Personal Sketches of His Own Times, Vol. II.

PERSONAL SKETCHES

OF

HIS OWN TIMES,

BY

SIR JONAH BARRINGTON,

JUDGE OF THE HIGH COURT OF ADMIRALTY IN IRELAND,

&c. &c. &c.

IN THREE VOLUMES.

VOL. II.

SECOND EDITION,

REVISED AND IMPROVED.

LONDON:

HENRY COLBURN AND RICHARD BENTLEY,

NEW BURLINGTON STREET.

1830.

PRINTED BY A. J. VALPY, RED LION COURT, FLEET STREET.

TO

THE RIGHT HONOURABLE

LORD STOWELL.

My Dear Lord,

The general approbation of a literary work must be highly gratifying to any Author. But the cordial approval of an eminent individual, whose grave, sound judgment, and profound erudition, give authenticity to his opinions, affords a gratification of an higher order.

Such was my feeling on your Lordship’s suggestion to me of a third volume of those Sketches, “composed of similar materials.” To have amused you gives me pleasure—to have informed you excites my vanity. My gratitude for your kindness (when in office) has met no alloy by retirement from a station where your repute will find no rivals. Your suggestion is in progress.

Time and declining health impair the vigour of men’s intellect,—in that point I must bow to Providence. But such as my coming volume may be, if it does not arrive at my own wishes, I hope it will not stop very short of your Lordship’s expectation.

I am, my Dear Lord,

With true regard and respect,

Your Lordship’s sincere Servant, &c.

Jonah Barrington.

10th July, 1828.

CONTENTS

OF

THE SECOND VOLUME.

PERSONAL SKETCHES.

THE FIRE-EATERS.

Passion for duelling in Ireland—Ancient duel before the judges and law authorities, &c. &c. at the Castle of Dublin—List of official and judicial duellists in author’s time—Family weapons described—The Fire-eaters’ Society—Their chiefs—Elegant institution of the Knights of Tara—Description of them—Their exhibitions and meetings—The rules of duelling and points of honour established by the fire-eaters, called the Thirty-six Commandments—Singular duel between the author and Mr. Richard Daley, a remarkable duellist and fop—Daley hit—Author’s second the celebrated Balloon Crosby—His singular appearance and character.

It may be objected that anecdotes of duelling have more than their due proportion of space in these sketches, and that no writer should publish feats of that nature (if feats they can be called), especially when performed by persons holding grave offices, or by public functionaries. These are very plausible, rational observations, and are now anticipated for the purpose of being answered.

It might be considered a sufficient excuse, that these anecdotes refer to events long past; that they are amusing, and the more so as being matters of fact, (neither romance nor exaggeration,) and so various that no two of them are at all similar. But a better reason can be given;—namely, that there is no other species of detail or anecdote which so clearly illustrates the character, genius, and manners of a country, as that which exemplifies the distinguishing propensities of its population for successive ages. Much knowledge of a people will necessarily be gained by possessing such a series of anecdotes, and by then going on to trace the decline of such propensities to the progress of civilization in that class of society where they had been prevalent.

As to the objection founded on the rank or profession of the parties concerned, it is only necessary to subjoin the following short abstract from a long list of official duellists who have figured away in my time, and some of them before my eyes.—The number of grave personages who appear to have adopted the national taste, (though in most instances it was undoubtedly before their elevation to the bench that they signalised themselves in single combat,) removes from me all imputation of pitching upon and exposing an unusual frailty; and I think I may challenge any country in Europe to show such an assemblage of gallant judicial and official antagonists at fire and sword as is exhibited even in the following list.[^[1]]

[1]. Single combat was formerly a very prevalent and favourite mode of administering justice in Ireland; the letter of that law existed in England; and, not being considered so brutal as bullfights, or other beastly amusements of that nature, it was legally authorised, and frequently performed before the high authorities and their ladies, in the castle-yard of Dublin;—bishops, judges, and other persons of high office, generally honouring the spectacle with their presence.

The last exhibition of that nature I have read of was between two Irish gentlemen, Connor Mac Cormac O’Connor, and Teige Mac Kilpatrick O’Connor. They fought with broadswords and skeens (large knives), in the castle of Dublin, in the presence of the archbishop and all the chief authorities and ladies of rank. They had hewed each other for a full hour, when Mr. Mac Kilpatrick O’Connor happening to miss his footing, Mr. Mac Cormac O’Connor began to cut his head off very expertly with his knife; which, after a good deal of cutting, struggling, and hacking, he was at length so fortunate as to effect; and, having got the head clear off the shoulders, he handed it to the lords justices (who were present), and by whom the head and neck was most graciously received.

Earl Clare, Lord Chancellor of Ireland, fought the Master of the Rolls, the Right Honourable John Philpot Curran, with twelve-inch pistols.

The Earl of Clonmell, Chief Justice of the King’s Bench, fought Lord Tyrawly, about his wife, and the Earl Landaff, about his sister; and others, with sword or pistol, on miscellaneous subjects.

The Judge of the County of Dublin, Egan, fought the Master of the Rolls, Roger Barrett,[^[2]] and three others; one with swords.

[2]. On the duel between Judge Egan and Counsellor Roger Barret a curious incident occurred, of hackneyed celebrity, but very illustrative of that volatile eccentricity with which the gravest events were frequently accompanied in that country.

On the combatants taking their ground (secundum consuetudinem), Roger (who was the challenger) immediately fired without much aim, and missing his antagonist, coolly said, “Egan, now my honour is satisfied,” and began to walk away with great stateliness and composure.

The judge, however, (who had not fired,) cried aloud, “Hulloa, Roger—hulloa!—stop—stop, Roger; come back here; stay till I take a shot at your honour!”

Roger obeyed; and with the same composure cried out, “Very well, fire away, Jack.”

Egan presented, and seemed by his motions determined to finish Roger:—at length he cried out, “Pho! pho! I won’t humour you, by G—d! I wouldn’t be bothered shooting you, Roger!—so now you may go to the devil your own road; or shake hands, whichever you like best.”

The finale may be anticipated. This circumstance is truly Irish; it took place on the site of Donnybrook fair, and some hundreds of amateurs were present.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Right Honourable Isaac Corry, fought the Right Honourable Henry Grattan, a privy counsellor, and the chancellor was hit. He also exchanged shots or thrusts with two other gentlemen.

A baron of the exchequer, Baron Medge, fought his brother-in-law and two others—a hit.

The Chief Justice, C. P., Lord Norbury, fought Fire-eater Fitzgerald, and two other gentlemen, muzzle to muzzle, and frightened Napper Tandy and several besides: one hit only.—Napper was near being hanged for running away!

The Judge of the Prerogative Court, Doctor Duigenan, fought one barrister and frightened another on the ground.—The latter case a very curious one.

The First Counsel to the Revenue, Henry Deane Grady, Esq., K. C., fought Counsellor O’Maher, Counsellor Campbell, and others:—very stout work.

The Right Honourable the Master of the Rolls fought Lord Buckinghamshire, (Chief Secretary, &c.) because he would not dismiss an official person.

The Provost of the University of Dublin, the Right Honourable Hely Hutchinson, fought Mr. Doyle, master in Chancery: they went to the plains of Minden to fight!

N.B. The spirit of the Hutchinson family was proverbial, and their good nature was no less so.

The Chief Justice C. P. Patterson fought three country gentlemen, one of them with swords, another with guns, and wounded all of them.

The Right Honourable George Ogle, the Orange chieftain, a privy counsellor, fought Barny Coyle, a whiskey distiller, because he was a papist.—They fired eight shots without stop or stay, and no hit occurred: but Mr. Ogle’s second broke his own arm by tumbling into a potatoe-trench.

Sir Harding Gifford, late Chief Justice of Ceylon, fought the rebel General Bagenal Harvey at a place called the Scalp, near Dublin. The Chief Justice received a severe, but very odd wound.—He eventually, however, suffered no important injury.

Counsellor Dan O’Connell fought the Orange chieftain, who had been halloo’d at him by the corporation. The champion of Protestant ascendancy never rose to fight again.

The Collector of the Customs of Dublin, the Honourable Francis Hutchinson, fought the Right Honourable Lord Mountnorris:—a hit. Cum multis aliis quæ nunc enumerare longum est.

The reader of this dignified list (which, as I have said, is only a very short abridgment[^[3]]) will surely see no great indecorum in an Admiralty Judge having now and then, when required so to do, exchanged broadsides, more especially as they did not militate against the law of nations, and no ghost was the consequence.

[3]. Two hundred and twenty-seven memorable duels have actually been fought during my grand climacteric.

However, it must be owned that there were occasionally peaceable and forgiving instances among the barristers.—A brave, thrice-proven, but certainly capricious individual, Mr. Curran, was whipped by a very savage nobleman, Lord Clanmorris; and another eminent barrister was said to have had his eye saluted by a messenger from a gentleman’s lips in the body of the House of Commons.—Yet both those little incivilities were arranged very amicably, and without the aid of any deadly weapon whatsoever, I suppose for variety’s sake. But the people of Dublin used to observe, that a judgment came upon Counsellor O’Callaghan, for having kept his friend, Mr. Curran, quiet in the horse-whipping affair, inasmuch as his own brains were literally scattered about the ground by a Galway attorney very soon after he had turned pacificator.

To speak after the manner of a Bulletin:—“In my time, the number of killed and wounded among the bar was very considerable.—The other learned professions suffered much less.”

It is nearly incredible what a singular passion the Irish gentlemen (though in general excellent-tempered fellows) formerly had for fighting each other and immediately becoming friends again. A duel was indeed considered a necessary piece of a young man’s education, but by no means a ground for any future animosity with his opponent:—on the contrary, proving the bravery of both, it only cemented their friendship.

One of the most humane men existing, an intimate friend of mine, and a prominent and benevolent public character, but who (as the expression then was) had frequently played both “hilt to hilt” and “muzzle to muzzle,” in desperate rencontres, was heard endeavouring to keep a little son of his quiet who was crying for something:—“Come, now, do be a good boy! Come, now,” said my friend, “don’t cry, and I’ll give you a case of nice little pistols to-morrow. Come, now, don’t cry, and we’ll shoot them all in the morning.”—“Oh, yes! yes! papa! we’ll shoot them all in the morning!” responded the child, drying his little eyes and delighted at the notion.

I have heard Sir Charles Ormsby, who affected to be a wit, though at best but a humourist and gourmand, liken the story of my friend and his son to a butcher at Nenagh, who in a similar manner wanted to keep his son from crying, and effectually stopped his tears by saying,—“Come, now, be a good boy! don’t cry, and you shall kill a lamb to-morrow! now, won’t you be good?”—“Oh yes, yes,” said the child, sobbing; “Father, is the lamb ready?”

Within my recollection, this national relish for fighting was nearly universal,—originating (I think) in the spirit and habits of former times. When men had a glowing ambition to excel in all manner of feats and exercises, as their forefathers had done, they naturally conceived that single combat in an honest way (that is, not knowing which would be perforated) was the most chivalrous and gentlemanly of all possible accomplishments; and this idea gave rise to an assiduous cultivation of personal tactics, and dictated laws for carrying them into execution with regularity, honour, and dispatch, among the nobility and gentry of that punctilious nation.

About the year 1777, Fire-eating was in great repute in Ireland. No young fellow could finish his education till he had exchanged shots with some of his friends or acquaintances. The first questions asked as to a young man’s respectability and qualifications (particularly when he proposed for a lady-wife) were, “What family is he of?”—“Did he ever blaze?”—His fortune was then the last inquiry; because the reply was seldom satisfactory.

Tipperary and Galway were the ablest schools of the duelling science. Galway was most scientific at the sword: Tipperary most practical and prized at the pistol: Mayo not amiss at either: Roscommon and Sligo had many professors and a high reputation in the leaden branch of the pastime.

When I was at the university, Jemmy Keogh, Buck English,[^[4]] Cosey Harrison, Crowe Ryan, Reddy Long, Amby Bodkin, Squire Fulton, Squire Blake, Amby Fitzgerald, Terry Magrath, and some others, were supposed to understand the points of honour better than any men in Ireland, and were constantly referred to.—Terry Magrath especially was counted a very good opinion.

[4]. The celebrated Buck English was expelled for killing by foul play, and had like to be hanged. The “Fire-eaters” outlawed him.—Foul play was never known to occur in that society—save in this instance. English was saved, on his trial, by one juror holding out against his eleven brethren:—however, as they could not agree, Baron Hamilton ordered them all to be packed in turf kishes, conveyed on cars to the boundary of the county, twenty-seven miles off, and there discharged on foot. At the ensuing assizes all the witnesses against English were duly disposed of—none appeared—and he was acquitted of course.

In the North, the Fallons and the Fentons were the first hands at it; and most counties could then boast their regular point-of-honour men. The late chief justice of the common pleas was supposed to understand the thing as well as any gentleman in Ireland, and was frequently referred to by the high circles.

In truth, these oracles were in general gentlemen of good connexions[^[5]] and most respectable families, otherwise nobody would either fight or consult them.

[5]. There was an association in the year 1782, (a volunteer corps) which was called the “Independent Light Horse.” They were not confined to one district, and none could be admitted but the younger brothers of the most respectable families. They were all both “hilt and muzzle adepts;”—and, that no member might set himself up as greater than another, every individual of the corps was obliged, on entering, to give his honour “that he could cover his fortune with the crown of his hat, and had exchanged a shot or thrust before he was ballotted for.”

