Produced by Judith Boss and Charles Keller
THE PURCELL PAPERS.
BY THE LATE
JOSEPH SHERIDAN LE FANU,
AUTHOR OF 'UNCLE SILAS.'
With a Memoir by
ALFRED PERCEVAL GRAVES
IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
CONTENTS OF VOL. I.
MEMOIR OF JOSEPH SHERIDAN LE FANU
THE GHOST AND THE BONE-SETTER
THE FORTUNES OF SIR ROBERT ARDAGH
THE LAST HEIR OF CASTLE CONNOR
THE DRUNKARD'S DREAM
MEMOIR OF JOSEPH SHERIDAN LE FANU.
A noble Huguenot family, owning considerable property in Normandy, the
Le Fanus of Caen, were, upon the revocation of the Edict of Nantes,
deprived of their ancestral estates of Mandeville, Sequeville, and
Cresseron; but, owing to their possessing influential relatives at the
court of Louis the Fourteenth, were allowed to quit their country for
England, unmolested, with their personal property. We meet with John Le
Fanu de Sequeville and Charles Le Fanu de Cresseron, as cavalry officers
in William the Third's army; Charles being so distinguished a member of
the King's staff that he was presented with William's portrait from his
master's own hand. He afterwards served as a major of dragoons under
Marlborough.
At the beginning of the eighteenth century, William Le Fanu was the sole
survivor of his family. He married Henrietta Raboteau de Puggibaut,
the last of another great and noble Huguenot family, whose escape
from France, as a child, by the aid of a Roman Catholic uncle in high
position at the French court, was effected after adventures of the most
romantic danger.
Joseph Le Fanu, the eldest of the sons of this marriage who left issue,
held the office of Clerk of the Coast in Ireland. He married for the
second time Alicia, daughter of Thomas Sheridan and sister of Richard
Brinsley Sheridan; his brother, Captain Henry Le Fanu, of Leamington,
being united to the only other sister of the great wit and orator.
Dean Thomas Philip Le Fanu, the eldest son of Joseph Le Fanu, became by
his wife Emma, daughter of Dr. Dobbin, F.T.C.D., the father of Joseph
Sheridan Le Fanu, the subject of this memoir, whose name is so familiar
to English and American readers as one of the greatest masters of the
weird and the terrible amongst our modern novelists.
Born in Dublin on the 28th of August, 1814, he did not begin to speak
until he was more than two years of age; but when he had once started,
the boy showed an unusual aptitude in acquiring fresh words, and using
them correctly.
The first evidence of literary taste which he gave was in his sixth
year, when he made several little sketches with explanatory remarks
written beneath them, after the manner of Du Maurier's, or Charles
Keene's humorous illustrations in 'Punch.'
One of these, preserved long afterwards by his mother, represented a
balloon in mid-air, and two aeronauts, who had occupied it, falling
headlong to earth, the disaster being explained by these words: 'See the
effects of trying to go to Heaven.'
As a mere child, he was a remarkably good actor, both in tragic and
comic pieces, and was hardly twelve years old when he began to write
verses of singular spirit for one so young. At fourteen, he produced
a long Irish poem, which he never permitted anyone but his mother and
brother to read. To that brother, Mr. William Le Fanu, Commissioner of
Public Works, Ireland, to whom, as the suggester of Sheridan Le Fanu's
'Phaudrig Croohore' and 'Shamus O'Brien,' Irish ballad literature owes
a delightful debt, and whose richly humorous and passionately pathetic
powers as a raconteur of these poems have only doubled that obligation
in the hearts of those who have been happy enough to be his hearers--to
Mr. William Le Fanu we are indebted for the following extracts from the
first of his works, which the boy-author seems to have set any store by:
'Muse of Green Erin, break thine icy slumbers!
Strike once again thy wreathed lyre!
Burst forth once more and wake thy tuneful numbers!
Kindle again thy long-extinguished fire!
'Why should I bid thee, Muse of Erin, waken?
Why should I bid thee strike thy harp once more?
Better to leave thee silent and forsaken
Than wake thee but thy glories to deplore.
'How could I bid thee tell of Tara's Towers,
Where once thy sceptred Princes sate in state--
Where rose thy music, at the festive hours,
Through the proud halls where listening thousands
sate?
'Fallen are thy fair palaces, thy country's glory,
Thy tuneful bards were banished or were slain,
Some rest in glory on their deathbeds gory,
And some have lived to feel a foeman's chain.
'Yet for the sake of thy unhappy nation,
Yet for the sake of Freedom's spirit fled,
Let thy wild harpstrings, thrilled with indignation,
Peal a deep requiem o'er thy sons that bled.
'O yes! like the last breath of evening sighing,
Sweep thy cold hand the silent strings along,
Flash like the lamp beside the hero dying,
Then hushed for ever be thy plaintive song.'
To Mr. William Le Fanu we are further indebted for the accompanying
specimens of his brother's serious and humorous powers in verse, written
when he was quite a lad, as valentines to a Miss G. K.:
'Life were too long for me to bear
If banished from thy view;
Life were too short, a thousand year,
If life were passed with you.
'Wise men have said "Man's lot on earth
Is grief and melancholy,"
But where thou art, there joyous mirth
Proves all their wisdom folly.
'If fate withhold thy love from me,
All else in vain were given;
Heaven were imperfect wanting thee,
And with thee earth were heaven.'
