Humours of Irish Life Part 22

"Why, I think you'd better not, because, ye see, maybe I might be troublesome to ye in the night, though I'll not, if I can help it; and it might be uncomfortable to you to be here if I was to get one of the fits."

"One of the fits! Why, it's not possible, sir," said I, "you would travel in a public conveyance in the state you mention; your friends surely would not permit it?"

"Why, if they knew, perhaps," slily responded the interesting invalid--"if they knew, they might not exactly like it; but ye see, I escaped only last night, and there'll be a fine hubbub in the morning when they find I'm off; though I'm thinking Rooney's barking away by this time."

"Rooney barking!--why, what does that mean?"

"They always bark for a day or two after they're bit, if the infection comes first from the dog."

"You are surely not speaking of _hydrophobia_?" said I, my hair actually bristling with horror and consternation.

"Ain't I?" replied he; "maybe you've guessed it, though."

"And you have the malady on you at present?" said I trembling for the answer.

"This is the ninth day since I took to biting," said he, gravely.

"And with such a propensity, sir, do you think yourself warranted in travelling in a public coach, exposing others----"

"You'd better not raise your voice that way. If I'm roused it'll be worse for ye, that's all."

"Well, but, is it exactly prudent, in your present delicate state, to undertake a journey?"

"Ah," said he, with a sigh, "I've been longing to see the fox-hounds throw off near Kilkenny; these three weeks I've been thinking of nothing else; but I'm not sure how my nerves will stand the cry; I might be troublesome."

"Well," thought I, "I shall not select that morning for my debut in the field."

"I hope, sir, there's no river or watercourse in this road; anything else I can, I hope, control myself against; but water--running water particularly--makes me troublesome."

Well knowing what he meant by the latter phrase, I felt the cold perspiration settling on my forehead as I remembered that we must be within about ten or twelve miles of a bridge, where we should have to pa.s.s a very wide river. I strictly concealed this fact from him, however. He now sank into a kind of moody silence, broken occasionally by a low, muttering noise, as if speaking to himself.

How comfortable my present condition was I need scarcely remark, sitting vis-a-vis to a lunatic, with a pair of pistols in his possession, who had already avowed his consciousness of his tendency to do mischief, and his inability to master it--all this in the dark, and in the narrow limits of a mail-coach, where there was scarcely room for defence, and no possibility of escape. If I could only reach the outside of the coach I would be happy. What were rain and storm, thunder and lightning compared with the chance that awaited me here?--wet through I should inevitably be: but, then, I had not yet contracted the horror of moisture my friend opposite laboured under. Ha! what is that?--is it possible he can be asleep;--is it really a snore? Ah, there it is again;--he must be asleep, surely;--now, then, is my time, or never. I slowly let down the window of the coach, and, stretching forth my hand, turned the handle cautiously and slowly; I next disengaged my legs, and by a long, continuous effort of creeping, I withdrew myself from the seat, reached the step, when I muttered something very like thanksgiving to Providence for my rescue. With little difficulty I now climbed up beside the guard, whose astonishment at my appearance was indeed considerable.

Well, on we rolled, and very soon, more dead than alive, I sat a ma.s.s of wet clothes, like a morsel of black and spongy wet cotton at the bottom of a schoolboy's ink-bottle, saturated with rain and the black dye of my coat. My hat, too, had contributed its share of colouring matter, and several long, black streaks coursed down my "wrinkled front," giving me very much the air of an Indian warrior who had got the first priming of his war paint. I certainly must have been a rueful object, were I only to judge from the faces of the waiters as they gazed on me when the coach drew up at Rice and Walsh's Hotel.

Cold, wet, and weary as I was, my curiosity to learn more of my late agreeable companion was strong as ever within me. I could catch a glimpse of his back, and hurried after the great unknown into the coffee room. By the time I entered, he was spreading himself comfortably, _a l'Anglais_, before the fire, and displayed to my wandering and stupefied gaze the pleasant features of Dr. Finucane.

"Why, Doctor--Doctor Finucane," cried I, "is it possible? Were you, then, really the inside in the mail last night?"

