One evening in the beginning of the eighteenth century--as nearly as we
can conjecture, the year might be that of 1720--some time about the end
of April, a young man named _Lamh Laudher_ O'Rorke, or Strong-handed
O'Eorke, was proceeding from his father's house, with a stout oaken
cudgel in his hand, towards an orchard that stood at the skirt of a
country town, in a part of the kingdom which, for the present, shall be
nameless. Though known by the epithet of _Lamh Laudher_, his Christian
name was John; but in those time(s) Irish families of the same name
were distinguished from each other by some indicative of their natural
position, physical power, complexion, or figure. One, for instance,
was called _Parra Ghastha_, or swift Paddy, from his fleetness of foot;
another, _Shaun Buie_, or yellow Jack, from his bilious look; a third,
_Micaul More_, or big Michael, from his uncommon size; and a fourth,
_Sheemus Ruah_, or red James, from the color of his hair. These
epithets, to be sure, still occur in Ireland, but far less frequently
now than in the times of which we write, when Irish was almost the
vernacular language of the country. It was for a reason similar to those
just alleged, that John O'Rorke was known as _Lamh Laudher_ O'Rorke;
he, as well as his forefathers for two or three generations, having been
remarkable for prodigious bodily strength and courage. The evening was
far advanced as O'Rorke bent his steps to the orchard. The pale, but
cloudless sun hung over the western hills, and sun upon the quiet gray
fields that kind of tranquil radiance which, in the opening of summer,
causes many a silent impulse of delight to steal into the heart. Lamh
Laudher felt this; his step was slow, like that of a man who, without
being capable of tracing those sources of enjoyment which the spirit
absorbs from the beauties of external nature, has yet enough of
uneducated taste and feeling within him, to partake of the varied feast
which she presents.
As he sauntered thus leisurely along he was met by a woman rather
advanced in years, but still unusually stout and muscular, considering
her age. She was habited in a red woollen petticoat that reached but
a short distance below the knee, leaving visible two stout legs, from
which dangled a pair of red garters that bound up her coarse blue hose.
Her gown of blue worsted was pinned up, for it did not meet around her
person, though it sat closely about her neck. Her grizzly red hair,
turned up in front, was bound by a dowd cap without any border, a
circumstance which, in addition to a red kerchief, tied over it, and
streaming about nine inches down the back, gave to her _tout ensemble_
a wild and striking expression. A short oaken staff, hooked under the
hand, completed the description of her costume. Even on a first glance
there appeared to be something repulsive in her features, which had
evidently been much exposed to sun and storm. By a closer inspection one
might detect upon their hard angular outline, a character of cruelty and
intrepidity. Though her large cheek-bones stood widely asunder, yet her
gray piercing eyes were very near each other; her nose was short and
sadly disfigured by a scar that ran tranversely across it, and her chin,
though pointed, was also deficient in length. Altogether, her whole
person had something peculiar and marked about it--so much so, indeed,
that it was impossible to meet her without feeling she was a female of
no ordinary character and habits.
Lamh Laudher had been, as we have said, advancing slowly along the
craggy road which led towards the town, when she issued from an
adjoining cabin and approached him. The moment he noticed her he stood
still, as if to let her pass and uttered one single exclamation of
chagrin and anger.
“_Ma shaughth milia mollach ort, a calliagh!_ My seven thousand curses
on you for an old hag,” said he, and haying thus given vent to his
indignation at her appearance, he began to retrace his steps as if
unwilling to meet her.
“The son of your father needn't lay the curse upon us so bitterly all
out, Lamh Laudher!” she exclaimed, pacing at the same time with vigorous
steps until she overtook him.
The young man looked at her maimed features, and as if struck by some
sudden recollection, appeared to feel regret for the hasty malediction
he had uttered against her. “Nell M'Collum,” said he, “the word was
rash; and the curse did not come from my heart. But, Nell, who is there
that doesn't curse you when they meet you? Isn't it well known that to
meet you is another name for falling in wid bad luck? For my part I'd go
fifty miles about rather than cross you, if I was bent on any business
that my heart 'ud be in, or that I cared any thing about.”