A few days after, he sent the following sequel:
'My dear good Madam, You can't think how very sad I'm. I sent you, or
I mistake myself foully, A very excellent imitation of the poet Cowley,
Containing three very fair stanzas, Which number Longinus, a very
critical man, says, And Aristotle, who was a critic ten times more
caustic, To a nicety fits a valentine or an acrostic. And yet for all my
pains to this moving epistle, I have got no answer, so I suppose I may
go whistle. Perhaps you'd have preferred that like an old monk I
had pattered on In the style and after the manner of the unfortunate
Chatterton; Or that, unlike my reverend daddy's son, I had attempted the
classicalities of the dull, though immortal Addison.
I can't endure this silence another week;
What shall I do in order to make you speak?
Shall I give you a trope
In the manner of Pope,
Or hammer my brains like an old smith
To get out something like Goldsmith?
Or shall I aspire on
To tune my poetic lyre on
The same key touched by Byron,
And laying my hand its wire on,
With its music your soul set fire on
By themes you ne'er could tire on?
Or say,
I pray,
Would a lay
Like Gay
Be more in your way?
I leave it to you,
Which am I to do?
It plain on the surface is
That any metamorphosis,
To affect your study
You may work on my soul or body.
Your frown or your smile makes me Savage or Gay
In action, as well as in song;
And if 'tis decreed I at length become Gray,
Express but the word and I'm Young;
And if in the Church I should ever aspire
With friars and abbots to cope,
By a nod, if you please, you can make me a Prior--
By a word you render me Pope.
If you'd eat, I'm a Crab; if you'd cut, I'm your Steel,
As sharp as you'd get from the cutler;
I'm your Cotton whene'er you're in want of a reel,
And your livery carry, as Butler.
I'll ever rest your debtor
If you'll answer my first letter;
Or must, alas, eternity
Witness your taciturnity?
Speak--and oh! speak quickly
Or else I shall grow sickly,
And pine,
And whine,
And grow yellow and brown
As e'er was mahogany,
And lie me down
And die in agony.
P.S.--You'll allow I have the gift
To write like the immortal Swift.'
But besides the poetical powers with which he was endowed, in common
with the great Brinsley, Lady Dufferin, and the Hon. Mrs. Norton, young
Sheridan Le Fanu also possessed an irresistible humour and oratorical
gift that, as a student of Old Trinity, made him a formidable rival of
the best of the young debaters of his time at the 'College Historical,'
not a few of whom have since reached the highest eminence at the Irish
Bar, after having long enlivened and charmed St. Stephen's by their wit
and oratory.
Amongst his compeers he was remarkable for his sudden fiery eloquence of
attack, and ready and rapid powers of repartee when on his defence.
But Le Fanu, whose understanding was elevated by a deep love of the
classics, in which he took university honours, and further heightened by
an admirable knowledge of our own great authors, was not to be tempted
away by oratory from literature, his first and, as it proved, his last
love.
Very soon after leaving college, and just when he was called to the
Bar, about the year 1838, he bought the 'Warder,' a Dublin newspaper,
of which he was editor, and took what many of his best friends and
admirers, looking to his high prospects as a barrister, regarded at the
time as a fatal step in his career to fame.
Just before this period, Le Fanu had taken to writing humorous Irish
stories, afterwards published in the 'Dublin University Magazine,' such
as the 'Quare Gander,' 'Jim Sulivan's Adventure,' 'The Ghost and the
Bone-setter,' etc.
These stories his brother William Le Fanu was in the habit of repeating
for his friends' amusement, and about the year 1837, when he was about
twenty-three years of age, Joseph Le Fanu said to him that he thought an
Irish story in verse would tell well, and that if he would choose him
a subject suitable for recitation, he would write him one. 'Write me an
Irish "Young Lochinvar,"' said his brother; and in a few days he handed
him 'Phaudrig Croohore'--Anglice, 'Patrick Crohore.'
Of course this poem has the disadvantage not only of being written after
'Young Lochinvar,' but also that of having been directly inspired by
it; and yet, although wanting in the rare and graceful finish of the
original, the Irish copy has, we feel, so much fire and feeling that it
at least tempts us to regret that Scott's poem was not written in that
heart-stirring Northern dialect without which the noblest of our British
ballads would lose half their spirit. Indeed, we may safely say that
some of Le Fanu's lines are finer than any in 'Young Lochinvar,' simply
because they seem to speak straight from a people's heart, not to be the
mere echoes of medieval romance.
'Phaudrig Croohore' did not appear in print in the 'Dublin University
Magazine' till 1844, twelve years after its composition, when it was
included amongst the Purcell Papers.
To return to the year 1837. Mr. William Le Fanu, the suggester of this
ballad, who was from home at the time, now received daily instalments
of the second and more remarkable of his brother's Irish poems--'Shamus
O'Brien' (James O'Brien)--learning them by heart as they reached him,
and, fortunately, never forgetting them, for his brother Joseph kept no
copy of the ballad, and he had himself to write it out from memory ten
years after, when the poem appeared in the 'University Magazine.'
Few will deny that this poem contains passages most faithfully, if
fearfully, picturesque, and that it is characterised throughout by
a profound pathos, and an abundant though at times a too grotesquely
incongruous humour. Can we wonder, then, at the immense popularity
with which Samuel Lover recited it in the United States? For to Lover's
admiration of the poem, and his addition of it to his entertainment,
'Shamus O'Brien' owes its introduction into America, where it is now
so popular. Lover added some lines of his own to the poem, made Shamus
emigrate to the States, and set up a public-house. These added lines
appeared in most of the published versions of the poem. But they are
indifferent as verse, and certainly injure the dramatic effect of the
poem.
