CHAPTER XXXIV.   CONCLUSION

PREFACE.

An eminent apothecary of my acquaintance once told me that at each

increase to his family, he added ten per cent to the price of his drugs,

and as his quiver was full of daughters, Blackdraught, when I knew him,

was a more costly cordial than Curaçoa.

To apply this to my own case, I may mention that I had a daughter born

to me about the time this story dates from, and not having at my command

the same resource as my friend the chemist, I adopted the alternative of

writing another story, to be published contemporaneously with that now

appearing,--"The Daltons;" and not to incur the reproach so natural in

criticism--of over-writing myself--I took care that the work should come

out without a name.

I am not sure that I made any attempt to disguise my style; I

was conscious of scores of blemishes--I decline to call them

mannerisms--that would betray me: but I believe I trusted most of all to

the fact that I was making my monthly appearance to the world in another

story, and with another publisher, and I had my hope that my small

duplicity would thus escape undetected.

I was aware that there was a certain amount of peril in running an

opposition coach on the line I had made in some degree my own; not to

say that it might be questionable policy to glut the public with a kind

of writing more remarkable for peculiarity than perfection.

I remember that excellent Irishman Bianconi, not the less Irish that he

was born at Lucca,--which was simply a "bull,"--once telling me that to

popularize a road on which few people were then travelling, and on which

his daily two-horse car was accustomed to go its journey, with two or at

most three passengers, the idea occurred to him that he would start

an opposition conveyance, of course in perfect secrecy, and with every

outward show of its being a genuine rival. He effected his object with

such success that his own agents were completely taken in, and never

wearied of reporting, for his gratification, all the shortcomings and

disasters of the rival company.

At length, and when the struggle between the competitors was at its

height, one of his drivers rushed frantically into his office one day,

crying out, "Give a crown-piece to drink your honor's health for what I

done to-day."

"What was it, Larry?"

"I killed the yallow mare of the opposition car; I passed her on the

long hill, when she was blown, and I bruk her heart before she reached

the top."

"After this I gave up the opposition," said my friend; "'mocking was

catching,' as the old proverb says; and I thought that one might carry a

joke a little too far."

I had this experience before me, and I will not say it did not impress

me. My puzzle was, however, in this wise: I imagined I did not care on

which horse I stood to win; in other words, I persuaded myself that it

was a matter of perfect indifference to me which book took best with the

public, and whether the reader thought better of "The Daltons" or "Con

Cregan," that it could in no way concern me.

That I totally misunderstood myself, or misconceived the case before

me, I am now quite ready to own. For one notice of "The Daltons" by the

Press, there were at least three or four of "Con Cregan," and while the

former was dismissed with a few polite and measured phrases, the latter

was largely praised and freely quoted. Nor was this all. The critics

discovered in "Con Cregan" a freshness and a vigor which were so sadly

deficient in "The Daltons." It was, they averred, the work of a less

practised writer, but of one whose humor was more subtle, and whose

portraits, roughly sketched as they were, indicated a far higher power

than the well-known author of "Harry Lorrequer."

The unknown--for there was no attempt to guess him--was pronounced not

to be an imitator of Mr. Lever, though there were certain small points

of resemblance; for he was clearly original in his conception of

character, in his conduct of his story, and in his dialogues, and there

were traits of knowledge of life in scenes and under conditions to

which Mr. Lever could lay no claim. One critic, who had found out more

features of resemblance between the two writers than his colleagues,

uttered a friendly caution to Mr. Lever to look to his laurels, for

there was a rival in the field possessing many of the characteristics by

which he first won public favor, but a racy drollery in description and

a quaintness in his humor all his own. It was the amusement of one of my

children at the time to collect these sage comments and torment me with

their judgments, and I remember a droll little note-book, in which they

were pasted, and read aloud from time to time with no small amusement

and laughter.

One or two of these I have even now before me:--

"Our new novelist has great stuff in him."--_Bath Gazette_.

"'Con Cregan'--author unknown--begins promisingly; his first number is a

decided hit."--_Cambridge Chronicle_.

"The writer of 'Con Cregan' is a new hand, but we predict he will be a

success"."--_Cambridge Advertiser_.

"A new tale, in a style with which Lever and his followers have made us

acquainted."--_Hampshire Advertiser_.

"This tale is from the pen of an able Irish writer. The dialogue is very

smartly written, so much so--and we cannot pay the writer a more

genuine compliment--that it bespeaks the author to be an Irishman,

&c."--_Somerset Gazette_.

"'Con Cregan '--by an unnamed author--is a new candidate for

popularity," &c.--_Northern Whig_, Belfast.

"The writer must be an Irishman."--_Nottingham Gazette_.

"A new bark, launched by an unknown builder."--_Cheltenham Chronicle_.

"That the author's name is not disclosed will not affect the popularity

of this work,--one of the most attractive," &c.--_Oxford Journal_.

"This is a new tale by the pen of some able Irish writer, the first part

of which is only published."--_Ten Town Messenger_.

"Another new candidate for popular fame, and 'Harry Lorrequer' had

better look to his laurels. There is a poacher in the manor in the

person of the writer of 'Con Cregan.'"--_Yorkshireman_.

"'Con Cregan' promises to become as great a fact as 'Harry Lorrequer.'

"--_People's Journal_.

"The author of 'Con Cregan,' whoever he be, is no ordinary man."

"Another daring author has entered the lists, and with every promise of

success."--_Exeter Post_.

It may sound very absurd to confess it, but I was excessively provoked

at the superior success of the unacknowledged book, and felt the rivalry

to the full as painfully as though I had never written a line of it. Was

it that I thought well of one story and very meanly of the other, and

in consequence was angry at the want of concurrence of my critics? I

suspect not. I rather imagine I felt hurt at discovering how little hold

I had, in my acknowledged name, on a public with whom I fancied myself

on such good terms; and it pained me to see with what little difficulty

a new and a nameless man could push for the place I had believed to be

my own.

"The Daltons" I always wrote, after my habit, in the morning; I never

turned to "Con Cregan" until nigh midnight; and I can still remember the

widely different feelings with which I addressed myself to the task I

liked, and to a story which, in the absurd fashion I have mentioned, was

associated with wounded self-love.

It is scarcely necessary for me to say that there was no plan whatever

in this book. My notion was, that "Con Cregan," once created, would not

fail to find adventures. The vicissitudes of daily poverty would beget

shifts and contrivances; with these successes would come ambition

and daring. Meanwhile a growing knowledge of life would develop his

character, and I should soon see whether he would win the silver spoon

or spoil the horn. I ask pardon in the most humble manner for presuming

for a moment to associate my hero with the great original of Le Sage.

But I used the word "Irish" adjectively, and with the same amount of

qualification that one employs to a diamond, and indeed, as I have read

it in a London paper, to a "Lord."

An American officer, of whom I saw much at the time, was my guide to the

interior of Mexico; he had been originally in the Santa Fé expedition,

was a man of most adventurous disposition, and a love of stirring

incident and peril, that even broken-down health and a failing

constitution could not subdue.

It was often very difficult for me to tear myself away from his Texan

and Mexican experiences, his wild scenes of prairie life, or his sojourn

amongst Indian tribes, and keep to the more commonplace events of my own

story; nor could all my entreaties confine him to those descriptions of

places and scenes which I needed for my own characters.

The saunter after tea-time, with this companion, generally along that

little river that tumbles through the valley of the Bagno di Lucca, was

the usual preparation for my night's work; and I came to it as intensely

possessed by Mexico--dress, manner, and landscape--as though I had been

drawing on the recollection of a former journey.

So completely separated in my mind were the two tales by the different

parts of the day in which I wrote them, that no character of "The

Daltons" ever crossed my mind after nightfall, nor was there a trace of

"Con Cregan" in my head at my breakfast next morning.

None of the characters of this story have been taken from life. The one

bit of reality in the whole is in the sketch of "Anticosti," where I

myself suffered once a very small shipwreck, but of which I retain a

very vivid recollection to this hour.

I have already owned that I bore a grudge to the story as I wrote it;

nor have I outlived the memory of the chagrin it cost me, though it is

many a year since I acknowledged that "Con Cregan" was by the author of

"Harry Lorrequer."

CHAPTER I. A PEEP AT MY FATHER

When we shall have become better acquainted, my worthy reader, there

will be little necessity for my insisting upon a fact which at this

early stage of our intimacy, I deem it requisite to mention; namely,

that my native modesty and bashfulness are only second to my veracity,

and that while the latter quality in a manner compels me to lay an

occasional stress upon my own goodness of heart, generosity, candor, and

so forth, I have, notwithstanding, never introduced the subject without

a pang,--such a pang as only a sensitive and diffident nature can suffer

or comprehend. There now, not another word of preface or apology!

I was born in a little cabin on the borders of Meath and King's County.

It stood on a small triangular bit of ground, beside a cross-road; and

although the place was surveyed every ten years or so, they were never

able to say to which county we belonged; there being just the same

number of arguments for one side as for the other,--a circumstance,

many believed, that decided my father in his original choice of the

residence; for while, under the "disputed boundary question," he paid

no rates or county cess, he always made a point of voting at both county

elections! This may seem to indicate that my parent was of a naturally

acute habit; and indeed the way he became possessed of the bit of ground

will confirm that impression.

There was nobody of the rank of gentry in the parish, nor even

"squireen;" the richest being a farmer, a snug old fellow, one Henry

M'Cabe, that had two sons, who were always fighting between themselves

which was to have the old man's money,--Peter, the elder, doing

everything to injure Mat, and Mat never backward in paying off the

obligation. At last Mat, tired out in the struggle, resolved he would

bear no more. He took leave of his father one night, and next day set

off for Dublin, and 'listed in the "Buffs." Three weeks after, he sailed

for India; and the old man, overwhelmed by grief, took to his bed, and

never arose from it after.

Not that his death was any way sudden, for he lingered on for months

long,--Peter always teasing him to make his will, and be revenged on

"the dirty spalpeen" that disgraced the family, but old Harry as stoutly

resisting, and declaring that whatever he owned should be fairly divided

between them.

These disputes between them were well known in the neighborhood. Few of

the country people passing the house at night but had overheard the old

man's weak, reedy voice, and Peter's deep, hoarse one, in altercation.

When at last--it was on a Sunday night--all was still and quiet in the

house,--not a word, not a footstep, could be heard, no more than if it

were uninhabited,--the neighbors looked knowingly at each other, and

wondered if the old man was worse--if he was dead!

It was a little after midnight that a knock came to the door of our

cabin. I heard it first, for I used to sleep in a little snug basket

near the fire; but I did n't speak, for I was frightened. It was

repeated still louder, and then came a cry, "Con Cregan! Con, I

say, open the door! I want you." I knew the voice well; it was Peter

M'Cabe's; but I pretended to be fast asleep, and snored loudly. At last

my father unbolted the door, and I heard him say, "Oh, Mr. Peter, what's

the matter? Is the ould man worse?"

"Faix that's what he is, for he 's dead!"

"Glory be his bed! when did it happen?"

"About an hour ago," said Peter, in a voice that even I from my corner

could perceive was greatly agitated. "He died like an ould haythen, Con,

and never made a will!"

"That's bad," says my father; for he was always a polite man, and said

whatever was pleasing to the company.

"It is bad," said Peter; "but it would be worse if we could n't help

it. Listen to me now, Corny, I want ye to help me in this business; and

here's five guineas in goold, if ye do what I bid ye. You know that ye

were always reckoned the image of my father, and before he took ill ye

were mistaken for each other every day of the week."

"Anan!" said my father; for he was getting frightened at the notion,

without well knowing why.

"Well, what I want is, for ye to come over to the house, and get into

the bed."

"Not beside the corpse?" said my father, trembling.

"By no means, but by yourself; and you 're to pretend to be my father,

and that ye want to make yer will before ye die; and then I 'll send for

the neighbors, and Billy Scanlan the schoolmaster, and ye 'll tell him

what to write, laving all the farm and everything to me,--ye understand.

And as the neighbors will see ye, and hear yer voice, it will never be

believed but that it was himself that did it."

"The room must be very dark," says my father.