“And who brought the bad luck upon me first?” asked the woman. “Wasn't
it the husband of the mother that bore you? Wasn't it his hand that
disfigured me as you see, when I was widin a week of bein' dacently
married? Your father, Lamh Laudher was the man that blasted my name, and
made it bitther upon tongue of them that mintions it.”
“And that was because he wouldn't see one wid the blood of Lamh Laudher
in his veins married to a woman that he had reason to think--I don't
like to my it, Nelly--but you know it is said that there was darkness,
and guilt, too, about the disappearin' of your child. You never cleared
that up, but swore revenge night and day against my father, for only
preventin' you from bein' the ruination of his cousin. Many a time, too,
since that, has asked you in my own hearing what became of the boy.”
The old woman stopped like one who had unexpectedly trod with bare foot
upon something sharp enough to pierce the flesh to the bone, and even
to grate against it. There was a strong, nay, a fearful force of anguish
visible in what she felt. Her brows were wildly depressed from their
natural position, her face became pale, her eyes glared upon O'Rorke as
if he had planted a poisoned arrow in her breast, she seized him by the
arm with a hard pinching grip, and looked for two or three minutes in
his face, with an appearance of distraction. O'Rorke, who never feared
man, shrunk from her touch, and shuddered under the influence of what
had been, scarcely without an exception, called the “bad look.” The
crone held him tight, however, and there they stood, with their eyes
fixed upon each other. From the gaze of intense anguish, the countenance
of Nell M'Collum began to change gradually to one of unmingled
exultation; her brows were raised to their proper curves, her color
returned, the eye corruscated with a rapid and quivering sense of
delight, the muscles of the mouth played for a little, as if she strove
to suppress a laugh. At length O'Rorke heard a low gurgling sound
proceed from her chest; it increased; she pressed his arm more tightly,
and in a loud burst of ferocious mirth, which she immediately subdued
into a condensed shriek that breathed the very luxury of revenge, she
said--
“_Lamh Laudher Oge_, listen--ax the father of you, when you see him,
what has become _of his own child_--of the first that ever God sent him;
an' listen again--when he tells me what has become of mine, I'll tell
him what has become of his, Now go to Ellen--but before you go, let
me _cuggher_ in your ear that I'll blast you both. I'll make the _Lamh
Laudhers, Lamh Lhugs_. I'll make the strong arm the weak arm afore I've
done wid 'em.”
She struck the point of her stick against the pavement, until the iron
ferrule with which it was bound dashed the fire from the stones, after
which she passed on, muttering threats and imprecations as she left him.
O'Rorke stood and looked after her with sensations of fear and
astonishment. The age was superstitious, and encouraged a belief in the
influence of powers distinct from human agency. Every part of Ireland
was filled at this time with characters, both male and female, precisely
similar to old Nell M'Collum.. The darkness in which this woman walked,
according to the opinions of a people but slightly advanced in knowledge
and civilization, has been but feebly described to the reader. To meet
her, was considered an omen of the most unhappy kind; a circumstance
which occasioned the imprecation of Lamh Laudher. She was reported
to have maintained an intercourse with the fairies, to be capable
of communicating the blight of an evil eye, and to have carried on a
traffic which is said to have been rather prevalent in Ireland at the
time we speak of--namely, that of kidnapping. The speculations with
reference to her object in perpetrating the crimes were strongly
calculated to exhibit the degraded state of the people at that period.
Some said that she disposed of the children to a certain class of
persons in the metropolis, who subsequently sent them to the colonies,
when grown, at an enormous profit. Others maintained that she never
carried them to Dublin at all, but insisted that, having been herself
connected with the fairies, she possessed the power of erasing, by
some secret charm, the influence of baptismal protection, and that she
consequently acted as agent for the “gentry” to whom she transferred
them. Even to this day it is the opinion in Ireland, that the “good
people” themselves cannot take away a child, except through the
instrumentality of some mortal residing with them, who has been
baptized; and it is also believed that no baptism can secure children
from them, except that in which the priest has been desired to baptize
them with an especial view to their protection against fairy power.
