When our merry friend the pedlar left the proctor's parlor, he proceeded
at a brisk pace in the direction of the highway, which, however, was not
less than three-quarters of a mile from Longshot Lodge, which was the
name Purcel had given to his residence. He had only got clear of the
offices, however, and was passing the garden wall, which ran between him
and the proctor's whole premises, when he was arrested by Mogue Moylan.
“Ah! merry Mogue,” exclaimed the pedlar, ironically, “I was missin' you.
Where were you, my cherub?”
“I was in the barn 'ithin,” replied Mogue, “just offerin' up a little
pathernavy for the protection o' this house and place, and of the
daicent, kind-hearted peeople that's in it.”
“An', as a joint prayer, they say, is worth ten single ones, I suppose,”
returned the pedlar,--laying his fingers on his lips and winking--“you
had--ahem--you understand?”
“No, thin,” replied Mogue, brightening up with excessive vanity, “may I
be happy if I do!”
“Why, our fair friend, Letty Lenehan--begad, Mogue, she's a purty girl
that--says she to herself,” proceeded the pedlar; “for I don't think she
knew or thought I heard her--'If I thought he would like these rib-bons,
I'd buy them for myself.' 'Who do you mane, acushla?' says I, whisperin'
to her. 'Who,' says she, 'but--but Mogue himself--only honor bright, Mr.
Magrath' says she, 'sure you wouldn't betray me?' 'Honor bright again,'
says I, 'I'm not the stuff a traitor's made of;' and so you see we both
laughed heartily, bekaise we understood one another. Mogue,” proceeded
the other, “will you answer me the truth in one thing?”
“If I can I will, Misther Magrath.
“I know ye will, bekaise you can,” replied, the pedlar; “how do you come
round the girls at all? how do you make them fond o' you? I want you to
tell me that, if it's not a family saicret.”
Mogue gravely drew his fingers and thumb down his thin yellow jaws,
until they met under his chin, and replied--
“It can't be tould, Misther Magrath; some men the women's naturally
fond of, and some men they can't bear--throth it's like a freemason's
saicret, if you wor a man that the women wor naturally fond of you'd
know it yoarself, but not bein' that, Mr. Magrath, you could not
understand it. It's born wid one, an' troth, a troublesome gift it
is--for it is a gift--at least, I find it so. There's no keep in' the
crathurs oft o' you.”
“Begad, you must be a happy man, Mogue. I wish I was like you--but
whisper, man alive, why don't you look higher.
“How is that?” asked the other, now apparently awakened to a new
interest.
“Mogue,” said the pedlar, with something like solemnity of manner, “you
and I are both embarked in the same ship, you know--we know how things
are to go. I'm now provin' to you that I'm your friend. Listen, you
passed through the back-yard to-day while I was in the parlor wid the
family sellin' my goods as well as I could. Well, Miss Julia had a
beautiful shawl about her purty shoulders, and as she seen you passin,
she started, kept her eyes fixed upon you till you disappeared, and
then, afther thinkin 'or some time, she sighed deeply. Whisper, the
thing flashed upon me--that's that, thought I, at any rate--and devil
a doubt of it, you're safe there, or my name's not Andy Magrath, better
known as the Cannie Soogah-Hurra, Mogue, more power!”
A richer comic study than Mogue's face ould not possibly be depicted.
His thin craggy jaws--for cheeks he had none--were winkled and puckered
into such a multiplicity of villanous folds and crevices, as could
scarcely be paralleled on a human countenance; and what added to the
ludicrous impression made, was the fact that he endeavored to look--and,
in fact, did so successfully--more like a man who felt that a secret
long known to himself had been discovered, than a person to whom the
intelligence had come for the first time.
“An' Misther Magrath,” he replied, once more repeating the survey of his
puckered laws; “is it by way of information that you tould me that? That
I mayn't sin, but you should be ever and always employed in carryin'
coals to, Newcastle. Troth, since you have broached\the thing, I've
known it this good while, and no one could tell you more about it, if
I liked. Honor bright, however, as poor Letty said, troth, I pity that
girl--but what can I do? no--no--honor bright, for ever!”
“Well, anyhow, now that we've thrown light upon what I noticed a while
ago, let us talk about other matters. The house is still well armed and
guarded, you say?”
“That I may die in grace, but it 'ud take me half an hour to reckon all
the guns, pistols, and blunderbushes they have freshly loaded in the
house every night.”
“Well, couldn't you assist us, you in the house?”
“No--for I'm not in the house; they wouldn't allow any servant to sleep
in the house for fear o' traichery, and they say so. If they'd let me
sleep in the house, it 'ud be another thing; I might wet the powdher,
and make their fire-arms useless; but sure they have lots of swords and
bagnets, and daggers, and other instruments o' that kind that 'ud skiver
one like a rabbit.”
“Well, but you know all the outs and ins of the house, the rooms and
passages, and everything that way so thoroughly, that one could depend
upon your account of them.”