Roscommon and Sligo then furnished some of the finest young fellows (fire-eaters) I ever saw: their spirit and decorum were equally admirable, and their honour and liberality conspicuous on all occasions.

Every family had then a case of hereditary pistols, which descended as an heir-loom, together with a long silver-hilted sword, for the use of their posterity. Our family pistols, denominated pelters, were brass (I believe my second brother has them still): the barrels were very long and point-blankers. They were included in the armoury of our ancient castle of Ballynakill in the reign of Elizabeth, (the stocks, locks, and hair-triggers were, however, modern,) and had descended from father to son from that period: one of them was named “sweet lips,” the other “the darling.” The family rapier was called “skiver the pullet” by my grand-uncle, Captain Wheeler Barrington, who had fought with it repeatedly and run through different parts of their persons several Scots officers, who had challenged him all at once for some national reflection. It was a very long, narrow-bladed, straight cut-and-thrust, as sharp as a razor, with a silver hilt, and a guard of buff leather inside it. I kept this rapier as a curiosity for some time; but it was stolen during my absence at Temple.

I knew Jemmy Keogh extremely well, when he was pretty old. He was considered in the main a peace-maker, for he did not like any body to fight but himself; and it was universally admitted that he never killed any man who did not well deserve it. He was a plausible, although black-looking fellow, with remarkably thick, long, curled eyebrows closing with a tuft over his nose. He spoke deliberately, reasoned well, and never showed passion. When determined to fight, his brows knit, his eyes fixed, and (as an antagonist) he cut a very unprepossessing figure. I never heard that he was wounded. When he tried to restrain his anger, he set his teeth, kept his tongue a close prisoner, and appeared like one with a locked jaw. No man was more universally known in Ireland. He unfortunately shot a cripple in the Phœnix Park, which, though fair enough, did him great mischief. He was land-agent to Bourke of Glinsk, to whom he always officiated as second.

At length, so many quarrels arose without sufficiently dignified provocation, and so many things were considered as quarrels of course, which were not quarrels at all,—that the principal fire-eaters of the South clearly saw disrepute was likely to be thrown both on the science and its professors, and thought it full time to interfere and arrange matters upon a proper, steady, rational, and moderate footing; and to regulate the time, place, and other circumstances of duelling, so as to govern all Ireland on one principle—thus establishing a uniform, national code of the lex pugnandi; proving, as Hugo Grotius did, that it was for the benefit of all belligerents to adopt the same regulations.

In furtherance of this object, a branch society had been formed in Dublin termed the “Knights of Tara,” which met once a month at the theatre, Capel-street, gave premiums for fencing, and proceeded in the most laudably systematic manner. The amount of admission-money was laid out on silver cups, and given to the best fencers, as prizes, at quarterly exhibitions of pupils and amateurs.

Fencing with the small-sword is certainly a most beautiful and noble exercise: its practice confers a fine, bold, manly carriage, a dignified mien, a firm step, and graceful motion. But, alas! its professors are now supplanted by contemptible groups of smirking quadrillers with unweaponed belts, stuffed breasts, and strangled loins!—a set of squeaking dandies, whose sex may be readily mistaken, or, I should rather say, is of no consequence.

The theatre of the Knights of Tara, on these occasions, was always overflowing:—the combatants were dressed in close cambric jackets, garnished with ribbons, each wearing the favourite colour of his fair one: bunches of ribbons also dangled at their knees, and roses adorned their morocco slippers, which had buff soles, to prevent noise in their lunges. No masks or visors were used as in these more timorous times; on the contrary, every feature was uncovered, and its inflections all visible. The ladies appeared in full morning dresses, each handing his foil to her champion for the day, and their presence animating the singular exhibition. The prizes were handed to the conquerors by the fair ones from the stage-boxes, accompanied each with a wreath of laurel, and a smile then more valued than a hundred victories! The tips of the foils were blackened, and therefore instantly betrayed the hits on the cambric jacket, and proclaimed without doubt the successful combatant. All was decorum, gallantry, spirit, and good temper.

The Knights of Tara also had a select committee to decide on all actual questions of honour referred to them:—to reconcile differences, if possible; if not, to adjust the terms and continuance of single combat. Doubtful points were solved generally on the peaceable side, provided women were not insulted or defamed; but when that was the case, the knights were obdurate, and blood must be seen. They were constituted by ballot, something in the manner of the Jockey Club; but without the possibility of being dishonourable, or the opportunity of cheating each other.

This most agreeable and useful association did not last above two or three years. I cannot tell why it broke up: I rather think, however, the original fire-eaters thought it frivolous, or did not like their own ascendancy to be rivalled. It was said that they threatened direct hostilities against the knights; and I am the more disposed to believe this, because, soon after, a comprehensive code of the laws and points of honour was issued from the Southern fire-eaters, with directions that it should be strictly observed by all gentlemen throughout the kingdom, and kept in their pistol-cases, that ignorance might never be pleaded. This code was not circulated in print, but very numerous written copies were sent to the different county clubs, &c. My father got one for his sons; and I transcribed most of it on some blank leaves. These rules brought the whole business of duelling into a focus, and have been much acted upon down to the present day. They called them in Galway “the thirty-six commandments.”

As far as my copy went, they appear to have run as follows:—

The practice of duelling and points of honour settled at Clonmell summer assizes, 1775, by the gentlemen delegates of Tipperary, Galway, Mayo, Sligo, and Roscommon, and prescribed for general adoption throughout Ireland.

Rule 1.

The first offence requires the first apology, though the retort may have been more offensive than the insult: example;—A tells B he is impertinent, &c. B retorts, that he lies: yet A must make the first apology, because he gave the first offence, and then (after one fire) B may explain away the retort by subsequent apology.

Rule 2.

But if the parties would rather fight on, then, after two shots each, (but in no case before,) B may explain first, and A apologise afterwards.

N.B. The above rules apply to all cases of offences in retort not of a stronger class than the example.

Rule 3.

If a doubt exist who gave the first offence, the decision rests with the seconds: if they won’t decide or can’t agree, the matter must proceed to two shots, or to a hit, if the challenger require it.

Rule 4.

When the lie direct is the first offence, the aggressor must either beg pardon in express terms; exchange two shots previous to apology; or three shots followed up by explanation; or fire on till a severe hit be received by one party or the other.

Rule 5.

As a blow is strictly prohibited under any circumstances amongst gentlemen, no verbal apology can be received for such an insult: the alternatives therefore are—first, the offender handing a cane to the injured party, to be used on his own person, at the same time begging pardon;—second, firing on until one or both are disabled; or thirdly, exchanging three shots, and then asking pardon, without the proffer of the cane.

If swords are used, the parties engage till one is well blooded, disabled, or disarmed; or until, after receiving a wound, and blood being drawn, the aggressor begs pardon.

N.B. A disarm is considered the same as a disable: the disarmer may (strictly) break his adversary’s sword; but if it be the challenger who is disarmed, it is considered as ungenerous to do so.

In case the challenged be disarmed, and refuses to ask pardon or atone, he must not be killed, as formerly; but the challenger may lay his own sword on the aggressor’s shoulder, then break the aggressor’s sword, and say, “I spare your life!” The challenged can never revive that quarrel—the challenger may.

Rule 6.

If A gives B the lie, and B retorts by a blow (being the two greatest offences), no reconciliation can take place till after two discharges each, or a severe hit;—after which, B may beg A’s pardon humbly for the blow, and then A may explain simply for the lie;—because a blow is never allowable, and the offence of the lie therefore merges in it. (See preceding rule.)

N.B. Challenges for undivulged causes may be reconciled on the ground, after one shot. An explanation or the slightest hit should be sufficient in such cases, because no personal offence transpired.

Rule 7.

But no apology can be received, in any case, after the parties have actually taken their ground, without exchange of fires.

Rule 8.

In the above case, no challenger is obliged to divulge his cause of challenge (if private), unless required by the challenged so to do before their meeting.

Rule 9.

All imputations of cheating at play, races, &c. to be considered equivalent to a blow; but may be reconciled after one shot, on admitting their falsehood, and begging pardon publicly.

Rule 10.

Any insult to a lady under a gentleman’s care or protection, to be considered as, by one degree, a greater offence than if given to the gentleman personally, and to be regulated accordingly.

Rule 11.

Offences originating or accruing from the support of ladies’ reputation, to be considered as less unjustifiable than any others of the same class, and as admitting of slighter apologies by the aggressor:—this to be determined by the circumstances of the case, but always favourably to the lady.

Rule 12.

In simple unpremeditated rencontres with the small sword, or couteau-de-chasse the rule is—first draw, first sheath; unless blood be drawn: then both sheath, and proceed to investigation.

Rule 13.

No dumb-shooting or firing in the air admissible in any case. The challenger ought not to have challenged without receiving offence; and the challenged ought, if he gave offence, to have made an apology before he came on the ground: therefore, children’s play must be dishonourable on one side or the other, and is accordingly prohibited.

Rule 14.

Seconds to be of equal rank in society with the principals they attend, inasmuch as a second may either choose or chance to become a principal, and equality is indispensable.

Rule 15.

Challenges are never to be delivered at night, unless the party to be challenged intend leaving the place of offence before morning; for it is desirable to avoid all hot-headed proceedings.

Rule 16.

The challenged has the right to choose his own weapon, unless the challenger gives his honour he is no swordsman; after which, however, he cannot decline any second species of weapon proposed by the challenged.

Rule 17.

The challenged chooses his ground: the challenger chooses his distance: the seconds fix the time and terms of firing.

Rule 18.

The seconds load in presence of each other, unless they give their mutual honours they have charged smooth and single, which should be held sufficient.

Rule 19.

Firing may be regulated—first, by signal; secondly, by word of command; or, thirdly, at pleasure—as may be agreeable to the parties. In the latter case, the parties may fire at their reasonable leisure, but second presents and rests are strictly prohibited.

Rule 20.

In all cases, a miss-fire is equivalent to a shot, and a snap or a non-cock is to be considered as a miss-fire.

Rule 21.

Seconds are bound to attempt a reconciliation before the meeting takes place, or after sufficient firing or hits, as specified.

Rule 22.

Any wound sufficient to agitate the nerves and necessarily make the hand shake, must end the business for that day.

Rule 23.

If the cause of meeting be of such a nature that no apology or explanation can or will be received, the challenged takes his ground, and calls on the challenger to proceed as he chooses: in such cases, firing at pleasure is the usual practice, but may be varied by agreement.

Rule 24.

In slight cases, the second hands his principal but one pistol; but, in gross cases, two, holding another case ready-charged in reserve.

Rule 25.

Where seconds disagree, and resolve to exchange shots themselves, it must be at the same time and at right angles with their principals, thus:—

S

|

|

P-----------P

|

|

S

If with swords, side by side, with five paces interval.

N.B. All matters and doubts not herein mentioned will be explained and cleared up by application to the committee, who meet alternately at Clonmell and Galway, at the quarter-sessions, for that purpose.[^[6]]

Crow Ryan, President,

James Keogh, }

Amby Bodkin,} Secretaries.

[6]. The residue of the rules I have found among other papers since the first edition of this book was printed—but they are much defaced. There were eleven or twelve of them only, on points of honour. The rules of combat are all given; and they are full of a pugnacious sophistry, which would scarcely entertain the reader.

Additional Galway Articles.

Rule 1.

No party can be allowed to bend his knee, or cover his side with his left hand; but may present at any level from the foot to the eye.

Rule 2.

None can either advance or retreat, if the ground be measured. If no ground be measured, either party may advance at his pleasure, even to touch muzzle; but neither can advance on his adversary after the fire, unless the adversary step forward on him.

N.B. The seconds on both sides stand responsible for this last rule being strictly observed, bad cases having accrued from neglect of it.

These rules and resolutions of the “Fire-eaters” and “Knights of Tara” were the more deeply impressed on my mind, from my having run a great chance of losing my life, when a member of the university, in consequence of the strict observance of one of them. A young gentleman of Galway, Mr. Richard Daly, then a Templar, had the greatest predilection for single combat of any person (not a society fire-eater) I ever recollect: he had fought sixteen duels in the space of two years; three with swords and thirteen with pistols;—yet, with so little skill or so much good fortune, that not a wound worth mentioning occurred in the course of the whole. This gentleman was called to the Bar; figured afterwards for many years as patentee of the Theatre Royal, Dublin; and had the credit of first introducing that superior woman and actress, Mrs. Jordan, when Miss Francis, on the Dublin boards.

I was surprised one winter’s evening by receiving a written challenge, in the nature of an invitation, from Mr. Daly, to fight him early the ensuing morning. I never had spoken a word to him in my life, and scarcely of him, and no possible cause of quarrel that I could guess existed between us: however, it being then a decided opinion that a first overture of that nature could never be declined, I accepted the invitation without any inquiry; writing, in reply, that as to place, I chose the field of Donnybrook fair as the fittest spot for all sorts of encounters. I had then to look out for a second, and resorted to a person with whom I was very intimate, and who, as he was a curious character, may be worth noticing. He was brother to the unfortunate Sir Edward Crosby, Bart., who was murdered by a court-martial at Carlow, May, 1798. My friend was afterward called “Balloon Crosby,” being the first aeronaut who constructed an Hibernian balloon, and ventured to take a journey into the sky from Ireland (from Ranelagh Gardens).[^[7]]

[7]. His second ascent was a most unfortunate one for the spectators. It took place from the Duke of Leinster’s lawn, Merrion-square: the crowds outside were immense, and so many squeezed together and leaned against a thick parapet wall fronting the street, that it yielded to the weight and pressure, and the spectators and parapet wall came tumbling down together a great depth. Several were killed and many disabled; while Crosby sailed quietly over their heads, in all human probability, to be drowned before an hour had expired.

