
person, full of enthusiastic affection and a strong imagination,
returns to his native place after a long absence, under the peculiar
circumstances which we are describing, we need not feel surprised that
the heart of the stranger was filled with such a conflicting tumult of
feelings and recollections as it is utterly impossible to portray.
From the moment the coach passed the bridge we have alluded to, every
hill, and residence, and river, and lake, and meadow, was familiar to
him, and he felt such an individual love and affection for them, as
if they had been capable of welcoming and feeling the presence of the
light-hearted boy, whom they had so often made happy.
In the gairish eye of day, the contemplation of this exquisite landscape
would have been neither so affecting to the heart, nor so beautiful
to the eye. He, the stranger, had not seen it for years, except in his
dreams, and now he saw it in reality, invested with that ideal beauty in
which fancy had adorned it in those visions of the night. The river, as
it gleamed dimly, according as it was lit by the light of the moon,
and the lake, as it shone with pale but visionary beauty, possessed an
interest which the light of day would never have given them. The light,
too, which lay on the sleeping groves, and made the solitary church
spires, as they went along, visible, in dim, but distant beauty, and the
clear outlines of his own mountains, unchanged and unchangeable--all,
all crowded from the force of the recollections with which they were
associated, upon his heart, and he laid himself back, and, for some
minutes, wept tears that were at once both sweet and bitter.
In proportion as they advanced toward the town of Ballytrain, the
stranger imagined that the moon shed a diviner radiance over the
surrounding country; but this impression was occasioned by the fact that
its aspect was becoming, every mile they proceeded, better and better
known to him. At length they came to a long but gradual elevation in
the road, and the stranger knew that, on reaching its eminence, he could
command a distinct view of the magnificent valley on which his native
parish lay. He begged of the coachman to stop for half a minute, and the
latter did so. The scene was indeed unrivalled. All that constitutes a
rich and cultivated country, with bold mountain scenery in the distance,
lay stretched before him. To the right wound, in dim but silver-like
beauty, a fine river, which was lost to the eye for a considerable
distance in the wood of Gallagh. To the eye of the stranger, every scene
and locality was distinct beyond belief, simply because they were
lit up, not only by the pale light of the moon, but by the purer and
stronger light of his own early affections and memories.
Now it was, indeed, that his eye caught in, at a glance, all those
places and objects that had held their ground so strongly and firmly in
his heart. The moon, though sinking, was brilliant, and the cloudless
expanse of heaven seemed to reflect her light, whilst, at the same time,
the shadows that projected from the trees, houses, and other elevated
objects, were dark and distinct in proportion to the flood of mild
effulgence which poured down upon them from the firmament. Let not
our readers hesitate to believe us when we say, that the heart of the
stranger felt touched with a kind of melancholy happiness as he passed
through their very shadows--proceeding, as they did, from objects that
he had looked upon as the friends of his youth, before life had opened
to him the dark and blotted pages of suffering and sorrow. There, dimly
shining to the right below him, was the transparent river in which he
had taken many a truant plunge, and a little further on he could see
without difficulty the white cascade tumbling down the precipice, and
mark its dim scintillations, that looked, under the light of the
moon, like masses of shivered ice, were it not that such a notion was
contradicted by the soft dash and continuous murmur of its waters.
But where was the gray mill, and the large white dwelling of the miller?
and that new-looking mansion on the elevation--it was not there in
his time, nor several others that he saw around him; and, hold--what
sacrilege is this? The coach is not upon the old road--not on that with
every turn and winding of which the light foot of his boyhood was
so familiar! What, too! the school-house down--its very foundations
razed--its light-hearted pupils, some dead, others dispersed, its master
in the dust, and its din, bustle, and monotonous murmur--all banished
and gone, like the pageantry of a dream. Such, however, is life; and
he who, on returning to his birthplace after an absence of many years,
expects to find either the country or its inhabitants as he left
them, will experience, in its most painful sense, the bitterness of
disappointment. Let every such individual prepare himself for the
consequences of death, change, and desolation.
At length the coach drove into Ballytrain, and, in a few minutes, the
passengers found themselves opposite to the sign of the Mitre, which
swung over the door of the principal inn of that remarkable town.
“Sir,” said the guard, addressing the stranger, “I think I have kept my
word.”
The latter, without making any reply, dropped five shillings into his
hand; but, in the course of a few minutes--for the coach changed horses
there--he desired him to call the waiter or landlord, or any one to whom
he could intrust his trunks until morning.
“You are going to stop in the 'Mithre,' sir, of course,” said the guard,
inquiringly.
The traveler nodded assent, and, having seen his luggage taken into the
inn, and looking, for a moment, at the town, proceeded along the shadowy
side of the main street, and, instead of seeking his bed, had, in a
short time, altogether vanished, and in a manner that was certainly
mysterious, nor did he make his appearance again until noon on the
following day.