“Depend upon them--ay, as well as you might upon the Gospel itself;--she
was fond of M'Carthy, they say, and they think she is still; but, _be
dhu husth_, (* Hold your tongue.) there's one that knows betther. You
don't like M'Carthy?”
“To be sure I do, as the devil does holy wather.”
“Well,” proceeded Mogue, “I've a thing in my head about him--but sure
he's in the black list as it is.”
“Well, what is it you have in your head about him?”
Mogue shook it, but added, “Never mind, I'll think it over again, and
when I'm made up on it, maybe I'll tell you. Don't we meet on this day
week?”
“Sartainly, will you come?”
“I intend it, for the truth is, Misther Magrath, that the Millstone must
be broke; that I may die in pace, but it must, an' any one that stands
in the way of it must suffer. May I be happy, but they must.”
The pedlar looked cautiously about him, and seeing that the coast was
clear and no person visible, he thrust a letter into his hand, adding,
“you may lave it in some place where the ould chap, or either of the
sons, will be sure to find it. Maybe it'll tache them a little more
civility to their neighbors.”
Mogue looked at the document, and placing it securely in his pocket,
asked, “Is it a notice?”
The other nodded in the affirmative, and added, with a knowing wink,
“There's a coffin and a cross-bones in it, and the name is signed
wid real blood, Mogue; and that's the way to go about breakin' the
Millstone, my man.”
“That I may never do an ill turn, but it is. Well, God bless you,
Misther Magrath, an' whisper now, don't forget an odd patther-anavy
goin' to bed, in hopes that God will prosper our honest endayvours. That
was a hard thing upon young Devlin in Murray's murdher. I'm not sure
whether you do, but I know that that act was put upon him through
ill-will; and now he'll hang for it. But sure it's one comfort that
he'll die a martyr, glory be to God!”
The pedlar, having assented to this, got on his pack, and leaving Mogue
to meditate on the new discovery which he had made respecting Julia
Purcel, he proceeded on towards the highway to which we have alluded.
Purcel himself, in the course of a few miles' drive, reached the
parsonage, in which the Rev. Jeremiah Turbot ought to have lived, but in
which, for several years past, he had not resided; if we except about a
fortnight twice a year, when he came to sweep off as weighty a load of
tithes as he could contrive to squeeze out of the people through worthy
Mat Purcel, his proctor.
For a year or two previous to this visit, there is no doubt but the
aspect of ecclesiastical affairs was gradually getting worse. Turbot
began to feel that there was something wrong, although he could not
exactly say what it was. Purcel, however, was by no means reluctant to
disclose to him the exceedingly desperate state to which not only had
matters been driving, but at which they had actually arrived. This, in
truth, was our worthy proctor's version of ecclesiastical affairs, for
at least two years before the present period of our narrative. But, like
every man who tampers with, simple truth, he began to perceive,
almost when it was too late, that his policy in antedating the tithe
difficulties was likely very soon to embarrass himself; and to deprive
the outrages resulting from the frightful opposition that was organized
against tithes of all claim to novelty. He had, in fact, so strongly
exaggerated the state of the country, and surcharged his pictures of
anti-tithe violence so much beyond all truth and reality, that when the
very worst and most daring organization did occur, he could do nothing
more than go over the same ground again. The consequence was, that
worthy Turbot, so long habituated to these overdrawn narratives, began
to look upon them as the friends of the boy who shouted out “wolf!” did
upon the veracity of his alarms. He set down his intrepid and courageous
proctor as nothing else than a cowardly poltroon, whose terrors
exaggerated everything, and whose exaggerated accounts of fraud,
threats, and violence had existed principally in his own imagination.
Such were the circumstances under which Purcel and Dr. Turbot now met.
The worthy rector of Ballysoho was a middle-sized man, with coal-black
hair, brilliant, twinkling eyes of the same color, and as pretty a
double chin as ever graced the successor of an apostle. Turbot was by
no means an offensive person; on the contrary, he must of necessity have
been very free from evil or iniquity of any kind, inasmuch as he never
had time to commit sin. He was most enthusiastically addicted to hunting
and shooting, and felt such a keen and indomitable relish for the good
things of this world, especially for the luxuries of the table, that
what between looking after his cuisine, attending his dogs, and enjoying
his field sports, he scarcely ever might be said to have a single day
that he could call his own. And yet, unreasonable people expected that a
man, whose daily occupations were of such importance to--himself, should
very coolly forego his own beloved enjoyments in order to attend to the
comforts of the poor, with whom he had scarcely anything in common. Many
other matters of a similar stamp were expected from him, but only
by those who had no opportunity of knowing the multiplicity of his
engagements. Such persons were unreasonable enough to think that he
ought to have occasionally appropriated some portion of his income to
the relief of poverty and destitution, but as he said himself, he could
not afford it. How could any man afford it who in general lived up to,
and sometimes beyond, his income, and who was driven to such pinches
as not unfrequently to incur the imputation of severity and oppression
itself, by the steps he was forced to take or sanction for the recovery
of his tithes.