"To be sure it will, but have no fear! Nobody will dare to come nigh the

bed; and ye 'll only have to make a cross with yer pen under the name."

"And the priest?" said my father.

"My father quarrelled with him last week about the Easter dues, and

Father Tom said he 'd not give him the 'rites,' and that's lucky now!

Come along now, quick, for we 've no time to lose; it must be all

finished before the day breaks."

My father did not lose much time at his toilet, for he just wrapped his

big coat 'round him, and slipping on his brogues, left the house. I

sat up in the basket and listened till they were gone some minutes; and

then, in a costume as light as my parent's, set out after them, to

watch the course of the adventure. I thought to take a short cut, and

be before them; but by bad luck I fell into a bog-hole, and only escaped

being drowned by a chance. As it was, when I reached the house, the

performance had already begun.

I think I see the whole scene this instant before my eyes, as I sat on

a little window with one pane, and that a broken one, and surveyed the

proceeding. It was a large room, at one end of which was a bed, and

beside it a table, with physic-bottles, and spoons, and teacups; a

little farther off was another table, at which sat Billy Scanlan, with

all manner of writing materials before him. The country people sat two,

sometimes three, deep round the walls, all intently eager and anxious

for the coming event. Peter himself went from place to place, trying

to smother his grief, and occasionally helping the company to whiskey,

which was supplied with more than accustomed liberality.

All my consciousness of the deceit and trickery could not deprive the

scene of a certain solemnity. The misty distance of the half-lighted

room; the highly wrought expression of the country people's faces,

never more intensely excited than at some moment of this kind; the low,

deep-drawn breathings, unbroken save by a sigh or a sob,--the tribute of

affectionate sorrow to some lost friend, whose memory was thus forcibly

brought back; these, I repeat it, were all so real that, as I looked, a

thrilling sense of awe stole over me, and I actually shook with fear.

A low, faint cough, from the dark corner where the bed stood, seemed to

cause even a deeper stillness; and then, in a silence where the buzzing

of a fly would have been heard, my father said, "Where's Billy Scanlan?

I want to make my will!"

"He's here, father!" said Peter, taking Billy by the hand and leading

him to the bedside.

"Write what I bid ye, Billy, and be quick; for I hav'n't a long time

afore me here. I die a good Catholic, though Father O'Rafferty won't

give me the 'rites '!"

A general chorus of muttered "Oh! musha, musha!" was now heard through

the room; but whether in grief over the sad fate of the dying man, or

the unflinching severity of the priest, is hard to say.

"I die in peace with all my neighbors and all mankind!"

Another chorus of the company seemed to approve these charitable

expressions.

"I bequeath unto my son Peter,--and never was there a better son, or

a decenter boy!--have you that down? I bequeath unto my son Peter the

whole of my two farms of Killimundoonery and Knocksheboora, with the

fallow meadows behind Lynch's house; the forge, and the right of turf on

the Dooran bog. I give him, and much good may it do him, Lanty Cassara's

acre, and the Luary field, with the limekiln; and that reminds me that

my mouth is just as dry; let me taste what ye have in the jug." Here the

dying man took a very hearty pull, and seemed considerably refreshed

by it. "Where was I, Billy Scanlan?" says he; "oh, I remember, at the

limekiln; I leave him--that's Peter, I mean--the two potato-gardens at

Noonan's Well; and it is the elegant fine crops grows there."

"An't you gettin' wake, father, darlin'?" says Peter, who began to be

afraid of my father's loquaciousness; for, to say the truth, the punch

got into his head, and he was greatly disposed to talk.

"I am, Peter, my son," says he; "I am getting wake; just touch my lips

again with the jug. Ah, Peter, Peter, you watered the drink!"

"No, indeed, father; but it's the taste is leavin' you," says Peter; and

again a low chorus of compassionate pity murmured through the cabin.

"Well, I'm nearly done now," says my father; "there's only one little

plot of ground remaining; and I put it on you, Peter,--as ye wish to

live a good man, and die with the same easy heart I do now,--that ye

mind my last words to ye here. Are ye listening? Are the neighbors

listening? Is Billy Scanlan listening?"

"Yes, sir. Yes, father. We're all minding," chorused the audience.

"Well, then, it's my last will and testament, and may--Give me over the

jug." Here he took a long drink. "And may that blessed liquor be poison

to me if I 'm not as eager about this as every other part of my will.

I say, then, I bequeath the little plot at the cross-roads to poor Con

Cre-gan; for he has a heavy charge, and is as honest and as hard-working

a man as ever I knew. Be a friend to him, Peter, dear; never let him

want while ye have it yourself; think of me on my death-bed whenever he

asks ye for any trifle. Is it down, Billy Scanlan? the two acres at the

cross to Con Cregan and his heirs in _secla seclorum_. Ah, blessed be

the saints! but I feel my heart lighter after that," says he; "a good

work makes an easy conscience. And now I 'll drink all the company's

good health, and many happy returns--"

What he was going to add, there 's no saying; but Peter, who was now

terribly frightened at the lively tone the sick man was assuming,

hurried all the people away into another room, to let his father die in

peace.

When they were all gone Peter slipped back to my father, who was putting

on his brogues in a corner. "Con," says he, "ye did it all well; but

sure that was a joke about the two acres at the cross."

"Of course it was, Peter," says he; "sure it was all a joke, for the

matter of that. Won't I make the neighbors laugh hearty to-morrow when I

tell them all about it!"

"You wouldn't be mean enough to betray me?" says Peter, trembling with

fright.

"Sure ye would n't be mean enough to go against yer father's dying

words," says my father,--"the last sentence ever he spoke? And here he

gave a low, wicked laugh, that made myself shake with fear.

"Very well, Con!" says Peter, holding out his hand; "a bargain's a

bargain; yer a deep fellow, that's all!" And so it ended; and my father

slipped quietly home over the bog, mighty well satisfied with the legacy

he left himself.

And thus we became the owners of the little spot known to this day as

Con's Acre; of which, more hereafter.

CHAPTER II. ANOTHER PEEP AT MY FATHER

My father's prosperity had the usual effect it has on similar cases.

It lifted him into a different sphere of companionship and suggested new

habits of life. No longer necessitated to labor daily for his bread,

by a very slight exercise of industry he could cultivate his

"potato-garden;" and every one who knows anything of Ireland well knows

that the potato and its corollary, the pig, supply every want of an

Irish cottier household.

Being thus at liberty to dispose of himself and his time, my parent was

enabled to practise a long-desired and much-coveted mode of life; which

was to frequent "sheebeens" and alehouses, and all similar places of

resort,--not, indeed, for the gratification of any passion for drink,

for my father only indulged when he was "treated," and never could bring

himself to spend a farthing in liquor himself, but his great fondness

for these places took its origin in his passion for talk. Never, indeed,

lived there a man--from Lord Brougham himself downwards--who had a

greater taste for gossip and loquaciousness than my father. It mattered

little what the subject, he was always ready; and whether it were a

crim. con. in the newspapers, a seizure for rent, a marriage in

high life, or a pig in the pound,--there he was, explaining away all

difficult terms of law and jurisprudence; and many a difficulty that Tom

Cafferty, the postmaster, had attempted in vain to solve was, by a kind

of "writ of error," removed to my father's court for explanation and

decision.

That he soon became a kind of authority in the neighboring town of

Kilbeggan need not excite any surprise. It is men of precisely his kind,

and with talents of an order very similar to his, that wield influence

in the great cities of the earth. It is your talking, pushing, forward

men, seeming always confident in what they say, never acknowledging an

error nor confessing a defeat, who take the lead in life. With average

ability, and ten times the average assurance, they reach the goal that

bashful merit never even so much as gets within sight of.

His chief resort, however, was the Court of Quarter Sessions, where he

sat from the first opening case to the last judgment, watching with an

intense interest all the vacillating changes of the law's uncertainty,

which unquestionably were not in any way diminished by the singular

individual who presided in that seat of justice. Simon Ball, or, as he

was better known at the bar, Snow Ball,--an epithet he owed to his white

head and eyebrows,--had qualified himself for the Bench by improving

upon the proverbial attribute of justice. He was not only blind but

deaf. For something like forty-five years he had walked the hall of the

Four Courts with an empty bag, and a head scarcely more encumbered, when

one morning--no one could guess why--the "Gazette" announced that

the Lord Lieutenant had appointed him to the vacant chairmanship

of Westmeath,--a promotion which had the effect of confounding all

political animosity by its perfect unaccountableness.

It is a law of Nature that nothing ever goes to loss. Bad wine will make

very tolerable vinegar; spoiled hay is converted into good manure; and

so, a very middling lawyer often drops down into a very respectable

judge. Had the gods but acknowledged Mr. Ball's abilities some years

earlier, doubtless he had been an exception to the theory.

They waited, however, so long that both sight and hearing were in

abeyance when the promotion came. It seemed to rally him, however, this

act of recognition, although late. It was a kind of corroboration of the

self-estimate of a long life, and he prepared to show the world that he

was very different from what they took him for. No men have the bump

of self-esteem like lawyers; they live, and grow old, and die, always

fancying that Holts, and Hales, and Mansfields are hid within the

unostentatious exterior of their dusty garments; and that the wit that

dazzles, and the pathos that thrills, are all rusting inside, just

for want of a little of that cheering encouragement by which their

contemporaries are clad in silk and walk in high places. Snow Ball was

determined to show the world its error, and with a smart frock and green

spectacles he took the field like a "fine old Irish barrister," with

many a dry joke or sly sarcasm curled up in the wrinkles beside his

mouth. However cheap a man may be held by his fellows in the "Hall,"

he is always sure of a compensation in the provinces. There the country

gentlemen looked upon their chairman as a Blackstone,--not alone

a storehouse of law, but a great appeal upon questions of general

knowledge and information. I should scarcely have ventured upon what

some of my readers may regard as a mere digression, if it were not that

the gentleman and the peculiar nature of his infirmities had led to an

intimate relation with my father. My parent's fondness for law, and all

appertaining to it, had attached him to the little inn where Mr. Ball

usually put up at each season of his visit; and gradually, by tendering

little services, as fetching an umbrella when it rained, hastening for a

book of reference if called for, searching out an important witness, and

probably by a most frequent and respectful use of the title "my lord,"

instead of the humble "your worship," he succeeded in so ingratiating

himself with the judge that, without exactly occupying any precise

station, or having any regular employment, he became in some sort

a recognized appendage, a kind of "unpaid attaché to the court" of

Kilbeggan.

My father was one of those persons who usually ask only a "lift" from

Fortune, and do not require to be continually aided by her. From being

the humble attendant on the judge, he soon succeeded to being his

privy councillor; supplying a hundred little secret details of the

neighborhood and its local failings, which usually gave Mr. Ball's

decisions on the bench an air approaching inspiration, so full were they

of a knowledge of individual life. As confidence ripened, my father

was employed in reading out to the judge of an evening the various

depositions of witnesses, the informations laid, and the affidavits

sworn,--opportunities from which he did not neglect to derive the full

advantage; for while he usually accompanied the written document with a

running commentary of his own to Mr. Ball, he also contrived to let the

suitor feel how great was his knowledge of the case, and what a powerful

influence behind the scenes he wielded over the fortunes of the cause;

insomuch that it became soon well known that he who had Con Cregan on

his side was better off than with the whole Bench of country magistrates

disposed to favor him.

My father's prudence did not desert him in these trying circumstances.

Without any historical knowledge of the matter, he knew by a species of

instinct that pride was the wreck of most men, and that, to wield real,

substantial power, it is often necessary to assume a garb of apparent

inefficiency and incapacity. To this end, the greater the influence he

possessed, the humbler did he affect to be; disclaiming everything like

power, he got credit for possessing a far greater share than he ever

really enjoyed.

That the stream of justice did not run perfectly pure and clear,

however, may not be a matter of surprise; for how many rocks, and

shoals, and quicksands, are there in the channel! and certainly my

father was a dangerous hand at the wheel. Litigation, it must be owned,

lost much of its vacillation. The usual question about any case was,

"What does Con say? Did Con Cregan tell ye ye 'll win?" That was

decisive; none sceptical enough to ask for more!