'Shamus O'Brien' is so generally attributed to Lover (indeed we remember
seeing it advertised for recitation on the occasion of a benefit at a
leading London theatre as 'by Samuel Lover') that it is a satisfaction
to be able to reproduce the following letter upon the subject from Lover
to William le Fanu:
'Astor House,
'New York, U.S. America.
'Sept. 30, 1846.
'My dear Le Fanu,
'In reading over your brother's poem while I crossed the Atlantic,
I became more and more impressed with its great beauty and dramatic
effect--so much so that I determined to test its effect in public, and
have done so here, on my first appearance, with the greatest success.
Now I have no doubt there will be great praises of the poem, and people
will suppose, most likely, that the composition is mine, and as you know
(I take for granted) that I would not wish to wear a borrowed feather, I
should be glad to give your brother's name as the author, should he not
object to have it known; but as his writings are often of so different a
tone, I would not speak without permission to do so. It is true that in
my programme my name is attached to other pieces, and no name appended
to the recitation; so far, you will see, I have done all I could to
avoid "appropriating," the spirit of which I might have caught here,
with Irish aptitude; but I would like to have the means of telling all
whom it may concern the name of the author, to whose head and heart it
does so much honour. Pray, my dear Le Fanu, inquire, and answer me here
by next packet, or as soon as convenient. My success here has been quite
triumphant.
'Yours very truly,
'SAMUEL LOVER.'
We have heard it said (though without having inquired into the truth
of the tradition) that 'Shamus O'Brien' was the result of a match at
pseudo-national ballad writing made between Le Fanu and several of the
most brilliant of his young literary confreres at T. C. D. But however
this may be, Le Fanu undoubtedly was no young Irelander; indeed he did
the stoutest service as a press writer in the Conservative interest, and
was no doubt provoked as well as amused at the unexpected popularity
to which his poem attained amongst the Irish Nationalists. And here
it should be remembered that the ballad was written some eleven years
before the outbreak of '48, and at a time when a '98 subject might
fairly have been regarded as legitimate literary property amongst the
most loyal.
We left Le Fanu as editor of the 'Warder.' He afterwards purchased the
'Dublin Evening Packet,' and much later the half-proprietorship of the
'Dublin Evening Mail.' Eleven or twelve years ago he also became the
owner and editor of the 'Dublin University Magazine,' in which his
later as well as earlier Irish Stories appeared. He sold it about a year
before his death in 1873, having previously parted with the 'Warder' and
his share in the 'Evening Mail.'
He had previously published in the 'Dublin University Magazine' a number
of charming lyrics, generally anonymously, and it is to be feared that
all clue to the identification of most of these is lost, except that of
internal evidence.
The following poem, undoubtedly his, should make general our regret at
being unable to fix with certainty upon its fellows:
'One wild and distant bugle sound
Breathed o'er Killarney's magic shore
Will shed sweet floating echoes round
When that which made them is no more.
'So slumber in the human heart
Wild echoes, that will sweetly thrill
The words of kindness when the voice
That uttered them for aye is still.
'Oh! memory, though thy records tell
Full many a tale of grief and sorrow,
Of mad excess, of hope decayed,
Of dark and cheerless melancholy;
'Still, memory, to me thou art
The dearest of the gifts of mind,
For all the joys that touch my heart
Are joys that I have left behind.
Le Fanu's literary life may be divided into three distinct periods.
During the first of these, and till his thirtieth year, he was an Irish
ballad, song, and story writer, his first published story being the
'Adventures of Sir Robert Ardagh,' which appeared in the 'Dublin
University Magazine' of 1838.
In 1844 he was united to Miss Susan Bennett, the beautiful daughter of
the late George Bennett, Q.C. From this time until her decease, in 1858,
he devoted his energies almost entirely to press work, making, however,
his first essays in novel writing during that period. The 'Cock and
Anchor,' a chronicle of old Dublin city, his first and, in the opinion
of competent critics, one of the best of his novels, seeing the light
about the year 1850. This work, it is to be feared, is out of print,
though there is now a cheap edition of 'Torlogh O'Brien,' its immediate
successor. The comparative want of success of these novels seems to have
deterred Le Fanu from using his pen, except as a press writer, until
1863, when the 'House by the Churchyard' was published, and was soon
followed by 'Uncle Silas' and his five other well-known novels.
We have considered Le Fanu as a ballad writer and poet. As a press
writer he is still most honourably remembered for his learning and
brilliancy, and the power and point of his sarcasm, which long made the
'Dublin Evening Mail' one of the most formidable of Irish press critics;
but let us now pass to the consideration of him in the capacity of a
novelist, and in particular as the author of 'Uncle Silas.'
There are evidences in 'Shamus O'Brien,' and even in 'Phaudrig
Croohore,' of a power over the mysterious, the grotesque, and the
horrible, which so singularly distinguish him as a writer of prose
fiction.
'Uncle Silas,' the fairest as well as most familiar instance of this
enthralling spell over his readers, is too well known a story to tell
in detail. But how intensely and painfully distinct is the opening
description of the silent, inflexible Austin Ruthyn of Knowl, and
his shy, sweet daughter Maude, the one so resolutely confident in his
brother's honour, the other so romantically and yet anxiously
interested in her uncle--the sudden arrival of Dr. Bryerly, the strange
Swedenborgian, followed by the equally unexpected apparition of Madame
de la Rougiere, Austin Ruthyn's painful death, and the reading of his
strange will consigning poor Maude to the protection of her unknown
Uncle Silas--her cousin, good, bright devoted Monica Knollys, and her
dreadful distrust of Silas--Bartram Haugh and its uncanny occupants, and
foremost amongst them Uncle Silas.