In person he was, as we have said, about or somewhat under the middle
size. In his gait he was very ungainly. When walking, he drove forward
as if his head was butting or boring its way through a palpable
atmosphere, keeping his person, from the waist up, so far in advance
that the _a posteriori_ portion seemed as if it had been detached from
the other, and was engaged in a ceaseless but ineffectual struggle to
regain its position; or, in shorter and more intelligible words, the
latter end of him seemed to be perpetually in pursuit of his head and
shoulders, without ever being able to overtake them. Whilst engaged in
maintaining this compound motion, his elbows and arms swung from right
to left, and vice versa, very like the movements of a weaver throwing
the shuttle from side to side. Turbot had one acknowledged virtue in a
pre-eminent degree, we mean hospitality. It is true he gave admirable
dinners, but it would be a fact worth boasting of, to find any man at
his table who was not able to give, and who did give, better dinners
than himself. The doctor's face, however, in spite of his slinging and
ungainly person, was upon the whole rather good. His double chin, and
the full, rosy expression of his lips and mouth, betokened, at the very
least, the force of luxurious habits, and, as a hedge school-master
of our acquaintance used to say, the smallest taste in life of
voluptuousity; whilst from his black, twinkling eyes, that seemed always
as if they were about to herald a jest, broke forth, especially when he
conversed with the softer sex, something which might be considered
as holding a position between a laugh and a leer. Such was the Rev.
Jeremiah Turbot, to whom we shall presently take the liberty of
introducing the reader.
The parsonage, to which our friend Purcel is now making his approach,
was an excellent and comfortable building. It stood on a very pretty
eminence, and consequently commanded a beautiful prospect both in front
and rear; for the fact was, that in consequence of the beauty of the
scenery for miles about it, some incumbent of good taste had given it a
second hall door, thus enabling the inhabitants to partake of a double
enjoyment, by an equal facility of contemplating the exquisite scenery
of the country both in front and rear. A beautiful garden lay facing the
south, and a little below, in the same direction, stood a venerable old
rookery, whilst through the rich, undulating fields flowed, in graceful
windings, a beautiful river, on whose green and fertile banks sheep and
black cattle were always to be seen, sometimes feeding or chewing the
cud in that indolent repose which gives to the landscape, in the golden
light of a summer's evening, such a poetical and pastoral effect.
Purcel, on coming in sight of the parsonage, instead of keeping his
horse to the rapid pace at which he had driven him along until then, now
drew him up, and advanced at a rate which seemed to indicate anything
but that of a man whose spirits were cheerful or free from care. On
reaching the front entrance he discounted very slowly, and with a solemn
and melancholy air, walked deliberately, step by step, till he stood
at the hall door, where he gave a knock so spiritless, depressed and
disconsolate, that it immediately communicated itself, as was intended,
to the usually joyful and rosy countenance of the rector, who surveyed,
his agent as if he expected to hear that he either had lost, or was
about to lose, half his family or the whole of his wealth.
“How do you do, Purcel?--eh, what's this? Is there anything wrong? You
look very much dejected--what's the matter? Sit down.”
“Thank you, sir; but I really do not think I am well--at least my
spirits are a great deal depressed; but indeed, Dr. Turbot, a man must
be more or less than a man to be able to keep up his spirits in such
times.”
“Oh! ho, my worthy proctor, is that all? Thank you for nothing, Purcel.
I understand you; but you ought to know I am not to be caught now by
your 'calamities'.”
“My calamities! I declare to goodness, Dr. Turbot, I could rest
contented if they were nobody's calamities but my own; unfortunately,
however, you are as deep in them as I am, and in a short time, God
knows, we will be a miserable pair, I fear.”
“Not at all, Purcel--this is only the old story. Raw-heads and
bloody-bones coming to destroy the tithes, and eat up the parsons. Let
me see--it is now three years since you commenced these 'lamentations.'”
“Three years ago; why we had peace and quietness then compared to what
we have at present,” replied Purcel.
“And what have we now, pray?”
“Why, sir, the combinations against tithes is quite general over the
whole country.”
“Well; so was it then upon your own showing. Go on.”
“As I said, sir, it was nothing at that time. There is little now but
threatening notices that breathe of blood and murder.”
“Very good; so was it then upon your own showing. Go on.”
“But of late, sir, lives have been taken. Clergymen have been threatened
and fired at.”
“Very good; so was it then upon you! own showing. Go on, I say.”
“Fired at I say, and shot, sir. The whole White boy system has turned
itself into a great tithe conspiracy. The farmers, the landholders
of all descriptions, the cottiers, the daily laborers, and the very
domestic servants, have all joined this conspiracy, and sworn neither to
pay tithes themselves nor to allow others to pay them. They compare the
established church to a garrison; and although the law prevents them
from openly destroying it by force, they swear that they'll starve it
out.”
“Eh!” said Turbot, starting, “what's that you say? Starve us out! What
an infamous and unconstitutional project! What a diabolical procedure!
But I forgot--bravo, Purcel! This was all the case before upon your own
showing.”