Crosby was of immense stature, being near six feet three inches high: he had a comely-looking, fat, ruddy face, and was, beyond comparison, the most ingenious mechanic I ever knew. He had a smattering of all sciences, and there was scarcely an art or trade of which he had not some practical knowledge. His chambers at college were like a general workshop for all kinds of artisans: he was very good tempered, exceedingly strong, and as brave as a lion—but as dogged as a mule: nothing could change a resolution of his when once made; and nothing could check or resist his perseverance to carry it into execution. He highly approved of my promptness in accepting Daly’s invitation; but I told him that I unluckily had no pistols, and did not know where to procure any against the next morning. This puzzled him: but on recollection, he said he had no complete pistols neither; but he had some old locks, barrels, and stocks, which, as they did not originally belong to each other, he should find it very difficult to make any thing of: nevertheless, he would fall to work directly. He kept me up till late at night in his chambers to help him in filing the old locks and barrels, and endeavouring to patch up two or three of them so as to go off and answer that individual job. Various trials were made: much filing, drilling, and scouring were necessary. However, by two o’clock in the morning we had completed three entire pistols, which, though certainly of various lengths and of the most ludicrous workmanship, struck their fire right well, and that was all we wanted of them,—symmetry (as he remarked) being of no great value upon these occasions.

It was before seven o’clock on the 20th of March, with a cold wind and a sleety atmosphere, that we set out on foot for the field of Donnybrook fair, after having taken some good chocolate and a plentiful draught of cherry-brandy, to keep the cold wind out. On arriving, we saw my antagonist and his friend (Jack Patterson, nephew to the chief justice) already on the ground. I shall never forget Daly’s figure. He was a very fine-looking young fellow, but with such a squint that it was totally impossible to say what he looked at, except his nose, of which he never lost sight. His dress (they had come in a coach) made me ashamed of my own: he wore a pea-green coat; a large tucker with a diamond brooch stuck in it; a three-cocked hat with a gold button-loop and tassels, and silk stockings; and a couteau-de-chasse hung gracefully dangling from his thigh. In fact, he looked as if already standing in a state of triumph, after having vanquished and trampled on his antagonist. I did not half like his steady position, showy surface, and mysterious squint; and I certainly would rather have exchanged two shots with his slovenly friend, Jack Patterson, than one with so magnificent and overbearing an adversary.

My friend Crosby, without any sort of salutation or prologue, immediately cried out “Ground, gentlemen! ground—ground! come, d—n measurement, to work!” and placing me on his selected spot, whispered into my ear “Medio tutissimus ibis: never look at the head or the heels: hip the maccaroni! the hip for ever, my boy! hip, hip!”—when my antagonist’s second, advancing and accosting mine, said, Mr. Daly could not think of going any further with the business; that he found it was totally a mistake on his part, originating through misrepresentation, and that he begged to say he was extremely sorry for having given Mr. Barrington and his friend the trouble of coming out, hoping they would excuse it and shake hands with him. To this arrangement I certainly had no sort of objection; but Crosby, without hesitation, said, “We cannot do that yet sir: I’ll show you we can’t: (taking a little manuscript book out of his breeches pocket,) there’s the rules!—look at that, sir,” continued he, “see No. 7.:—‘No apology can be received after the parties meet, without a fire.’ You see, there’s the rule,” pursued Crosby, with infinite self-satisfaction; “and a young man on his first blood cannot break rule, particularly with a gentleman so used to the sport as Mr. Daly. Come, gentlemen, proceed! proceed!”

Daly appeared much displeased, but took his ground, without speaking a word, about nine paces from me. He presented his pistol instantly, but gave me most gallantly a full front.

It being, as Crosby said, my first blood, I lost no time, but let fly without a single second of delay, and without taking aim: Daly staggered back two or three steps; put his hand to his breast; cried, “I’m hit, sir!” and did not fire. Crosby gave me a slap on the back which staggered me, and a squeeze of the hand which nearly crushed my fingers. We got round him: his waistcoat was opened, and a black spot, about the size of a crown-piece, with a little blood, appeared directly on his breast-bone. I was greatly shocked: fortunately, however, the ball had not penetrated; but his brooch had been broken, and a piece of the setting was sticking fast in the bone. Crosby stamped, cursed the damp powder or under-loading, and calmly pulled out the brooch: Daly said not a word; put his cambric handkerchief doubled to his breast, and bowed. I returned the salute, extremely glad to get out of the scrape, and so we parted without conversation or ceremony; save that when I expressed my wish to know the cause of his challenging me, Daly replied that he would now give no such explanation, and his friend then produced his book of rules, quoting No. 8.:—“If a party challenged accept the challenge without asking the reason of it, the challenger is never bound to divulge it afterward.”

My friend Crosby, as I have mentioned, subsequently attempted to go off from Dublin to England in a balloon of his own making, and dropped between Dublin and Holyhead into the sea, but was saved. The poor fellow some time after went abroad, and was supposed to have died far too early for friendship,—which he was eminently capable of exciting. I never saw two persons in face and figure more alike than Crosby and my friend Daniel O’Connell: but Crosby was the taller by two inches, and it was not so easy to discover that he was an Irishman.[^[8]]

[8]. It has since been discovered that death did not master him for many years after this report. His history is not a common one. I have lately received a considerable quantity of documents and Mss. collected or written during the period he was supposed to be dead, and at many different places, till a late day. Most of them are to me utterly unintelligible; but there is sufficient to furnish matter for one of the most curious memoirs that can be conceived, and altogether novel. So multifarious, however, are the materials, that I fear their due arrangement would be quite beyond my powers.

DUELLING EXTRAORDINARY.

Frequency of election-duels—Ludicrous affair between Frank Skelton and an exciseman—Frank shoots the exciseman and runs away—His curious reasons—Sir J. Bourke’s quadrille duel, with five hits—Mr. H. D. G * * * y’s remarkable meeting with Counsellor O’Maher—O’Maher hit—Civil proposition of G * * *’s second—G * * *’s gallant letter to the author on his election for Maryborough—Honourable Barry Yelverton challenged by nine officers at once—His elucidation of the Fire-eaters’ Resolutions—Lord Kilkenny’s memorable duels and law-suits—His Lordship is shot by Mr. Ball, an attorney—The heir to his title (the Hon. Somerset Butler) challenges Counsellor Burrowes—The latter hit, but his life saved by some gingerbread nuts—Lord Kilkenny’s duel with Counsellor Byrne—The counsellor wounded—Counsellor Guinness escapes a rencontre—Sketch of Counsellor M‘Nally—His duel with the author—His three friends: all afterward hanged—M‘Nally wounded—Bon-mot of Mr. Harding—The affair highly beneficial to M‘Nally—His character, marriage, and death—Ancient mode of fighting duels—The lists described—Duel of Colonel Barrington with Squire Gilbert on horseback—Both wounded—Gilbert’s horse killed—Chivalrous conclusion.

Our elections were more prolific in duels than any other public meetings: they very seldom originated at a horse-race, cock-fight, hunt, or at any place of amusement: folks then had pleasure in view, and “something else to do” than to quarrel: but at all elections, or at assizes, or, in fact, at any place of business, almost every man, without any very particular or assignable reason, immediately became a violent partisan, and frequently a furious enemy to somebody else; and gentlemen often got themselves shot before they could tell what they were fighting about.

At an election for Queen’s County, between General Walsh and Mr. Warburton, of Garryhinch, about the year 1783, took place the most curious duel of any which occurred within my recollection. A Mr. Frank Skelton, one of the half-mounted gentlemen described in the early part of the first volume,—a boisterous, joking, fat young fellow, called a harmless blackguard,—was prevailed on, much against his grain, to challenge Roberts, the exciseman of the town, for running the butt-end of a horse-whip down his throat the night before, while he sat drunk and sleeping with his mouth open. The exciseman insisted that snoring at a dinner-table was a personal offence to every gentleman in company, and would therefore make no apology.

Frank, though he had been nearly choked, was very reluctant to fight; he said “he was sure to die if he did, as the exciseman could snuff a candle with his pistol-ball; and as he himself was as big as a hundred dozen of candles, what chance could he have?” We told him jocosely to give the exciseman no time to take aim at him, by which means he might perhaps hit his adversary first, and thus survive the contest. He seemed somewhat encouraged and consoled by the hint, and most strictly did he adhere to it.

Hundreds of the towns-people went to see the fight on the green of Maryborough. The ground was regularly measured; and the friends of each party pitched a ragged tent on the green, where whiskey and salt beef were consumed in abundance. Skelton having taken his ground, and at the same time two heavy drams from a bottle his foster-brother had brought, appeared quite stout till he saw the balls entering the mouths of the exciseman’s pistols, which shone as bright as silver, and were nearly as long as fusils. This vision made a palpable alteration in Skelton’s sentiments: he changed colour, and looked about him as if he wanted some assistance. However, their seconds, who were of the same rank and description, handed to each party his case of pistols, and half-bellowed to them—“blaze away, boys!”

Skelton now recollected his instructions, and lost no time: he cocked both his pistols at once; and as the exciseman was deliberately and most scientifically coming to his “dead level,” as he called it, Skelton let fly.

“Holloa!” said the exciseman, dropping his level, “I’m battered, by J—s!”

“Oh! the devil’s cure to you!” said Skelton, instantly firing his second pistol.

One of the exciseman’s legs then gave way, and down he came on his knee, exclaiming, “Holloa! holloa! you blood-thirsty villain! do you want to take my life?”

“Why, to be sure I do!” said Skelton. “Ha! ha! have I stiffened you, my lad?” Wisely judging, however, that if he staid till the exciseman recovered his legs, he might have a couple of shots to stand, he wheeled about, took to his heels, and got away as fast as possible. The crowd shouted; but Skelton, like a hare when started, ran the faster for the shouting.

Jemmy Moffit, his own second, followed, overtook, tripped up his heels, and cursing him for a disgraceful rascal, asked “why he ran away from the exciseman?”

“Ough thunther!” said Skelton, “how many holes did the villain want to have drilled into his carcase? Would you have me stop to make a riddle of him, Jemmy?”

The second insisted that Skelton should return to the field, to be shot at. He resisted, affirming that he had done all that honour required. The second called him “a coward!”

“By my sowl,” returned he, “my dear Jemmy Moffit, may be so! you may call me a coward, if you please; but I did it all for the best.”

“The best? you blackguard!”

“Yes,” said Frank: “sure it’s better to be a coward than a corpse! and I must have been either one or t’other of them.”

However, he was dragged up to the ground by his second, after agreeing to fight again, if he had another pistol given him. But, luckily for Frank, the last bullet had stuck so fast between the bones of the exciseman’s leg that he could not stand. The friends of the latter then proposed to strap him to a tree, that he might be able to shoot Skelton; but this being positively objected to by Frank, the exciseman was carried home: his first wound was on the side of his thigh, and the second in his right leg; but neither proved at all dangerous.

The exciseman, determined on gauging Frank, as he called it, on his recovery challenged Skelton in his turn. Skelton accepted the challenge, but said he was tould he had a right to choose his own weapons. The exciseman, knowing that such was the law, and that Skelton was no swordsman, and not anticipating any new invention, acquiesced. “Then,” said Skelton, “for my weapons, I choose my fists: and, by the powers, you diabolical exciseman, I’ll give you such a basting that your nearest relations shan’t know you.” Skelton insisted on his right, and the other not approving of this species of combat, got nothing by his challenge; the affair dropped, and Skelton triumphed.

The only modern instance I recollect to have heard of as applicable to No. 25., (refer to the regulations detailed in last sketch,) was that of old John Bourke, of Glinsk, and Mr. Amby Bodkin. They fought near Glinsk, and the old family steward and other servants brought out the present Sir John, then a child, and held him upon a man’s shoulder, to see papa fight. On that occasion, both principals and seconds engaged: they stood at right angles, ten paces distant, and all began firing together on the signal of a pistol discharged by an umpire. At the first volley, the two principals were touched, though very slightly. The second volley told better;—both the seconds, and Amby Bodkin, Esq. staggered out of their place: they were well hit, but no lives lost. It was, according to custom, an election squabble.

The Galway rule, No. 2., was well exemplified in a duel between an old and very particular friend of mine and a Counsellor O’Maher, who had given offence, yet I believe was the challenger: no ground was measured; they fired ad libitum. G., never at a loss upon such occasions, took his ground at once, and kept it steadily. O’Maher began his career at a hundred paces distance, advancing obliquely, and gradually contracting his circle round his opponent, who continued changing his front by corresponding movements; both parties now and then aiming, as feints, then taking down their pistols. This pas de deux lasted more than half an hour, as I have been informed:—at length, when the assailant had contracted his circle to firing distance, G. cried out, suddenly and loudly: O’Maher obeyed the signal, and instantly fired: G. returned the shot, and the challenger reeled back hors de combat.

