Produced by Al Haines
[Frontispiece: THE CLERGYMAN'S VISIT TO TOR BAY.]
A CHILD OF THE GLENS;
OR,
Elsie's Fortunes.
PUBLISHED UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THE
COMMITTEE OF GENERAL LITERATURE AND EDUCATION,
APPOINTED BY THE SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING
CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE
LONDON:
SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE
SOLD AT THE DEPOSITORIES:
77, GREAT QUEEN STREET, LINCOLN'S INN FIELDS;
4, ROYAL EXCHANGE; 48, PICCADILLY;
AND BY ALL BOOKSELLERS.
NEW YORK: POTT, YOUNG & CO.
1875
Illustrations
The clergyman's visit to Tor Bay . . . . . . _Frontispiece_
A strange waif of the sea
Jim building castles-in-the-air.
A CHILD OF THE GLENS;
or,
Elsie's Fortunes.
CHAPTER I.
Doubtless some of our readers are acquainted with the noble "coast
road" that skirts round the north-eastern corner of Ireland, extending,
it might almost be said, from Belfast to Londonderry. The
characteristic features of this noble esplanade (for such it is) are
chiefly to be seen between the little town of Larne, where the railway
ends, and Cushendall. Throughout this drive of forty miles you are
never out of sight or sound of the sea. The almost level road is seen
far ahead of the traveller, like a white boundary line between cliff
and wave. You wonder at first if the road was made merely to gladden
the tourist, for it does not seem likely that there could be much
traffic other than that of pleasure-seekers thus along the margin of
the sea. The configuration of this part of the County Antrim, however,
explains the position of the road, and justifies the engineer who was
so happily enabled to combine the utilitarian with the romantic. A
series of deep cut gorges, locally known as "The Glens," intersect the
country, running at right angles to the coast-line and thus forming a
succession of gigantic ridges, over which it would be impossible to
drive a road. For this reason it has been found necessary to wind
round the mouths of these romantic valleys, which are guarded and shut
off from each other by a number of formidable and noble headlands,
foremost among which ranks the beautiful Garron Point. Thus a
succession of surprises await the tourist. Having fairly made your way
between the foot of the towering cliff and the inflowing tide, with no
prospect in front but huge and grotesque-shaped rocks, which look bent
on opposing all further advance, you suddenly find that you have
doubled the point. A blue bay opens before you, shut in at its farther
side by the next promontory, at the base of which you can distinctly
trace the white streak of dusty road, that sweeps round the bay in a
graceful semicircle. To your left--or while you are speaking, almost
directly ahead--is the wide opening of one of the "Glens"--sweet,
retired abodes of peace, sheltered and happy as they look out forever
on the sea. The barren and rocky highlands, terminated by the wild
bluffs that so courageously plunge themselves into the waves, become
gradually softened and verdure-clad as they slope downward, while the
narrow valley itself is studded with trees and pretty homesteads.
The people of "The Glens" are peculiar, primitive, and distinct. In
these shut-in retreats the ancient Irish and Roman Catholic element
largely prevails. When, in consequence of frequent rebellions, the
original inhabitants were well-nigh exterminated, and their places
taken by Scotch and English settlers, the natives found a refuge in the
wilder and more remote parts of the country. Thus, here and there in
Ulster--generally known as "Protestant Ulster"--we come upon little
nooks and nests where for two centuries the primitive Irish race has
survived. Naturally, living in the presence of their more pushing and
prosperous Presbyterian neighbours, these last representatives of a
conquered nationality are for the most part of a retiring and
suspicious disposition. In quiet country places there is seldom any
manifestation of open hostility, and intermarriages and neighbourly
feeling have done much to smooth away the edge of bitter memories, but
at bottom there remains a radical difference of sentiment, as of creed,
which constitutes an impassable, though for the most invisible, barrier.
Michael McAravey was a good specimen of the old Ulster Roman Catholic.
He was a tall, powerful man, of nearly seventy at the time when our
story opens, while he did not look sixty. His hair was long,
iron-grey, and wiry, and it was only when uncovered that the high,
bald, wrinkled forehead gave indication of his real age. A rebel at
heart, the son of a man who had been "out" in '98, Michael had gone
through life with a feeling that every man's hand was against him.