"Not a doubt of it, Mr. Lorrequer; and may I make bould to ask were you the outside?"

"Then what, may I beg to know, did you mean by your story about Barney Doyle, and the hydrophobia, and Cusack Rooney's thumb--eh?"

"Oh!" said Finucane, "this will be the death of me. And it was you that I drove outside in all the rain last night? Oh, it will kill Father Malachi outright with laughing when I tell him." And he burst out into a fit of merriment that nearly induced me to break his head with a poker.

"Am I to understand, then, Mr. Finucane, that this practical joke of yours was contrived for my benefit and for the purpose of holding me up to the ridicule of your acquaintances?"

"Nothing of the kind," said Fin., drying his eyes, and endeavouring to look sorry and sentimental. "If I had only the least suspicion in life that it was you, I'd not have had the hydrophobia at all--and, to tell you the truth, you were not the only one frightened--you alarmed me, too."

"I alarmed you! Why, how can that be?"

"Why, the real affair is this: I was bringing these two packages of notes down to my cousin Callaghan's bank in Cork--fifteen thousand pounds, and when you came into the coach at Naas, I thought it was all up with me. The guard just whispered in my ear that he saw you look at the priming of your pistols before getting in. Well, when you got seated, the thought came into my mind that maybe, highwayman as you were, you would not like dying an unnatural death, more particularly if you were an Irishman; and so I trumped up that long story about the hydrophobia, and the gentleman's thumb, and dear knows what besides; and, while I was telling it, the cold perspiration was running down my head and face, for every time you stirred I said to myself--Now he'll do it. Two or three times, do you know, I was going to offer you ten s.h.i.+llings in the pound, to spare my life; and once, G.o.d forgive me, I thought it would not be a bad plan to shoot you by 'mistake,' do you perceive?"

"Why, I'm very much obliged to you for your excessively kind intentions; but, really, I feel you have done quite enough for me on the present occasion. But, come now, doctor, I must get to bed, and, before I go, promise me two things--to dine with us to-day at the mess, and not to mention a syllable of what occurred last night: it tells, believe me, very badly for both. So keep the secret; for if these fellows of ours ever get hold of it I may sell out, and quit the army;--I'll never hear the end of it!"

"Never fear, my boy; trust me. I'll dine with you, and you're as safe as a church mouse for anything I'll tell them; so now, you'd better change your clothes, for I'm thinking it rained last night."

The Battle of Aughrim.

_From "Anna Cosgrave," an unpublished Novel._

BY WILLIAM CARLETON.

Many of our readers will be surprised at what we are about to relate.

Nay, what is more, we fear they will not yield us credence, but impute it probably to our own invention; whereas we beg to a.s.sure them that it is strictly and literally true. The period of the scene we are about to describe may be placed in the year 1806. At the time neither party feeling nor religious animosity had yet subsided after the ferment of the '98 insurrection and the division between the Catholic and Protestant population was very strong and bitter. The rebellion, which commenced in its first principles among the northern Presbyterians and other Protestant cla.s.ses in a spirit of independence and a love of liberty, soon, in consequence of the influence of some bigots, a.s.sumed the character of a civil war between the two religions,--the most internecine description of war that ever devastated a country or drenched it in blood.

A usual amus.e.m.e.nt at the time was to reproduce the "Battle of Aughrim,"

in some s.p.a.cious barn, with a winnowing-cloth for the curtain. This play, bound up with "The Siege of Londonderry," was one of the reading-books in the hedge schools of that day, and circulated largely among the people of all religions: it had, indeed, a most extraordinary influence among the lower cla.s.ses. "The Battle of Aughrim," however, because it was written in heroic verse, became so popular that it was rehea.r.s.ed at almost every Irish hearth, both Catholic and Protestant, in the north. The spirit it evoked was irresistible. The whole country became dramatic. To repeat it at the fireside in winter nights was nothing: the Orangemen should act it, and show to the whole world how the field of Aughrim was so gloriously won. The consequence was that frequent rehearsals took place. The largest and most s.p.a.cious barns and kilns were fitted up, the night of representation was given out, and crowds, even to suffocation, as they say, a.s.sembled to witness the celebrated "Battle of Aughrim."