At the feet of this Gamaliel I was brought up; nothing the more tenderly

that a stepmother presided over the "home department." As I was a stout

boy, of some thirteen or fourteen at this period of my father's life,

and could read and write tolerably well, I was constantly employed

in making copies of various papers used at the Sessions. Were I

psychologically inclined, I might pause here to inquire how far these

peculiar studies had their influence in biassing the whole tenor of my

very eventful life; what latent stores of artifice did I lay up from

all these curious subtleties; how did I habituate my mind to weigh and

balance probabilities, as evidence inclined to this side or that; above

all, how gratified was I with the discovery that there existed a legal

right and wrong, perfectly distinct from the moral ones,--a fact which

served at once to open the path of life far wider and more amply before

me.

I must, however, leave this investigation to the reader's acuteness, if

he think it worth following out; nor would I now allude to it save as

it affords me the opportunity, once for all, of explaining modes

of thinking and acting which might seem, without some such clue, as

unfitting and unseemly in one reared and brought up as I was.

Whether the new dignity of his station had disposed him to it or not,

I cannot say; but my father became far more stern in his manner and

exacting in his requirements as he rose in life. The practice of the

law seemed to impart some feature of its own peremptory character to

himself, as he issued his orders in our humble household with all the

impressive solemnity of a writ,--indeed, aiding the effect by phrases

taken from the awful vocabulary of justice.

If my stepmother objected to anything the answer was, usually, she might

"traverse in prox" at the next Sessions; while to myself every order was

in the style of a "mandamus." Not satisfied with the mere terrors of the

Bench, he became so enamoured of the pursuit as to borrow some features

of prison discipline for the conduct of our household; thus, for

the slightest infractions of his severe code I was "put" upon No. 3

Penitentiary diet,--only reading potatoes _vice_ bread.

There would seem to be something uncongenial to obedience in any form

in the life of an Irish peasant; something doubtless in the smell of the

turf. He seems to imbibe a taste for freedom by the very architecture of

his dwelling, and the easy, unbuttoned liberty of his corduroys. Young

as I was, I suppose the Celt was strong within me; and the "Times" says,

that will account for all delinquencies. I felt this powerfully; not

the less, indeed, that my father almost invariably visited me with the

penalty of the case then before the Court; so that while copying out at

night the details of the prosecution, I had time to meditate over the

coming sentence. It was, perhaps, fortunate for me that capital cases

do not come under the jurisdiction of a "sitting barrister;" otherwise I

verily believe I might have suffered the last penalty of the law from my

parent's infatuation.

My sense of "equity" at last revolted. I perceived, that no matter who

"sued," I was always "cast;" and I at length resolved on resistance. I

remember well the night this resolution was formed; it was a cold and

cheerless one of January. My father had given me a great mass of papers

to copy, and a long article for the newspapers to write out, which the

"Judge" was to embody in his address to the Bench. I never put pen to

either, but sat with my head between my hands for twelve mortal hours,

revolving every possible wickedness, and wondering whether in my

ingenuity I could not invent some offences that no indictment could

comprise. Day broke, and found me still unoccupied. I was just

meditating whether I should avow my rebellion openly, and "plead" in

mitigation, when my father came in.

My reader must excuse me if I do not dwell on what followed. It is

enough to say that the nature of my injuries are unknown to the criminal

statute, and that although my wounds and bruises are familiar to the

prize-ring, they are ignored by all jurisprudence out of the slave

states. Even my stepmother confessed that I was not fit to "pick out of

the gutter;" and she proved her words by leaving me where I lay.

Revenge must be a very "human" passion; my taste for it came quite

naturally. I had never read "Othello" nor "Zanga;" but I conceived a

very clear and precise notion that I had a debt to pay, and pay it

I would. Had the obligation been of a pecuniary character, and some

"bankrupt commission" been in jurisdiction over it, I had doubtless been

called upon to discharge it in a series of instalments proportional to

my means of life; being a moral debt, however, I enjoyed the privilege

of paying it at once, and in full; which I did thus: I had often

remarked that my father arose at night and left the cabin, crossing a

little garden behind the house to a little shed, where our pig and an

ass lived in harmony together; and here, by dint of patient observation,

I discovered that his occupation lay in the thatch of the aforesaid

shed, in which he seemed to conceal some object of value.

Thither I now repaired, some secret prompting suggesting that it might

afford me the wished-for means of vengeance. My disappointment was

indeed great that no compact roll of bank-notes, no thick woollen

stocking close packed with guineas, or even crown-pieces, met my hand.

A heavy bundle of papers and parchment was all I could find; and

these bore such an unhappy family resemblance to the cause of all my

misfortunes that I was ready to tear them to pieces in very spite. A

mere second's reflection suggested a better course. There was a certain

attorney in Kilbeggan, one Morissy, my father's bitterest enemy; indeed,

my parent's influence in the Session court had almost ruined and left

him without a client. The man of law and precedents in vain struggled

against decisions which a secret and irresponsible adviser contrived

beforehand, and Morissy's knowledge and experience were soon discovered

to be valueless. It was a game in which skill went for nothing.

This gentleman's character at once pointed him out as the fitting agent

of vengeance on my father, and by an hour after daybreak did I present

myself before him in all the consciousness of my injured state.

Mr. Morissy's reception of me was not over gracious.

"Well, ye spawn of the devil," said he, as he turned about from a small

fragment of looking-glass, before which he was shaving, "what brings ye

here? Bad luck to ye; the sight of ye's made me cut myself."

"I'm come, sir, for a bit of advice, sir," said I, putting my hand to my

hat in salutation.

"Assault and battery!" said he, with a grin on the side of his mouth

where the soap had been shaved away.

"Yes, sir; an aggravated case," said I, using the phrase of the

Sessions.

"Why don't ye apply to yer father? He's Crown lawyer and

Attorney-General; faith, he 's more besides,--he 's judge and jury too."

"And more than that in the present suit, sir," says I, following up his

illustration; "he's the defendant here."

"What! is that his doing?"

"Yes, sir; his own hand and mark," said I, laughing.

"That's an ugly cut, and mighty near the eye! But sure, after all, you

're his child."

"Very true, sir; it's only paternal correction; but I have something

else!"

"What's that, Con my boy?" said he; for we were now grown very familiar.

"It is this, sir," said I; "this roll of papers that I found hid in the

thatch,--a safe place my father used to make his strong-box."

"Let us see!" said Morissy, sitting down and opening the package. Many

were old summonses discharged, notices to quit withdrawn, and so on;

but at last he came to two papers pinned together, at sight of which he

almost jumped from his chair. "Con," says he, "describe the place you

found them in."

I went over all the discovery again.

"Did ye yourself see your father put in papers there?"

"I did, sir."

"On more than one occasion?"

"At least a dozen times, sir."

"Did ye ever remark any one else putting papers there?"

"Never, sir! none of the neighbors ever come through the garden."

"And it was always at night, and in secret, he used to repair there?"

"Always at night"

"That'll do, Con; that 'll do, my son. You'll soon turn the tables on

the old boy. You may go down to the kitchen and get your breakfast;

be sure, however, that you don't leave the house to-day. Your father

mustn't know where ye are till we're ready for him."

"Is it a strong case, sir?" said I.

"A very strong case--never a flaw in it."

"Is it more than a larceny, sir?" said I.

"It is better than that."

"I'd rather it didn't go too far," said I, for I was beginning to feel

afraid of what I had done.

"Leave that to me, Con," said Mr. Morissy, "and go down to yer

breakfast."

I did as I was bid, and never stirred out of the house the whole day,

nor for eight days after; when one morning Morissy bid me clean myself,

and brush my hair, to come with him to the Court-house.

I guessed at once what was going to happen; and now, as my head was

healed, and all my bruises cured, I'd very gladly have forgiven all the

affair, and gone home again with my father; but it was too late. As Mr.

Morissy said, with a grin, "The law is an elegant contrivance; a child's

finger can set it in motion, but a steam engine could not hold it back

afterwards!"

The Court was very full that morning; there were five magistrates on

the bench, and Mr. Ball in the middle of them. There were a great many

farmers, too, for it was market-day; and numbers of the townspeople, who

all knew my father, and were not sorry to see him "up." Cregan versus

Cregan stood third on the list of cases; and very little interest

attached to the two that preceded it. At last it was called; and there I

stood before the Bench, with five hundred pair of eyes all bent upon me;

and two of them actually looking through my very brain,--for they were

my father's, as he stood at the opposite side of the table below the

Bench.

The case was called an assault, and very soon terminated; for, by my own

admission, it was clear that I deserved punishment; though probably

not so severely as it had been inflicted. The judge delivered a very

impressive lesson to my father and myself, about our respective duties,

and dismissed the case with a reproof, the greater share of which fell

to me. "You may go now, sir," said he, winding up a line peroration;

"fear God and honor the king; respect your parents, and make your

capitals smaller."

"Before your worship dismisses the witness," said Morissy, "I wish to

put a few questions to him."

"The case is disposed of: call the next," said the judge, angrily.

"I have a most important fact to disclose to your worship,--one which

is of the highest importance to the due administration of justice,--one

which, if suffered to lie in obscurity, will be a disgrace to the law,

and a reproach to the learned Bench."

"Call the next case, crier," said the judge. "Sit down, Mr. Morissy."

"Your worshipw may commit me; but I will be heard--"

"Tipstaff! take that man into--" "When you hear of a mandamus from the

King's Bench--when you know that a case of compounding a felony--"

"Come away, Mr. Morissy; come quiet, sir!" said the police-sergeant.

"What were ye saying of a mandamus?" said the judge, getting frightened

at the dreaded word.

"I was saying this, sir," said Morissy, turning fiercely round; "that

I am possessed of information which you refused to hear, and which

will make the voice of the Chief Justice heard in this court, which now

denies its ear to truth."

"Conduct yourself more becomingly, sir," said one of the county

magistrates, "and open your case."

Morissy, who was far more submissive to the gentry than to the chairman,

at once replied in his blandest tone:--

"Your worship, it is now more than a month since I appeared before you

in the case of Noonan versus M'Quade and others,--an aggravated case of

homicide; I might go further, and apply to it the most awful term the

vocabulary of justice contains! Your worship will remember that on that

very interesting and important case a document was missing, of such a

character that the main feature of the case seemed actually to hang upon

it. This was no less than the deathbed confession of Noonan, formally

taken before a justice of the peace, Mr. Styles, and written with all

the accurate regard to circumstances the law exacts. Mr. Styles, the

magistrate who took the deposition, was killed by a fall from his horse

the following week; his clerk being ill, the individual who wrote the

case was Con Cregan. Your worship may bear in mind that this man,

when called to the witness box, denied all knowledge of this dying

confession; asserted that what he took down in writing were simply some

brief and unsatisfactory notes of the affray, all to the advantage

of the M'Quades, and swore that Mr. Styles, who often alluded to the

document as a confession, was entirely in error, the whole substance

of it being unimportant and vague; some very illegible and-ill-written

notes corroborating which were produced in court as the papers in

question.

"Noonan being dead, and Mr. Styles also, the whole case rested on the

evidence of Cregan; and although, your worship, the man's character

for veracity was not of that nature among the persons of his own

neighborhood to--"

"Confine yourself to the case, sir," said the judge, "without

introducing matter of mere common report."

"I am in a position to prove my assertion," said Morissy, triumphantly.

"I hold here in my hand the abstracted documents, signed and sealed by

Mr. Styles, and engrossed with every item of regularity. I have more: a

memorandum purporting to be a copy of a receipt for eighteen pounds

ten shillings, received by Cregan from Jos. M'Quade, the wages of this

crime; and, if more were necessary, a promissory note from M'Quade for

an additional sum of seven pounds, at six months' date. These are the

papers which I am prepared to prove in court; this the evidence which

a few minutes back I tendered in vain before you; and there," said he,

turning with a vindictive solemnity to where my father was standing,

pale, but collected, "there's the man who, distinguished by your

worship's confidence, I now arraign for the suppression of this

evidence, and the composition of a felony!"

