Yet in true order must thy heart love me;
For without order can no virtue be.
By thine own virtue, then, I from above
Stand in thy soul; and so, most earnestly,
Must love from turmoil be kept wholly free.
The life of fruitful trees, the seasons of
The circling year, move gently as a dove.
I measured all the things upon the earth;
Love ordered them, and order kept them fair,
And love to order must be truly wed.
O soul! why all this heat of little worth?
Why cast out order with no thought or care?
For by love’s warmth must love be governèd.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
THE LITTLE CHAPEL AT MONAMULLIN.
Situated in the wildest portion of the county of Mayo, Monamullin, at
the date upon which this story opens, mustered about forty mud-cabins
erected here and there, and in such positions as were deemed most
suitable, having regard to the cruel winds from the ocean, and the “bit
o’ ground” for the cultivation of the potatoes.
A cottage covered with a crisp amber thatch, and whitewashed to the
color of the driven snow, held the post of honor in the village. It
boasted a flower-garden in front and a vegetable patch in the rear.
Moreover, it was guarded by a neatly-cropped privet hedge, while a
little green gate admitted to a red-bricked pathway leading to a rustic
porch adorned with roses that seemingly bloomed the whole year round,
and a Virginia creeper whose leaves were now the hue of blood.
In the front garden, his head bared, the rays of the setting sun
surrounding it as with an aureole, stalked a man attired in the black
flowing soutane of a Catholic clergyman.
Father Maurice O’Donnell, the parish priest, was engaged in reading his
office from a tattered and dog’s-eared breviary. Tall and thin almost to
emaciation, there was yet a wiry swing in his gaunt frame that spoke of
unfaded vigor, whilst the glowing fire in the dark blue eye told its own
tale.
“Father Maurice” was loved and cherished by his little flock. His every
want—and his wants were few enough—was anxiously anticipated. His patch
of oats was tilled, weeded, cut, and stacked, his cottage thatched and
whitewashed, his potatoes planted, his pony treated as common property
in so far as fodder was concerned, while upon fast-days the “finest lump
av a salmin” or the “illigantest” turbot, ever found its way to the back
door of “The House,” as his humble abode was somewhat grandiloquently
styled.
Maurice O’Donnell was wrapped up in his flock. In good sooth he was
their shepherd. Night, noon, and morning found him ever watchful at “the
gate in the vineyard wall.” He was the depositary of all their griefs,
the sharer in all their joys—their guide, philosopher, and friend. In
worldly matters he was simple as a child. Living, as he did, out of the
world, he was perfectly contented to learn what was whirling round
within it from the pages of the _Nation_, from the columns of which it
was his practice to read aloud on Sunday afternoon to a very large
muster, if not to the entire adult population, of Monamullin—in summer
time seated in a coign of vantage by the sad sea-wave, in winter
opposite a rousing turf fire laid on especially for the important
occasion, and with a great display of ceremony by his housekeeper, “an
ould widdy wumman” rejoicing in the name of Clancy, whose husband had
been lost at sea in the night of “the great storm.”
Father Maurice never asked for money—he had no occasion for it. His
solitary extravagance was snuff, and the most sedulous care was taken by
the “boys” returning from Castlebar or Westport to fetch back a supply
of “high toast,” in order that his “riverince’s box” might stand
constantly replenished.
Upon this particular August evening Father Maurice was hurrying through
his office with as much rapidity as the solemn nature of the duty would
permit, as a drive of no less than seven honest Irish miles lay between
him and his dinner.
The even tenor of his life had been broken in upon by an invitation to
dine and sleep at the palatial residence of Mr. Jocelyn Jyvecote, a
Yorkshire squire, who had purchased the old acres of the Blakes of
Ballinacor, and who had recently expended a fabulous sum in erecting a
castle upon the edge of a gloomy lake in the desolate valley of
Glendhanarrahsheen. In his letter of invitation Mr. Jyvecote had said:
“I am extremely desirous of introducing my youngest daughter to you, as
she has taken it into her head to go over to your church; and, since you
are so devoted to _her_ interests, I beg of you to accept this
invitation as you would undertake a little extra duty.”