It may be as well to state here that he was a man of about thirty,
somewhat above the middle size, and, although not clumsy, yet, on being
closely scanned, he appeared beyond question to be very compact, closely
knit, well-proportioned, and muscular. Of his dress, however, we must
say, that it was somewhat difficult to define, or rather to infer from
it whether he was a gentleman or not, or to what rank or station of life
he belonged. His hair was black and curled; his features regular; and
his mouth and nose particularly aristocratic; but that which constituted
the most striking feature of his face was a pair of black eyes, which
kindled or became mellow according to the emotions by which he happened
to be influenced.
“My good lad,” said he to “Boots,” after his return, “Will you send me
the landlord?”
“I can't, sir,” replied the other, “he's not at home.”
“Well, then, have the goodness to send me the waiter.”
“I will, sir,” replied the monkey, leaving the room with an evident
feeling of confident alacrity.
Almost immediately a good-looking girl, with Irish features, brown hair,
and pretty blue eyes, presented herself.
“Well, sir,” she said, in an interrogative tone.
“Why,” said the stranger, “I believe it is impossible to come at any
member of this establishment; I wish to see the waiter.”
“I'm the waiter, sir,” she replied, with an unconscious face.
“The deuce you are!” he exclaimed; “however,” he added, recovering
himself, “I cannot possibly wish for a better. It is very likely that I
may stay with you for some time--perhaps a few months. Will you see now
that a room and bed are prepared for me, and that my trunks are put into
my own apartment? Get a fire into my sitting-room and bedchamber. Let
my bed be well aired; and see that everything is done cleanly and
comfortably, will you?”
“Sartinly, sir, an' I hope we won't lave you much to complain of. As for
the sheets, wait till you try them. The wild myrtles of Drumgau, beyant
the demesne 'isliout, is foulded in them; an' if the smell of them won't
make you think yourself in Paradise, 'tisn't my fault.”
The stranger, on looking at her somewhat more closely, saw that she
was an exceedingly neat, tight, clean-looking young woman, fair and
youthful.
“Have you been long in the capacity of waiter, here.” he asked.
“No, sir,” she replied; “about six months.”
“Do you never keep male waiters in this establishment,” he inquired.
“Oh, yes, sir; Paudeen Gair and I generally act week about. This is my
week, sir, an' he's at the plough.”
“And where have you been at service before you came here, my good girl?”
“In Sir Thomas Gourlay's, sir.”
The stranger could not prevent himself from starting.
“In Sir Thomas Gourlay's!” he exclaimed. “And pray in what capacity were
you there?”
“I was own maid to Miss Gourlay, sir.”
“To Miss Gourlay! and how did you come to leave your situation with
her?”
“When I find you have a right to ask, sir,” she replied, “I will tell
you; but not till then.”
“I stand reproved, my good girl,” he said; “I have indeed no right to
enter into such inquiries; but I trust I have for those that are more to
the purpose. What have you for dinner?”
“Fish, flesh, and fowl, sir,” she replied, with a peculiar smile, “and a
fine fat buck from the deer-park.”
“Well, now,” said he, “that really promises well--indeed it is more than
I expected--you had no quarrel, I hope, at parting? I beg your pardon--a
fat buck, you say. Come, I will have a slice of that.”
“Very well, sir,” she replied; “what else would you wish?”
“To know, my dear, whether Sir Thomas is as severe upon her
as--ahem!--anything at all you like--I'm not particular--only don't
forget a slice of the buck, out of the haunch, my dear; and, whisper, as
you and I are likely to become better acquainted--all in a civil way,
of course--here is a trifle of earnest, as a proof that, if you be
attentive, I shall not be ungenerous.”
“I don't know,” she replied, shaking her head, and hesitating; “you're a
sly-looking gentleman--and, if I thought that you had any--”
“Design, you would say,” he replied; “no--none, at any rate, that is
improper; it is offered in a spirit of good-will and honor, and in such
you may fairly accept of it. So,” he added, as he dropped the money into
her hand, “Sir Thomas insisted that you should go? Hem!--hem!”
The girl started in her turn, and exclaimed, with a good deal of
surprise:
“Sir Thomas insisted! How did you come to know that, sir? I tould you
no such thing.”
“Certainly, my dear, you--a--a--hem--did you not say something to that
effect? Perhaps, however,” he added, apprehensive lest he might have
alarmed, or rather excited her suspicions--“perhaps I was mistaken. I
only imagined, I suppose, that you said something to that effect; but it
does not matter--I have no intimacy with the Gourlays, I assure you--I
think that is what you call them--and none at all with Sir Thomas--is
not that his name? Goodby now; I shall take a walk through the town--how
is this you name it? Ballytrain, I think--and return at five, when I
trust you will have dinner ready.”
He then put on his hat, and sauntered out, apparently to view the town
and its environs, fully satisfied that, in consequence of his having
left it when a boy, and of the changes which time and travel had wrought
in his appearance, no living individual there could possibly recognize
him.