Quid leges sine moribus,
Vana proficiunt!
It is but an illiberal business for a traveller, who designs to publish
remarks upon a country to sit down coolly in his closet and write a
satire on the inhabitants. Severity of that sort must be enlivened with
an uncommon share of wit and ridicule, to please. Where very gross
absurdities are found, it is fair and manly to note them; but to enter
into character and disposition is generally uncandid, since there are no
people but might be better than they are found, and none but have virtues
which deserve attention, at least as much as their failings; for these
reasons this section would not have found a place in my observations, had
not some persons, of much more flippancy than wisdom, given very gross
misrepresentations of the Irish nation. It is with pleasure, therefore,
that I take up the pen on the present occasion; as a much longer
residence there enables me to exhibit a very different picture; in doing
this, I shall be free to remark, wherein I think the conduct of certain
classes may have given rise to general and consequently injurious
condemnation.
There are three races of people in Ireland, so distinct as to strike the
least attentive traveller: these are the Spanish which are found in
Kerry, and a part of Limerick and Cork, tall and thin, but well made, a
long visage, dark eyes, and long black lank hair. The time is not remote
when the Spaniards had a kind of settlement on the coast of Kerry, which
seemed to be overlooked by government. There were many of them in Queen
Elizabeth's reign, nor were they entirely driven out till the time of
Cromwell. There is an island of Valentia on that coast, with various
other names, certainly Spanish. The Scotch race is in the north, where
are to be found the feature which are supposed to mark that people, their
accent and many of their customs. In a district near Dublin, but more
particularly in the baronies of Bargie and Forth in the county of
Wexford, the Saxon tongue is spoken without any mixture of the Irish, and
the people have a variety of customs mentioned in the minutes, which
distinguish them from their neighbours. The rest of the kingdom is made
up of mongrels. The Milesian race of Irish, which may be called native,
are scattered over the kingdom, but chiefly found in Connaught and
Munster; a few considerable families, whose genealogy is undoubted,
remain, but none of them with considerable possessions except the
O'Briens and Mr. O'Neil; the former have near twenty thousand pounds a
year in the family, the latter half as much, the remnant of a property
once his ancestors, which now forms six or seven of the greatest estates
in the kingdom. O'Hara and M'Dermot are great names in Connaught, and
O'Donnohue a considerable one in Kerry; but I heard of a family of
O'Drischal's in Cork, who claim an origin prior in Ireland to any of the
Milesian race.
The only divisions which a traveller, who passed through the kingdom
without making any residence could make, would be into people of
considerable fortune and mob. The intermediate division of the scale, so
numerous and respectable in England, would hardly attract the least
notice in Ireland. A residence in the kingdom convinces one, however,
that there is another class in general of small fortune--country
gentlemen and renters of land. The manners, habits, and customs of
people of considerable fortune are much the same everywhere, at least
there is very little difference between England and Ireland, it is among
the common people one must look for those traits by which we discriminate
a national character. The circumstances which struck me most in the
common Irish were, vivacity and a great and eloquent volubility of
speech; one would think they could take snuff and talk without tiring
till doomsday. They are infinitely more cheerful and lively than
anything we commonly see in England, having nothing of that incivility of
sullen silence with which so many Englishmen seem to wrap themselves up,
as if retiring within their own importance. Lazy to an excess at work,
but so spiritedly active at play, that at hurling, which is the cricket
of savages, they shew the greatest feats of agility. Their love of
society is as remarkable as their curiosity is insatiable; and their
hospitality to all comers, be their own poverty ever so pinching, has too
much merit to be forgotten. Pleased to enjoyment with a joke, or witty
repartee, they will repeat it with such expression, that the laugh will
be universal. Warm friends and revengeful enemies; they are inviolable
in their secrecy, and inevitable in their resentment; with such a notion
of honour, that neither threat nor reward would induce them to betray the
secret or person of a man, though an oppressor, whose property they would
plunder without ceremony. Hard drinkers and quarrelsome; great liars,
but civil, submissive, and obedient. Dancing is so universal among them,
that there are everywhere itinerant dancing-masters, to whom the cottars
pay sixpence a quarter for teaching their families. Besides the Irish
jig, which they can dance with a most luxuriant expression, minuets and
country-dances are taught; and I even heard some talk of cotillions
coming in.