If Mr. Morissy was not perfectly correct in his law, there was still

quite enough to establish a charge of misdemeanor against my father; and

he was accordingly committed for trial at the approaching assizes,

while I was delivered over to the charge of a police-sergeant, to be in

readiness when my testimony should be required.

The downfall of a dynasty is sure to evoke severe recrimination against

the late ruler; and now my parent, who but a few days past could have

tilted the beam of justice at his mere pleasure, was overwhelmed with

not merely abuse and attack, but several weighty accusations of crime

were alleged against him. Not only was it discovered that he interfered

with the due course of justice, but that he was a prime actor in, and

contriver of, many of the scenes of insurrectionary disturbance which

for years back had filled the country with alarm and the jails with

criminals.

For one of these cases, a night attack for arms, the evidence was so

complete and unquestionable that the Crown prosecutor, disliking the

exhibition of a son giving evidence against his parent, dispensed with

my attendance altogether, and prosecuting the graver charge obtained a

verdict of guilty.

The sentence was transportation for life, with a confiscation of all

property to the Crown. Thus my first step in life was to exile my

father, and leave myself a beggar,--a promising beginning, it must be

owned!

CHAPTER III. A FIRST STEP ON LIFE'S LADDER

It is among the strange and singular anomalies of our nature that

however pleased men may be at the conviction of a noted offender, few

of those instrumental to his punishment are held in honor and esteem.

If all Kilbeggan rejoiced, as they did, at my father's downfall, a very

considerable share of obloquy rested on me,--a species of judgment, I

honestly confess, that I was not the least prepared for.

"There goes the little informer," said they, as I passed; "what did ye

get for hanging--" a very admirable piece of Irish exaggeration--"for

hanging yer father, Con?" said one.

"Could n't ye help yer stepmother to a say voyage?" shouted another.

"And then we 'd be rid of yez all," chimed in a third.

"He's rich now," whined out an old beggar-man that often had eaten his

potatoes at our fireside. "He's rich now, the chap is; he 'll marry a

lady!"

This was the hardest to bear of all the slights, for not alone had I

lost all pretension to my father's property, but the raggedness of my

clothes and the general misery of my appearance might have saved me from

the reproach of what is so forcibly termed "blood-money."

"Come over to me this evening," said Father Rush; and they were the

only words of comfort I heard from any side. "Come over to me about six

o'clock, Con, for I want to speak to you."

They were long hours that intervened between that and six. I could not

stay in the town, where every one I met had some sneer or scoff against

me; I could not go home, I had none! and so I wandered out into the open

country, taking my course towards a bleak common, about two miles off,

where few, if any one, was like to be but myself.

This wild and dreary tract lay alongside of the main road to Athlone,

and was traversed by several footpaths, by which the country people were

accustomed to make "short cuts" to market, from one part of the road to

another; for the way, passing through a bog, took many a winding turn as

the ground necessitated.

There is a feeling of lonely desolation in wide far-stretching wastes

that accords well with the purposeless vacuity of hopelessness; but,

somehow or other, the very similitude between the scene without and the

sense of desolation within, establishes a kind of companionship. Lear

was speaking like a true philosopher when he uttered the words, "I like

this rocking of the battlements."

I had wandered some hours "here and there" upon the common; and it

was now the decline of day when I saw at a little distance from me the

figure of a young man whose dress and appearance bespoke condition,

running along at a brisk pace, but evidently laboring under great

fatigue.

The instant he saw me he halted, and cried out, "I say, my boy, is that

Kilbeggan yonder, where I see the spire?"

"Yes, sir."

"And where is the high-road to Athlone?"

"Yonder, sir, where the two trees are standing."

"Have you seen the coach pass,--the mail for Athlone?"

"Yes, sir, she went through the town about half an hour ago."

"Are ye certain, boy? are ye quite sure of this?" cried he, in a voice

of great agitation.

"I am quite sure, sir; they always change horses at Moone's

public-house; and I saw them 'draw up' there more than half an hour

since."

"Is there no other coach passes this road for Dublin?"

"The night mail, sir, but she does not go to-night; this is Saturday."

"What is to be done?" said the youth, in deep sorrow; and he seated

himself on a stone as he spoke, and hid his face between his hands.

As he sat thus, I had time to mark him well, and scan every detail of

his appearance.

Although tall and stoutly knit, he could not have been above sixteen, or

at most seventeen, years of age; his dress, a kind of shooting-jacket,

was made in a cut that affected fashion; and I observed on one finger

of his very white hand a ring which, even to my uneducated eyes, bespoke

considerable value.

He looked up at last, and his eyes were very red, and a certain

trembling of the lips showed that he was much affected. "I suppose, my

lad, I can find a chaise or a carriage of some kind in Kilbeggan?" said

he; "for I have lost the mail. I had got out for a walk, and by the

advice of a countryman taken this path over the bog, expecting, as he

told me, it would cut off several miles of way. I suppose I must have

mistaken him, for I have been running for above an hour, and am too late

after all; but still, if I can find a chaise, I shall be in time yet."

"They 're all gone, sir," said I; "and sorry am I to have such tidings

to tell. The Sessions broke up to-day, and they're away with the lawyers

to Kinnegad."

"And how far is that from us?"

"Sixteen miles or more, by the road."

"And how am I to get there?"

"Unless ye walk it--"

"Walk! impossible. I am dead beat already; besides, the time it would

take would lose me all chance of reaching Dublin as I want."

"Andy Smith has a horse, if he'd lend it; and there's a short road by

Hogan's boreen."

"Where does this Smith live?" said he, stopping me impatiently.

"Not a half mile from here; you can see the house from this."

"Come along, then, and show me the way, my boy," said he; and the gleam

of hope seemed to lend alacrity to his movements.

Away we set together, and as we went, it was arranged between us that if

Andy would hire out his mare, I should accompany the rider as guide, and

bring back the animal to its owner, while the traveller proceeded on his

journey to town.

The negotiation was tedious enough; for, at first, Andy would n't appear

at all; he thought it was a process-server was after him,--a suspicion

probably suggested by my presence, as it was generally believed that a

rag of my father's mantle had descended to me. It was only after a very

cautious and careful scrutiny of the young traveller through a small

glass eye--it wasn't a window--in the mud wall that he would consent to

come out. When he did so, he treated the proposal most indignantly.

"Is it he hire out his baste? as if she was a dirty garraun of Betty

Nowlan's of the head inn; he wondered who 'd ask the like!" and so on.

The youth, deterred by this reception, would have abandoned the scheme

at once; but I, better acquainted with such characters as Andy, and

knowing that his difficulties were only items in the intended charge,

higgled, and bargained, and bullied, and blarneyed by turns; and, after

some five and forty minutes of alternate joking and abusing each other,

it was at last agreed on that the "baste" was to be ceded for the sum of

fifteen shillings,--"two and sixpence more if his honor was pleased with

the way she carried him;" the turnpike and a feed of oats being also

at the charge of the rider, as well as all repairs of shoes incurred

by loss or otherwise. Then there came a supplemental clause as to the

peculiar care of the animal. How "she was n't to be let drink too much

at once, for she 'd get the colic;" and if she needed shoeing, she

was to have a "twitch" on her nose, or she'd kick the forge to

"smithereens." The same precaution to be taken if the saddle required

fresh girthing; a hint was given, besides, not to touch her with the

left heel, or she 'd certainly kick the rider with the hind leg of

the same side; and, as a last caution given, to be on our guard at the

cross-roads at Toomes-bridge, or she'd run away towards Croghan, where

she once was turned out in foal. "Barring" these peculiarities, and

certain smaller difficulties about mounting, "she was a lamb, and the

sweetest-tempered crayture ever was haltered."

In the very midst of this panegyric upon the animal's good and noble

qualities he flung open the door of a little shed, and exhibited her to

our view. I verily believe, whatever the urgency of the youth's reason

for proceeding, that his heart failed him at the sight of the steed; a

second's reconsideration seemed to rally his courage, and he said, "No

matter, it can't be helped; saddle her at once, and let us be off."

"That's easier said nor done," muttered Andy to himself, as he stood at

the door, without venturing a step farther. "Con," said he, at last, in

a species of coaxing tone I well knew boded peril, "Con, a cushla! get

a hould of her by the head, that's a fine chap; make a spring at the

forelock."

"Maybe she 'd kick--"

"Sorra kick! get up there, now, and I'll be talking to you all the

while."

This proposition, though doubtless meant as most encouraging, by no

means reassured me.

"Come, come! I'll bridle the infernal beast," said the youth, losing

all patience with both of us, and he sprung forward into the stable; but

barely had he time to jump back, as the animal let fly with both hind

legs together. Andy, well aware of what was coming, pulled us both back

and shut to the door, against which the hoofs kept up one rattling din

of kicks that shook the crazy edifice from roof to ground.

"Ye see what comes of startlin' her; the crayture's timid as a

kid," said Andy, whose blanched cheek badly corroborated his assumed

composure. "Ye may do what ye plaze, barrin' putting a bridle on her;

she never took kindly to that!"

"But do ye intend me to ride her without one?" said the youth.

"By no manner of means, sir," said Andy, with a plausible slowness on

each word that gave him time to think of an expedient. "I would n't be

guilty of the like; none that knows me would ever say it to me: I 'm a

poor man--"

"You're a devilish tiresome one," broke in the youth, suddenly; "here we

have been above half an hour standing at the door, and none the nearer

our departure than when we arrived."

"Christy Moore could bridle her, if he was here," said Andy; "but he's

gone to Moate, and won't be back till evening; may be that would do?"

A very impatient, and not very pious exclamation consigned Christy to an

untimely fate. "Well, don't be angry, anyhow, sir," said Andy; "there's

many a thing a body might think of, if they were n't startled. See, now,

I have a way this minute; an elegant fine way, too."

"Well, what is it? Confound your long-winded speeches!"

"There, now, you're angry again! sure it's enough to give one quite a

through-otherness, and not leave them time to reflect."

"Your plan, your plan!" said the young man, his lips trembling with

anger and impatience.

"Here it is, then; let the 'gossoon,'" meaning me, "get up on the roof

and take off two or three of the scraws, the sods of grass, till he can

get through, and then steal down on the mare's back; when he 's once on

her, she 'll never stir head nor foot, and he can slip the bridle over

her quite asy."

"The boy might be killed; no, no, I 'll not suffer that--"

"Wait, sir," cried I, interrupting, "it's not so hard, after all; once

on her back, I defy her to throw me."

"Sure I know that well; sorra better rider in the Meath hunt than little

Con," broke in Andy; backing me with a ready flattery he thought would

deceive me.

It was not without reluctance that the youth consented to this forlorn

hope, but he yielded at last; and so, with a bridle fastened round me

like a scarf, I was hoisted on the roof by Andy, and, under a volley of

encouraging expressions, exhorted to "go in and win."

"There! there, a cushla!" cried Andy, as he saw me performing the first

act of the piece with a vigor he had never calculated on; "'tis n't a

coach and six ye want to drive through. Tear and ages! ye'll take the

whole roof off." The truth was, I worked away with a malicious pleasure

in the destruction of the old miser's roof; nor is it quite certain

how far my zeal might have carried me, when suddenly one of the

rafters--mere light poles of ash--gave way, and down I went, at first

slowly, and then quicker, into a kind of funnel formed by the smashed

timbers and the earthen sods. The crash, the din, and the dust appeared

to have terrified the wicked beast below, for she stood trembling in one

corner of the stable, and never moved a limb as I walked boldly up and

passed the bridle over her head. This done, I had barely time to spring

on her back, when the door was forced open by the young gentleman, whose

fears for my fate had absorbed every other thought.

"Are you safe, my boy, quite safe?" he cried, making his way over the

fallen rubbish.

"Oh! the devil fear him," cried Andy, in a perfect rage of passion;

"I wish it was his bones was smashed, instead of the

roof-sticks--see!--Och, murther, only look at this." And Andy stood amid

the ruins, a most comical picture of affliction, in part real and in

part assumed. Meanwhile the youth had advanced to my side, and, with

many a kind and encouraging word, more than repaid me for all my danger.

"'T is n't five pound will pay the damage," cried Andy, running up on

his fingers a sum of imaginary arithmetic.