Sober, self-reliant, and hard-working, the man was grasping and hard as
flint. By tradition and instinct a bitter enemy to Protestantism, he
was not on that account a friend of the priest, or a particularly
faithful son of the Church. He had his own "notions" about things, and
though a professed "Catholic," his neighbours used to speculate whether
age or sickness would ever have power to bend that proud spirit, and
bring Michael to confession and a humble reception of the "last rites"
of the Church. Early in life McAravey had married a Presbyterian girl,
and the almost inevitable estrangement that results from a "mixed
marriage" had cast its shadow over the lives of the pair. The Kanes
had belonged to the small and rigid body of "Covenanters," and never a
Sabbath from childhood till her marriage had 'Lisbeth failed to walk
the four rough, up-hill, dreary miles that separated her father's home
from the meeting-house that rose alone, and stern as the Covenant
itself, on the bleak moorland above Glenariff. But her last
Sabbath-day's journey was taken the week before her wedding. Michael
had gloomily announced that no wife of his should be seen going to a
"meeting-house," and though he never sought to bring her to mass
(perhaps in part because it might have involved going himself), his
resolution never varied. Nor did his wife contend against it. The
habit once broken, she felt no inclination to undertake those long and
wearisome journeys. But a Covenanter she meant to live and die.
Nothing would have tempted her into the Presbyterian chapel close by.
And thus when there came two children to be baptized the difficulty as
to religion was compromised, and a triumph allowed to neither side, by
the babes being solemnly received into the compassionate and truly
Catholic fold of what was then the Established Church. That both these
little ones had been taken away by death was a misfortune, and tended
to harden even more the somewhat disagreeable and rigid lines that
marked the individuality of both Mr. and Mrs. McAravey.
Not that the home thus early laid desolate was altogether unblessed by
young faces. For many years the McAraveys had had charge of two little
children, who called them father and mother. But, as it was quite
evident that no such relationship as this could exist, so it came to be
generally understood that there was no tie of blood at all. What
connection there might be, or who the children were, was a mystery none
had ever solved, nor was it likely that any inquiries--if such had ever
been ventured upon--had met with much encouragement on the part of
"auld Mike" or his equally taciturn wife.
Though the Antrim glens had been the scene of such courtship as it is
possible to conceive of between Michael McAravey and Elizabeth Kane,
they had for many years ceased to be the place of their abode.
Previous to the opening of our tale, McAravey had fallen into the
tenant-right and goodwill of a farm held by an elder and unmarried
brother, and hither he had accordingly moved with his wife, now past
middle-age, and the two little ones that called her mother. To find
the spot where the McAraveys now lived--a spot yet more retired and
more lovely than any in the glens properly so called--we must once more
return to the great "coast road." Having reached Cushendall, the
scenery becomes more imposing, and the high background almost deserves
the name of a mountain. Here, at length, the rugged and towering
coast-line successfully defies further violation of its lonely majesty.
Accordingly the baffled road bends abruptly to the left, and turning
its back upon the sea proceeds to climb the long, dreary slope of a
flat-topped, uninteresting mountain, and then, having reached the
highest point (which is scarcely to be discerned), descends, till once
more the sea is come upon at the secluded little country town of
Ballycastle. The extreme northeast point of Ireland is thus cut off,
and thus the ordinary tourist is cut off too, from one of Nature's most
fairy-like retreats. On looking back from Ballycastle you at once
perceive the necessity for your bleak and tedious mountain drive. The
eye immediately catches and rests fascinated upon the gigantic and
literally overhanging precipice of Fair Head, as it rears its peculiar
and acute-angled summit against the sky. One look, and you are
convinced that no road could wind its way round the base of that
frowning monster. But let us strive to penetrate this cut-off region
either on foot across the moors, or by the rough mountain road that
suffices for the wants of the few and scattered residents. Standing
(sometimes not without difficulty) on the pitched-up edge of the mighty
headland, and gazing on the remote sea beneath, you feel oppressed by
the sense of Nature's vastness and your own insignificance. Nor does
the dreary extent of rock and pool-dotted moor that stretches inland to
the very horizon afford any relief to such feelings. So you turn away
in search of rest and shelter. Then but a comparatively few downward
steps and you find that the tempestuous wind has ceased to wrangle with
you; already you are beneath the shadow of the great rock. Descending
further, the bleak aspect of Nature is transformed. The heather gives
place to dwarf shrubs; the bare, weather-beaten rocks are clothed with
blackberry bushes, or hidden amid luxurious bracken. Dark hollies
clinging to detached rocks present varied and life-like forms. The air
has suddenly become still. The butterflies hover over the foxgloves.
The wild strawberry is at your feet. The sloeberries ripen around you.
The sea before you might be the Mediterranean, so gently does it ripple
up to the very edge of the hundred tiny plants that force their way
amid the sand. Great rock bastions shut you in on either side, and
behind, the green slope you had descended rises upward till it meets
the blue sky beyond. You might be in the south of England rather than
in the "black north" of Ireland; and you are struck with the probably
accidental suggestiveness of the name--Tor Bay. It was here that
McAravey's lot was cast, and here that Elsie and Jim used in their
leisure hours to gather the strawberries and stain themselves with
sloes.