Some degree of education is also general, hedge schools, as they are
called, (they might as well be termed ditch ones, for I have seen many a
ditch full of scholars,) are everywhere to be met with where reading and
writing are taught; schools are also common for men; I have seen a dozen
great fellows at school, and was told they were educating with an
intention of being priests. Many strokes in their character are
evidently to be ascribed to the extreme oppression under which they live.
If they are as great thieves and liars as they are reported, it is
certainly owing to this cause.
If from the lowest class we rise to the highest, all there is gaiety,
pleasure, luxury, and extravagance; the town life at Dublin is formed on
the model of that of London. Every night in the winter there is a ball
or a party, where the polite circle meet, not to enjoy but to sweat each
other; a great crowd crammed into twenty feet square gives a zest to the
_agrements_ of small talk and whist. There are four or five houses large
enough to receive a company commodiously, but the rest are so small as to
make parties detestable. There is however an agreeable society in
Dublin, in which a man of large fortune will not find his time heavy.
The style of living may be guessed from the fortunes of the resident
nobility and great commoners; there are about thirty that possess incomes
from seven to twenty thousand pounds a year. The court has nothing
remarkable or splendid in it, but varies very much, according to the
private fortune or liberality of disposition in the lord lieutenant.
In the country their life has some circumstances which are not commonly
seen in England. Large tracts of land are kept in hand by everybody to
supply the deficiencies of markets; this gives such a plenty, that,
united with the lowness of taxes and prices, one would suppose it
difficult for them to spend their incomes, if Dublin in the winter did
not lend assistance. Let it be considered that the prices of meat are
much lower than in England; poultry only a fourth of the price; wild fowl
and fish in vastly greater plenty; rum and brandy not half the price;
coffee, tea, and wines far cheaper; labour not above a third; servants'
wages upon an average thirty per cent. cheaper. That taxes are
inconsiderable, for there is no land-tax, no poor-rates, no window tax,
no candle or soap tax, only half a wheel-tax, no servants' tax, and a
variety of other articles heavily burdened in England, but not in
Ireland. Considering all this, one would think they could not spend
their incomes; they do contrive it, however. In this business they are
assisted by two customs that have an admirable tendency to it, great
numbers of horses and servants.
In England such extensive demesnes would be parks around the seats for
beauty as much as use, but it is not so in Ireland; the words deer-park
and demesne are to be distinguished; there are great demesnes without any
parks, but a want of taste, too common in Ireland, is having a deer-park
at a distance from the house; the residence surrounded by walls, or
hedges, or cabins; and the lawn inclosure scattered with animals of
various sorts, perhaps three miles off. The small quantity of corn
proportioned to the total acres, shows how little tillage is attended to
even by those who are the best able to carry it on; and the column of
turnips proves in the clearest manner what the progress of improvement is
in that kingdom. The number of horses may almost be esteemed a satire
upon common sense; were they well fed enough to be useful, they would not
be so numerous, but I have found a good hack for a common ride scarce in
a house where there were a hundred. Upon an average, the horses in
gentlemen's stables throughout the kingdom are not fed half so well as
they are in England by men of equal fortune; yet the number makes the
expense of them very heavy.
Another circumstance to be remarked in the country life is the
miserableness of many of their houses; there are men of five thousand a
year in Ireland, who live in habitations that a man of seven hundred a
year in England would disdain; an air of neatness, order, dress, and
_proprete_, is wanting to a surprising degree around the mansion; even
new and excellent houses have often nothing of this about them. But the
badness of the houses is remedying every hour throughout the whole
kingdom, for the number of new ones just built, or building, is
prodigiously great. I should suppose there were not ten dwellings in the
kingdom thirty years ago that were fit for an English pig to live in.