At first, it was true, the Orangemen had it all to themselves. This, however, could not last. The Catholics felt that they were as capable of patronising the drama as the victors of Aughrim. A strong historic spirit awoke among them. They requested of the Orangemen to be allowed the favour of representing the Catholic warriors of the disastrous field, and, somewhat to their surprise, the request was immediately granted. The Orangemen felt that there was something awkward and not unlike political apostasy in acting the part of Catholics in the play, under any circ.u.mstances, no matter how dramatic. It was consequently agreed that the Orangemen should represent the officers of the great man on whose name and t.i.tle their system had been founded, and the Catholics should represent their own generals and officers under the name of St.

Ruth, Sarsfield, and Colonel O'Neill. The first representation of this well-known play took place in the town of Au----. During the few weeks before the great night nothing was heard but incessant repet.i.tions and rehearsals of the play.

The fact of this enactment of the play by individuals so strongly opposed to each other both in religion and politics excited not only an unusual degree of curiosity, but some apprehension as to the result, especially when such language as this was heard:--

"We licked them before," said the Orangemen, "an' by j.a.pers, we'll lick them again. Jack Tait acts General Jingle, an' he's the boy will show them what chance a Papist has against a Prodestan!"

"Well, they bate us at Aughrim," said the Catholics, "but with Tam Whiskey at our head, we'll turn the tebles and lick them now."

Both parties on that night were armed with swords for the battle scene, which represented the result of the engagement. Unfortunately, when the scene came on, instead of the bloodless fiction of the drama they began to slash each other in reality, and had it not been for the interference of the audience there is no doubt that lives would have been lost. After this, swords were interdicted and staves subst.i.tuted. The consequence, as might have been expected, was that heads were broken on both sides, and a general fight between Protestant and Catholic portions of the actors and the audience ensued.

In the meanwhile the dramatic mania had become an epidemic. Its fascination carried overt opposition before it. A new system was adopted. The Orange party was to be represented by staunch Catholics, all probably Ribbonmen, and the Catholics by the rankest and most violent Orangemen in the parish. This course was resorted to in order to prevent the serious quarrels with which the play generally closed. Such was the state which the dramatic affairs of the parish had reached when the occasion, a summer evening, arrived that had been appointed by the herculean manager, John Tait, for the exhibition of "The Battle of Aughrim," in a large and roomy barn of a wealthy farmer named Jack Stuart, in the townland of Rark.

His house stood on a little swelling eminence beside which an old road ran, and into which the little green before the door sloped. The road, being somewhat lower, pa.s.sed close to his outhouses, which faced the road, but in consequence of their positions a loft was necessary to const.i.tute the barn, so that it might be level with the haggard on the elevation. The entrance to the barn was by a door in one of the gables, whilst the stable and cow-house, or byre as it was called, were beneath the loft, and had their door open to the road. This accurate description will be found necessary in order to understand what followed.

In preparing the barn for the entertainment, the princ.i.p.al embarra.s.sment consisted in want of seats.

Necessity, however, is well-known to be the mother of invention; and in this case that fact was established at the expense of honest Jack Stuart. Five or six sacks of barley were stretched length-wise on that side of the wall which faced the road. Now, barley, although the juice of it makes many a head light, is admitted to be the heaviest of all grain. On the opposite side, next the haggard, the seats consisted of chairs and forms, some of them borrowed from the neighbours. The curtain (i.e., the winnowing-cloth) was hung up at the south end, and everything, so far as preparation went, was very well managed. Of course, it was unnecessary to say that the entertainment was free to such as could find room, for which there was many an angry struggle.

We have said that from an apprehension that the heroes on both sides might forget the fiction and resort to reality by actual fighting, it had generally been arranged that the Catholic party should be represented by the Orangemen, and _vice versa_; and so it was in this instance. The caste of the piece was as follows:--

Baron de Ginckel (General of the English forces) Tom Whiskey.

(A perfect devil at the cudgels when sober, especially against an Orangeman.)

Marquis de Ruvigny Denis Shevlin.