Such was the character which this woman bore; whether unjustly or not,
matters little. For the present it is sufficient to say, that after
having passed on, leaving Lamh Laudher to proceed in the direction he
had originally intended, she bent her steps towards the head inn of the
town. Her presence here produced some cautious and timid mirth of which
they took care she should not be cognizant. The servants greeted her
with an outward show of cordiality, which the unhappy creature easily
distinguished from the warm kindness evinced to vagrants whose history
had not been connected with evil suspicion and mystery. She accordingly
tempered her manner and deportment towards them with consummate skill.
Her replies to their inquiries for news were given with an appearance
of good humor; but beneath the familiarity of her dialogue there lay an
ambiguous meaning and a cutting sarcasm, both of which were tinged with
a prophetic spirit, capable, from its equivocal drift, of being applied
to each individual whom she addressed. Owing to her unsettled life, and
her habit of passing from place to place, she was well acquainted with
local history. There lived scarcely a family within a very wide circle
about her, of whom she did not know every thing that could possibly be
known; a fact of which she judiciously availed herself by allusions
in general conversations that were understood only by those whom they
concerned. These mysterious hints, oracularly thrown out, gained her the
reputation of knowing more than mere human agency could acquire, and of
course she was openly conciliated and secretly hated.
Her conversation with the menials of the inn was very short and
decisive.
“Sheemus,” said she to the person who acted in the capacity of waiter,
“where's Meehaul Neil?”
“Troth, Nell, dacent woman,” replied the other, “myself can't exactly
say that. I'll be bound he's on the _Esker_, looking afther the sheep,
poor crathurs, durin' Andy Connor's illness in the small-pock. Poor
Andy's very ill, Nell, an' if God hasn't sed it, not expected; glory be
to his name!”
“Is Andy ill?” inquired Nell; “and how long?”
“Bedad, going on ten days.”
“Well,” said the woman, “I knew nothin' about that; but I want to see
Meehaul Neil, and I know he's in the house.”
“Faix he's not, Nelly, an' you know I wouldn't tell you a lie about it.”
“Did you get the linen that was stolen from your masther?” inquired Nell
significantly, turning at the same time a piercing glance on the waiter;
“an' tell me,” she added, “how is Sally Lavery, and where is she?”
“It wasn't got,” he replied, in a kind of stammer; “an' as to Sally, the
nerra one o' me knows any thing about her, since she left this.”
“Sheemus,” replied Nell, “you know that Meehaul Neil is in the house;
but I'll give you two choices, either to bring me to the speech of him,
or else I'll give your masther the name of the thief that stole his
linen; ay! the name of the thief that resaved it. I name nobody at
present; an' for that matther, I know nothin'. Can't all the world tell
you that Nell M'Cullum knows nothin'!”
“_Ghe dhevin_, Nelly,” said the waiter, “maybe Meehaul is in the house
unknownst to me. I'll try, any how, an' if he's to the fore, it won't be
my fault or he'll see you.”
Nell, while the waiter went to inform Meehaul, took two ribbons out of
her pocket, one white and the other black, both of which she folded into
what would appear to a bystander to be a simple kind of knot. When the
innkeeper's son and the waiter returned to the hall, the former asked
her what the nature of her business with him might be. To this she made
no reply, except by uttering the word husht! and pulling the ends, first
of the white ribbon, and afterwards of the black. The knot of the first
slipped easily from the complication, but that of the black one, after
gliding along from its respective ends, became hard and tight in the
middle.
“_Tha sha marrho!_ life passes and death stays,” she exclaimed. “Andy
Connor's dead, Meehaul Neil; an' you may tell your father that he must
get some one else to look afther his sheep. Ay! he's dead!--But that's
past. Meehaul, folly me; it's you I want, an' there's no time to be
lost.”