“Well, sir,” returned Purcel, “there was at least this difference, that
I was able to get something out of them then, but devil a copper can
I get out o' them now. I think you'll admit, sir, that this fact gives
some weight to my argument.”
“You don't mean to say, Purcel,” replied the other, from whose chin the
rosy tint gradually paled away until it assumed that peculiar hue which
is found inside of a marine shell, that is to say, white with a dream
of red barely and questionably visible; “you don't mean to say, my good
friend Purcel, that you have no money for me on this occasion?”
“By no means, sir,” replied the proctor. “Money I have got for you, no
doubt--money I have got certainly.”
The double chin once more assumed its natural hue of celestial rosy
red.”
“Upon my honor, Purcel,” he replied, “I have not temper for this; it
seems to me that you take particular delight in wantonly tampering with
my feelings. I am really quite tired of it. Why harass and annoy me with
your alarms? Conspiracy, blood, and massacre are the feeblest terms in
your vocabulary. It is absolutely ridiculous, sir, and I beg you will
put an end to it.”
“I would be very glad to do so, sir,” replied Purcel; “and still more
satisfied if I had never had anything to do with the temporalities of
your church.”
“I don't see why, above all men living, you should say so, Purcel; you
have feathered your nest tolerably well by the temporalities of our
church.”
“If I have, sir,” replied the proctor, “it has been at the expense of my
popularity and good name. I and my family are looked upon as a part and
parcel of your system, and, I may add, as the worst and most odious
part of it. I and they are looked upon as the bitterest enemies of the
people; and because we endeavor to get out of them the means of enabling
you to maintain your rank in the world, we are obliged to hear
ourselves branded every day in the week as villains, oppressors, and
blood-suckers. This, however, we could bear; but to know that we are
marked down for violence, brutality, and, if possible, assassination, is
a penalty for which nothing in your establishment could compensate us.
I and my sons have received several notices of violence in every shape,
and we are obliged to sleep with our house half filled with arms and
ammunition, in dread of an attack every night in the year.”
“Well, well,” replied Turbot, “this, after all, is but the old story;
the matter is only an ebullition, and will pass away. I know you are
constitutionally timid. I know you are; and have in fact a great deal of
the natural coward in your disposition; and I say natural, because a
man is no more to be blamed for being born a coward than he is for being
born with a bad complexion or an objectionable set of features. You
magnify the dangers about you, and, in fact, become a self-tormentor. As
for my part, I am glad you have got money, for I do assure you, I never
stood so much in need of it in my life.”
“The very papers, sir,” continued Purcel, who could not prevent himself
from proceeding, “might enable you to see the state of the country.”
“Oh, d--n the papers,” said the parson, “I am sick of them. Our side is
perpetually exaggerating matters--just as you are; and as for the other
side, your papist rags I never, of course, see or wish to see. I want
six hundred now, or indeed eight if you can, and I had some notion of
taking a day or two's shooting. How is the game on the glebe? Has it
been well preserved, do you know?”
“I am not aware,” said the proctor, “that any one has shot over the
glebe lands this season; but if you take my advice, sir, you will expose
yourself as little as you can in the neighborhood. There are not two
individuals in the parish so unpopular as Dr. Turbot and your humble
servant.”
“In that case, then,” replied the other, “the less delay I make here the
better--you can let me have six hundred, I hope?”
“I certainly told you, sir,” replied Purcel, with something of a
determined and desperate coolness about him, “that I had money for you,
and so I have.”
“Thank you, Purcel; I must say you certainly have, on all occasions,
exerted yourself faithfully and honestly in support of my interests.”
“Money, sir,” pursued the other, without appearing to look to the right
or to the left, “I have for you. Would you venture to guess to what
amount?”
“Well, under the circumstances you speak of, less, I dare say, than I
expect.”
“I have been able to get, within the last six months, exactly fifty-nine
pounds thirteen and sevenpence!”
If the ebb which we have described before of the blood from the doctor's
double chin was a gradual one, we can assure the reader that, in this
case, it was rapid in proportion to the terror and dismay conveyed by
this authentic, but astounding piece of intelligence. The whole face
became pale, his eyes at once lost their lustre, and were, as he fixed
them in astonishment upon the proctor, completely without speculation;
his voice became tremulous, and, as he pulled out his handkerchief to
wipe away the unexpected perspiration which the proctor's words had
brought out upon his forehead, his hands trembled as if he had been
suddenly seized with palsy. In truth, Purcel, who had a kind of
good-natured regard for the little man, felt a sensation of compassion
for him, on witnessing the extraordinary distress under which he
labored.
“I am sorry for this,” said he, “for I really know not what is to be
done, and, what is equally distressing, our prospects are not at all
likely to improve.”
“You don't mean to say, Purcel, that circumstances are as bad as you
report them--as bad--as desperate, I should say--and as ruinous?”