This is his portrait:
'A face like marble, with a fearful monumental look, and for an old man,
singularly vivid, strange eyes, the singularity of which rather grew
upon me as I looked; for his eyebrows were still black, though his hair
descended from his temples in long locks of the purest silver and fine
as silk, nearly to his shoulders.
'He rose, tall and slight, a little stooped, all in black, with an ample
black velvet tunic, which was rather a gown than a coat....
'I know I can't convey in words an idea of this apparition, drawn, as it
seemed, in black and white, venerable, bloodless, fiery-eyed, with
its singular look of power, and an expression so bewildering--was it
derision, or anguish, or cruelty, or patience?
'The wild eyes of this strange old man were fixed on me as he rose; an
habitual contraction, which in certain lights took the character of
a scowl, did not relax as he advanced towards me with a thin-lipped
smile.'
Old Dicken and his daughter Beauty, old L'Amour and Dudley Ruthyn, now
enter upon the scene, each a fresh shadow to deepen its already sombre
hue, while the gloom gathers in spite of the glimpse of sunshine shot
through it by the visit to Elverston. Dudley's brutal encounter with
Captain Oakley, and vile persecution of poor Maude till his love
marriage comes to light, lead us on to the ghastly catastrophe, the
hideous conspiracy of Silas and his son against the life of the innocent
girl.
It is interesting to know that the germ of Uncle Silas first appeared
in the 'Dublin University Magazine' of 1837 or 1838, as the short tale,
entitled, 'A Passage from the Secret History of an Irish Countess,'
which is printed in this collection of Stories. It next was published as
'The Murdered Cousin' in a collection of Christmas stories, and finally
developed into the three-volume novel we have just noticed.
There are about Le Fanu's narratives touches of nature which reconcile
us to their always remarkable and often supernatural incidents. His
characters are well conceived and distinctly drawn, and strong soliloquy
and easy dialogue spring unaffectedly from their lips. He is a close
observer of Nature, and reproduces her wilder effects of storm and gloom
with singular vividness; while he is equally at home in his descriptions
of still life, some of which remind us of the faithfully minute detail
of old Dutch pictures.
Mr. Wilkie Collins, amongst our living novelists, best compares with
Le Fanu. Both of these writers are remarkable for the ingenious mystery
with which they develop their plots, and for the absorbing, if often
over-sensational, nature of their incidents; but whilst Mr. Collins
excites and fascinates our attention by an intense power of realism
which carries us with unreasoning haste from cover to cover of his
works, Le Fanu is an idealist, full of high imagination, and an
artist who devotes deep attention to the most delicate detail in his
portraiture of men and women, and his descriptions of the outdoor and
indoor worlds--a writer, therefore, through whose pages it would be
often an indignity to hasten. And this more leisurely, and certainly
more classical, conduct of his stories makes us remember them more fully
and faithfully than those of the author of the 'Woman in White.' Mr.
Collins is generally dramatic, and sometimes stagy, in his effects. Le
Fanu, while less careful to arrange his plots, so as to admit of their
being readily adapted for the stage, often surprises us by scenes of so
much greater tragic intensity that we cannot but lament that he did
not, as Mr. Collins has done, attempt the drama, and so furnish another
ground of comparison with his fellow-countryman, Maturin (also, if we
mistake not, of French origin), whom, in his writings, Le Fanu far
more closely resembles than Mr. Collins, as a master of the darker and
stronger emotions of human character. But, to institute a broader ground
of comparison between Le Fanu and Mr. Collins, whilst the idiosyncrasies
of the former's characters, however immaterial those characters may
be, seem always to suggest the minutest detail of his story, the latter
would appear to consider plot as the prime, character as a subsidiary
element in the art of novel writing.
Those who possessed the rare privilege of Le Fanu's friendship, and only
they, can form any idea of the true character of the man; for after the
death of his wife, to whom he was most deeply devoted, he quite forsook
general society, in which his fine features, distinguished bearing, and
charm of conversation marked him out as the beau-ideal of an Irish wit
and scholar of the old school.
From this society he vanished so entirely that Dublin, always ready with
a nickname, dubbed him 'The Invisible Prince;' and indeed he was for
long almost invisible, except to his family and most familiar friends,
unless at odd hours of the evening, when he might occasionally be seen
stealing, like the ghost of his former self, between his newspaper
office and his home in Merrion Square; sometimes, too, he was to be
encountered in an old out-of-the-way bookshop poring over some rare
black letter Astrology or Demonology.
To one of these old bookshops he was at one time a pretty frequent
visitor, and the bookseller relates how he used to come in and ask with
his peculiarly pleasant voice and smile, 'Any more ghost stories for me,
Mr. -----?' and how, on a fresh one being handed to him, he would
seldom leave the shop until he had looked it through. This taste for the
supernatural seems to have grown upon him after his wife's death, and
influenced him so deeply that, had he not been possessed of a deal of
shrewd common sense, there might have been danger of his embracing some
of the visionary doctrines in which he was so learned. But no! even
Spiritualism, to which not a few of his brother novelists succumbed,
whilst affording congenial material for our artist of the superhuman to
work upon, did not escape his severest satire.