To decline would be worse than ungracious, especially under the peculiar
circumstances of the case, and it was with a heavy heart, and not
without a keen debate with Mr. Lawrence Muldoon, the “warm” man of the
village, in which the _pros_ and _cons_ were duly and gravely weighed,
that the worthy priest replied in the affirmative. While Father Maurice
was engaged in pacing his little garden, Mrs. Clancy, his housekeeper,
was calmly preparing for a steady but copious enjoyment of her evening
meal in the kitchen, which from floor to ceiling, from fireplace to
dresser—shining again with crockery of the willow pattern—was, to use
her own expression, “as nate as a new-biled egg.” A large brown
earthenware teapot had just been promoted from the hob to a table
“convaynient” to the window. A huge platter of stirabout, with a lump of
butter oiling itself in the middle, stood within easy reach of her right
hand, while a square of griddle-bread occupied a like position upon her
left, and a wooden bowl full of jacket-bursted potatoes formed the near
background.
Mrs. Clancy was strong upon tea, and in the village her opinion upon
this as upon most other subjects was unwritten law. She was particularly
fond of a dash of green through a full-flavored Pekoe, preparing the
mixture with her own fair hands with a solemn gravity befitting so
serious an undertaking. She was now about to try a sample of Souchong
which had just arrived from Westport, and her condition of mind was akin
to that of an analytical chemist upon the eve of some exceedingly
important result.
Mrs. Clancy had seated herself in that cosy attitude peculiar to elderly
females about to enjoy, to them, that most inviting of all meals, and
had already ascertained, upon anxious reference to the teapot, that its
contents had been sufficiently drawn, when the door was thrust somewhat
violently open, and Murty Mulligan, the “priest’s boy,” unceremoniously
entered the _sanctum_.
Murty was handy-man and _factotum_. He “swep out” the chapel, rang the
bell, attended Mass, groomed the pony, dug the potatoes, landed the
cabbage, and made himself generally useful.
Although designated a “boy,” he had allowed—not that he could claim any
particular option in the matter—some forty-five summers to roll over his
head, every one of which, in addition to their attendant winters, had
been passed in the peaceful little village of Monamullin. His travels
had never extended further than Westport, which he regarded as a vast
commercial seaport—a Liverpool, in fact—and it was his habit to place it
in comparison with any city of note that might come upon the _tapis_,
extolling its dimensions and dilating upon its unlimited importance.
Murty’s appearance savored much of the stage Irishman’s. His eyes
sparkled comically, his nose was tip-tilted—Mr. Tennyson will excuse the
application of the simile—while his mouth was large and always open. His
forehead was rather low, and his ears stood out upon either side of his
head like the orifices of air-shafts. He was now arrayed in his bravest
attire, as he had been told off to drive his reverence to Moynalty
Castle. His brogues were as highly greased as his hair, and his
Sunday—last Mass—clothes, consisting of a gray frieze body-coat with
brass buttons, a flowered silk waistcoat, corduroy knee-breeches, and
blue worsted stockings, looked as fresh as if they had been donned for
the first time.
Not a little vain of the importance of his office, combined with the
general effect of his appearance, he swaggered into the kitchen in a
manner totally at variance with his usual custom, as Mrs. Clancy was
every inch queen of this realm, and a potentate who exercised her
prerogative with right royal despotism.
The “consait” was considerably taken out of Murty by being met with an
angry, contemptuous stare and “What ails ye, Murty Mulligan?”
“It’s time for to bring round the yoke, ma’am,” replied Murty in an
abashed and respectful tone, eyeing the teapot with a wistful glance, as
he was particularly partial to a cup of the beverage it distilled,
especially when brewed by Mrs. Clancy.
“Well, av it is, bring it round,” was the tart rejoinder.
“I dunna how far he’s upon his office,” said Murty.
“Ye’d betther ax, Murty Mulligan.”
“I dar’n’t disturb him, Mrs. Clancy, an’ ye know that as well as I do
meself, ma’am.”
“Well, don’t bother me, anyhow,” observed the lady, proceeding to pour
out a cup of tea.
“Is that the tay I brought ye from Westport, ma’am?” demanded Murty,
upon whom the sight of the rich brown fluid and its pungent aroma were
producing longing effects.
Mrs. Clancy took a preliminary sip with the sound of a person
endeavoring to suck a coy oyster from a clinging shell.
“Sorra worse tay I ever wetted,” she retorted. “There’s no more
substance in it nor in chopped sthraw. I’ll never take a grain o’ tay
out o’ Westport agin—sorra a wan.”
“I done me best for ye, anyhow, ma’am. I axed Misther Foley himself for
the shupariorest tay in the town, an’ he gim me what’s in that pot; an’,
faix, it smells rosy an’ well.” And Murty sniffed, as if he would drive
the aroma up through his nostrils out to the top of his head.
Mrs. Clancy turned to Murty with a frowning and ominous aspect, the
glare of an intense irritation blazing in her face.