She passed out as she spoke, leaving the waiter in a state of wonder
at the extent of her knowledge, and of the awful means by which, in his
opinion, she must have acquired it.
Meehaul, without uttering a syllable, immediately walked after her. The
pace at which she went was rapid and energetic, betokening a degree of
agitation and interest on her part, for which he could not account.
As she had no object in bringing him far from the house, she availed
herself of the first retired spot that presented itself, in order to
disclose the purport of her visit. “Meehaul Neil,” said she, “we're now
upon the Common, where no ear can hear what passes between us. I ax have
you spirit to keep your sister Ellen from shame and sorrow?” The young
man started, and became strongly excited at such a serious prelude to
what she was about to utter.
“_Millia diououl!_ woman, why do you talk about shame or disgrace comin'
upon any sister of mine?” What villain dare injure her that regards his
life? My sisther! Ellen Neil! No, no! the man that 'ud only think of
that, I'd give this right hand a dip to the wrist in the best blood of
his heart.”
“Ay, ay! it's fine spakin': but you don't know the hand you talk of.
It's one that you had better avoid than meet. It's the strong hand, an'
the dangerous one when vexed. You know Lamh Laudher Oge?”
Meelmul started again, and the crone could perceive by his manner that
the nature of the communication she was about to make had been already
known to him, though not, she was confident, in so dark and diabolical a
shape as that in which she determined to put it.
“Lamh Laudher Oge!” he exclaimed; “surely you don't mane to say that he
has any bad design upon Ellen! It's not long since I gave him a caution
to drop her, an' to look out for a girl fittin' for his station. Ellen
herself knows what he'll get, if we ever catch him spakin' to her again.
The day will never come that his faction and ours can be friends.”
“You did do that, Meehaul,” replied Nell, “an' I know it; but what 'ud
you think if he was so cut to the heart by your turnin' round upon
his poverty, that he swore an oath to them that I could name, bindin'
himself to bring your sister to a state of shame, in order to punish you
for your words? That 'ud be great glory over a faction that they hate.”
“Tut, woman, he daren't swear such an oath; or, if he swore it fifty
times over on his bare knees, he'd ate the stones off o' the pavement
afore he'd dare to act upon it. In the first place, I'd prepare him
for his coffin, if he did; an' in the next, do you think so inanely
of Ellen, as to believe that she would bring disgrace an' sorrow upon
herself and her family? No, no, Nell; the old _dioul's_ in you, or
you're beside yourself, to think of such a story. I've warned her
against him, and so did we all; an' I'm sartin' this minute, that
she'd not go a single foot to change words with him, unknownst to her
friends.”
The old woman's face changed from the expression of anxiety and
importance that it bore, to one of coarse glee, under which, to those
who had penetration sufficient to detect it, lurked a spirit of hardened
and reckless ferocity.
“Well, well,” she replied, “sure I'm proud to hear what you tell me.
How is poor Nanse M'Collum doin' wid yez? for I hadn't time to see her
a while agone. I hope she'll never be ashamed or afraid of her aunt,
any how. I may say, I'm all that's left to the good of her name, poor
girshah.”
“What 'ud ail her?” replied Meehaul; “as long a' she's honest an'
behaves herself, there's no fear of her. Had you nothing elsa to say to
me, Nell?”
The same tumultuous expression of glee and malignity again lit up the
features of the old woman, as she looked at him, and replied, with
something like contemptuous hesitation, “Why, I don't know that. If
you had more sharpness or sinse I might say--Meehaul Neil,” she added,
elevating her voice, “what do you think I could say, this sacred moment!
Your sister! Why she's a good girl!--true enough that: but how long she
may be so's another affair. Afeard! Be the ground we stand on, man dear,
if you an' all belongin' to you, had eyes in your heads for every day in
the year, you couldn't keep her from young Lamh Laudher. Did you hear
anything?”