Shortly after completing his last novel, strange to say, bearing the
title 'Willing to Die,' Le Fanu breathed his last at his home No. 18,
Merrion Square South, at the age of fifty-nine.
'He was a man,' writes the author of a brief memoir of him in the
'Dublin University Magazine,' 'who thought deeply, especially on
religious subjects. To those who knew him he was very dear; they admired
him for his learning, his sparkling wit, and pleasant conversation, and
loved him for his manly virtues, for his noble and generous qualities,
his gentleness, and his loving, affectionate nature.' And all who knew
the man must feel how deeply deserved are these simple words of sincere
regard for Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu.
Le Fanu's novels are accessible to all; but his Purcell Papers are now
for the first time collected and published, by the permission of his
eldest son (the late Mr. Philip Le Fanu), and very much owing to the
friendly and active assistance of his brother, Mr. William Le Fanu.
THE GHOST AND THE BONE SETTER.
In looking over the papers of my late valued and respected friend,
Francis Purcell, who for nearly fifty years discharged the arduous
duties of a parish priest in the south of Ireland, I met with the
following document. It is one of many such; for he was a curious and
industrious collector of old local traditions--a commodity in which
the quarter where he resided mightily abounded. The collection and
arrangement of such legends was, as long as I can remember him, his
hobby; but I had never learned that his love of the marvellous and
whimsical had carried him so far as to prompt him to commit the results
of his inquiries to writing, until, in the character of residuary
legatee, his will put me in possession of all his manuscript papers.
To such as may think the composing of such productions as these
inconsistent with the character and habits of a country priest, it is
necessary to observe, that there did exist a race of priests--those of
the old school, a race now nearly extinct--whose education abroad tended
to produce in them tastes more literary than have yet been evinced by
the alumni of Maynooth.
It is perhaps necessary to add that the superstition illustrated by the
following story, namely, that the corpse last buried is obliged,
during his juniority of interment, to supply his brother tenants of
the churchyard in which he lies, with fresh water to allay the burning
thirst of purgatory, is prevalent throughout the south of Ireland.
The writer can vouch for a case in which a respectable and wealthy
farmer, on the borders of Tipperary, in tenderness to the corns of his
departed helpmate, enclosed in her coffin two pair of brogues, a light
and a heavy, the one for dry, the other for sloppy weather; seeking thus
to mitigate the fatigues of her inevitable perambulations in procuring
water and administering it to the thirsty souls of purgatory. Fierce
and desperate conflicts have ensued in the case of two funeral parties
approaching the same churchyard together, each endeavouring to secure to
his own dead priority of sepulture, and a consequent immunity from the
tax levied upon the pedestrian powers of the last-comer. An instance not
long since occurred, in which one of two such parties, through fear of
losing to their deceased friend this inestimable advantage, made their
way to the churchyard by a short cut, and, in violation of one of their
strongest prejudices, actually threw the coffin over the wall, lest time
should be lost in making their entrance through the gate. Innumerable
instances of the same kind might be quoted, all tending to show
how strongly among the peasantry of the south this superstition is
entertained. However, I shall not detain the reader further by any
prefatory remarks, but shall proceed to lay before him the following:
Extract from the MS. Papers of the late Rev. Francis Purcell, of
Drumcoolagh.
I tell the following particulars, as nearly as I can recollect them, in
the words of the narrator. It may be necessary to observe that he
was what is termed a well-spoken man, having for a considerable time
instructed the ingenious youth of his native parish in such of the
liberal arts and sciences as he found it convenient to profess--a
circumstance which may account for the occurrence of several big words
in the course of this narrative, more distinguished for euphonious
effect than for correctness of application. I proceed then, without
further preface, to lay before you the wonderful adventures of Terry
Neil.
'Why, thin, 'tis a quare story, an' as thrue as you're sittin' there;
and I'd make bould to say there isn't a boy in the seven parishes could
tell it better nor crickther than myself, for 'twas my father himself it
happened to, an' many's the time I heerd it out iv his own mouth; an' I
can say, an' I'm proud av that same, my father's word was as incredible
as any squire's oath in the counthry; and so signs an' if a poor man
got into any unlucky throuble, he was the boy id go into the court an'
prove; but that doesn't signify--he was as honest and as sober a man,
barrin' he was a little bit too partial to the glass, as you'd find in a
day's walk; an' there wasn't the likes of him in the counthry round for
nate labourin' an' baan diggin'; and he was mighty handy entirely for
carpenther's work, and men din' ould spudethrees, an' the likes i' that.
An' so he tuk up with bone-settin', as was most nathural, for none of
them could come up to him in mendin' the leg iv a stool or a table; an'
sure, there never was a bone-setter got so much custom-man an' child,
young an' ould--there never was such breakin' and mendin' of bones
known in the memory of man. Well, Terry Neil--for that was my father's
name--began to feel his heart growin' light, and his purse heavy; an'
he took a bit iv a farm in Squire Phelim's ground, just undher the ould
castle, an' a pleasant little spot it was; an' day an' mornin' poor
crathurs not able to put a foot to the ground, with broken arms and
broken legs, id be comin' ramblin' in from all quarters to have their
bones spliced up. Well, yer honour, all this was as well as well could
be; but it was customary when Sir Phelim id go anywhere out iv the
country, for some iv the tinants to sit up to watch in the ould castle,
just for a kind of compliment to the ould family--an' a mighty unplisant
compliment it was for the tinants, for there wasn't a man of them but
knew there was something quare about the ould castle. The neighbours
had it, that the squire's ould grandfather, as good a gintlenlan--God
be with him--as I heer'd, as ever stood in shoe-leather, used to keep
walkin' about in the middle iv the night, ever sinst he bursted a blood
vessel pullin' out a cork out iv a bottle, as you or I might be doin',
and will too, plase God--but that doesn't signify. So, as I was sayin',
the ould squire used to come down out of the frame, where his picthur
was hung up, and to break the bottles and glasses--God be marciful to us
all--an' dthrink all he could come at--an' small blame to him for that
same; and then if any of the family id be comin' in, he id be up again
in his place, looking as quite an' as innocent as if he didn't know
anything about it--the mischievous ould chap.