"Where's the saddle, you old--" What the young man was about to add, I

know not; but at a look from me he stopped short.

"Is it abusin' me you're for now, afther wrecking my house and

destroying my premises?" cried Andy, whose temper was far from sweetened

by the late catastrophe. "Sure what marcy my poor beast would get from

the likes of ye! sorry step she 'll go in yer company; pay the damages

ye done, and be off."

Here was a new turn of affairs, and, judging from the irascibility

of both parties, a most disastrous one; it demanded, indeed, all my

skill,--all the practised dexterity of a mind trained, as mine had been

been by many a subtlety, to effect a compromise, which I did thus:

my patron being cast in the costs of all the damages to the amount of

twenty shillings, and the original contract to be maintained in all its

integrity.

The young man paid the money without speaking; but I had time to mark

that the purse from which he drew it was far from weighty. "Are we free

to go at last?" cried he, in a voice of suppressed wrath.

"Yes, yer honor; all's right," answered Andy, whose heart was mollified

at the sight of money. "A pleasant journey, and safe to ye; take good

care of the beast, don't ride her over the stones, and--"

The remainder of the exhortation was lost to us, as we set forth in a

short jog-trot, I running alongside.

"When we are once below the hill, yonder," said I to my companion, "give

her the whip, and make up for lose time."

"And how are you to keep up, my lad?" asked he, in some surprise.

I could scarcely avoid a laugh at the simplicity of the question; as

if an Irish gossoon, with his foot on his native bog, would n't be an

overmatch in a day's journey for the best hack that ever ambled! Away we

went, sometimes joking over, sometimes abusing, the old miser Andy, of

whom, for my fellow-traveller's amusement, I told various little traits

and stories, at which he laughed with a zest quite new to me to witness.

My desire to be entertaining then led me on to speak of my father and

his many curious adventures,--the skill with which he could foment

litigation, and the wily stratagems by which he sustained it afterwards.

All the cunning devices of the process-server I narrated with a gusto

that smacked of my early training: how, sometimes, my crafty parent

would append a summons to the collar of a dog, and lie in wait till

he saw the owner take it off and read it, and then, emerging from his

concealment, cry out "sarved," and take to his heels; and again how he

once succeeded in "serving" old Andy himself, by appearing as a beggar

woman, and begging him to light a bit of paper to kindle her pipe.

The moment, however, he took the bit of twisted paper, the assumed

beggar-woman screamed out, "Andy, yer sarved: that's a process, my

man!" The shock almost took Andy's life; and there's not a beggar in the

barony dares to come near him since.

"Your father must be well off, then, I suppose," said my companion.

"He was a few weeks ago, sir; but misfortune has come on us since that."

I was ashamed to go on, and yet I felt that strange impulse so strong in

the Irish peasant to narrate anything of a character which can interest

by harrowing and exciting the feelings.

Very little pressing was needed to make me recount the whole story,

down to the departure of my father with the other prisoners sentenced to

transportation.

"And whither were you going when I met you this morning on the common?"

said my fellow-traveller, in a voice of some interest.

"To seek my fortune, sir," was my brief answer; and either the words or

the way they were uttered seemed to strike my companion, for he drew

up short, and stared at me, repeating the phrase, "Seek your fortune!"

"Just so," said I, warmed by an enthusiasm which then was beginning to

kindle within me, and which for many a long year since, and in many a

trying emergency, has cheered and sustained me. "Just so; the world is

wide, and there 's a path for every one, if they 'd only look for it."

"But you saw what came of _my_ taking a short cut, this morning," said

my companion, laughing.

"And you'd have been time enough too, if you had been always thinking of

what you were about, sir; but as you told me, you began a thinking and

a dreaming of twenty things far away. Besides, who knows what good turn

luck may take, just at the very moment when we seem to have least of

it?"

"You 're quite a philosopher, Con," said he, smiling.

"So Father Mahon used to say, sir," said I, proudly, and in reality

highly flattered at the reiteration of the epithet.

Thus chatting, we journeyed along, lightening the way with talk, and

making the hours seem to me the very pleasantest I had ever passed. At

last we came in sight of the steeple of Kinnegad, which lay in the plain

before us, about a mile distant.

The little town of Kinnegad was all astir as we entered it The "up

mail" had just come down, in the main street, sending all its passengers

flying in various directions,--through shop-windows; into cow-houses and

piggeries; some being proudly perched on the roof of a cabin, and others

most ignobly seated on a dunghill; the most lamentable figure of all

being an elderly gentleman, who, having cut a summerset through an

apothecary's window, came forth cut by a hundred small vials, and

bearing on his person unmistakable evidence of every odor, from

tar-water to assafotida. The conveyance itself lay, like the Ark after

the Deluge, quietly reposing on one side; while animals male and female,

"after their kind," issued from within. Limping and disconsolate figures

were being assisted into the inn; and black eyes and smashed faces were

as rife as in a country fair.

I was not slow in appropriating the calamity to a good purpose. "See,

sir," I whispered to my companion, "you said, a while ago, that nobody

had such bad luck as yourself; think what might have happened you, now,

if you had n't missed the coach."

"True enough, Con," said he, "there is such a thing as being too late

for bad as well as for good fortune; and I experience it now. But the

next question is, how to get forward; for, of course, with a broken

axle, the mail cannot proceed further."

The difficulty was soon got over. The halt and the maimed passengers,

after loudly inveighing against all coach-proprietors,--the man that

made, and the man that horsed, he that drove, and he that greased the

wheels of all public conveyances,--demanded loudly to be forwarded to

the end of their journey by various chaises and other vehicles of the

town; I at the same time making use of my legal knowledge to suggest

that while doing so, they acted under protest; that it was "without

prejudice" to any future proceedings they might deem fit to adopt for

compensatory damages. If some laughed heartily at the source from

which the hint came, others said I was a "devilish shrewd chap," and

insinuated something about a joint-stock subscription of sixpences for

my benefit; but the motion was apparently unseconded, and so, like

many benefactors of my species, I had to apply to my conscience for my

reward; or, safer still, had to wait till I could pay myself.

My young companion, who now, in a few words, told me that he was a

student at Trinity College and a "reader for honors," pulled out his

purse to pay me. "Remember, my boy, the name of Henry Lyndsay; I 'm

easily found, if you chance to come to Dublin,--not that I can be of

much service to any one, but I shall not forget the service you rendered

me this day. Here, take this, pay for the mare's feeding, and when she

has rested--"

I would not suffer him to proceed further, but broke in:

"I'm not going back, sir! I'll never turn my footsteps that way again!

Leave the mare in the inn; Andy comes every Saturday here for the

market, and will find her safe. As for me, I must 'seek my fortune;'

and when one has to search for anything, there's nothing like beginning

early."

"You 're a strange fellow, Con," said he, looking at me; and I was

shrewd enough to see that his features exhibited no small astonishment

at my words. "And where do you intend to look for this same fortune you

speak of?"

"No one place in particular, sir! I read in an old book once, that good

luck is like sunshine, and is not found in all climates at the same

time; so I intend to ramble about; and when I breakfast on the sunny

side of the apple, never stay to dine off the green one."

"And you are the kind of fellow to succeed!" said he, half to himself,

and rather as though reflecting on my words than addressing me.

"So I intend, sir," replied I, confidently.

"Have you ever read 'Gil Blas,' Con?"

"I have it almost by heart, sir."

"That's it!" said he, laughing; "I see whence you've got your taste for

adventure. But remember, Con, Gil Blas lived in different times from

ours, and in a very different land. He was, besides, a well-educated

fellow, with no small share of good looks and good manners."

"As for age and country, sir," said I, boldly, "men and women are pretty

much alike at all times, and in all places; in the old book I told you

of a while ago, I read that human passions, like the features of the

face, are only infinite varieties of the same few ingredients. Then, as

to education and the rest,--what one man can pick up, so can another.

The will is the great thing, and I feel it very strong in me. And now,

to give a proof of it, I am determined to go up to Dublin, and with your

honor too, and you'll see if I won't have my way."

"So you shall, Con!" replied he, laughing; "I'll take you on the top of

the chaise; and although I cannot afford to keep a servant, you shall

stay with me in College until chance, in which you have such implicit

faith, shall provide better for you. Come, now, lead the mare into the

stable, for I see my companions are packing up to be gone."

I was not slow in obeying the orders, and soon returned to assist my

new master with his luggage. All was quickly settled; and a few minutes

after saw me seated on a portmanteau on the roof on my way to Dublin.

CHAPTER IV. HOW I ENTERED COLLEGE, AND HOW I LEFT IT

It was still dark, on a drizzling morning in January, as we reached the

Capital; the lamps shone faintly through the foggy, wet atmosphere; and

the gloom was deepened as we entered the narrow streets at the west of

the city. A few glimmering lights from five-stories high, showed where

some early riser was awaking to his daily toil; while here and there,

some rough-coated policeman stood at the corner of a street to be rained

on; except these, no sign of living thing appeared; and I own the whole

aspect was a sad damper to the ardor of that enthusiasm which had often

pictured the great metropolis as some gorgeous fairy-land.

The carriage stopped twice, to set down two of the travellers, in

obscure dingy streets, and then I heard Mr. Lyndsay say, "To the

College;" and on we went through a long labyrinth of narrow lanes and

thoroughfares, which gradually widened out into more spacious streets,

and at length arrived at a great building, whose massive gates slowly

opened to receive, and then solemnly closed after us. We now stood in a

spacious quadrangle, silent and noiseless as a church at midnight.

Mr. Lyndsay hastily descended, and ordering me to carry in some of the

baggage, I followed him into a large scantily furnished room, beyond

which was a bedchamber, of like accommodation. "This is my home, Con,"

said he, with a melancholy attempt at a smile; "and here," said he,

leading me to a small one-windowed room on the opposite side, "here is

yours." A bed, of that humble kind called a stretcher, placed against

one wall, and a large chest for holding coals against the other,

a bottomless chair, and a shoe-brush with very scanty bristles,

constituted the entire furniture.

It was some time after all the luggage was removed before Mr. Lyndsay

could get rid of the postilion; like all poor men in a like predicament,

he had to bargain and reason and remonstrate, submitting to many a

mortification, and enduring many a sore pang, at the pitiless ribaldry

which knows nothing so contemptible as poverty; at last, after various

reflections on the presumption of people who travel and cannot afford

it, on their vanity, self-conceit, and so forth, the fellow departed,

with what my ears assured me was no contemptible share of my poor

master's purse.

I was sitting alone in my den during this scene, not wishing by my

presence to add anything to his mortification; and, now all was still

and noiseless, I waited for some time expecting to be called,--to be

told of some trifling service to execute, or, at least, to be spoken to;

but no, not a sound, not a murmur, was to be heard.

My own thoughts were none of the brightest: the ceaseless rain that

streamed against the little window, and shut out all prospect of what

was without; the cold and cheerless chamber and the death-like silence

were like lead upon my heart.

I had often, in my reveries at home, fancied that all who were lifted

above the cottier in life must have neither care nor sorrow; that real

want was unknown, save in their class; and that all afflictions of

those more highly placed were of a character too trifling to be deemed

serious; and now suddenly there came to me the thought, What if every

one had his share of grief? I vow, the very suspicion thrilled through

me, and I sat still, dwelling on the sad theme with deep intensity.

As I sat thus, a sigh, low, but distinct, came from the adjoining

chamber. I suddenly remembered my young master, and crept noiselessly to

the door; it stood ajar, and I could see in, and mark everything well.

He was sitting at a table covered with books and writing materials; a

single candle threw its yellow glare over the whole, and lit up with a

sickly tint the travel-worn and tired features of the youth.

As I looked, he leaned his forehead down upon his arm, and seemed either

overcome by sorrow or fatigue; when suddenly a deep-booming bell sent

forth a solemn peal, and made the very chamber vibrate with its din.

Lyndsay started at the sound; a kind of shudder, like a convulsive

throe, shook his limbs; and sitting up on his seat, he pushed back the

falling hair from his eyes, and again addressed himself to his book.