Gardens were equally bad, but now they are running into the contrary
extreme, and wall in five, six, ten, and even twenty Irish acres for a
garden, but generally double or treble what is necessary.
The tables of people of fortune are very plentifully spread; many
elegantly, differing in nothing from those of England. I think I
remarked that venison wants the flavour it has with us, probably for the
same reason, that the produce of rich parks is never equal to that of
poor ones; the moisture of the climate, and the richness of the soil,
give fat but not flavour. Another reason is the smallness of the parks,
a man who has three or four thousand acres in his hands, has not perhaps
above three or four hundred in his deer-park, and range is a great point
for good venison. Nor do I think that garden vegetables have the flavour
found in those of England, certainly owing to the climate; green peas I
found everywhere perfectly insipid, and lettuce, etc., not good. Claret
is the common wine of all tables, and so much inferior to what is drunk
in England, that it does not appear to be the same wine; but their port
is incomparable, so much better than the English, as to prove, if proof
was wanting, the abominable adulterations it must undergo with us.
Drinking and duelling are two charges which have long been alleged
against the gentlemen of Ireland, but the change of manners which has
taken place in that kingdom is not generally known in England.
Drunkenness ought no longer to be a reproach, for at every table I was at
in Ireland I saw a perfect freedom reign, every person drank just as
little as they pleased, nor have I ever been asked to drink a single
glass more than I had an inclination for; I may go farther and assert
that hard drinking is very rare among people of fortune; yet it is
certain that they sit much longer at table than in England. I was much
surprised at first going over to find no summons to coffee, the company
often sitting till eight, nine, or ten o'clock before they went to the
ladies. If a gentleman likes tea or coffee, he retires without saying
anything; a stranger of rank may propose it to the master of the house,
who from custom contrary to that of England, will not stir till he
receives such a hint, as they think it would imply a desire to save their
wine. If the gentlemen were generally desirous of tea, I take it for
granted they would have it, but their slighting is one inconvenience to
such as desire it, not knowing when it is provided, conversation may
carry them beyond the time, and then if they do trifle over the coffee it
will certainly be cold. There is a want of attention in this, which the
ladies should remedy, if they will not break the old custom and send to
the gentlemen, which is what they ought to do, they certainly should have
a salver fresh. I must, however, remark, that at the politest tables,
which are those of people who have resided much out of Ireland, this
point is conducted exactly as it is in England.
Duelling was once carried to an excess, which was a real reproach and
scandal to the kingdom; it of course proceeded from excessive drinking;
as the cause has disappeared, the effect has nearly followed; not
however, entirely, for it is yet far more common among people of fashion
than in England. Of all practices, a man who felt for the honour of his
country would wish soonest to banish this, for there is not one
favourable conclusion to be drawn from it: as to courage, nobody can
question that of a polite and enlightened nation, entitled to a share of
the reputation of the age; but it implies uncivilised manners, an
ignorance of those forms which govern polite societies, or else a brutal
drunkenness; the latter is no longer the cause or the pretence. As to
the former, they would place the national character so backward, would
take from it so much of its pretence to civilisation, elegance and
politeness of manners, that no true Irishman would be pleased with the
imputation. Certain it is, that none are so captious as those who think
themselves neglected or despised; and none are so ready to believe
themselves either one or the other as persons unused to good company.
Captious people, therefore, who are ready to take an affront, must
inevitably have been accustomed to ill company, unless there should be
something uncommonly crooked in their natural dispositions, which is not
to be supposed. Let every man that fights his one, two, three, or
half-a-dozen duels, receive it as a maxim, that every one he adds to the
number is but an additional proof of his being ill-educated, and having
vitiated his manners by the contagion of bad company; who is it that can
reckon the most numerous rencontres? who but the bucks, bloods,
landjobbers, and little drunken country gentlemen? Ought not people of
fashion to blush at a practice which will very soon be the distinction
only of the most contemptible of the people? the point of honour will and
must remain for the decision of certain affronts, but it will rarely be
had recourse to in polite, sensible, and well-bred company. The practice
among real gentlemen in Ireland every day declining is a strong proof
that a knowledge of the world corrects the old manners, and consequently
its having ever been prevalent was owing to the causes to which I have
attributed it.