On the same occasion, Mr. O’Maher’s second said to G.’s, (the famous Counsellor Ned Lysight,) “Mr. Lysight, take care:—your pistol is cocked!”—“Well, then,” said Lysight, “cock yours, and let me take a slap at you, as we are idle!” However, this proposition was not acceded to.

There could not be a greater game-cock (the Irish expression for a man of determined courage) than my friend G—. That he was not only spirited himself, but the cause of infusing spirit into others, will appear from the following humorous letter which I received from him during my contested election for Maryborough. That election gave rise to many characteristic Irish adventures, for which this volume does not afford compass. Lord Castlecoote, the returning officer, (himself also a joint proprietor,) evinced an excessive horror of becoming acquainted with the reporters. Some person having jocularly told him of my friend’s letter, it became a subject of great amusement, and afforded a variety of anecdotes for the Honourable Robert Moore, who supported me on that election against his brother, the Marquis of Drogheda.

“Dublin, Jan. 29th, 1800.

“My dear Jonah,

“I have this moment sent to the mail coach-office two bullet-moulds, not being certain which of them belongs to the reporters: suspecting, however, that you may not have time to melt the lead, I also send half-a-dozen bullets, merely to keep you going while others are preparing.

“I lament much that my situation and political feeling prevent me from seeing you exhibit at Maryborough.

“Be bold, wicked, steady, and fear nought!

“Give a line to yours, truly,

“H. D. G.

“Jonah Barrington, Esq.”

I took his advice:—our friendship was long and close; and we never (that I am aware of) had any cause for coolness.

There could not be a better elucidation of Rule No. 5. of the code of honour, than an anecdote of Barry Yelverton, second son of Lord Avonmore, baron of the exchequer.—Barry was rather too odd a fellow to have been accounted at all times perfectly compos mentis. He was a barrister. In a ball-room on circuit, where the officers of a newly arrived regiment had come to amuse themselves and set the Munster lasses agog, Barry, having drunk too many bumpers, let out his natural dislike to the military, and most grossly insulted several of the officers; abusing one, treading on the toes of another, jostling a third, and so forth, till he had got through the whole regiment. Respect for the women, and the not choosing to commit themselves with the black gowns on the first day of their arrival, induced the insulted parties to content themselves with only requiring Barry’s address, and his hour of being seen the next morning. Barry, with great satisfaction, gave each of them his card, but informed them that sending to him was unnecessary;—that he was his own second, and would meet every man of them at eight o’clock next morning, in the ball-room; concluding by desiring them to bring their swords, as that was always his weapon. Though this was rather a curious rendezvous, yet, the challenged having the right to choose his weapon, and the place being à propos, the officers all attended next day punctually, with the surgeon of the regiment and a due proportion of small-swords, fully expecting that some of his brother gownsmen would join in the rencontre. On their arrival, Barry requested to know how many gentlemen had done him the honour of giving him the invitation, and was told their names, amounting to nine. “Very well, gentlemen,” said Yelverton, “I am well aware I abused some of you, and gave others an offence equivalent to a blow,—which latter being the greatest insult, we’ll dispose of those cases first, and I shall return in a few minutes fully prepared.”

They conceived he had gone for his sword, and friends. But Barry soon after returned alone, and resumed thus:—“Now, gentlemen, those to each of whom I gave an equivalent to a blow will please step forward.” Four of them accordingly did so, when Barry took from under his coat a bundle of switches, and addressed them as follows:—“Gentlemen, permit me to have the honour of handing each of you a switch, (according to the rule No. 5. of the Tipperary Resolutions,) wherewith to return the blow, if you feel any particular desire to put that extremity into practice. I fancy, gentlemen, that settles four of you; and as to the rest, here, (handing one of his cards to each, with I beg your pardon written above his name) that’s agreeable to No. 1. (reading the Rule). Now I fancy all your cases are disposed of; and having done my duty according to the Tipperary Resolutions, which I will never swerve from,—if, gentlemen, you are not satisfied, I shall be on the bridge to-morrow morning, with a case of barking-irons.” The officers stared, first at him, then at each other: the honest, jolly countenance and drollery of Barry were quite irresistible; first a smile of surprise, and then a general laugh, took place, and the catastrophe was their asking Barry to dine with them at the mess, where his eccentricity and good humour delighted the whole regiment. The poor fellow grew quite deranged at last, and died, I believe, in rather unpleasant circumstances.

The late Lord Mount Garret (afterward Earl of Kilkenny) had for several years a great number of law-suits on his hands at once, particularly with some insolvent tenants, whose causes had been gratuitously taken up by Mr. Ball, an attorney;—Mr. William Johnson and several other gentlemen of the circuit took their briefs. His Lordship was dreadfully tormented. He was naturally a very clever man, and devised a new mode of carrying on his law-suits, not being able, as he said, to trust his attorney out of his sight.

He engaged a clientless attorney, named Egan, as his working solicitor, at a very liberal yearly stipend, upon the express terms of his undertaking no other business whatsoever, and holding his office solely in his Lordship’s own house and under his own eye and direction. His Lordship applied to Mr. Fletcher (afterward judge) and to myself, requesting an interview; whereupon, he informed us of his situation: that there were generally eight or ten counsel pitted against him; but that he would have much more reliance on the advice and punctual attendance of two certain, than of ten straggling gentlemen; and that, under the full conviction that one of us at least would always attend the court when his causes were on, and not leave him in the lurch as he had been left, he had directed his attorney to mark on our two briefs ten times the amount of what the fees should be on the other side: “Because,” said his Lordship, “if you don’t attend, to a certainty I must engage ten counsel, as well as my opponents.” The singularity of the proposal set us laughing, in which his Lordship joined.

Fletcher and I accepted the offer: we did punctually and zealously attend these numerous trials, and were most liberally feed; but most unsuccessful in our efforts; for we never were able to gain a single cause, verdict, or motion, for our client.

The principle of strict justice certainly was with his Lordship; but certain formalities of the law were decidedly against him: he had, in fact, adopted an obsolete mode of proceeding as a short cut: thus, perceiving himself likely to be foiled, he determined to take another course, quite out of our line, and a course whereby no suit is decided in modern days—namely fight it out, “muzzle to muzzle,” with the attorney and all the counsel on the other side.

The first procedure on this determination was a direct challenge from his Lordship to the attorney, Mr. Ball: it was accepted, and a duel immediately followed, in which his Lordship got the worst of it. He was wounded by the attorney at each shot, the first taking place in his Lordship’s right arm, which probably saved the solicitor, as his Lordship was a most accurate marksman. The noble challenger received the second bullet in his side, but the wound was not dangerous. The attorney’s skin remained quite whole.

My Lord and the attorney having been thus disposed of for the time being, the Honourable Somerset Butler (his Lordship’s son) now took the field, and proceeded, according to due form, by a challenge to Mr. Peter Burrowes, &c., the senior of the adversaries’ counsel (now judge commissioner of insolvents). The invitation not being refused, the combat took place, one chilly morning, near Kilkenny. Somerset knew his business well; but Peter had had no practice whatever in that line of litigation—being good tempered and peaceable.

Few persons feel too warm on such occasions, of a cold morning, and Peter formed no exception to the general rule. An old woman who sold spiced gingerbread nuts in the street they passed through accosted the party, extolling her nuts to the very skies, as being well spiced, and fit to expel the wind, and to warm any gentleman’s stomach and bowels as well as a dram. Peter bought a pennyworth on the advice of his second, Dick Waddy, an eminent attorney, and duly receiving the change of a sixpenny-piece, marched off to the scene of action munging his gingerbread.

Preliminaries being soon arranged—the pistols given—ten steps measured—the flints hammered—and the feather-springs set—Somerset, a fine dashing young fellow, full of spirit, activity, and animation, after making a few graceful attitudes, and slapping his arms together as hackney-coachmen do in frosty weather, to make their fingers supple—gave elderly Peter (who was no posture-master) but little time to take his fighting position:—in fact, he had scarcely raised his pistol to a wabbling level, before Somerset’s ball came crack-dash against Peter’s body! The halfpence rattled in his pocket: Peter dropped; Somerset fled; Dick Waddy roared “murder,” and called out to Surgeon Pack. Peter’s clothes were ripped up; and Pack, secundum artem, examined the wound:—something like a black hole designated the spot where the lead had penetrated the abdomen. The doctor shook his head, and pronounced but one short word—“mortal!”—it was, however, more expressive than a long speech. Peter groaned; his friend Waddy began to think about the coroner; his brother barristers sighed heavily, and Peter was supposed to be departing this world (but, as they all endeavoured to persuade him, for a better);—when Surgeon Pack, after another fatal, taking leave of Peter, and leaning his hand on the grass to assist him in rising, felt something hard, took it up, and looked at it curiously: the spectators closed in the circle, to see Peter die; the patient turned his expiring eyes toward Surgeon Pack, as much as to say—“Good bye to you all, lads!”—when lo! the doctor held up to the astonished assembly the identical bullet, which, having rattled among the heads and harps, and gingerbread nuts, in Peter’s waistcoat-pocket, had flattened its own body on the surface of a copper, and left His Majesty’s bust distinctly imprinted and accurately designated, in black and blue shading, on his subject’s carcase! Peter’s heart beat high; and finding that his Gracious Sovereign, and the gingerbread, had saved his life, lost as little time as possible in rising from the sod: a bandage was applied round his body, and in a short time he was able (though of course he had no reason to be over-willing) to begin another combat.[^[9]]

His Lordship having now, on his part, recovered from the attorney’s wounds, considered it high time to recommence hostilities according to his original plan of the campaign; and the engagement immediately succeeding was between him and the late Counsellor John Byrne, king’s counsel, and next in rotation of his learned adversaries.

His Lordship was much pleased with the spot upon which his son had chosen to hit Counsellor Peter, and resolved to select the same for a hit on Counsellor John. The decision appeared to be judicious; and, as if the pistol itself could not be ignorant of its destination, and had been gratified at its own previous accuracy and success, (for it was the same,) it sent a bullet in the identical level, and Counsellor Byrne’s carcase received a precisely similar compliment with Counsellor Burrowes’s:—with this difference; that as the former had no gingerbread nuts, the matter appeared more serious. I asked him during his illness how he felt when he received the crack? he answered, just as if he had been punched by the mainmast of a man of war!—certainly a grand simile; but how far my friend Byrne was enabled to form the comparison he never divulged to me.

[9]. Mr. Peter Burrowes, K. C., was my old friend and schoolfellow. He was one of those persons whom every body likes:—there never was a better hearted man! We were at Temple together.

My Lord having got through two counsellors, and his son a third, it became the duty of Captain Pierce Butler (brother to Somerset) to take his turn in the lists. The barristers now began not much to relish this species of argument; and a gentleman who followed next but one on the list owned fairly to me, that he would rather be on our side of the question: but it was determined by our noble client, so soon as the first series of combats should be finished, to begin a new one, till he and the lads had tried the mettle or “touched the inside” of all the remaining barristers. Mr. Dick Guinness, a very good-humoured, popular, lisping,[^[10]] dapper little pleader, was next on the list; and the Honourable Pierce Butler, his intended slaughterer, was advised, for variety’s sake, to put what is called the onus on that gentleman, and thereby force him to become the challenger,—which he was told by a young parson would considerably diminish the crime of killing him.

[10]. Lord Clare (when attorney-general) coming out of the Exchequer, which was much crowded, was asked who was speaking. “Speaking!” said Fitzgibbon; “nobody—Dick Guinness is whistling a demurrer.”

Dick’s friends kindly and candidly informed him that he could have but little chance—the Honourable Pierce being one of the most resolute of a courageous family, and quite an undeviating marksman: that he had, besides, a hot, persevering, thirsty spirit, which a little fighting would never quench: and as Dick was secretly informed that he would to a certainty be forced to battle (it being his turn), and his speedy dissolution being nearly as certain, he was recommended to settle all his worldly concerns without delay.

But it was to be otherwise.—Providence took Dick’s part, and decided that there should be no coroner’s inquest held on his body. The Honourable Pierce injudiciously put his onus (and rather a wicked one) on Dick in open court before the judge; an uproar ensued, and the Honourable Pierce hid himself under the table: however, the sheriff lugged him out, and prevented that encounter effectually; Pierce with great difficulty escaping immediate incarceration on giving his honour never to meddle with Dick, his members, or appurtenances, for three years, commencing from the day of his onus. This was an interruption which the Kilkenny family could not have foreseen; and at length his Lordship, finding that neither the laws of the land, nor those of battle, were likely to adjust affairs to his satisfaction, suffered them to be terminated by the three duels already narrated.

Counsellor Leonard M‘Nally, well known both at the English and Irish bars, and in the dramatic circles as author of that popular little piece “Robin Hood,” &c., was one of the strangest fellows in the world. His figure was ludicrous: he was very short, and nearly as broad as long: his legs were of unequal length, and he had a face which no washing could clean: he wanted one thumb, the absence of which gave rise to numerous expedients on his part; and he took great care to have no nails, as he regularly eat every morning the growth of the preceding day: he never wore a glove, lest he should appear to be guilty of duplicity in concealing the want of thumb. When in a hurry, he generally took two thumping steps with the short leg, to bring up the space made by the long one;—and the bar, who never missed a favourable opportunity of naming people, called him “one pound two.” As being a poet, the bar wags termed him “Olympus.” He possessed, however, a fine eye, and by no means an ugly countenance; a great deal of middling intellect; a shrill, full, good forensic voice; great quickness at cross examination, with sufficient adroitness at defence; and in Ireland he was both the staff and standing-dish of the criminal jurisdictions: in a word, M‘Nally was a good-natured, hospitable, talented, dirty fellow, and had, by the latter qualification, so disgusted the circuit bar, that they refused to receive him at their mess—a cruelty I set my face against, and every summer circuit endeavoured to vote him into the mess, but always ineffectually; his neglect of his person, the shrillness of his voice, and his low solicitor company, being assigned as reasons which never could be got over.