The heavy tolling sounds seemed now no longer to distract, but rather

to nerve him to greater efforts, for he read on with an intense

persistence; turning from volume to volume, and repeatedly noting down

on the paper as he read.

Of a sudden the bell ceased, and Lyndsay arose from the table and passed

into the bedroom, from which he almost instantaneously reappeared,

dressed in his cap and gown,--a new and curious costume in my eyes, but

which at the time was invested with a deep, mysterious interest to me.

I retired silently now to my room, and saw him pass out into the wide

court. I hastened to look out. Already some hundred others in similar

costume were assembled there, and the buzz of voices and the sound of

many feet were a pleasant relief to the desert-like silence of the

court as I had seen it before. The change was, however, of a very brief

duration; in less than a minute the whole assemblage moved off and

entered a great building, whose heavy door closed on them with a deep

bang, and all was still once more.

I now set myself to think by what small services I could render myself

acceptable to my young master. I arranged the scanty furniture into a

resemblance, faint enough, certainly, to comfort, and made a cheerful

fire with the remnant of the roomy coal-box. This done, I proceeded to

put his clothes in order, and actually astonished myself with the skill

I seemed to possess in my new walk. An intense curiosity to know what

was going on without led me frequently to the door which led into the

court; but I profited little by this step. The only figures which met my

eye were now and then some elderly personage clad in his academic robes,

gravely wending towards the "Hall," and the far less imposing cries

of some "college women," as the hags are called who officiate as the

University housemaids.

It was at one of these visits that suddenly I heard the great door

of the "Hall" burst open with a crash, and immediately down the

steps poured the black tide of figures, talking and laughing in

one multifarious din that seemed to fill the very air. Cautiously

withdrawing, I closed the door, and retired; but scarcely had I reached

my room, when young Lyndsay passed through to his own chamber: his cheek

was flushed, and his eyes sparkled with animation, and his whole air and

gesture indicated great excitement.

Having removed his cravat, and bathed his temples with cold water, he

once more sat down before his books, and was soon so immersed in study

as not to hear my footsteps as I entered.

I stood uncertain, and did not dare to interrupt him for some minutes;

the very intensity of his application awed me. Indeed, I believe I

should have retired without a word, had he not accidentally looked

up and beheld me. "Eh!--what!--how is this?" cried he, endeavoring to

recall his mind from the themes before him; "I had forgotten you, my

poor boy, and you have had no breakfast."

"And you, sir?" said I, in reality more interested for him than myself.

"Take this, Con," said he, not heeding my remark, and giving me a piece

of silver from his purse; "get yourself something to eat: to-morrow, or

next day, we shall arrange these things better; for at this moment my

head has its load of other cares."

"But will _you_ not eat something?" said I; "_you_ have not tasted food

since we met."

"We are expected to breakfast with our tutor on the examination

mornings, Con," said he; and then, not seeming to feel the inconsistency

of his acts with his words, he again bent his head over the table,

and lost all remembrance of either me or our conversation. I stole

noiselessly away, and sallied forth to seek my breakfast where I could.

There were few loiterers in the court; a stray student hurrying past,

or an old slipshod hag of hideous aspect and squalid misery, were all I

beheld; but both classes' bestowed most unequivocal signs of surprise

at my country air and appearance, and to my question, where I could buy

some bread and milk, answers the most cynical or evasive were returned.

While I was yet endeavoring to obtain from one of the ancient maidens

alluded to some information on the point, two young men, with velvet

caps and velvet capes on their gowns, stopped to listen.

"I say, friend," cried one, seemingly the younger of the two, "when did

_you_ enter?"

"This morning," said I, taking the question literally.

"Do you hear that, Ward?" continued he to his companion. "What place did

you take?"

"I was on the roof," replied I, supposing the quaere bore allusion to

the mode of my coming.

"Quite classical," said the elder, a tall, good-looking youth; "you

came as did Caesar into Gaul, '_summâ diligentiâ,_' on the top of the

Diligence."

They both laughed heartily at a very threadbare college joke, and were

about to move away, when the younger, turning round, said, "Have you

matriculated?"

"No, sir,--what's that?"

"It's a little ceremony," interposed the elder, "necessary, and indeed

indispensable, to every one coming to reside within these walls. You've

heard of Napoleon, I dare say?"

"Bony, is it?" asked I, giving the more familiar title by which he was

better known to my circle of acquaintance.

"Exactly," said he, "Bony. Now Bony used to call a first battle the

baptism of Glory; so may we style, in a like way, Matriculation to be

the baptism of Knowledge. You understand me, eh?"

"Not all out," said I, "but partly."

"We 'll illustrate by a diagram, then."

"I say, Bob," whispered the younger, "let us find out with whom he is;"

then, turning to me, said, "Where do you live here?"

"Yonder," said I, "where that lamp is."

"Mr. Lyndsay's chambers?"

"Yes, sir."

"All right," cried the younger; "we'll show you the secret of

matriculation."

"Come along, my young friend," said the elder, in the same pompous tone

he had used at first, "let us teach you to drink of that Pierian spring

which 'Labitur et labetur in omne volubile oevum.'"

I believe it was the fluent use of the unknown tongue which at once

allayed any mistrust I might have felt of my new acquaintances; however

that may be, there was something so imposing in the high-sounding

syllables that I yielded at once, and followed them into another and

more remote quadrangle.

Here they stopped under a window, while one gave a loud whistle with his

fingers to his lips; the sash was immediately thrown up, and a handsome,

merry-looking face protruded. "Eh!--what!--Taylor and Ward," cried he,

"what's going on?"

"Come down, Burton; here's a youth for matriculation," cried the

younger.

"All right," cried the other. "There are eight of us here at breakfast;"

and disappearing from the window, he speedily descended to the court,

followed by a number of others, who gravely saluted me with a deep bow,

and solemnly welcomed me within the classic precincts of old Trinity.

"Domine--what's his name?" said the young gentleman called Burton.

"Cregan, sir," replied I, already flattered by the attentions I was

receiving,--"Con Cregan, sir."

"Well, Domine Cregan, come along with us, and never put faith in a

junior sophister. You know what a junior sophister is, I trust?"

"No, sir."

"Tell him, Ward."

"A junior sophister, Mr. Cregan, is one who, being in 'Locke' all day,

is very often locked out all night, and who observes the two rubrics

of the statute '_de vigilantibus et lucentibus_,' by extinguishing both

lamps and watchmen."

"Confound your pedantry!" broke in Burton; "a junior soph, is a man in

his ninth examination."

"The terror of the porters," cried one.

"The Dean's milch cow," added another.

"A credit to his parents, but a debtor to his tailor," broke in a third.

"Seldom at Greek lecture, but no fellow commoner at the Currah," lisped

out Taylor; and by this time we had reached a narrow lane, flanked on

one side by a tall building of gloomy exterior, and on the other by an

angle of the square.

"Here we are, Mr. Cregan; as the poet says, 'this is the place, the

centre of the wood.'"

"Gentlemen sponsors, to your functions!" Scarce were the words out, when

I was seized by above half a dozen pair of strong hands; my legs were

suddenly jerked upwards, and, notwithstanding my attempts to resist, I

was borne along for some yards at a brisk pace. I was already about

to forbear my struggles, and suffer them to play their--as I deemed

it--harmless joke in quiet, when straight in front of me I saw an

enormous pump, at which, and by a double handle, Burton and another were

working away like sailors on a wreck; throwing forth above a yard off, a

jet of water almost enough to turn a mill.

The whole plot now revealed itself to me at once, and I commenced a

series of kickings and plungings that almost left me free. My enemies,

however, were too many and too powerful; on they bore me, and in a

perfect storm of blows, lunges, writhings, and boundings, they held me

fast under the stream, which played away in a frothy current over my

head, face, chest, and legs,--for, with a most laudable impartiality,

they moved me from side to side till not a dry spot remained on my whole

body.

I shouted, I yelled, I swore, and screamed for aid, but all in vain; and

my diabolical tormentors seemed to feel no touch of weariness in their

inhuman pastime; while I, exhausted by my struggles and the continual

rush of the falling water, almost ceased to resist; when suddenly a cry

of "The Dean! the Dean!" was heard; my bearers let go their hold,--down

I tumbled upon the flags, with barely consciousness enough to see

the scampering crew flying in all directions, while a host of porters

followed them in hot pursuit.

"Who are you, sir? What brought you here?" said a tall old gentleman I

at once surmised to be the Dean.

"The devil himself, I believe!" replied I, rising with difficulty under

the weight of my soaked garments.

"Turn him outside the gates, Hawkins!" said the Dean to a porter behind

him. "Take care, too, he never reenters them."

"I 'll take good care of it, sir," said the fellow, as with one strong

hand on my collar, and the closed fingers of the other administering

gentle admonitions to the back of my head, he proceeded to march me

before him through the square; revolving as I went thoughts which,

certes, evinced not one sentiment of gratitude to the learned

university.

My college career was, therefore, more brief than brilliant, for I was

"expelled" on the very same day that I "entered."

With the "world before me where to choose," I stepped out into the

classic precincts of College Green, fully assured of one fact, that

"Town" could scarcely treat me more harshly than "Gown." I felt, too,

that I had passed through a kind of ordeal; that my ducking, like

the ceremonies on crossing the line, was a kind of masonic ordinance,

indispensable to my opening career; and that thus I had got successfully

through one at least of my "trials."

A species of filial instinct suggested to me the propriety of seeing

Newgate, where my father lay, awaiting the arrival of the convict ship

that was to convey him to Van Diemen's Land; and thither I accordingly

repaired, not to enter, but simply to gaze, with a very awestruck

imagination, upon that double-barred cage of human ferocity and crime.

In itself the circumstance has nothing worthy of record, nor should I

mention it, save that to the deep impression of that morning do I owe a

certain shrinking horror of all great crime; that impression has been of

incalculable benefit to me through life.

I strained my eyes to mark if, amid the faces closely pressed against

the strong bars, I could recognize that of my parent, but in vain; there

was a terrible sameness in their features, as if the individual had sunk

in the criminal, that left all discrimination difficult; and so I turned

away satisfied that I had done a son's part most completely.

CHAPTER V. A PEEP AT "HIGH AND LOW COMPANY"

I have often heard it observed that one has as little to do with the

choice of his mode of life as with the name he receives at baptism. I

rather incline to the opinion that this is true. My own very varied and

somewhat dissimilar occupations were certainly far less the result of

any preconceived plan or scheme than the mere "turn-up" of the rolling

die of Fortune.

It was while revolving a species of fatalism in this wise, and calmly

assuring myself that I was not born to be starved, that I strolled along

Merrion Square on the same afternoon of my expulsion from Trinity and

visit to Newgate.

There were brilliant equipages, cavaliers, and ladies on horseback;

handsome houses, with balconies often thronged by attractive-looking

occupants; and vast crowds of gayly dressed persons promenaded within

the square itself, where a military band performed; in fact, there was

more than enough to interest and amuse one of higher pretensions in the

scale of pleasure than myself.

While I was thus gazing on this brilliant panorama of the outdoor life

of a great city, and wondering and guessing what precise object thus

brought people together,--for no feature of a market, or a fair, or any

festive occupation solved the difficulty,--I was struck by a class of

characters who seemed to play the subordinate parts of the drama,--a set

of ragged, ill-fed, half-starved boys, who followed in crowds each new

arrival on horseback, and eagerly sought permission to hold his horse

when he dismounted; the contrast of these mangy looking attendants to

the glossy coated and handsomely caparisoned steeds they led about

being too remarkable to escape notice. Although a very fierce rivalry

prevailed amongst them, they seemed a species of organized guild,

who constituted a distinct walk in life, and indignantly resented the

attempt of some two or three "voluntaries" who showed a wish to join the

fraternity.

I sat against the rails of the square, studying with some curiosity

little details of their etiquette, and their strange conventionalities.

A regular corps of them stood in front of me, canvassing with all

the eager volubility of their craft for the possession of a handsome

thoroughbred pony, from which a young officer, in a cavalry undress, was

about to dismount.

"I 'm your own boy, Captain! I'm Tim, sir!" cried one, with a leer of

most familiar intimacy.