“I fear,” said Purcel, “they go beyond the gloomiest and most desponding
views you could take of them. The conspiracy, for such we must term it,
is, in point of fact, deepening down to the very foundations, if I may
use the expression, of society. Every day it is becoming more dangerous
and alarming; but how it is to be checked or mitigated, or how we are to
stand out of its way and avoid its consequences, heaven only knows, for
I don't.”
“But, Purcel, my dear friend, what am I and my domestic establishment
to do? Good God! there is nothing but ruin before us! You know I always
lived up to my income--indeed, at best, it was too limited for the
demands of my family, and our habits of life. And now, to have the very
prop--the only one on which I leant--suddenly snapt from under me--it is
frightful. But you are to blame, Purcel; you are much to blame. Why did
you not apprise me of this ruinous state of things before it came
thus on me unawares? It was unfeeling and heartless in you not to have
prepared me for it.”
The proctor actually imagined, and not without reason, that the worthy
doctor was beginning to get beside himself, as it is termed, on hearing
such a charge as this brought against him; and he was about to express
his astonishment at it, when Mr. Temple, his curate, who resided in the
parsonage, made his appearance, and joined them at Dr. Turbot's request.
“Temple,” said he, as the latter portion of his body began to pursue
the other through the room, “are you aware of the frightful condition to
which the country has come?”
“Who can be ignorant of it?” replied Temple; “how can any man live in
the country, and not know it?”
“Yes, sir,” replied Turbot, tartly, “I have lived in the country, and,
until a few minutes ago, I was ignorant of the extent to which it has
come.”
“Well, sir,” said Temple, “that is odd enough; for, to my own knowledge,
your information has been both regular and authentic upon this subject
at all events. Our friend Purcel, here, has not left you in ignorance of
it.”
“Yes,” said Turbot, “but he had the country as bad three years ago as
it is now. Was this fair? Why, I took it for granted that all his alarms
and terrors were the mere play and subterfuge of the proctor upon the
parson, and, consequently, thought little of it; but here I am stranded
at once, wrecked, and left on my bottom. How will I meet my tradesmen?
how will I continue my establishment? and, what is worse, how can I
break it up? You know, Temple, I cannot, unfortunately, live without
luxuries. They are essential to my health, and if suddenly deprived
of them, as I am likely to be, I cannot answer to society for the
consequences.”
“Sir,” said Temple, “it is quite obvious that a period of severe trial
and chastening is at hand, or I should rather say, has already arrived.
Many of our calling, I am grieved I to know, are even now severely
suffering, and suffering, I must add, with unexampled patience and
fortitude under great and trying privations. Yet I trust that the health
of the general body will be improved by it, and purged of the grossness
and worldly feeling which have hitherto, I fear, too much characterized
it. Many, I know, may think we are merely in the hands of man, but
for my part, I think, and earnestly hope, that we are in those of God
himself, and that He chasteneth no only because He loveth.”
“This is most distressing to hear, my dear Temple,” replied his rector;
“but I trust I am as willing and as well prepared, from religious
feeling, to suffer as another--that is, provided always I am not
deprived of those comforts and little luxuries to which I have all my
life been accustomed.”
“I am very much afraid,” observed Purcel, “that the clergy of the
established church will have a very fine opportunity to show the world
how well and patiently they can suffer.”
“I have already said, Purcel,” said the doctor, “that I am as willing
to suffer as another. I know I am naturally of a patient and rather an
humble disposition; let these trials come then, and I am prepared for
them, provided only that I am not deprived of my little luxuries, for
these are essential to my health itself, otherwise I could bear even
this loss. I intended, Temple, to have had a day or two's shooting on
the glebe lands, but Purcel, here, tells me that I am very unpopular,
and would not, he says, recommend me to expose myself much, or if
possible at all, in the neighborhood.
“And upon my word and credit I spoke nothing,” replied the other, “but
what I know to be truth. There is not a feather of game on the glebe
lands that would be shot down with half the pleasure that the parson
himself would. I beg, then, Dr. Turbot, that you won't think of it. I'll
get my sons to go over the property, and if there's any game on it we
shall have it sent to you.”
“How does it stand for game, Temple, do you know?”
“I really cannot say,” replied the good man. “The killing of game is a
pursuit I have never relished, and with which I am utterly unacquainted.
I fear, however, that the principal game in the country will soon be the
parson and the proctor.”
“It's a delightful pursuit,” replied the Rev. Doctor, who did not at
all relish the last piece of information, and only replied to the first,
“and equally conducive to health and morals. What, for instance, can be
more delicious than a plump partridge or grouse, stewed in cinnamon and
claret? and yet, to think that a man must be deprived of--well,” said
he, interrupting himself, “it is a heavy, and awful dispensation--and
one that I ought to have been made acquainted with--that is, to its
full and fearful extent--before it came on me thus unawares. Purcel here
scarcely did his duty by me in this.”
“I fear, sir,” replied Temple, “that it was not Purcel who neglected his
duty, but you who have been incredulous. I think he has certainly not
omitted to sound the alarm sufficiently loud during the approach of this
great ordeal to which we are exposed.”