M‘Nally had done something in the great cause of Napper and Dutton, which brought him into still further disrepute with the bar. Anxious to regain his station by some act equalising him with his brethren, he determined to offend or challenge some of the most respectable members of the profession, who, however, showed no inclination to oblige him in that way. He first tried his hand with Counsellor * * *, a veteran of the bar, but who, upon this occasion, according to the decision of his fellows, refused the combat. M‘Nally, who was as intrepid as possible, by no means despaired, and was so obliging as to honour me with the next chance; in furtherance thereof, on very little provocation, to my surprise, and by no means to my satisfaction, gave me the retort not courteous in the Court of King’s Bench.

I was well aware of his object; and, not feeling comfortable under this public insult, told him (taking out my watch), “M‘Nally, you shall meet me in the Park in an hour.”

The little fellow’s eyes sparkled with pleasure at the invitation: never, perhaps, was any person so rejoiced at a good chance of going out of the world before dinner time. He instantly replied, “In half an hour, if you please,” comparing, at the same moment, his watch with mine:—“I hope you won’t disappoint me,” continued he.

“Never fear, Mac,” answered I, “there’s not a gentleman at the bar will be ashamed to fight you to-morrow, provided you live so long, which I can’t promise;—though I confess I wish you had selected some other of your friends for so very disagreeable an operation.”

We had no time to spare, so parted, to get ready. The first man I met was Mr. Henry Harding, a huge, wicked, fighting King’s County attorney.—I asked him to come out with me: to him it was “fine sport.” I also summoned Rice Gibbon, a surgeon, who being the most ostentatious fellow imaginable, brought an immense bag of surgical instruments, &c. from Mercers Hospital. In forty-five minutes we were regularly posted in the middle of the review-ground in the Phœnix-park, and the whole scene, to any person not so seriously implicated, must have been irresistibly ludicrous. The sun shone brightly; and Surgeon Gibbon, to lose no time in case of a hit, spread out all his polished instruments, dissecting-knives, forceps, scalpels, saws, tourniquets, probes of all lengths, &c., on the grass, glittering in the light on one side of me. I am sure it looked more like a regimental preparation before a battle, than for an individual encounter:—every thing was ranged in surgical order, ready for the most desperate operations; while a couple of young pupils from Mercers Hospital unfurled their three-tailed bandages like so many streamers. My second having stepped nine paces, then stood at the other side, handed me a case of pistols, and desired me to “work away by J——s.”—M‘Nally stood before me, very like a beer-barrel on its stilling, and by his side were ranged three unfortunate barristers, who were all soon afterward hanged and beheaded for high-treason;—namely, John Sheers, (who was his second, and had given him his point-blanks,) with Henry Sheers and Bagenal Harvey, who came as amateurs. Both of the latter, I believe, were amicably disposed, but a negociation would not be admitted by M‘Nally, (to whom it was of great consequence to fight a King’s Counsel,) and to it we went. M‘Nally presented so coolly, that I could plainly see I had but little chance of being missed, so I thought it best to lose no time on my part. The poor fellow staggered, and cried out, “I am hit!” and I felt some little twitch myself, which I could not at the moment account for. Never did I experience so miserable a feeling. He had received my ball directly in the centre of his ribs. My doctor rushed at him with the zeal and activity of a dissecting surgeon, and in one moment, with a long knife, which he thrust eagerly into his waistband, ripped up his clothes to the skin, and exposed his naked carcase to the bright sun.

The ball appeared to have hit the buckle of his suspenders (vulgariter, gallows), by which it had been partially impeded, and had turned round, instead of entering his paunch. While I was still in dread as to the result, my second, after seeing that he had been so protected by the suspenders, inhumanly exclaimed, “By J—, Mac, you are the only rogue I ever knew that was saved by the gallows!”—I felt quite happy that he was not dangerously hurt.

On returning home, I found I had not got off quite so well as I thought; the skirt of my coat was perforated on both sides, and a scratch just enough to break the skin had taken place on both my thighs. I did not know this while on the ground, but it accounts for the twitch I spoke of.

My opponent soon recovered, and after the precedent of being wounded by a King’s Counsel, no barrister could afterward decently refuse to give him satisfaction. He was, therefore, no longer insulted, and the poor fellow has often told me since that my shot was his salvation. He subsequently got Curran to bring us together at his house, and a more zealous partisan I never had than M‘Nally proved himself, on my contest for the city of Dublin, during which he did me good service.

Leonard was a great poetaster; and having fallen in love with a Miss Ianson, daughter to a very rich attorney, of Bedford-row, London, he wrote on her the celebrated song of “The Lass of Richmond Hill” (her father had a lodge there). She could not withstand this, and returned his flame. This young lady was absolutely beautiful, but quite a slattern in her person. She likewise had a turn for versification, and was therefore altogether well adapted to her lame lover, particularly as she never could spare time from her poetry to wash her hands; a circumstance in which M‘Nally was sympathetic. The father, however, notwithstanding all this, refused his consent; and consequently, M‘Nally took advantage of his dramatic knowledge, by adopting the precedent of Barnaby Brittle, and bribed a barber to lather old Ianson’s eyes as well as his chin, and with something rather sharper too than Windsor soap. Slipping out of the room, while her father was getting rid of the lather and the smart, this Sappho, with her limping Phaon, escaped, and were united in the holy bands of matrimony the same evening; and she continued making, and M‘Nally correcting, verses, till it pleased God to call his angel away. This curious couple conducted themselves, both generally and toward each other, extremely well, after their union. Old Ianson partly forgave them, and made some settlement upon their children.

The ancient mode of duelling in Ireland was generally on horseback. The combatants gallopped past each other, at a distance marked out by posts which prevented a nearer approach: they were at liberty to fire at any time from the commencement to the end of their course; but it must be at a hand-gallop: their pistols were charged alike with a certain number of bullets, slugs, or whatever was most convenient, as agreed.

There had been, from time immemorial, a spot marked out on level ground near the Doone of Clapook, Queen’s County, on the estate of my grand-uncle, Sir John Byrne, which I have often visited as classic ground. It was beautifully situated, near Stradbally; and here, according to tradition and legendary tales, the old captains and chieftains used to meet and decide their differences. Often did I walk it over, measuring its dimensions step by step. The bounds of it are still palpable, above sixty or seventy steps long, and about forty wide: large stones remain on the spot where, I suppose, the posts originally stood to divide the combatants, which were about eight or nine yards asunder—being the nearest point from which they were to fire. The time of firing was voluntary, so as it occurred during their course, and, as before stated, in a hand-gallop. If the quarrel was not terminated in one course, the combatants proceeded to a second; and if it was decided to go on after their pistols had been discharged, they then either finished with short broad-swords on horseback, or with small-swords on foot; but the tradition ran, that when they fought with small-swords, they always adjourned to the rock of Donamese, the ancient fortress of the O’Moors and the Princes of Offely. This is the most beautiful inland ruin I have seen in Ireland. There, in the centre of the old fort, on a flat green sod, are still visible the deep indentures of the feet both of principals, who have fought with small rapiers, and their seconds: every modern visitor naturally stepping into the same marks, the indentures are consequently kept up; and it is probable that they will be deeper a hundred years hence than they were a twelvemonth ago.

My grandfather, Colonel Jonah Barrington, of Cullenaghmore, had a great passion for hearing and telling stories of old events, particularly respecting duels and battles fought in his own neighbourhood, or by his relatives: and as these were just adapted to make impression on a very young curious mind, like mine, at the moment nearly a carte blanche, (the Arabian Nights, for instance, read by a child, are never forgotten by him,) I remember, as if they were told yesterday, many of his recitals and traditionary tales, especially those he could himself attest; and his face bore, to the day of his death, ample proof that he had not been idle among the combatants of his own era. The battle I remember best, because I heard it oftenest and through a variety of channels, was one of my grandfather’s, about the year 1759. He and a Mr. Gilbert had an irreconcilable grudge. (I forget the cause, but I believe it was a very silly one.) It increased every day, and the relatives of both parties found it must inevitably end in a combat, which, were it postponed till the sons of each grew up, might be enlarged perhaps from an individual into a regular family engagement. It was therefore thought better that the business should be ended at once; and it was decided that they should fight on horseback on the green of Maryborough; that the ground should be one hundred yards of race, and eight of distance; the weapons of each, two holster pistols, a broad-bladed but not very long sword (I have often seen my grandfather’s,) with basket handle, and a skeen, or long broad-bladed dagger: the pistols to be charged with one ball and swan-drops.

The entire country, for miles round, attended to see the combat, which had been six months settled and publicly announced, and the county-trumpeter, who attended the judges at the assizes, was on the ground. My grandfather’s second was a Mr. Lewis Moore, of Cremorgan, whom I well recollect to have seen—he long survived my grandfather: Gilbert’s was one of his own name and family—a captain of cavalry.

All due preliminaries being arranged, the country collected and placed as at a horse-race, and the ground kept free by the gamekeepers and huntsmen mounted, the combatants started, and gallopped toward each other. Both fired before they reached the nearest spot, and missed. The second course was more fortunate. My grandfather received many of Gilbert’s shot full in his face: the swan-drops penetrated no deeper than his temple and cheek-bones; the large bullet luckily passed him. The wounds, not being dangerous, only enraged old Jonah Barrington; and the other being equally willing to continue the conflict, a fierce battle, hand to hand, ensued: but I should think they did not close totally, or they could not have escaped with life.

My grandfather got three cuts, which he used to exhibit with great glee; one on the thick of the right arm, a second on his bridle-arm, and the third on the outside of the left hand. His hat, which he kept to the day of his death, was also sliced in several places; but both had iron skull-caps under their hats, which probably saved their brains from remaining upon the green of Maryborough.

Gilbert had received two pokes from my grandfather on his thigh and his side, but neither disabling. I fancy he had the best of the battle, being as strong as, and less irritable than, my grandfather, who, I suspect, grew, toward the last, a little ticklish on the subject; for he rushed headlong at Gilbert, closed, and instead of striking at his person, thrust his broad-sword into the horse’s body as often as he could, until the beast dropped with his rider underneath him: my grandfather then leaped off his horse, threw away his sword, and putting his skeen, or broad dagger, to the throat of Gilbert, told him to ask his life or die, as he must do either one or the other in half a minute. Gilbert said he would ask his life only upon the terms that, without apology or conversation, they should shake hands heartily and be future friends and companions, and not leave the youths of two old families to revenge their quarrel by carving each other. These terms being quite agreeable to my grandfather, as they breathed good sense, intrepidity, and good heart, he acquiesced; and from that time they were the most intimately attached and joyous friends and companions of the county wherein they resided.

My grandfather afterward fought at Clapook Squire Neddy Fitzgerald, who was badly shot. On this occasion, old Gilbert was my grandfather’s second:—I remember well seeing him; as I do also, about the same time, the late Chief Justice (then Serjeant) Pattison, who had come down to Cullenaghmore to visit my grandfather, and, as I afterward discovered, to cheat him of a borough and two seats in parliament, which he effected. Gilbert brought me a great many sweet things; and I heard that evening so many stories of fights at Clapook, and on the ridge of Maryborough, that I never forgot them; and it is curious enough that I have all my life taken the greatest delight in hearing of, or reading about, ancient battles and chivalrous adventures. Nothing amuses me more to this day; and hence perhaps it is, that I recollect those tales and traditions at the present moment with perfect distinctness and accuracy: my memory seldom fails me in any thing, and least of all in recitals such as the foregoing.[^[11]]

[11]. I have found many notes respecting such-like matters, in old Ms. books, &c. &c.; particularly two or three at the end of an old Cookery book, in Ms., by my great-grandmother Lady Byrne, of Timogue, in her own hand-writing, in 1729, with several receipts purporting to be by Lady Rory O’Neil, of Smithfield, Dublin, who died in 1741, at a great age. I shall revive this subject in another volume, which I contemplate.

GEORGE HARTPOLE.

Curious fatality in the Hartpole family—Characteristic sketch of the last of the name—Description of Shrewl Castle—The chapel and cemetery—Strictures on epitaph-writing—Eccentricities of the Earl of Aldborough—His Lordship proposes his sister, Lady Hannah Stratford, as returning-officer for the borough of Baltinglass—Consequent disturbances—The North-Briton put on his mettle, but out-manœuvred—“Lending to the Lord”—Successful conspiracy to marry Hartpole to the daughter of a village inn-keeper—He is stabbed by his wife, and deserts her in consequence—He forms an attachment to Miss Maria Otway, whom he marries, under the plea of his previous connexion being illegal—Unfortunate nature of this union—Separation of the parties—Hartpole’s voyage to Portugal, his return, and death—Sundry other anecdotes of the Stratford family.