“I'd not believe a word of it,” said Meehaul calmly, and he turned to
depart.
“I tell you it's as true as the sun to the dial,” replied Nell; “and I
tell you more, he's wid her this minnit behind your father's orchard!
Ay! an' if you wish you may see them together wid your own eyes, an'
sure if you don't b'lieve me, you'll b'lieve them. But, Meehaul,
take care of him; for he has his fire-arms; if you meet him don't go
empty-handed, and I'd advise you to have the first shot.”
“Behind the orchard,” said Meehaul, astonished; “where there?”
“Ay, behind the orchard, where they often war afore. Where there? Why,
if you want to know that, sittin' on one of the ledges in the Grassy
Quarry. That's their sate whenever they meet; an' a snug one it is for
them that don't like their neighbors' eyes to be upon them. Go now an'
satisfy yourself, but watch them at a distance, an', as you expect to
save your sister, don't breathe the name of Nell M'Collum to a livin'
mortal.”
Meehaul Neil's cheek flushed with deep resentment on hearing this
disagreeable intelligence. For upwards of a century before there had
subsisted a deadly feud between the Neils and Lamh Laudhers, without
either party being able exactly to discover the original fact from
which their enmity proceeded. This, however, in Ireland, makes little
difference. It is quite sufficient to know that they meet and fight upon
every possible opportunity, as hostile factions ought to do, without
troubling themselves about the idle nonsense of inquiring why they
hate and maltreat each other. For this reason alone, Meehaul Neil was
bitterly opposed to the most distant notion of a marriage between his
sister and young Lamh Laudher. There were other motives also which
weighed, with nearly equal force, in the consideration of this subject.
His sister Ellen was by far the most beautiful girl of her station in
the whole country,--and many offers, highly advantageous, and far above
what she otherwise could have expected, had been made to her. On the
other hand, Lamh Laudher Oge was poor, and by no means qualified in
point of worldly circumstances to propose for her, even were hereditary
enmity out of the question. All things considered, the brother and
friends of Ellen would rather have seen her laid in her grave, than
allied to a comparatively poor young man, and their bitterest enemy.
Meehaul had but little doubt as to the truth of what Nell M'Collum told
him. There was a saucy and malignant confidence in her manner, which,
although it impressed him with a sense of her earnestness, left,
nevertheless, an indefinite feeling of dislike against her on his mind.
He knew that her motive for disclosure was not one of kindness or regard
for him or for his family. Nell M'Collum had often declared that “the
wide earth did not carry a bein' she liked or loved, but one--not even
excepting herself, that she hated most of all.” This however was not
necessary to prove that she acted rather from the gratification of some
secret malice, than from the principle of benevolence. The venomous
leer of her eye, therefore, and an accurate knowledge of her character,
induced him to connect some apprehension of approaching evil with the
unpleasant information she had just given him.
“Well,” said Meehaul, “if what you say is true, I'll make it a black
business to Lamh Laudher. I'll go directly and keep my eye on them; an'
I'll have my fire-arms, Nell; an' by the life that's in me, he'll taste
them if he provokes me; an Ellen knows that.” Having thus spoken he left
her.
The old woman stood and looked after him with a fiendish complacency.
“A black business, will you?” she exclaimed, repeating his words in
a soliloquy;--“do so--an' may all that's black assist you in it! Dher
Chiernah, I'll do it or lose a fall--I'll make the Lamh Laudhers the
Lamh Lhugs afore I've done wid 'em. I've put a thorn in their side this
many a year, that'll never come out; I'll now put one in their marrow,
an' let them see how they'll bear that. I've left _one_ empty chair at
their hearth, an' it 'll go hard wid me but I'll lave another.”
Having thus expressed her hatred against a family to whom she attributed
the calamities that had separated her from society, and marked her as
a being to be avoided and detested, she also departed from the Common,
striking her stick with peculiar bitterness into the ground as she went
along.