“And in addition to everything else, I am in arrears to you, Temple,” he
added; “and now I have no means of paying you.”
Temple was silent, for at that moment the necessities of his family
pressed with peculiar severity upon himself--and he was not exactly
prepared for such an intimation. The portion of salary then coming to
him was, in truth, his sole dependence at that peculiar crisis, and this
failing him, he knew not on what hand or in what direction to turn.
After musing for some time, he at length replied, “If you have it not,
Dr. Turbot, or cannot procure it, of course it is idle for me to expect
it--although I will not deny, that in the present circumstances of
my family, it would have come to us with very peculiar and seasonable
relief.”
“But I have not a pound,” replied the doctor; “so far from that, I am
pretty deeply in debt--for I need hardly say, that for years I have been
balancing my affairs--paying off debts to-day, and contracting other
to-morrow--always dipped, but and rather deeply, too, as I said.”
He again got to his legs, when the pursuit of the latter part of his
person after the rest once more took place, and in this odd way he
traversed the room in a state of extreme tribulation.
“What is to be done?” he asked--“surely the government cannot abandon
us?--cannot allow us to perish utterly, which we must do, if left to
the mercy of our enemies? No, certainly it cannot desert us in such a
strait as this, unless it wishes to surrender the established church to
the dark plots and designing ambition of popery. No, no--it cannot--it
must not--it dares not. Some vigorous measure for our relief must be
taken, and that speedily;--let us not be too much dejected, then--our
sufferings will be short--and as for myself, I am willing to make
any reasonable sacrifice, provided I am not called upon--at these
years--fifty-eight--to give up my usual little luxuries. Purcel, I want
you to take a turn in the garden. Temple, excuse me--will you?--and say
to Mrs. Temple to make no preparations, as I don't intend to stop--I
shall return to Dublin in an hour at farthest; and don't be cast down,
Temple; matters will soon brighten.”
“It is not at all necessary, sir,” replied Temple, “that you should
adjorn to the garden to speak with Mr. Purcel. I was on my way to the
library when I met you, and I am going there now.”
“It is not so much,” he replied, “that I have anything very particular
to say to Purcel, as that I feel a walk in the fresh air will relieve
me. Good-bye, then, for a little; I shall see you before I go.”
“Now, Purcel,” said he, when they had reached the garden, “this, after
all, is only a false alarm, or even if it be not, we know that the
government could by no means afford to abandon the established church
in Ireland, because that would be, in other words, to reject the aid
of, and sever themselves from all connection with, the whole Protestant
party; and you, as a man of sense, Purcel, need not be told that it is
only by the existence of a Protestant party in this country that they
are enabled to hold it in union with England at all.”
“But what has that to do with our present distresses?” said the proctor,
who, as he probably began to anticipate the doctor's ultimate object
in this conversation, very shrewdly associated himself rather in an
official spirit with the embarrassments of his friend, and the church in
general.
“It has considerably,” replied Dr. Turbot; “for instance, there will be
no risk whatsoever, in lending to many of the embarrassed clergy sums
of money upon their! personal security, until this pressure passes away,
and their prosperity once more returns.”
“Oh, ho, doctor,” thought his sharp and wily companion, “I believe I
have you now, Well, Dr. Turbot,” he replied, “I think, the case, even as
you put it, will be attended with difficulties. What, for instance, is
personal security from a poor or a ruined man? very little, or rather
nothing. Still it is possible that many, relying upon the proverbial
honor and integrity of the Irish Protestant clergy, may actually lend
money upon this security. But then,” he added, with a smile, “those who
will, must belong to a peculiar and privileged class.”
“Why,” asked Turbot, “to what class do you allude?”
“To one with which,” said the proctor, “I unfortunately have no
connection--I mean the class that can afford to lend it.”
“Purcel,” said Dr. Turbot, “I am sorry to hear this ungenerous
observation from you; I did not expect it.”
“Why do you call it ungenerous, sir?” asked Purcel.
“Because,” replied Turbot, “it is obvious that it was made in
anticipation of a favor which I was about to ask of you.”
“If I can grant you any favor,” replied the proctor, “I shall be most
happy to do so;--if you will only let me know what it is.”
“You must be particularly dull not to perceive it,” replied the parson,
“aware, as you are, of the unexpected state of my circumstances. In
short, I want you to assist me with a few hundreds.”
The proctor, after a pause, replied, “You place me in circumstances of
great difficulty, sir; I am indeed anxious to oblige you, but I know
not whether I can do so with honor, without violating my good faith to
another party.”
“I don't understand you,” said Turbot.
“Then I shall explain it,” replied Purcel; “the sum I can command is one
of four hundred, which is at this moment virtually lent upon excellent
security, at an interest of eight per cent. The loan is certainly not
legally completed, but morally and in point of honor it is. Now, if I
lend this money to you, sir, I must break my word and verbal agreement
to the party in question.”