'Well, your honour, as I was sayin', one time the family up at the
castle was stayin' in Dublin for a week or two; and so, as usual, some
of the tinants had to sit up in the castle, and the third night it kem
to my father's turn. "Oh, tare an' ouns!" says he unto himself, "an'
must I sit up all night, and that ould vagabone of a sperit, glory be
to God," says he, "serenadin' through the house, an' doin' all sorts iv
mischief?" However, there was no gettin' aff, and so he put a bould
face on it, an' he went up at nightfall with a bottle of pottieen, and
another of holy wather.
'It was rainin' smart enough, an' the evenin' was darksome and gloomy,
when my father got in; and what with the rain he got, and the holy
wather he sprinkled on himself, it wasn't long till he had to swally a
cup iv the pottieen, to keep the cowld out iv his heart. It was the ould
steward, Lawrence Connor, that opened the door--and he an' my father wor
always very great. So when he seen who it was, an' my father tould him
how it was his turn to watch in the castle, he offered to sit up along
with him; and you may be sure my father wasn't sorry for that same. So
says Larry:
'"We'll have a bit iv fire in the parlour," says he.
'"An' why not in the hall?" says my father, for he knew that the
squire's picthur was hung in the parlour.
'"No fire can be lit in the hall," says Lawrence, "for there's an ould
jackdaw's nest in the chimney."
'"Oh thin," says my father, "let us stop in the kitchen, for it's very
unproper for the likes iv me to be sittin' in the parlour," says he.
'"Oh, Terry, that can't be," says Lawrence; "if we keep up the ould
custom at all, we may as well keep it up properly," says he.
'"Divil sweep the ould custom!" says my father--to himself, do ye mind,
for he didn't like to let Lawrence see that he was more afeard himself.
'"Oh, very well," says he. "I'm agreeable, Lawrence," says he; and so
down they both wint to the kitchen, until the fire id be lit in the
parlour--an' that same wasn't long doin'.
'Well, your honour, they soon wint up again, an' sat down mighty
comfortable by the parlour fire, and they beginned to talk, an' to
smoke, an' to dhrink a small taste iv the pottieen; and, moreover, they
had a good rousin' fire o' bogwood and turf, to warm their shins over.
'Well, sir, as I was sayin' they kep' convarsin' and smokin' together
most agreeable, until Lawrence beginn'd to get sleepy, as was but
nathural for him, for he was an ould sarvint man, and was used to a
great dale iv sleep.
'"Sure it's impossible," says my father, "it's gettin' sleepy you are?"
'"Oh, divil a taste," says Larry; "I'm only shuttin' my eyes," says
he, "to keep out the parfume o' the tibacky smoke, that's makin' them
wather," says he. "So don't you mind other people's business," says
he, stiff enough, for he had a mighty high stomach av his own (rest his
sowl), "and go on," says he, "with your story, for I'm listenin'," says
he, shuttin' down his eyes.
'Well, when my father seen spakin' was no use, he went on with his
story. By the same token, it was the story of Jim Soolivan and his ould
goat he was tellin'--an' a plisant story it is--an' there was so much
divarsion in it, that it was enough to waken a dormouse, let alone to
pervint a Christian goin' asleep. But, faix, the way my father tould
it, I believe there never was the likes heerd sinst nor before, for
he bawled out every word av it, as if the life was fairly lavin' him,
thrying to keep ould Larry awake; but, faix, it was no use, for the
hoorsness came an him, an' before he kem to the end of his story Larry
O'Connor beginned to snore like a bagpipes.
'"Oh, blur an' agres," says my father, "isn't this a hard case," says
he, "that ould villain, lettin' on to be my friend, and to go asleep
this way, an' us both in the very room with a sperit," says he. "The
crass o' Christ about us!" says he; and with that he was goin' to shake
Lawrence to waken him, but he just remimbered if he roused him, that
he'd surely go off to his bed, an' lave him complately alone, an' that
id be by far worse.
'"Oh thin," says my father, "I'll not disturb the poor boy. It id be
neither friendly nor good-nathured," says he, "to tormint him while he
is asleep," says he; "only I wish I was the same way, myself," says he.
'An' with that he beginned to walk up an' down, an' sayin' his prayers,
until he worked himself into a sweat, savin' your presence. But it was
all no good; so he dthrunk about a pint of sperits, to compose his mind.
'"Oh," says he, "I wish to the Lord I was as asy in my mind as Larry
there. Maybe," says he, "if I thried I could go asleep;" an' with that
he pulled a big arm-chair close beside Lawrence, an' settled himself in
it as well as he could.