There is another point of manners somewhat connected with the present
subject, which partly induced me to place a motto at the head of this
section. It is the conduct of juries; the criminal law of Ireland is the
same as that of England, but in the execution it is so different as
scarcely to be known. I believe it is a fact, at least I have been
assured so, that no man was ever hanged in Ireland for killing another in
a duel: the security is such that nobody ever thought of removing out of
the way of justice, yet there have been deaths of that sort, which had no
more to do with honour than stabbing in the dark. I believe Ireland is
the only country in Europe, I am sure it is the only part of the British
dominions, where associations among men of fortune are necessary for
apprehending ravishers. It is scarcely credible how many young women
have even of late years been ravished, and carried off in order (as they
generally have fortunes) to gain to appearance a voluntary marriage.
These actions, it is true, are not committed by the class I am
considering at present; but they are tried by them, and acquitted. I
think there has been only one man executed for that crime, which is so
common as to occasion the associations I mentioned; it is to this supine
execution of the law that such enormities are owing. Another
circumstance which has the effect of screening all sorts of offenders, is
men of fortune protecting them, and making interest for their acquittal,
which is attended with a variety of evil consequences. I heard it
boasted in the county of Fermanagh, that there had not been a man hanged
in it for two-and-twenty years; all I concluded from this was, that there
had been many a jury who deserved it richly.
Let me, however, conclude what I have to observe on the conduct of the
principal people residing in Ireland, that there are great numbers among
them who are as liberal in all their ideas as any people in Europe; that
they have seen the errors which have given an ill character to the
manners of their country, and done everything that example could effect
to produce a change: that that happy change has been partly effected, and
is effecting every hour, insomuch that a man may go into a vast variety
of families which he will find actuated by no other principles than those
of the most cultivated politeness, and the most liberal urbanity.
But I must now come to another class of people, to whose conduct it is
almost entirely owing that the character of the nation has not that
lustre abroad, which I dare assert it will soon very generally merit:
this is the class of little country gentlemen; tenants, who drink their
claret by means of profit rents; jobbers in farms; bucks; your fellows
with round hats, edged with gold, who hunt in the day, get drunk in the
evening, and fight the next morning. I shall not dwell on a subject so
perfectly disagreeable, but remark that these are the men among whom
drinking, wrangling, quarrelling, fighting, ravishing, etc. etc. are
found as in their native soil; once to a degree that made them a pest of
society; they are growing better, but even now, one or two of them got by
accident (where they have no business) into better company are sufficient
very much to derange the pleasures that result from a liberal
conversation. A new spirit; new fashions; new modes of politeness
exhibited by the higher ranks are imitated by the lower, which will, it
is to be hoped, put an end to this race of beings; and either drive their
sons and cousins into the army or navy, or sink them into plain farmers
like those we have in England, where it is common to see men with much
greater property without pretending to be gentlemen. I repeat it from
the intelligence I received, that even this class are very different from
what they were twenty years ago, and improve so fast that the time will
soon come when the national character will not be degraded by any set.
That character is upon the whole respectable: it would be unfair to
attribute to the nation at large the vices and follies of only one class
of individuals. Those persons from whom it is candid to take a general
estimate do credit to their country. That they are a people learned,
lively, and ingenious, the admirable authors they have produced will be
an eternal monument; witness their Swift, Sterne, Congreve, Boyle,
Berkeley, Steele, Farquhar, Southerne, and Goldsmith. Their talent for
eloquence is felt, and acknowledged in the parliaments of both the
kingdoms. Our own service both by sea and land, as well as that
(unfortunately for us) of the principal monarchies of Europe, speak their
steady and determined courage. Every unprejudiced traveller who visits
them will be as much pleased with their cheerfulness, as obliged by their
hospitality; and will find them a brave, polite, and liberal people.