"'Tis me towld ye about Miss O'Grady, sir," shouted another, preferring

another and stronger claim.

"I'm the boy caught your mare the day ye was thrown, Captain!"

insinuated a third, exhibiting a want of tact in the reminiscence that

drew down many a scoff upon him from his fellows; for these ragged and

starving curs had a most lively sense of the use of flattery.

"Off with you!--stand off!" said the young dragoon, in a threatening

tone; "let that fellow take my mare;" and he pointed to me as I sat,

a patient but unconcerned spectator of the scene. Had a medical

consultation been suddenly set aside on the eve of a great surgical

operation, and the 'knife' committed to the unpractised hand of a new

bystander, the breach of etiquette and the surprise could scarce have

been greater. The gang stared at me with most undisguised contempt, and

a perfect volley of abuse and irony followed me as I hastened to obey

the summons.

It has been very often my fortune in life to take a position for which I

neither had submitted to the usual probationary study, nor possessed

the necessary acquirement; but I believe this my first step in the

very humble walk of a "horse-boy" gave me more pain than ever did any

subsequent one. The criticisms on my dress, my walk, my country look, my

very shoes,--my critics wore none,--were all poignant and bitter; and I

verily believe, such is the force of ridicule, I should have preferred

the rags and squalor of the initiated, at that moment, to the warm gray

frieze and blue worsted stockings of my country costume.

I listened attentively to the young officer's directions how I was to

walk his mare, and where; and then, assuming a degree of indifference

to sarcasm I was far from feeling, moved away from the spot in sombre

dignity. The captain--the title is generic--was absent about an hour;

and when he returned, seemed so well pleased with my strict obedience to

his orders that he gave me a shilling, and desired me to be punctually

at the same hour and the same place on the day following.

It was now dark; the lamplighter had begun his rounds, and I was just

congratulating myself that I should escape my persecutors, when I saw

them approaching in a body. In an instant I was surrounded, and assailed

with a torrent of questions as to who I was, where I came from,

what brought me there, and, lastly, and with more eagerness than all

besides,--what did "the captain" give me? As I answered this query

first, the others were not pressed; and it being voted that I should

expend the money on the fraternity, by way of entrance-fee, or, as they

termed it, "paying my footing," away we set in a body to a distant part

of the town, remote from all its better and more spacious thoroughfares,

and among a chaos of lanes and alleys called the "Liberties." If the

title were conferred for the excessive and unlimited freedoms permitted

to the inhabitants, it was no misnomer. On my very entrance into it I

perceived the perfect free and easy which prevailed.

A dense tide of population thronged the close, confined passages, mostly

of hodmen, bricklayers' laborers, and scavengers, with old-clothesmen,

beggars, and others whose rollicking air and daring look bespoke more

hazardous modes of life.

My companions wended their way through the dense throng like practised

travellers, often cutting off an angle by a dive through the two

doors of a whiskey shop, and occasionally making a great short-cut by

penetrating through a house and the court behind it,--little exploits

in geography expiated by a volley of curses from the occupants, and

sometimes an admonitory brickbat in addition.

The uniform good temper they exhibited; the easy freedom with which they

submitted to the rather rough jocularities of the passers-by,--the usual

salute being a smart slap on the crown of the head, administered by

the handicraft tool of the individual, and this sometimes being an iron

trowel or a slater's hammer,--could not but exalt them in my esteem

as the most patient set of varlets I had ever sojourned with. To my

question as to why we were going so far, and whither our journey tended,

I got for answer the one short reply,--"We must go to 'ould Betty's.'"

Now, as I would willingly spare as much of this period's recital to my

reader as I can, I will content myself with stating that "ould Betty,"

or Betty Cobbe, was an old lady who kept a species of ordinary for the

unclaimed youth of Dublin. They were fed and educated at her seminary;

the washing cost little, and they were certainly "done" for at the very

smallest cost, and in the most remarkably brief space of time. If ever

these faint memorials of a life should be read in a certain far-off

land, more than one settler in the distant bush, more than one angler in

the dull stream of Swan River, will confess how many of his first sharp

notions of life and manners were imbibed from the training nurture of

Mrs. Elizabeth Cobbe.

Betty's proceedings, for some years before I had the honor and felicity

of her acquaintance, had attracted towards her the attention of the

authorities.

The Colonial Secretary had possibly grown jealous; for she had been

pushing emigration to Norfolk Island on a far wider scale than ever

a cabinet dreamed of; and thus had she acquired what, in the polite

language of our neighbors, is phrased the "Surveillance of the

Police,"--a watchful superintendence and anxious protectorate, for

which, I grieve to say, she evinced the very reverse of gratitude.

Betty had, in consequence, and in requirement with the spirit of the

times--the most capricious spirit that ever vexed plain, old-fashioned

mortals--reformed her establishment; and from having opened her doors,

as before, to what, in the language of East Indian advertisements, are

called "a few spirited young men," she had fallen down to that small

fry who, in various disguises of vagrancy and vagabondage, infest the

highways of a capital.

By these disciples she was revered and venerated; their devotion was the

compensation for the world's neglect, and so she felt it. To train them

up with a due regard to the faults and follies of their better-endowed

neighbors was her aim and object, and to such teaching her knowledge of

Dublin life and people largely contributed.

Her original walk had been minstrelsy; she was the famous ballad-singer

of Drogheda Street, in the year of the rebellion of '98. She had been

half a dozen times imprisoned,--some said that she had even visited

"Beresford's riding-school," where the knout was in daily practice; but

this is not so clear: certain it is, both her songs and sympathy had

always been on the patriotic side. She was the terror of Protestant

ascendency for many a year long.

Like Homer, she sung her own verses; or, if they were made for her, the

secret of the authorship was never divulged. For several years previous

to the time I now speak of, she had abandoned the Muses, save on some

special and striking occasions, when she would come before the world

with some lyric, which, however, did little more than bear the name of

its once famed composer.

So much for the past. Now to the present history of Betty Cobbe.

In a large unceilinged room, with a great fire blazing on the hearth,

over which a huge pot of potatoes was boiling, sat Betty, in a straw

chair. She was evidently very old, as her snow-white hair and lustreless

eye bespoke; but the fire of a truculent, unyielding spirit still warmed

her blood, and the sharp, ringing voice told that she was decided to

wrestle for existence to the last, and would never "give in" until

fairly conquered.

Betty's chair was the only one in the chamber: the rest of the company

disposed themselves classically in the recumbent posture, or sat,

like primitive Christians, cross-legged. A long deal table, sparingly

provided with wooden plates and a few spoons, occupied the middle of the

room, and round the walls were several small bundles of straw, which I

soon learned were the property of private individuals.

"Come along till I show ye to ould Betty," said one of the varlets to

me, as he pushed his way through the crowded room; for already several

other gangs had arrived, and were exchanging recognitions.

"She's in a sweet temper, this evening," whispered another, as we

passed. "The Polis was here a while ago, and took up 'Danny White,' and

threatened to break up the whole establishment."

"The devil a thing at all they'll lave us of our institushuns," said a

bow-legged little blackguard, with the 'Evening Freeman' written round

his hat; for he was an attaché of that journal.

"Ould Betty was crying all the evening," said the former speaker; by

this time we had gained the side of the fireplace, where the old lady

sat.

"Mother! mother, I say!" cried my guide, touching her elbow gently;

then, stooping to her ear, he added, "Mother Betty!"

"Eh! Who's callin' me?" said the hag, with her hand aloft. "I'm here, my

Lord, neither ashamed nor afeard to say my name."

"She's wanderin'," cried another; "she thinks she's in Coort."

"Betty Cobbe! I say. It's me!" said my introducer, once more.

The old woman turned fiercely round, and her dimmed and glassy eyes,

bloodshot from excess and passion, seemed to flare up into an angry

gleam as she said, "You dirty thief! Is it you that's turnin' informer

agin me,--you that I took up--out of yer mother's arms, in Green Street,

when she fainted at the cutting down of yer father? Your father," added

she, "that murdered old Meredith!"

The boy, a hardened and bold-featured fellow, became lividly pale, but

never spoke.

"Yes, my Lord," continued she, still following the theme of her own wild

fancies, "it's James Butterley's boy! Butterley that was hanged!" and

she shook and rocked with a fiendish exultation at the exposure.

"Many of us does n't know what bekem of our fathers!" said a

sly-looking, old-fashioned creature, whose height scarcely exceeded two

feet, although evidently near manhood in point of age.

"Who was yours, Mickey?" cried another.

"Father Glynn, of Luke Street," growled out the imp, with a leer.

"And yours?" said another, dragging me forward, directly in front of

Betty.

"Con Cregan, of Kilbeggan," said I, boldly.

"Success to ye, ma bouchal!" said the old hag; "and so you 're a son of

Con the informer." She looked sternly at me for a few seconds, and then,

in a slower and more deliberate tone, added, "I 'm forty years, last

Lady Day, living this way, and keepin' company with all sorts of

thieves, and rogues, and blaguards, and worse,--ay, far worse besides;

but may I never see Glory if an informer, or his brat, was under the

roof afore!"

The steadfast decision of look and voice as she spoke seemed to

impress the bystanders, who fell back and gazed at me with that kind of

shrinking terror which honest people sometimes exhibit at the contact of

a criminal.

During the pause of some seconds, while this endured, my sense of abject

debasement was at the very lowest. To be the Pariah of such a society

was indeed a most distinctive infamy.

"Are ye ashamed of yer father? Tell me that!" cried the hag, shaking me

roughly by one shoulder.

"It is not here, and before the like of these," said I, looking round at

the ragged, unwashed assemblage, "that I should feel shame! or if I did,

it is to find myself among them!"

"That's my boy! that's my own spirited boy!" cried the old woman,

dragging me towards her. "Faix, I seen the time we 'd have made

somethin' out of you. Howld yer tongues, ye vagabonds! the child's

right,--yer a dirty mean crew! Them!" said she, pointing to me, "them

was the kind of chaps I used to have, long ago; that was n't afeard of

all the Beresfords, and Major Sirr, and the rest of them. Singing every

night on Carlisle Bridge, 'The Wearin' of the Green,' or 'Tra-lal-la,

the French is coming;' and when they wor big and grown men, ready and

willing to turn out for ould Ireland. Can you read, avick?"

"Yes, and write," answered I, proudly.

"To be sure ye can," muttered she, half to herself; "is it an informer's

child,--not know the first rules of his trade!"

"Tear and ages, mother!" cried out the decrepit imp called Mickey, "we

're starvin' for the meat!"

"Sarve it up!" shouted the hag, with a voice of command; and she gave

three knocks with her crutch on the corner of the table.

Never was command more promptly obeyed. A savory mess of that smoking

compound called "Irish stew" was ladled out on the trenchers, and

speedily disposed around the table, which at once was surrounded by

the guests,--a place being made for myself by an admonitory stroke of

Betty's crutch on the red head of a very hungry juvenile who had jostled

me in his anxiety to get near the table.

Our meal had scarcely drawn to its close when the plates were removed,

and preparations made for a new party; nor had I time to ask the reason,

when a noisy buzz of voices without announced the coming of a numerous

throng. In an instant they entered; a number of girls, of every age,

from mere child to womanhood,--a ragged, tattered, reckless-looking set

of creatures, whose wild, high spirits not even direst poverty could

subdue. While some exchanged greetings with their friends of the other

sex, others advanced to talk to Betty, or stood to warm themselves

around the fire, until their supper, a similar one to our own, was got

ready. My curiosity as to whence they came in such a body was satisfied

by learning that they were employed at the "Mendicity Institution"

during the day, and set free at nightfall to follow the bent of

their own, not over well-regulated, tastes. These creatures were the

ballad-singers of the city; and, sometimes alone, sometimes in company

with one of the boys, they were wont to take their stand in some public

thoroughfare, not only the character of the singer, but the poetry

itself, taking the tone of the street; so that while some daring bit of

town scandal caught the ears of College Green, a "bloody murder" or a

"dying speech" formed the attraction of Thomas Street and the "Poddle."