In the year 1791, George Hartpole, of Shrewl Castle, Queen’s County, Ireland, had just come of age. He was the last surviving male of that name, which belonged to a popular family, highly respectable, and long established in the county. Few private gentlemen commenced life with better promise, and none better merited esteem and happiness. He was my relative by blood; and though considerably younger, the most intimate and dearest friend I had.

His father, Robert, had married a sister of the late and present Earls of Aldborough. She was the mother of George; and through this connexion originated my intercourse with that eccentric nobleman and his family.

A singular fatality had attended the Hartpole family from time immemorial. The fathers seldom survived the attainment of the age of 23 years by their elder sons, which circumstance gave rise to numerous traditionary tales of sprites and warnings.[^[12]]

[12]. The country authorities were very wise, very grave, and very grim on this subject; but, after all, I suspect the most natural way of accounting for the fatality alluded to is, that the old gentlemen were commonly among the hardest livers in the country, and consequently, the gout was certain to be their companion, and generally their executioner.

If wood be kept alternately in and out of moisture, it rots soon:—if it is always in water, it never decays. A man’s constitution and rum-punch may to a degree resemble wood and water in this respect. The hardest incessant drinkers I ever recollect lived to a great age, were generally healthy, and usually made their exit, at last, by apoplexy, without troubling either doctor, parson, or apothecary: while, on the contrary, most of those who were only intermitting boozers, died much earlier; their finisher being, nine times out of ten, gout in the head or stomach: a cause, however, occasionally varied by a broken neck by a fall from a horse, when riding home from a housewarming, or drowning in a ditch, whilst watering their horses after the dogh à dourish. A few were smothered in shaking bogs, whilst attending the turf-cutters, &c. &c.

It required at least three days and nights incessant hard going to kill a drinker of the first class. It cost Squire Luke Flood of Roundwood, a place situated in Queen’s County, five days and nights hard working at port before he could finish either himself or the piper. Old Squire Lewis Moor of Cremorgan died, by way of variety, at seventy-six, of a violent passion, because his wife became jealous of his proceedings with the kitchen-maid. A few died of Drogheda usquebaugh, and several of sore ancles. I recollect, in fact, many of the most curious deaths and burials in Ireland that ever took place in any country under heaven. None of them were considered as being melancholy events, since every hard going squire then generally took his full turn in this world, and died by some coup de grace, as stated: however, he was commonly regretted by all his acquaintance and family, except his eldest son.

Robert, as usual with the gentlemen of his day, was the dupe of agents, and the victim of indolence and hospitality. He had deposited his consort in the tomb of her fathers, and had continued merrily enjoying the convivialities of the world (principally in the night-time) till his son George had passed his 22nd year, and then punctually made way for the succession, leaving George inheritor of a large territory, a moderate income, a tattered mansion, an embarrassed rent-roll, and a profound ignorance (without the consciousness of it) of business in all departments.

George, though not at all handsome, had completely the mien and manners of a gentleman. His features accorded well with his address, bespeaking the cordiality of a friend and the ardour of an Irishman. His disposition was mild—his nature brave, generous, and sincere: on some occasions he was obstinate and peevish; on others, somewhat sullen and suspicious; but in his friendships, George Hartpole was immutable.

His stature was of the middle height, and his figure exhibited no appearance either of personal strength or constitutional vigour: his slender form and the languid fire of his eye indicated excitation without energy; yet his spirits were moderately good, and the most careless observer might feel convinced that he had sprung from no ordinary parentage—a circumstance which then had due influence in Ireland, where agents, artisans, and attorneys had not as yet supplanted the ancient nobility and gentry of the country.

Shrewl Castle, the hereditary residence of the Hartpoles, was in no way distinguishable from the numerous other castellated edifices now in a state of dilapidation throughout the whole island—ruins which invariably excite a retrospect of happier times, when the resident landlord, reverenced and beloved, and the cheerful tenant, fostered and protected, felt the natural advantages of their reciprocal attachment; a reflection which leads us to a sad comparison with modern usages, when the absent lord and the mercenary agent have no consideration but the rents, no solicitude but for their collection; when the deserted tenantry keep pace in decline with the deserted mansion; when the ragged cottager has no master to employ, no guardian to protect him!—pining, and sunk in the lowest state of want and wretchedness,—sans work, sans food, sans covering, sans every thing,—he rushes forlorn and desperate into the arms of destruction, which in all its various shapes stands ready to receive him. The reflection is miserable, but true:—such is Ireland since the year 1800.

Hartpole’s family residence, picturesquely seated on a verdant bank of the smooth and beautiful Barrow, had, during the revolutions of time, entirely lost the character of a fortress: patched and pieced after all the numberless orders of village architecture, it had long resigned the dignity of a castle without acquiring the comforts of a mansion: yet its gradual descent, from the stronghold of powerful chieftains to the rude dwelling of an embarrassed gentleman, could be traced even by a superficial observer. Its half-levelled battlements, its solitary and decrepit tower, and its rough, dingy walls, (giving it the appearance of a sort of habitable buttress,) combined to portray the downfall of an ancient family.

Close bounding the site of this ambiguous heritage was situate the ancient burial-place of the Hartpole family and its followers for ages. Scattered graves, some green—some russet—denoted the recentness or remoteness of the different interments; and a few broad flag-stones indented with defaced or illegible inscriptions, and covering the remains of the early masters of the domain, just uplifted their mouldering sides from among weeds and briars, and half disclosed the only objects which could render that cemetery interesting.

One melancholy yew-tree, spreading wide its straggling branches over the tombs of its former lords and the nave of an ancient chapel, (its own hollow trunk proclaiming that it could not long survive,) seemed to await, in awful augury, the honour of expiring with the last scion of its hereditary chieftains.

To me the view of this melancholy tree always communicated a low feverish sensation, which I could not well account for. It is true, I ever disliked to contemplate the residence of the dead:[^[13]] but that of the Hartpole race, bounding their hall of revelry, seemed to me a check upon all hilarity; and I never could raise my spirits in any room, or sleep soundly in any chamber, which overlooked that sanctuary.

[13]. I never could get over certain disagreeable sensations and awe at the interment of any person. So strongly, indeed, have I been impressed in this way, that I formed a resolution, which (with one exception) I have strictly adhered to these forty years,—namely, never to attend the funeral even of a relative. I have now and then indulged a whim of strolling over a country church-yard, occasionally to kill time when travelling, in other instances for statistical purposes: but, in general, the intelligible and serious inscriptions on the tomb-stones are so mingled and mixed with others too ridiculous even for the brain of a stone-cutter to have devised, that the rational and preposterous, alternately counteracting each other, made a sort of equipoise; and I generally left an ordinary church-yard pretty much in the same mood in which I entered it.

The incidents which marked the life of the last owner of Shrewl Castle were singular and affecting, and on many points may tend to exhibit an instructive example. Nothing, in fact, is better calculated to influence the conduct of society, than the biography of those whose career has been conspicuously marked either by eminent virtues or peculiar events. The instance of George Hartpole may serve to prove, were proof wanting, that matrimony, as it is the most irrevocable, so is it the most precarious step in the life of mortals; and that sensations of presentiment and foreboding (as I have already more than once maintained) are not always visionary.

I was the most valued friend of this ill-fated young man. To me his whole heart was laid open;—nor was there one important circumstance of his life, one feeling of his mind, concealed from me. It is now many years since he paid his debt to nature; and, by her course, I shall not much longer tarry to regret his departure; but, whilst my pilgrimage continues, that regret cannot be extinguished.

George had received but a moderate education, far inadequate to his rank and expectations; and the country life of his careless father had afforded him too few conveniences for cultivating his capacity. His near alliance, however, and intercourse with the Aldborough family, gave him considerable opportunities to counteract, in a better class of society, that tendency to rustic dissipation to which his situation had exposed him, and which, at first seductive, soon becomes habitual, and ruinous in every way to youthful morals.

Whatever were the other eccentricities or failings of Robert, Earl of Aldborough (the uncle of Hartpole), the hyperbolical ideas of importance and dignity which he had imbibed, though in many practical instances they rendered him ridiculous, still furnished him with a certain address and air of fashion which put rustic vulgarity out of his society, and, combined with a portion of classic learning and modern belles-lettres, never failed to give him an entire ascendancy over his ruder neighbours. This curious character exhibited a pretty equal proportion of ostentation and meanness.[^[14]]

[14]. Hartpole, though he despised the empty arrogance of his uncle, yet saw that his Lordship knew the world well and profited by that knowledge:—he therefore occasionally paid much attention to some of my Lord’s worldly lectures; and had he observed the best of them, though he might possibly have appeared less amiable, he would doubtless have been far more fortunate. But Hartpole could not draw the due distinction between the folly of his uncle’s ostentation and the utility of his address; disgusted with the one, he did not sufficiently practise the other; and despised the idea of acting as if he knew the world, lest he should be considered as affecting to know too much of it.

The most remarkable act of his Lordship’s life was an experiment regarding his sister, Lady Hannah Stratford. The borough of Baltinglass was in the patronage of the Stratford family; and on that subject, his brothers, John and Benjamin, never gave him a peaceable moment: they always opposed him, and generally succeeded. He was determined, however, to make a new kind of burgomaster or returning-officer, whose adherence he might religiously depend on. He therefore took his sister, Lady Hannah, down to the corporation, and recommended her as a fit and proper returning-officer for the borough of Baltinglass! Many highly approved of her Ladyship, by way of a change, and a double return ensued—a man acting for the brothers, and the lady for the nobleman. This created a great battle. The honourable ladies of the family all got into the thick of it: some of them were well trounced—others gave as good as they received: the affair made a great uproar in Dublin, and informations were moved for and granted against some of the ladies. However, the brothers, as was just, kept the borough, and his Lordship never could make any farther hand of it.

The high-ways of Lord Aldborough, and the by-ways with which he intersected them, are well exhibited by an incident that occurred to him when the country was rather disturbed in 1797. He proceeded in great state, with his carriage, outriders, &c. to visit the commanding officer of a regiment of cavalry which had just arrived in that part of the country. On entering the room, he immediately began by informing the officer “that he was the Earl of Aldborough, of Belan Castle; that he had the finest mansion, demesne, park and fish-ponds in that county, and frequently did the military gentlemen the honour of inviting them to his dinners;”—adding, with what he thought a dignified politeness, “I have come from my castle of Belan, where I have all the conveniences and luxuries of life, for the especial purpose of saying, Major, I am glad to see the military in my county, and have made up my mind to give you, Major, my countenance and protection.” The Major, who happened to be rather a rough soldier and of a country not famed for the softness of its manners, could scarcely repress his indignation at his Lordship’s arrogant politeness: but when the last sentence was pronounced, he could restrain himself no longer:—“Coontenance and proteection!” repeated he contemptuously, two or three times: “as for your proteection, Mister my Lord, Major M‘Pherson is always able to proteect himsel; and as for your coontenance, by heeven I would not tak it for your eerldom!”

His Lordship withdrew, and the Major related the incident as a singular piece of assurance. My Lord, however, knew the world too well to let the soldier’s answer stick against himself:—next day he invited every officer of the regiment to dinner, and so civilly, that the Major lost all credit with his brother officers for his surly reply to so hospitable a nobleman! Nay, it was even whispered among them at mess, that the Major had actually invented the story, to show off his own wit and independence;—and thus Lord Aldborough obtained complete revenge.

On another occasion, his Lordship got off better still:—being churchwarden of Baltinglass parish, he did not please the rector, Bob Carter, as to his mode of accounting for the money in the poor-boxes. The peer treated Bob (who was as hard-going, good-hearted, devil-may-care a parson as any in Ireland) with the greatest contempt. The parson, who felt no sort of personal respect for my Lord, renewed his insinuations of his Lordship’s false arithmetic, until the latter, highly indignant, grew wroth, and would give Bob no further satisfaction on the matter: upon which, the rector took the only revenge then in his power, by giving out a second charity sermon, inasmuch as the proceeds of the first had not been productive. The hint went abroad, the church was crowded, and to the infinite amusement of the congregation, Bob put forth as his text—“Whosoever giveth to the poor, lendeth to the Lord.” The application was so clear, that the laugh was irresistible. Bob followed up his blow all through the sermon, and “the Lord” was considered to be completely blown; but skilfully enough, he contrived to give the matter a turn that disconcerted even the Rev. Bob himself. After the sermon was concluded, his Lordship stood up, publicly thanked Bob for his most excellent text and charity sermon, and declared that he had no doubt the Lord Lieutenant or the bishop would very soon promote him, according to his extraordinary merits, which he was ready to vouch, in common with the rest of the parishioners; finally begging of him to have the sermon printed!

Hartpole’s fortune on the death of his father was not large; but its increase would be great and certain, and this rendered his adoption of any money-making profession or employment unnecessary. He accordingly purchased a commission in the army, and commenced his entré into a military life and general society with all the advantages of birth, property, manners, and character.

A cursory observation of the world must convince us of one painful and inexplicable truth;—that there are some men (and frequently the best) who, even from their earliest youth, appear born to be the victims of undeviating misfortune; whom Providence seems to have gifted with free-agency only to lead them to unhappiness and ruin. Ever disappointed in his most ardent hopes—frustrated in his dearest objects—his best intentions overthrown—his purest motives calumniated and abused,—no rank or station suffices to shelter such an unfortunate:—ennui creeps upon his hopeless mind, communicates a listless languor to a sinking constitution, and at length he almost joyfully surrenders an existence which he finds too burdensome to be supported.[^[15]]

[15]. I cannot better illustrate the state of a person so chased by misery, than by quoting a few unpublished lines, the composition of a very young lady, Miss M. T., with whom, and with whose amiable family, I have the pleasure of being intimate.