“Very well, sir,” replied the rector, who, notwithstanding the love
he bore his “little luxuries,” was scrupulously honorable in all money
transactions, “don't attempt to break word, or to violate good faith
with any man; and least of all, on my account. I presume I shall be able
to raise the money somewhere else.”
Purcel, who had uniformly found the doctor a sharp, but correct man
in matters,of business, and who knew besides the severe pressure under
which he labored at the moment, was not exactly prepared to hear from
him the expression of a principle so high-minded. He paused again
for some time, during which he reasoned with himself somewhat to the
following effect:--“I did not expect this from the worthy doctor, but
I did, that he would at once have advised me to break the agreement I
mentioned and lend himself the money. I cannot think there will be
much risk in lending such a man a few hundreds, especially as no such
agreement as I allude to exists.” He then replied as follows:--
“Doctor,” he proceeded, “I have been thinking over this matter; I know
you want the money, and I am sorry for it. That I have myself been a
gainer by my connection with you, I will not attempt to deny, and I do
not think that I should be grateful or a sincere friend to you, if I saw
you now in such grievous and unexpected embarrassments without making an
effort to assist you. You shall have the four hundred, if you consent to
the same rate of interest I was about to receive for it from the other
party.”
“Then you will break faith with him,” replied the doctor. “I thank you,
Purcel, but I will not have it.”
“I break no faith with him,” replied the proctor; “he was bound to have
let me know, on yesterday, whether he would require the money or not,
for the matter was conditional; but as I have not yet heard from him, I
hold myself at liberty to act as I wish. The fault is his own.”
“And on these conditions, so you are; I well, thank you again, Purcel, I
accept this money on your terms, eight per cent. Nay, you oblige me very
much; indeed you do.”
“Well, then, that matter is settled,” said the proctor, “do not speak of
it,” he proceeded, in reply to the doctor's last observation; “I should
indeed be unworthy either of your good opinion or my own, if I held
aloof from you just now. I will have a bond prepared in a day or two,
but in the meantime, if you will call at my house, you may have the
money home with you.”
The doctor once more thanked Mm, and they were in the act of returning
to the house, when the noise of a pistol was heard, and at the same
moment a bullet whistled light between them, and so close to each that
it was utterly impossible to say at which of the two individuals the
murderous aim had been taken. The garden, a large one and highly walled
in, was entered by two gates, one of which led into the back yard, the
other into a corner of the lawn that was concealed from the house by a
clump of trees. The latter gate, which was not so large as the other,
had in it a small iron grating a little above the centre, through which
any one could command a view of the greater portion of the garden. It
was through this gate they had entered, and as no apprehension of any
attempt of assassination had existed in the mind of either, they left
the key in the outside, not having deemed it at all necessary to secure
the door, by locking it within.
The proctor, to whose cowardice the worthy clergyman had not long before
paid so sincere, but by no means so flattering a tribute, did not wait
to make even a single observation, but ran with all his speed towards
the gate, which, to his surprise and mortification, he found locked on
the outside. Apprehensive, however, of a second attack, he beckoned to
his companion to hasten towards the other gate, which was not visible
from that through which the shot had been fired, and in the meantime,
he himself ran also towards it, in order to try whether it might not
be possible to get some view or trace of the assassin. He had a case of
pistols in his hand, for we ought to have told the reader that neither
he nor his sons ever traveled unarmed, and on reaching the back-yard,
he was obliged to make a considerable circuit ere he arrived at the spot
from which the shot had been fired. Here, however, he found no mark
or vestige of a human being, but saw at a glance that the assassin, in
order, to secure time for escape, had locked the door, and either taken
the key with him or thrown it where it could not be found. It was in
vain that he ran in all directions, searched every place likely to
conceal the villain; not a clump of trees or ornamental shrubs remained
unexamined. The search, however, was fruitless. No individual was seen,
nor any clue gained on which even a conjecture could be founded. The
only individual visible was our friend the _Cannie Soogah_, whose loud
and mellow song was the first thing that drew their attention to him, as
he came up a back avenue that led by a private and winding walk round
to the kitchen-door. Purcel, on seeing him, signed hastily with his
hand that he should approach, which the other, observing the
unusual agitation betrayed by his gesture, immediately did at a pace
considerably quickened.
“Here, Cannie,” he shouted out to him, ere he had time to approach,
“here has been an attempt at murder by some cold-blooded and cowardly
assassin, who has, I fear, escaped us!”
“Murdher!” exclaimed the pedlar, “the Lord save and guard us!--for
there's nothin' but murdher in my ears! go where I will of late, it's
nothin' but bloodshed;--sure I cannot sing my harmless bit of a song
along the road, but I'm stopped wid an account of some piece o' murdher
or batthery, or God knows what. An' who was near gettin' it now, Misther
Purcel? Not yourself, I pray Jasus this day!”
“I really cannot say, Cannie; Dr. Turbot and I were walking in the
garden, when some damnable villain discharged a pistol from the gate
here, and the bullet of it whistled right between us both.”
“Whistled, did it!--hell resave it for one bullet, it was fond of mirth
it was; and you can't say which o' you it was whistling for?”