“Do ye know what I think ye done, Murty Mulligan? It’s me belief ye done
it, an’ if ye tuk the buke to the conthrairy I wudn’t credit ye,”
placing her arms akimbo and fixing him with her eye.
“What is it I done, Mrs. Clancy?” demanded Murty boldly, flinging his
caubeen upon the floor and assuming a defiant attitude. “What is it I
done, ma’am?”
The housekeeper regarded him steadily, while she said in a slow and
solemn tone of impeachment:
“Ye got me infayrior tay, an’ ye tuk a pint out av the change.”
It was Murty’s turn to become indignant now.
“I’d scorn for to do the likes of so mane an action, Mrs. Clancy.
There’s them that wud do the like, but I’d have ye know, ma’am, that me
father’s son wud rather be as dhry as a cuckoo, ma’am, nor demane
himself in that way. Yer sentiments, ma’am, is very hurtful to me
feelin’s, an’ I’d as lieve ye’d call me a thief at wanst, ma’am, as for
to run down me karakter in that a-way.”
“I don’t want for to call ye nothin’, but I repate that—”
“Don’t repate nothin’, ma’am. Av ye wur a man I’d give ye a crack in the
gob for daarin’ to asperge me karakter, more betokin all for the sake av
the filthy lucre av a pint of porther. Porther, indeed!” added Murty.
“I’m goin’ to-day, ma’am, where I’ll get me fill av port wine, an’
sherry wine, and Madayrial wine, ma’am; an’ dickins resave the word I’ll
tell ye av the goin’s-on at the castle beyant for yer thratemint av me
this blessed evenin’, Mrs. Clancy.”
This threat upon the part of Murty threw the housekeeper into the
uttermost consternation. The proceedings at Moynalty Castle were fraught
with the deepest interest to her; for in addition to her personal
curiosity, which was rampant, it was necessary that she should become
acquainted with everything that took place, in order to retail her
special knowledge to her cronies in the village, who awaited the
housekeeper’s report in eager and hopeful expectation.
Had she burnt her boats? Had she cut down the bridge behind her?
Murty Mulligan’s tone was resolute.
“Murty, Murty avic! shure it’s only jokin’ I was—sorra a more,” she said
in a coaxing way.
Murty grunted.
“Shure yer welkim to yer pint av—”
Murty confronted her:
“I tell ye, Missis Clancy, that I tuk nothin’, nayther bit, bite, nor
sup, from the time I et me brekquest till I met Misther Fogarty’s own
boy, and he thrated me. Av I tuk a pint out av yer lucre, ma’am, I’d say
it at wanst, wudout batin’ about the bush.”
“That’s enough, Murty; say no more about the tay. They gev ye a bad
matarial, Murty, an’ shure that’s none o’ you’re fault. Here,” she
added, pouring out a saucerful—the saucer being about the dimensions of
a large soup-plate—and presenting it to him; “put that to yer mouth an’
say is it worth three hapence an ounce?”
“Sorra a care I care,” growled Murty, but in a much softer tone.
“Thry it, anyhow,” urged the housekeeper.
“I don’t care a _thraneen_ for tay, Mrs. Clancy,” said Murty, throwing a
glance full of profound meaning towards a small press in which Mrs.
Clancy kept a supply of cordials.
“Ah!” exclaimed that lady, “I see be the twist in yer eye that ye want
somethin’ to put betune yer shammy an’ the cowld. Ye have a long road to
thravel, Murty, so a little sup o’ ginger cordial will warm it for ye,
avic.” And while the now thoroughly pacified Murty gently remonstrated,
Mrs. Clancy proceeded to the cupboard, and, pouring a _golliogue_ of the
grateful compound into a tea-cup, handed it to Murty, who tossed it off
with a smack that would have started a coach and four.
“So ye’ll stop the night at the castle?” observed the housekeeper in a
careless tone.
“Yis, ma’am.”
“It’s a fine billet, Murty.”
“Sorra a finer. Shure it bates Lord Sligo’s an’ Mitchell Hinry’s beyant
at Kylemore; an’ as for atin’ an’ dhrinkin’, be me song they say that
lamb-chops is as plentiful as cabbages is here, an’ that there’s as much
sperrits in it as wud float ould Mickey Killeher’s lugger.”
“It’s a quare thing for Misther Jyvecote for to be axin’ Father Maurice
to a forrin’ cunthry like that, Murty.”
“Troth, thin, it is quare, ma’am; but, shure, mebbe he wants for to be
convarted.”
“That must be it; an’ he’d be bet intirely, av Father Maurice wasn’t
there for to back his tack. His sermon last Sunda’ was fit for the Pope
o’ Room.”