I am aware that I do her great injustice by quoting these particular verses—some of the most inferior of her writings; but they seem so much to the point, that I venture to risk her displeasure. She is not, indeed, irritable; and I promise to atone for my error by a few further quotations from her superior compositions.

I.

I never sought a day’s repose

But some sharp thorn pierced my breast;

I never watch’d the evening’s close,

And hoped a heaven of rest;

But soon a darkling cloud would come

Athwart the prospect bright,

And, pale as twilight on a tomb,

My hopes grew dim in night.

II.

Oft have I mark’d the heav’nly moon

Wandering her pathless way

Along the midnight’s purple noon,

More fair—more loved than day:

But soon she flung her shadowy wreath

O’er dark eternity,

As a faint smile on the cheek of death

’Twixt hope and agony.

III.

Oft on the rainbow’s bloom I’ve gazed,

Arch’d as a gate of heaven,

Till gushing showers its portals razed,

And bathed the brow of even.

’Tis thus young hopes illume the sky

Of Life’s dark atmosphere,

Yet, like the rainbow’s splendid dye,

They meet and disappear.

IV.

Ev’n so, the mirth of man is madness;—

His joy as a sepulchral light,

Which shows his solitude and sadness,

But chaseth not the night.

Such nearly was the lot of the last of the Hartpoles. He had scarcely commenced a flattering entrance into public life, when one false and fatal step, to which he was led first by a dreadful accident, and subsequently by his own benevolent disposition, worked on by the chicanery of others, laid the foundation of all his future miseries.

While quartered with his regiment at Galway, in Ireland, his gun, on a shooting party, burst in his hand, which was so shattered, that it was long before his surgeon could decide that amputation might be dispensed with.

During the protracted period of his indisposition he was confined to his chamber at a small inn, such as Ireland then exhibited in provincial towns. The host, whose name was Sleven, had two daughters, both of whom assisted in the business. The elder, Honor, had long been celebrated as a vulgar wit and humourist, the cleverest of all her female contemporaries; and the bar, on circuits, frequented her father’s house purposely to be amused by her repartees. Her coarse person was well calculated to protect her moral conduct; and she jested and took her glass with reasonable moderation. Besides entertaining the bar, she occasionally amused the judges also; and Lord Yelverton, the chief baron, (who admired wit in any body,) was Honor’s greatest partisan.

Such females ever appeared to me unnatural and disgusting. A humorous and vulgar Amazon, who forgets her own sex, can scarcely expect that ours will recollect it.

Mary, the younger sister, was of a different appearance and character. She was as mild and unassuming as, from her low occupation and habits of life, could be expected: though destitute of any kind of talent, she yet appeared as if somewhat better born than Honor, and her attention to her guests was at the same time assiduous but properly reserved; which conduct, contrasted with the masculine effrontery of the other, gave her, in my mind, a great superiority.

It must have been remarked by every person who has observed the habits and manners of provincial towns, that the distinctions of society are frequently suspended by the necessary familiarities of a contracted circle, and that inferior females frequently excite (especially among youthful military) sensations of tenderness which in a metropolis would never have been thought of—at least in the same point of view. And here the evil genius of Hartpole first commenced her incantations for his ruin.

Throughout George’s painful and harassing confinement, the more than assiduous care of Mary Sleven could not escape the observation of the too sensitive convalescent. Hartpole has often described to me the rise and progress of the giddy, romantic feeling which then seized upon him; how he used to catch her moistened eye watching his interrupted slumbers, or the progress of his recovery; and when she was conscious of being perceived, how the mantling blush would betray a degree of interest far beyond that of an ordinary attendant.

Mary was rather well-looking; though there was little to captivate, there was nothing about her to excite his distaste: he was not permitted to have society; and thus, being left nearly alone with this young female during many weeks of pain and solitude, and accustomed to the solicitude of a woman, (so exquisite to a man in every state of suffering,) Hartpole discovered in the sequel, that a feeling of gratitude of the highest order had sunk deeper than he wished within his bosom.

He could not but perceive, indeed, that the girl actually loved him, and his vanity of course was alive to the disclosure; but his honourable principles prevented him from taking any advantage of that weakness, which she could not conceal, and whereto he could not be blind. It was in truth a dangerous situation for both. There were, as I have said, no external objects to divert George’s mind from this novel sensation; there was no one to point out its folly or interrupt its progress. Her partiality flattered him in his seclusion, and led his thoughts gradually and imperceptibly into a channel inconsistent with the welfare of himself, the honour of his family, and the becoming pride of a gentleman. It certainly was, after all, a sort of non-descript passion: it was not actually love.

Meanwhile the keen masculine understanding of Honor soon perceived the game which it would be wise in her to play, and conceived a project whereby to wind up Hartpole’s feeling to the pitch she wanted, and insensibly to lead his gratitude to love, and his love to matrimony. This was Honor’s aim; but she overrated her own penetration, and deceived herself as to Hartpole’s character: she overacted her part, and consequently diminished its effect.

At length, awakened from his vision of romantic gratitude, and beginning to open his eyes to the views of the two women, my friend felt ashamed of his facility, and mustered up sufficient resolution to rescue himself from the toils they were spreading for his capture. He had never made any species of proposal to Mary, and she could not, with just or honest hope, look to marriage with a person so greatly her superior. On his perfect recovery, he determined, by going over to England, to avoid all their machinations; and he also determined that his departure should be abrupt.

The keen and rapid eye of the designing Honor, however, soon discovered the secret of his thoughts; and guessing the extent of his resolution, she artfully impressed upon him (under the affectation of concealing it) the entire attachment of her pining sister; but at the same time communicated Mary’s resolution to be seen by him no more—“since it would be useless further to distract her devoted heart by cultivating society from which she must so soon be separated for ever.”

Here Honor was again mistaken:—no melting looks, no softening blandishments, now intervened to oppose George’s pride or stagger his resolution. He had only to struggle with himself; and after a day and night of calm reflection, he fully conquered the dangers of his high-flown gratitude, and departed at day-break from the inn without even desiring to see the love-lorn and secluded Mary.

The sisters were thus totally disappointed. He had paid munificently for the trouble he had given them, written a letter of grateful thanks to Mary, left her a considerable present, and set off to Dublin to take immediate shipping for England.

Hartpole now congratulated himself on his escape from the sarcasms of the world, the scorn of his family, and his own self-condemnation. He had acted with honour; he had done nothing wrong; and he had once more secured that rank in society which he had been in danger of relinquishing. In Dublin he stopped at the Marine Hotel, whence the packet was to sail at midnight, and considered himself as on the road to Stratford-place, London, which his uncle, Lord Aldborough, had built, and where his Lordship then resided.

The time of embarkation had nearly arrived when a loud shriek issued from an adjoining chamber to his, at the hotel. Ever alive to any adventure, Hartpole rushed into the room, and beheld—Mary Sleven! She was, or affected to be, fainting, and was supported by the artful Honor, who hung over her, apparently regardless of all other objects, and bemoaning, in low accents, the miserable fate of her only sister.

Bewildered both by the nature and suddenness of this rencontre, Hartpole told me that for a moment he nearly lost his sight—nay, almost his reason; but he soon saw through the scheme, and mustered up sufficient courage to withdraw without explanation. He had, in fact, advanced to the door, and was on the outside step, the boat being ready to receive him, when a second and more violent shriek was heard from the room he had just quitted, accompanied by exclamations of “She’s gone! she’s gone!” Hartpole’s presence of mind entirely forsook him; he retraced his steps, and found Mary lying, as it should seem, quite senseless, in the arms of Honor: his heart relented; his evil genius profited by the advantage; and he assisted to restore her. Gradually Mary’s eyes opened; she regarded George wildly but intently, and having caught his eye, closed hers again—a languid, and, as it were, an involuntary pressure of his hand, conveying to him her sensations. He spoke kindly to her: she started at the sound, and renewed the pressure with increased force. As she slowly and gradually revived, the scene became more interesting. A medical man being (by preconcert) at hand, he ordered her restorative cordials. Madeira only could at the moment be procured. She put the glass to her mouth, sipped, looked tenderly at Hartpole, and offered it him; her lips had touched it; he sipped also; the patient smiled; the doctor took a glass; Hartpole pledged him; glass followed glass, until George was bewildered! The artful Honor soon substituted another bottle: it was Hartpole’s first wine after his accident, and quickly mounted to his brain.

Thus did an hour flit away, and, meanwhile, the packet had sailed. Another person affected also to have lost his passage while occupied about the patient, and this turned out to be a Catholic priest. Refreshments were ordered: the doctor and the priest were pressed to partake of the fare: the Madeira was replenished: the moments fled! The young man’s brain was inflamed; and it is only necessary to add, that the morning’s sun arose, not on the happy George, but on the happy Mary, the wedded wife of Hartpole.

I will not attempt to describe the husband’s feelings when morning brought reflection. Every passion met its foe within his bosom: every resolve was overwhelmed by an adverse one: his sensitive mind became the field of contest for tumultuous emotions; until, worn out by its own conflicts, it sank into languor and dejection. He had lost himself! he therefore yielded to his fate, abandoned all idea of further resistance, and was led back in chains by the triumphant sisters.

None of his family or connexions would ever receive her; and George for awhile, sunk and disgraced, without losing all his attachment for the girl, had lost all his tranquillity. After two years’ struggle, however, between his feelings for her and his aspirations after a more honourable station in society, the conspiracy which had effected his ruin, being by chance discovered, arose before his eye like a spectre, and, as if through a prism, the deception appeared in the clearest colours.

A revulsion followed, and the conflict became still more keen within his breast: but, at length, his pride and resolution prevailed over his sensibility, and he determined (after providing amply for her) to take advantage of that statute which declares null and void all marriages between a Catholic and a Protestant solemnised by a popish priest. He made this determination; it was just; but, unfortunately, he lingered as to its execution. Her influence was not extinguished; and she succeeded in inducing him to procrastinate from time to time the fatal resolve. She could not, it is true, deny that he had been inveigled, and had made up her own mind, should he stand firm, to accept a liberal provision, and submit to a legal sentence, which indeed could not be resisted.

As the propriety of Mary’s moral conduct had never been called in question, she might, after all, be able to obtain a match more adapted to her station and to every thing except her ambition: but the coarse and vulgar Honor miscalculated all. She irritated and wound up Mary almost to madness; and in this state, her characteristic mildness forsook her; she became jealous of all other women, and hesitated not daily to lavish abuse on the passive and wretched Hartpole.

One morning, in Dublin, where they were residing, he came to my house in a state of trembling perturbation. He showed me a wound on his hand, and another slight one from a knife’s point indented on his breast-bone. Mary, he said, had, in a paroxysm of rage, attempted to stab him whilst sitting at breakfast: he had, with difficulty, wrested the knife from her grasp, and left the house never to return to it. He could in fact no longer feel safe in her society; and therefore, arranging all his necessary concerns, he repaired to Edinburgh, where his regiment was quartered.

The suit for a decree of nullity was immediately commenced, but no effective proceedings were ever taken, nor any sentence in the cause pronounced, owing to events still more unfortunate to poor Hartpole.

Prior to this fatal act of George’s, I had never observed an attachment on his part toward any female, save a very temporary one to a young lady in his neighbourhood, whom few men could see without strong feelings of admiration;—the second daughter of Mr. Yates, of Moon, a gentleman of the old school, almost antediluvian in his appearance, and of good fortune in County Kildare.

The beauty of Myrtle Yates arose nearly to perfection. It was of that brilliance with which poets and romance writers endeavour to adorn the most favoured of their heroines. Had she lived of yore, the Grecian sculptor or Roman artist might have profited by charms which they could never fancy:—she might have been the model for a Venus, or, at a later era, sat for a Madonna. Nature, indeed, seemed to have created her solely for the blandishments of affection; and her whole form appeared susceptible of being dissolved in love.

In a word, at twenty, Myrtle Yates was wholly irresistible; not a youth of her country, who had a heart, could boast of its insensibility; and perhaps she owed to the bewildering number of those admirers the good fortune of not devoting herself to any of them.

Yet Hartpole’s attachment to Myrtle Yates was neither deep nor lasting. He considered her too attractive—perhaps too yielding; and had he always adhered to the same principle of judgment, it is possible he might have yet existed.

On his return from Scotland he immediately repaired to Clifton, to drink the waters for a severe cold which could no longer be neglected, and required medical advice and a balmy atmosphere. Here fate threw in the way of this ill-fated youth another lure for his destruction, but such a one as might have entrapped even the most cautious and prudent. Love, in its genuine and rational shape, now assailed the breast of the ever-sensitive Hartpole; and an attachment sprang up fatal to his happiness, and eventually to his existence.

At Clifton, my friend made the acquaintance of a lady and gentleman, in whose only daughter were combined all the attractive qualities of youth, loveliness, and amiability. Their possessor moved in a sphere calculated to gratify his pride; and those who saw and knew the object of George’s new attachment could feel no surprise at the vehemence of his passion.