'But there was one quare thing I forgot to tell you. He couldn't
help, in spite av himself, lookin' now an' thin at the picthur, an' he
immediately obsarved that the eyes av it was follyin' him about, an'
starin' at him, an' winkin' at him, wheriver he wint. "Oh," says he,
when he seen that, "it's a poor chance I have," says he; "an' bad luck
was with me the day I kem into this unforthunate place," says he. "But
any way there's no use in bein' freckened now," says he; "for if I am to
die, I may as well parspire undaunted," says he.
'Well, your honour, he thried to keep himself quite an' asy, an' he
thought two or three times he might have wint asleep, but for the way
the storm was groanin' and creakin' through the great heavy branches
outside, an' whistlin' through the ould chimleys iv the castle. Well,
afther one great roarin' blast iv the wind, you'd think the walls iv the
castle was just goin' to fall, quite an' clane, with the shakin' iv it.
All av a suddint the storm stopt, as silent an' as quite as if it was
a July evenin'. Well, your honour, it wasn't stopped blowin' for
three minnites, before he thought he hard a sort iv a noise over the
chimley-piece; an' with that my father just opened his eyes the smallest
taste in life, an' sure enough he seen the ould squire gettin' out iv
the picthur, for all the world as if he was throwin' aff his ridin'
coat, until he stept out clane an' complate, out av the chimley-piece,
an' thrun himself down an the floor. Well, the slieveen ould chap--an'
my father thought it was the dirtiest turn iv all--before he beginned
to do anything out iv the way, he stopped for a while to listen wor they
both asleep; an' as soon as he thought all was quite, he put out his
hand and tuk hould iv the whisky bottle, an dhrank at laste a pint iv
it. Well, your honour, when he tuk his turn out iv it, he settled it
back mighty cute entirely, in the very same spot it was in before. An'
he beginned to walk up an' down the room, lookin' as sober an' as solid
as if he never done the likes at all. An' whinever he went apast my
father, he thought he felt a great scent of brimstone, an' it was that
that freckened him entirely; for he knew it was brimstone that was
burned in hell, savin' your presence. At any rate, he often heerd it
from Father Murphy, an' he had a right to know what belonged to it--he's
dead since, God rest him. Well, your honour, my father was asy enough
until the sperit kem past him; so close, God be marciful to us all, that
the smell iv the sulphur tuk the breath clane out iv him; an' with that
he tuk such a fit iv coughin', that it al-a-most shuk him out iv the
chair he was sittin' in.
'"Ho, ho!" says the squire, stoppin' short about two steps aff, and
turnin' round facin' my father, "is it you that's in it?--an' how's all
with you, Terry Neil?"
'"At your honour's sarvice," says my father (as well as the fright id
let him, for he was more dead than alive), "an' it's proud I am to see
your honour to-night," says he.
'"Terence," says the squire, "you're a respectable man" (an' it was
thrue for him), "an industhrious, sober man, an' an example of inebriety
to the whole parish," says he.
'"Thank your honour," says my father, gettin' courage, "you were always
a civil spoken gintleman, God rest your honour."
'"REST my honour?" says the sperit (fairly gettin' red in the face with
the madness), "Rest my honour?" says he. "Why, you ignorant spalpeen,"
says he, "you mane, niggarly ignoramush," says he, "where did you lave
your manners?" says he. "If I AM dead, it's no fault iv mine," says he;
"an' it's not to be thrun in my teeth at every hand's turn, by the likes
iv you," says he, stampin' his foot an the flure, that you'd think the
boords id smash undther him.
'"Oh," says my father, "I'm only a foolish, ignorant poor man," says he.
'"You're nothing else," says the squire: "but any way," says he, "it's
not to be listenin' to your gosther, nor convarsin' with the likes
iv you, that I came UP--down I mane," says he--(an' as little as the
mistake was, my father tuk notice iv it). "Listen to me now, Terence
Neil," says he: "I was always a good masther to Pathrick Neil, your
grandfather," says he.
'"'Tis thrue for your honour," says my father.
'"And, moreover, I think I was always a sober, riglar gintleman," says
the squire.
'"That's your name, sure enough," says my father (though it was a big
lie for him, but he could not help it).
'"Well," says the sperit, "although I was as sober as most men--at laste
as most gintlemin," says he; "an' though I was at different pariods a
most extempory Christian, and most charitable and inhuman to the poor,"
says he; "for all that I'm not as asy where I am now," says he, "as I
had a right to expect," says he.
'"An' more's the pity," says my father. "Maybe your honour id wish to
have a word with Father Murphy?"
'"Hould your tongue, you misherable bliggard," says the squire; "it's
not iv my sowl I'm thinkin'--an' I wondther you'd have the impitence to
talk to a gintleman consarnin' his sowl; and when I want THAT fixed,"
says he, slappin' his thigh, "I'll go to them that knows what belongs to
the likes," says he. "It's not my sowl," says he, sittin' down opossite
my father; "it's not my sowl that's annoyin' me most--I'm unasy on my
right leg," says he, "that I bruk at Glenvarloch cover the day I killed
black Barney."
'My father found out afther, it was a favourite horse that fell undher
him, afther leapin' the big fence that runs along by the glin.
'"I hope," says my father, "your honour's not unasy about the killin' iv
him?"