Many years afterwards, in the checkered page of my existence, when I

have sat at lordly tables and listened to the sharpened wit and polished

raillery of the high-born and the gifted, my mind has often reverted

to that beggar horde, and thought how readily the cutting jest was

answered, how soon repartee followed attack--what quaint fancies, what

droll conceits, passed through those brains, where one would have deemed

there was no room for aught save brooding guilt and sad repining.

As night closed in, the assembly broke up; some issued forth to their

stations as ballad-singers; some, in pure vagabond spirit, to stroll

about the streets; while others, of whom I was one, lay down upon the

straw to sleep, without a dream, till daylight.

CHAPTER VI. VIEWS OF LIFE

When I woke the next morning, it was a few minutes before I could

thoroughly remember where I was and how I came there; my next thought

was the grateful one, that if the calling was not a very exaltued one,

I had at least secured a mode of living, and that my natural acuteness,

and, better still, my fixed resolve within me "to get forward in the

world," would not permit me to pass my days in the ignoble craft of

a "horse-boy." I found that the "walk," like every other career, had

certain guiding rules and principles by which it was regulated. Not only

were certain parts of the town interdicted to certain gangs, but it was

a recognized rule that when a particular boy was singled out habitually

by any gentleman that no other should endeavor to supplant him. This was

the less difficult as a perfect community of property was the rule of

the order; and all moneys were each night committed to the charge of

"old Betty," with a scrupulous fidelity that would have shamed many a

"joint-stock company."

The regular etiquette required that each youth should begin his career

in the north side of the city, where the class of horsemen was of a less

distinguished order, and the fees proportionably lower. Thence he

was promoted to the Four Courts; from which, as the highest stage, he

arrived at Merrion Square and its neighborhood. Here the visitors were

either the young officers of the garrison, the Castle officials, or a

wealthy class of country gentlemen, all of whom gave sixpences; while

in the cold quarter of northern Dublin, penny-pieces were the only

currency. If the public differed in these three places, so did the

claims of the aspirant: a grave, quiet, almost sombre look being the

grand qualification in the one, while an air of daring effrontery was

the best recommendation in the other. For while the master in

chancery or the "six clerk" would only commit his bobtailed pony to a

discreet-faced varlet of grave exterior, the dashing aide-de-camp on his

thoroughbred singled out the wild imp with roguish eye and flowing hair,

that kept up with him from the barrack in a sharp canter, and actually

dived under a carriage-pole and upset an apple-stall to be "up" in

time to wait on him; and while yet breathless and blown, was ready with

voluble tongue to give him the current news of the neighborhood,--who

was in the Square, or out dining; who had arrived, or why they were

absent. To do this task with dexterity and tact was the crowning

feature of the craft, and in such hasty journalism some attained a high

proficiency; seasoning their scandal with sly bits of drollery or quaint

allusions to the current topics of the day. To succeed in this, it

was necessary to know the leading characters of the town and the

circumstances of their private history; and these I set myself to learn

with the assiduity of a study. Never did a Bath Master of the Ceremonies

devote himself more ardently to the investigation of the faults and

foibles of his company; never did young lady, before coming out, more

patiently pore over Debrett, than did I pursue my researches into Dublin

life and manners; until at last, what between oral evidence and shrewd

observation, I had a key to the secret mysteries of nearly every

well-known house in the city.

None like me to explain why the father of the dashing family in

Stephen's Green only appeared of a Sunday; how the blinds of No. 18 were

always drawn down at three o'clock; and what meant the hackney-coach

at the canal bridge every Thursday afternoon. From the gentleman that

always wore a geranium leaf in his coat, to the lady who dropped her

glove in the Square, I knew them all. Nor was it merely that I possessed

the knowledge, but I made it to be felt. I did not hoard my wealth

like a miser, but I came forth like a great capitalist to stimulate

enterprise and encourage credit. Had I been a malicious spirit, there is

no saying what amount of mischief I might have worked, what discoveries

anticipated, what awkward meetings effected. I was, however, what the

French call a "bon diable," and most generously took the side of

the poor sinner against the strong spirit of right. How many a poor

subaltern had been put in arrest for wearing "mufti," had I not been

there to apprise him the town-major White was coming. How often have I

saved a poor college-man from a heavy fine, who, with his name on the

sick-list, was flirting in the "Square." How have I hastened, at the

risk of my neck, between crashing carriages and prancing horses, to

announce to a fair lady lounging in her britzska that the "Counsellor,"

her husband, was unexpectedly returning from court an hour earlier than

his wont. I have rescued sons from fathers, daughters from mothers; the

pupil from his guardian, the debtor from his creditor,--in a word, was a

kind of ragged guardian angel, who watched over the peccadilloes of the

capital. My "amour propre"--if such an expression of such a quality may

be conceded to one like me--was interested in the cause of all who did

wrong. I was the Quixote of all deceivers.

With "Con on the look-out," none feared surprise; and while

my shrewdness was known to be first-rate, my honesty was alike

unimpeachable. It may readily be believed how, with acquirements

and talents like these, I no longer pursued the humble walk of

"horse-holder;" indeed, I rarely touched a bridle, or, if I did so, it

was only to account for my presence in such localities as I might need

an excuse to loiter in. I was at the head of my profession; and the

ordinary salutation of the cavaliers, "Con, get me a fellow to hold this

mare," showed that none presumed to expect the ignoble service at my own

hands.

To some two or three of my early patrons, men who had noticed me in my

obscurity, I would still condescend to yield this attention,--a degree

of grateful acknowledgment on my part which they always rewarded most

handsomely. Among these was the young officer whose pony I had held on

the first night of my arrival. He was an Honorable Captain De Courcy,

very well-looking, well-mannered, and very poor,--member of the

Commander-in-Chief's staff, who eked out his life by the aid of his

noble birth and his wits together.

At the time I speak of, his visits to Merrion Square were devoted to the

cause of a certain Mrs. Mansergh, the young and beautiful wife of an

old red-faced, foul-mouthed Queen's Counsel, at least forty years her

senior. The scandal was, that her origin had been of the very humblest,

and that, seen by accident on circuit, she had caught the fancy of the

old lawyer, a well-known connoisseur in female beauty. However that

might be, she was now about two years married, and already recognized as

the reigning beauty of the viceregal court and the capital.

The circumstances of her history,--her low origin, her beauty, and the

bold game she played,--all invested her with a great interest in my

eyes. I used to flatter myself that there was a kind of similarity in

at least our early fortunes; and I enlisted myself in her cause with an

ardor that I could not explain to myself. How often, as she passed in

her splendid barouche,--the best-appointed and handsomest equipage

of the capital,--have I watched her as, wrapped in her Cashmere, she

reclined in all the voluptuous indolence of her queenly state; glorying

to think that _she_,--she, whose proud glance scarce noticed the

obsequious throng that bowed with uncovered heads around her,--that she

was perhaps not better nurtured than myself. Far from envious jealousy

at her better fortune, I exulted in it; she was a kind of beacon set on

a hill to guide and cheer me. I remember well, it was an actual

triumph to me one day, as the Viceroy, a gay and dashing nobleman, not

overscrupulous where the claim of beauty was present, stopped, with all

his glittering staff, beside her carriage, and in playful raillery began

to chide her for being absent from the last drawing-room. "We missed you

sadly, Mrs. Mansergh," said he, smiling his most seductive smile. "Pray

tell my friend Mansergh that he shows himself a most lukewarm supporter

of the Government who denies us the fairest smiles of the capital."

"In truth, my Lord, he would not give me a new train, and I refused to

wear the old one," said she, laughing.

"Downright disloyalty, upon my honor," said the Viceroy, with well

got-up gravity.

"Don't you think so, my Lord?" rejoined she; "so I even told him that

I 'd represent the case to your Excellency, who, I 'm sure, would not

refuse a velvet robe to the wife, while you gave a silk gown to the

husband."

"It will be the very proudest of my poor prerogatives," said he, bowing,

while a flash of crimson lit up his pleased features. "Your favorite

color is--"

"I should like to wear your Lordship's," said she, with a look the most

finished coquette might envy, so admirably blended were trust and timid

bashfulness.

What he replied I could not catch. There was a flattering courtesy,

however, in his smile, and in the familiar motion of the hand with which

he bade "good-bye," that were enough to show me that he, the haughty

mirror of his sovereign, did not think it beneath him to bandy

compliments and exchange soft looks with the once humble beauty. From

that time out, my whole thoughts day and night were centred in her; and

I have passed hours long, fancying all the possible fortunes for which

destiny might intend her. It seemed to me as though she was piloting out

the course for me in life, and that her success was the earnest of my

own. Often, when a ball or a great reception was given by her, have

I sat, cold, shivering, and hungry, opposite the house, watching with

thrilling interest all the equipages as they came, and hearing the high

and titled names called aloud by the servants, and thinking to myself,

"Such are _her_ associates _now_. These great and haughty personages are

here to do honor to _her_, their lovely hostess; and _she_, but a

few years back, if report spoke truly, was scarcely better off than I

was--I--myself."

Only they who have a sanguine, hopeful temperament will be able to

understand how the poor houseless, friendless boy--the very outcast

of the world, the convict's child--could ever dare to indulge in such

day-dreams of future greatness. But I had set the goal before my eyes;

the intermediate steps to it I left to fortune. The noble bearing and

polished graces of the high and wealthy, which to my humble associates

seemed the actual birthright of the great, I perceived could all be

acquired. There was no prescriptive claim in any class to the manners

of high breeding; and why should not I, if fortune favored, be as good

a gentleman as the best? In other particulars, all that I had observed

showed me no wondrous dissimilarity of true feeling in the two classes.

The gentleman, to be sure, did not swear like the common fellow; but on

the racecourse or the betting-ground I had seen, to the full, as much

deceit as ever I witnessed in my "own order." There was faithlessness

beneath Valenciennes lace and velvet as well as beneath brown stuff and

check; and a spirit of backbiting, that we ragged folk knew nothing of,

seemed a current pastime in better circles.

What, then, should debar me from that class? Not the manners, which I

could feign, nor the vices, which I could feel. To be like them, was

only to be of them,--such, at least, was then my conviction and my

theory.

Any one who will take the pains to reflect on and analyze the mode of

thinking I have here mentioned, will see how necessarily it tends rather

to depress those above than to elevate those beneath. I did not purpose

to myself any education in high and noble sentiments, but simply the

performance of a part which I deemed easy to assume. The result soon

began to tell. I felt a degree of contemptuous hatred for the very

persons I had once revered as almost demigods. I no longer looked up to

the "gentleman" as such by right divine, but by accident; and I fostered

the feeling by the writings of every radical newspaper I could come

at. All the levelling doctrines of socialism, all the plausibilities

of equality, became as great truths to me; and I found a most ready

aptitude in my mind to square the fruits of my personal observation to

these pleasant theories. The one question recurred every morning as I

arose, and remained unanswered each night as I lay down, "Why should

I hold a horse, and why should another man ride one?" I suppose the

difficulty has puzzled wiser heads; indeed, since I mooted it to myself,

it has caused some trouble in the world; nor, writing now as I do in the

year of grace '48, do I suppose the question is yet answered.

I have dwelt perhaps too long on this exposition of my feelings; but

as my subsequent life was one of far more action than reflection, the

indulgent reader will pardon the prosiness, not simply as explaining the

history which follows, but also as affording a small breathing-space in

a career where there were few "halts."

I have said that I began to conceive a great grudge against all who

were well off in life, and against none did I indulge this aversion

more strongly than "the captain," my first patron,--almost my only one.

Though he had always employed me,--and none ever approached him save

myself,--he had never condescended to the slightest act of recognition

beyond the tap on my head with his gold-mounted whip, and a significant

nod where to lead his pony. No sign of his, no look, no gesture, ever

confessed to the fact that I was a creature of his own species, that I

had had a share in the great firm which, under the name of Adam and Co.,

has traded so long and industriously.

If I were sick, or cold, or hungry, it mattered not; my cheek might be

sunk with want or care, my rags might drip with rain, or freeze with

sleet,--he never noticed them; yet if the wind played too roughly with

his Arab's mane, or the silky tasselled tail, he saw it at once. If her

coat stirred with the chill breeze, he would pat and pet her. It was

evident enough which had the better existence.