“I never heerd the like av it. It flogged Europe. Whisht!” suddenly
cried Murty, “who’s this comin’ up the shore?”
“It’s a forriner,” exclaimed the housekeeper, after a prolonged
scrutiny—meaning by the term foreigner that the person who was now
approaching the cottage was not an inhabitant of the village. “A fine,
souple boy,” she added admiringly.
“It’s a gintleman, an’ he has a lump av a stick in his hand,” said
Murty.
“Arrah! what wud bring a gintleman _here_, ye omadhawn?” observed Mrs.
Clancy with some asperity.
“A thraveller, thin,” suggested her companion. “He’s a bag on his back.”
“Troth, it’s badly off he’d be for thravellin’, if he come here for to
do the like.”
“He’s makin’ for the gate.”
“He’s riz the latch.”
“I’ll run out, Mrs. Clancy, and bring ye the hard word, while ye’d be
axin’ for the lind av a sack.”
“Ay, do, Murty avic; an’ I’ll have a cup av Dimpsy’s tay wet be the time
yer back.”
* * * * *
Father Maurice had just finished the perusal of his office, and was in
the act of returning to the house, when the stranger approached him.
“Father Morris?” said the new-comer, lifting his hat.
“Maurice O’Donnell, at your service, sir,” replied the priest.
“I should apologize for addressing you so familiarly, reverend sir, but
three or four persons of whom I asked my way told me that Father Morris
was Monamullin, and that Monamullin was Father Morris.”
“My people invariably address me by my Christian name, and I beg, sir,
as you are now within my bailiwick, that _you_ will continue to do so.”
“As I _am_ within your bailiwick, I must needs do your bidding, Father
Maurice.”
Such a genial, happy voice! Such frank, kind blue eyes! Such a well
knit, strong-built figure!
The priest gazed at a young man of about five-and-twenty, six feet high,
with crisp brown curly hair, beard _en Henri Quatre_, broad forehead,
and manly, sunburnt neck and face, attired in a suit of light homespun
tweed, a blue flannel shirt very open at the throat, a scarlet silk tie
knotted sailor fashion, and heavy shoes, broad-toed and thick-soled.
“My name is Brown,” he said. “I am an artist. I have walked over from
Castlebar. I am doing picturesque bits of this lovely country—not your
confounded beaten tracks, but the nooks which must be sought like the
violet. I have very little money, and needs must rough it. This stick
and knapsack constitute my _impedimenta_, and, like Cæsar, I have
carried my Commentaries before now in my teeth while bridging a river by
swimming it. I asked for the inn, and I was referred to Father Maurice.”
“I can answer for it, Mr. Brown, that you will find every house in
Monamullin willing to shelter you; and, further, that you will find this
to be possibly the best. I am unfortunately compelled to travel seven
miles along the coast to-night, but will be back, please God, to-morrow;
in the meantime my housekeeper will try what some broiled fish and a
dish of ham and eggs can do towards appeasing what ought to be a giant’s
appetite. And I can answer for the sheets being well aired, having
pulled the lavender myself in which they are periodically enshrined.”
Father Maurice ushered his guest into the cottage with a welcome so
genuine that Mr. Brown felt at his ease almost ere the greeting had died
upon the priest’s lips, and proceeded to hang up his hat and knapsack
with the air of a man who was completely at home.
The neat little parlor was cosily furnished. A genuine bit of Domingo
mahogany stood in the centre of the room, and round it half a dozen
plump horse-haired, brass-nailed chairs, with a “Come and sit on us, we
are not for show” air about them peculiarly inviting. A venerable
bureau, black as ebony from age, and brass-mounted, ornamented one
corner, and opposite to it a plaster-of-paris bust of Pius IX. upon a
fluted pedestal, while the recesses at either side of the fireplace were
furnished with antique book-cases containing a well-thumbed library of
ecclesiastical literature, the works of St. Augustine being prominently
conspicuous. Over the mantel-piece hung a portrait of Daniel O’Connell,
with the autograph of the Liberator in a small frame beneath, and at his
right and left engravings, and of no mean order either, of Henry Grattan
and John Philpot Curran. The walls were adorned with copies of the
cartoons of Raphael, a view of Croagh Patrick from Clew Bay, a
bird’s-eye glance at St. Peter’s, and an illuminated address from the
inhabitants of Monamullin to their beloved pastor upon the completion of
his thirtieth year on the mission—an address the composition of which
conferred undying renown upon Tim Rafferty, the schoolmaster, and begat
for the boy who wrote it a fame only second to that of the erudite
pedagogue.