'"Hould your tongue, ye fool," said the squire, "an' I'll tell you why
I'm unasy on my leg," says he. "In the place, where I spend most iv my
time," says he, "except the little leisure I have for lookin' about me
here," says he, "I have to walk a great dale more than I was ever used
to," says he, "and by far more than is good for me either," says he;
"for I must tell you," says he, "the people where I am is ancommonly
fond iv cowld wather, for there is nothin' betther to be had; an',
moreover, the weather is hotter than is altogether plisant," says he;
"and I'm appinted," says he, "to assist in carryin' the wather, an' gets
a mighty poor share iv it myself," says he, "an' a mighty throublesome,
wearin' job it is, I can tell you," says he; "for they're all iv them
surprisinly dthry, an' dthrinks it as fast as my legs can carry it,"
says he; "but what kills me intirely," says he, "is the wakeness in my
leg," says he, "an' I want you to give it a pull or two to bring it to
shape," says he, "and that's the long an' the short iv it," says he.
'"Oh, plase your honour," says my father (for he didn't like to handle
the sperit at all), "I wouldn't have the impidence to do the likes to
your honour," says he; "it's only to poor crathurs like myself I'd do it
to," says he.
'"None iv your blarney," says the squire. "Here's my leg," says he,
cockin' it up to him--"pull it for the bare life," says he; an'"if you
don't, by the immortial powers I'll not lave a bone in your carcish I'll
not powdher," says he.
'When my father heerd that, he seen there was no use in purtendin',
so he tuk hould iv the leg, an' he kep' pullin' an' pullin', till the
sweat, God bless us, beginned to pour down his face.
'"Pull, you divil!" says the squire.
'"At your sarvice, your honour," says my father.
"'Pull harder," says the squire.
'My father pulled like the divil.
'"I'll take a little sup," says the squire, rachin' over his hand to the
bottle, "to keep up my courage," says he, lettin' an to be very wake in
himself intirely. But, as cute as he was, he was out here, for he tuk
the wrong one. "Here's to your good health, Terence," says he; "an' now
pull like the very divil." An' with that he lifted the bottle of holy
wather, but it was hardly to his mouth, whin he let a screech out, you'd
think the room id fairly split with it, an' made one chuck that sent the
leg clane aff his body in my father's hands. Down wint the squire over
the table, an' bang wint my father half-way across the room on his back,
upon the flure. Whin he kem to himself the cheerful mornin' sun was
shinin' through the windy shutthers, an' he was lying flat an his back,
with the leg iv one of the great ould chairs pulled clane out iv the
socket an' tight in his hand, pintin' up to the ceilin', an' ould Larry
fast asleep, an' snorin' as loud as ever. My father wint that mornin' to
Father Murphy, an' from that to the day of his death, he never neglected
confission nor mass, an' what he tould was betther believed that he
spake av it but seldom. An', as for the squire, that is the sperit,
whether it was that he did not like his liquor, or by rason iv the loss
iv his leg, he was never known to walk agin.'
THE FORTUNES OF SIR ROBERT ARDAGH.
Being a second Extract from the Papers of the late Father Purcell.
'The earth hath bubbles as the water hath--
And these are of them.'
In the south of Ireland, and on the borders of the county of Limerick,
there lies a district of two or three miles in length, which is rendered
interesting by the fact that it is one of the very few spots throughout
this country, in which some vestiges of aboriginal forest still remain.
It has little or none of the lordly character of the American forest,
for the axe has felled its oldest and its grandest trees; but in the
close wood which survives, live all the wild and pleasing peculiarities
of nature: its complete irregularity, its vistas, in whose perspective
the quiet cattle are peacefully browsing; its refreshing glades, where
the grey rocks arise from amid the nodding fern; the silvery shafts of
the old birch trees; the knotted trunks of the hoary oak, the grotesque
but graceful branches which never shed their honours under the tyrant
pruning-hook; the soft green sward; the chequered light and shade; the
wild luxuriant weeds; the lichen and the moss--all, all are beautiful
alike in the green freshness of spring, or in the sadness and sere of
autumn. Their beauty is of that kind which makes the heart full with
joy--appealing to the affections with a power which belongs to nature
only. This wood runs up, from below the base, to the ridge of a long
line of irregular hills, having perhaps, in primitive times, formed but
the skirting of some mighty forest which occupied the level below.
But now, alas! whither have we drifted? whither has the tide of
civilisation borne us? It has passed over a land unprepared for
it--it has left nakedness behind it; we have lost our forests, but our
marauders remain; we have destroyed all that is picturesque, while we
have retained everything that is revolting in barbarism. Through the
midst of this woodland there runs a deep gully or glen, where
the stillness of the scene is broken in upon by the brawling of a
mountain-stream, which, however, in the winter season, swells into a
rapid and formidable torrent.
There is one point at which the glen becomes extremely deep and narrow;
the sides descend to the depth of some hundred feet, and are so steep as
to be nearly perpendicular. The wild trees which have taken root in the
crannies and chasms of the rock have so intersected and entangled, that
one can with difficulty catch a glimpse of the stream, which wheels,
flashes, and foams below, as if exulting in the surrounding silence and
solitude.
This spot was not unwisely chosen, as a point of no ordinary strength,
for the erection of a massive square tower or keep, one side of which
rises as if in continuation of the precipitous cliff on which it is
based. Originally, the only mode of ingress was by a narrow portal in
the very wall which overtopped the precipice, opening upon a ledge
of rock which afforded a precarious pathway, cautiously intersected,
however, by a deep trench cut with great labour in the living rock; so
that, in its original state, and before the introduction of artillery
into the art of war, this tower might have been pronounced, and that not
presumptuously, almost impregnable.
The progress of improvement and the increasing security of the times
had, however, tempted its successive proprietors, if not to adorn, at
least to enlarge their premises, and at about the middle of the last
century, when the castle was last inhabited, the original square tower
formed but a small part of the edifice.