“No, how could I?--it was equally near us both.”
“Bad cess for ever saize him for a murdherin' villain, whoever he was.
You have no notion, Masther Purcel, darlin', where he went to?”
“Not the slightest, Cannie; the villain wouldn't have got off so easily,
only that he had the diabolical cunning to lock the gate outside and
conceal the key: so that whilst I was coming round to the place, he
escaped. Did you meet or see nobody yourself?”
The peddler shut his right hand, slapped it quickly into the palm of his
left. “By the Lomenty tarry,” he exclaimed, “I seen the villain! By the
high horicks, I seen the very man, if I have an eye in my head! A big,
able-bodied villain, wid a pair of thumpin' black whiskers that you
might steal my own out of--and I don't think I can complain myself. He
was comin' up the road from the Carr, and he was turnin' over towards
the bridge there below, so that I only got a short glimpse of him; and
faix, sure enough, as he passed the bridge, I seen him throw something
over the wall of it into the river, which I'd lay my head against the
three kingdoms was the kay o' the gate.”
The proctor paused a little, and then observed, “Ay, faith! I'm sure
you're right, Cannie; I've heard of that villain, and know him from your
description. He is the cowardly ruffian who's said to be at the head or
bottom of these secret combinations that are disgracing and destroying
the country. Yes, I've heard of him.”
“And what did you hear, Misther Purcel?” asked the pedlar, with
undisguised curiosity--.
“No matter now, Cannie; I haven't time to bestow upon the murdering
ruffian: I have my eye on him, however, and so have others. Indeed, I'm
rather inclined to think the hemp has already grown that will hang him.
What dress had he on?”
“Why, sir, he had on a whitish frieze coat, wid big brown buttons; but
there could be no mistakin' the size of his murderin' red whiskers.”
“Red whiskers!--why, you said a moment ago that they were black.”
“Black! hut tut, no, Misther Purcel, I couldn't say that; devil such a
pair of red thumpers ever I seen, barin' upon Rousin' Redhead that was
sent across--for--for--buildin' churches--ha! ha! ha!”
“Why, I'd take my oath you said black,” rejoined the proctor--“that is,
if I have ears to my head.”
“Troth, an' you have Misther Purcel, as brave a pair as a man could
boast of; but the truth is, you wor so much feflustered wid alarm, and
got altogether so much through other, that you didn't know what I said.”
“I did perfectly: you said distinctly that he had black whiskers.”
“Red, by the hokey, over the world; however, to avoid an argument, even
if I did, in mistake, say black, the whiskers were red in the mane time;
an', as I sed, barrin' Rousin' Redhead's, that was thransported, a never
laid my eyes on so red, nor so big I pair.”
“He can't be the fellow I suspect, then--for his, by all accounts, are
unusually large and black.”
“As to that, I can't say, sir: but you wouldn't have me give a wrong
description of any villain that 'ud make an attempt upon your life. Are
you sure, though, it wasn't his reverend honor that the pistol was aimed
at?”
“I am not; as I told you, it is impossible to settle that point. There
is neither of us very popular, certainly.”
“Bekaise, afther all, there is a difference; and it doesn't folly that,
although I'd purshue the villain for life and death, that 'ud attempt to
murdher you, that I'd distress myself to secure an honest man that might
free us an' the country from the like o' him;” and he pointed over his
left shoulder with his inverted thumb.
“Cannie,” said the proctor, somewhat sternly, “I've never heard you give
expression to such sentiments before, and I hope I shall never again. No
honest man would excuse or tamper with murder or murderers. No more of
this, Cannie, or you will lose my good opinion, although perhaps you
would think that no great loss.”
“Throth, I know I was wrong to spake as I did, sir, bad cess to me, but
I was, an' as for your good opinion, Misther Purcel, and the good of all
your family too, devil a man livin' 'ud go further to gain it, and to
keep it when he had it than I would; now, bad cess to the one.”
Whilst this dialogue was proceeding between the pedlar and the proctor.
Dr. Turbot, in a state of indescribable alarm, was relating the
attempted assassination to his curate inside. The amazement of the
latter gentleman, who was perfectly aware of the turbulent state of
the country, by no means kept pace with the alarm of his rector. He
requested of the latter, that should he see Mrs. Temple, he would make
no allusions to the circumstance, especially as she was at the period in
question not far from her confinement, and it was impossible to say
what unpleasant or dangerous effects an abrupt mention of so dreadful a
circumstance might have upon her.
In a few minutes Purcel and his patron were on their way to Longshot
Lodge, the residence of the proctor. At the solicitation of the parson,
however, they avoided the direct line of road, and reached home by one
that was much more circuitous, and as the latter thought also more safe.
Here, after Waiting for the arrival of the mail coach, which he resolved
to meet on its way to the metropolis, he partook of a lunch, which,
even to his voluptuous palate, was one that he could not but admit to be
excellent. He received four hundred pounds from the proctor, for which
he merely gave him a note of hand, and in a short time was on his way to
the metropolis.