“You are delightfully snug here, Father Maurice,” observed his guest,
seating himself and glancing admiringly round the apartment. “What a
treasure of an antique bureau! Why, the brokers in London are giving any
amount of money for such articles; we are all running mad over them. If
you could get it whispered that Dean Swift or Joe Addison worked at that
desk, it would be worth its weight in gold. It’s Queen Anne now or
nothing.”
“You are an Englishman?”
“A base, bloody, and brutal Saxon!”
“We have one of your countrymen residing in this part of the country—a
Mr. Jyvecote.”
The stranger started. “Any of the Jyvecotes of Marston Moor, in
Yorkshire?”
“_The_ Jyvecote, I believe. He came over here about ten years ago to
shoot, taking poor Mr. Bodkin Blake’s Lodge in the valley of
Glendhanarrahsheen, and—”
“Oh! do say that word again, it is so delightfully soft—a cross between
Italian and Japanese,” burst in the artist.
“Glendhanarrahsheen,” repeated Father Maurice. “We have some softer than
that. What think you of Tharramacornigaun? But, as I was saying, Mr.
Jyvecote liked the valley so much that he brought his family over in the
following year. Mr. Jyvecote was delighted with the place, and he bought
the Lodge, extended it, and at length determined upon building a castle.
This castle—Moynalty Castle he calls it—was completed about three years
ago, the bare walls alone costing seventy thousand pounds. Except the
Viceregal Lodge in Dublin,” added the priest, “there is nothing so grand
in all Ireland.”
“I must walk over there some day. Which way does it lie?”
“It’s between us and Westport, along the coast, almost out upon a rock.”
“What a strange idea to put such a lot of money into such a corner!”
“Is it not? It’s completely out of the world. The nearest railway
station is fifty miles.”
“Then I forgive Mr. Jyvecote. I take off my hat to him. I congratulate
him. O my dear Father Maurice!” exclaimed the artist enthusiastically,
“you who live in such tender tranquillity, with the moan of the sea for
a lullaby, can know nothing of the ecstatic feeling attendant upon
leaving steam fifty miles behind one. It is simply a new, a beatific
existence! And so Jocelyn Jyvecote is within ten miles,” he added, more
in the tone of a person engaged in thinking aloud than by way of
observation.
“Are you acquainted with him?” asked the priest.
“Oh! yes—that is, very slightly.” There was a decided shade of
embarrassment in his manner that would have struck an ordinary observer,
but the simple-minded clergyman failed to notice it.
“The yoke’s at the doore, yer riverince, an’ if we don’t start at wanst
we’ll be bet be the hill beyant Thronig na Coppagh,” shouted Murty
Mulligan, thrusting his shock head into the apartment.
“How unfortunately this happens!” exclaimed the priest. “I have not
slept out of this cottage for nearly thirty years, and the very night I
could have wished to be here I am compelled to go elsewhere. However,
Mr. Brown, I shall leave you in good hands, and before I start I must
make you acquainted with my housekeeper.”
Murty had returned to the kitchen considerably baffled.
“He’s goin’ for to stop the night, Mrs. Clancy,” he reported to the
expectant housekeeper.
“Who’s goin’ for to stop the night?”
“The strange gintleman above.”
“Where is he goin’ for to stop, I’d like for to know? Mrs. Dooly’s
childre is down wud maysles. The gauger is billeted at Mooney’s—”
“He’s goin’ to stop here in this house. I heerd his riverince axin’
him.”
“Arrah, _baithershin_!” exclaimed Mrs. Clancy incredulously.
“It’s truth I’m tellin’ ye, ma’am.”
“Well, may—”
At this moment the voice of Father Maurice was heard calling, “Mrs.
Clancy.”
“Yer wanted, ma’am,” cried Murty.
“I’m not fit for to be seen. Slip up an’ discoorse him, Murty avic, till
I put on a clane cap an’ apron.”
“Mrs. Clancy, you will take good care of this gentleman, Mr. Brown, till
I come back. Show your skill in frying eggs and bacon, and in turning
out a platter of stirabout. Don’t let the hens cheat him of his fresh
egg in the morning, and see that his bed is as comfortable as my own.”
And seating himself upon one side of the low-backed jaunting-car, with
Murty Mulligan upon the other, and with a courteous farewell to his
guest, Father Maurice rapidly disappeared in the direction of the valley
of Glendhanarrahsheen.
Mr. Brown stood in the middle of the road gazing after the car, his
hands plunged into his breeches pockets, and a sweet little bit of
meerschaum stuck in his handsome mouth.