The unfortunate young man, however, sorely felt that his situation under these circumstances was even more dreadful than in the former connexion. Loving one woman to adoration, and as yet the acknowledged husband of another, it is not easy to conceive any state more distracting to a man of honour. His agitated mind had now no suspension of its misery, save when lulled into a temporary trance by the very lassitude induced by its own unhappiness.

He wrote to me, expressing the full extent of his sensations—that is, as fully as pen could convey them. But imperfect indeed must be all expression which attempts to describe intensity of feeling. It was from blots and scratches, and here and there the dried-up stain of an hieroglyphic tear, rather than from words, that I gathered the excess of his mental agony. He required of my friendship to advise him—a task, to the execution of which I was utterly incompetent. All I could properly advise him to, was what I knew he would not comply with; namely, to come over to Ireland, and endeavour to conquer the influence of his passion, or at least to take no decisive step in divulging it till the law had pronounced its sentence on his existing connexion.

Hartpole had strong feelings of honour as to this latter. For a length of time he could scarcely reconcile himself to the idea of publicly annulling what he had publicly avowed; and it was only by urging on his consideration the fact, that the ceremony by a popish priest in no such case legally constituted a marriage, that he was prevailed on to seek for a decree of nullity. Such decree was not indeed absolutely necessary; but to have it upon record was judged advisable. Though the incipient proceedings had been taken by his proctor, they were not completed, and Mary Sleven’s marriage never was formally declared a nullity by the sentence of the Ecclesiastical Court, nor was she ever judicially separated from the deluded Hartpole.

Under all these circumstances, I was totally bewildered as to what ought to be my friend’s future conduct, when I was one morning greatly surprised by the sudden appearance of Hartpole at my breakfast-table, obviously in better health:—he looked very superior to what I had expected; his eye sparkled, and there was an air of satisfaction diffused both over his features and address which convinced me that some decisive step had been taken by him. He lost no time in telling me that he had actually proposed for Miss Otway to her father and mother; that she herself had consented; that Mr. and Mrs. Otway had come over to have his fortune investigated, and wished to see me with as little delay as convenient; and concluded by saying, that he was most anxious to introduce me to the source of all his terrestrial happiness.

I could not but start on hearing all this, and declined entering at all into the business with Mr. Otway till George had given me a written license to communicate with him as I pleased. He acceded to all I desired, and the next morning I waited on that gentleman—(Mr. Cooke Otway, of Castle Otway).

I never felt more embarrassed in my life than at this interview. I had in the interim made myself master of Mr. Otway’s character, and the knowledge by no means contributed to ease my scruples or diminish my embarrassment. However, to my surprise, a very short time disposed of both, and in a way which I had heretofore conceived quite impossible.

I found Colonel Cooke Otway a strong-minded, decided, gentlemanly man, obviously with more head than heart,—sensible, and practically good-natured;—in short, one of those well-trained persons who appear to be quite off-handed, yet, on closer remark, are obviously in reservation.

He introduced me to Mrs. Otway, whose character required no research. It was ordinary, but amiable: she had evidently great kindness of heart, and her conduct was uniformly reported to be such as left nothing to amend either as wife or mother: she appeared to be in declining health, whilst her daughter, in the full bloom of youth and first blush of ripening beauty, presented a striking contrast.

I also read, as far as its hitherto slight development would admit, the character of Maria Otway. I could perceive neither the languor of love nor the restlessness of suspense at all predominant in her feelings. Perfect ease and entire resignation appeared to sit most cheerfully on her brow: she seemed voluntarily to consider the wish of her parents as the rule of her destiny; and it was perceptible that Hartpole had the love entirely at his own disposal.

Maria united in her appearance, her manners, and her obvious disposition, most of those amiable and engaging traits which the age of eighteen can develope in a female.—Her figure, in height rather below the middle stature, had arrived at that proportionate fulness which forms the just medium between the round and slender, and without the defects of either gives the advantages of both. Her limbs, cast in the mould of perfect symmetry, moved with that ease and moderate activity which constitute the natural grace of female action. Her features small, and not justifying the epithet of “beautiful,” yet formed in their assemblage a blooming and expressive index of the young heart that ruled them: the imperfections of the profile were lost in the brilliant delicacy of the complexion which embellished it. Her blue eyes were untutored; but her smile was intoxicating; and my friend was bound and fettered in the trammels of female witchery.

In my own judgment, Maria Otway was certainly at that time a most interesting young female: still her beauty, obviously aided by youth, health, and thoughtless happiness, was not of that animated and vigorous cast on which we so often see neither time, care, nor age make quick impression: it was, on the other hand, that soft and delicate loveliness to which years and family are such inveterate and sometimes rapid enemies.

Over such a person as Hartpole, the victory of Miss Otway’s beauty was complete; and the result of that unfortunate passion convinces me that a man (unless his judgment be superior to his sensibility) cannot commit an act of greater folly than to encourage an attachment to any woman whom he thinks every body else must admire as well as himself. George at first was inclined to resist his passion, but he did not fly from the cause of it, and he therefore fell a victim to romantic love as he had before done to romantic gratitude.

Mr. Otway at once opened the business, and told me Hartpole had referred him to me for a statement of his estates and financial situation. On this point I had come fully prepared. Hartpole’s circumstances exceeded rather than fell below Mr. Otway’s expectation.

“I am quite satisfied, my dear sir,” said he to me, with a significant nod; “you know that in Ireland we always make some allowances for the Stratford consanguinity.”

I now found my embarrassment recommence, but determined, at every risk, to free myself from all future responsibility or reproach: I therefore informed Col. Otway explicitly of Hartpole’s marriage, and that no sentence had as yet been pronounced to declare that marriage a nullity, though in point of law it was so.

Having heard me throughout with the greatest complacency, he took me by the hand:—“My dear sir,” said he with a smile which at first surprised me, “I am happy to tell you that I was fully apprised, before I came to Ireland, of every circumstance you have related to me as to that woman, and had taken the opinions of several eminent practitioners on the point, each of whom gave without any hesitation exactly the same opinion you have done: my mind was therefore easy and made up on that subject before I left England, and I do not consider the circumstance any impediment to the present negotiation.”

It is not easy to describe the relief thus afforded me; though, at the same time, I must own I was somewhat astonished at this seeming nonchalance. We parted in excellent humour with each other, and I believe he was my friend to the day of his death.

The negotiation went on: Miss Sleven was no more regarded; and after a deal of discussion, but no difference of opinion, the terms were agreed on, and settlements prepared, for a marriage, in all its results as unfortunate for the young people, and as culpable in the old, as any that ever came within my recollection.

A circumstance of singular and not very auspicious nature occurred on the first step toward the completion of that ill-starred alliance. It was necessary to procure a license from the Prerogative Court for the solemnization of the marriage in the city of Dublin, and Hartpole’s uncle, the Honourable Benjamin O’Neil Stratford (now Earl of Aldborough), attended with George upon Doctor Duigenan, then judge of the prerogative, for that purpose.

The doctor (who when irritated was the most outrageous judge that ever presided in a court of justice) was on the bench officiating upon their arrival. Benjamin conceived that his rank and intimacy with the doctor would have procured him at least common civility; but in this he was egregiously mistaken.

Benjamin O’Neil Stratford, who attended his nephew on that dangerous expedition, was endowed with several good-natured qualities, but, as folks said, rather inclined to the pleasures of litigation. In every family which is not very popular, there is always one, of whom people in general say, “Oh! he is the best of them:” and this was Benjamin’s reputation as to the Stratford family.[^[16]]

[16]. The noble Earl had then also the appellation of “Blind Ben,” which had been conferred on him by the agreeable and witty Lady Aldborough, and which ought not to have been by any means considered derogatory, inasmuch as his name is certainly Benjamin, and one of his eyes is actually “not at home;” and as the abrupt mode of its quitting his Lordship’s service was rather humorous, it may be amusing to mention it.

He had once (as he thought) the honour of killing a crane. Benjamin’s evil genius, however, maliciously scattered the shot, and the crane had only been what they call in Ireland kilt; but feeling pretty sure that her death was determined on, she resolved to die heroically, and not unrevenged. She fell, and lying motionless, seduced her assassin to come and wring her head off, according to the usual rules and practice of humanity by fowlers. The honourable sportsman approached triumphantly, and stooping to seize the spolia opima, Madam Crane, (having as good eyes of her own as the one that took aim at her,) in return for his compliment, darted her long bill plump into the head of the Honourable Benjamin O’Neil Stratford, entering through the very same casement which he had closed the shutters of to take his aim. In fact, she turned the honourable gentleman’s eye clean out of its natural residence; and being thus fully gratified by extinguishing the light in one of her enemy’s lanterns, she resigned her body to be plucked, stuffed, and roasted, in the usual manner, as was performed accordingly. Thus, though her slayer was writhing in agony, his family was fully revenged by feasting on his tormentor. Daily consultations were held to ascertain whether her long rapier had not actually penetrated the brain of the Honourable Benjamin. One of the tenants being heard to say, in a most untenant-like manner, that it might in such case be all for the best, was asked his reason for so undutiful an expression; and replied, that if she had just pricked his honour’s brain, maybe it might have let out the humours, which would have done no harm either to his honour or to Baltinglass.

On their arrival in the presence of the doctor, who pretended never to know any body in Court, he asked, “Who those people were?” and on being informed, proceeded to inquire what business brought them there.

The Honourable Benjamin answered, “that he wanted a marriage-license for his nephew, George Hartpole, of Shrewl Castle, Esq., and Miss Maria Otway, of Castle Otway, County Tipperary.”

He had scarcely pronounced the words when the doctor, rising, with the utmost vehemence roared out, “George Hartpole! George Hartpole! is that the rascal who has another wife living?”

George, struck motionless, shrank within himself; but Benjamin, not being so easily frightened, said something equally warm, whereupon the doctor, without further ceremony, rushed at him, seized him by the collar, and cried, “Do you want me to countenance bigamy, you villains?” at the same time roaring to his crier and servants to “turn the fellows out!” which order, if not literally, was virtually performed, and the petitioners for a license congratulated themselves upon their providential escape from so outrageous a judge of prerogative.

The fact was, a suit of nullity had been actually commenced in the Court, but its merits never having been stated, the judge only knew Hartpole as a married man de facto, and it certainly could not appear very correct of the Honourable Benjamin to apply to the same judge who was to try the validity of the first marriage, to grant his license for the solemnization of a second while the first remained undecided. On Hartpole’s mind the circumstance made an indelible impression, and he never afterward took any further proceedings in the cause then instituted.

Hartpole returned to me and recounted the adventure, affecting to treat it as a jest against his uncle. But it was a vain disguise; although, by struggling sharply with his feelings, he in some degree overcame them.

But what was now to be done, since no license could be obtained in Dublin? A general consultation was held; Mr. Otway (still singularly to me) appeared to regard the circumstance as a mere bagatelle. I thought far otherwise; and it was so deeply engraven on Hartpole’s mind, that he mentioned it to me not three days previous to his dissolution, as having foreboded all his subsequent misfortunes.

It was at length agreed on that he should be married in the diocese of Kildare, by a license from the bishop’s surrogate there. This was in effect accomplished. I did not attend at the ceremony; after which, the parties pursued their journey to Castle Otway, where, in the midst of every thing that was desirable on earth, Hartpole commenced the trial of his new connexion.

In spite of these apparent advantages, however, my friend soon began either to find or conjure up new and dangerous sources of uneasiness. He continued some months at Castle Otway, listless and devoured by ennui—pining for a change of scene, and longing to return to his hereditary domain. His health gradually, although slowly, declined; yet he took no medical advice: remote symptoms of consumption began to exhibit themselves, and the effects of care upon a constitution naturally irritable favoured their development. But, amidst all this, he fancied for awhile that he possessed every thing he could wish for;—his wife daily improved in her person, her manners were delightful, her conduct unexceptionable.

Maria was adored by her parents, but adored to a degree that tended eventually to create her misery: the thought of separating from them was to her almost unbearable; she durst scarcely look at such an event with firmness. Her reluctance could not be concealed from the sharp eye of her uneasy husband. Every mark of affection lavished by her on her parents he considered as if filched from him. He thought her heart should have no room for any attachments but to himself, whereas it had been wholly preoccupied by filial tenderness, that true passion of nature. In a word, she had never loved Hartpole, for whom she felt no other than a neutral species of attachment. Neither her mind nor her person had arrived at their full maturity, when she was called upon to love; and under such circumstances, she really evinced more affection for her husband than I supposed she would do, but far less than he expected.

At length it was agreed that they should come, on a visit, to my house in Dublin for some time, and that her mother should afterwards stay with her at Shrewl Castle till Maria was gradually reconciled to the dreaded change, and to final residence with a man whom I believe she early discovered was not exactly calculated to make her happy. The story of Mary Sleven, I believe, she had not heard; if she had, I am pretty sure she never would have left the protection of her father.

When Hartpole arrived at my house, I soon perceived that my gloomy auguries had been too well grounded. I found his mind bewildered; he received no enjoyment from reading; his health did not permit strong exercise; he took no pleasure in new and strange society; but, on the contrary, pined for his own home, his free associates, his steward, his tenants, his colliers, and above all, for a passive, fond companion who should have no wish but her husband’s.

Now, none of these things were to Maria’s taste, and she yielded to the inroads of discontent, as I think, unreasonably: still, this feeling never showed itself with offensive prominence. She gave way to every desire expressed by her husband, but her acquiescence seemed to me like that of a victim. I have often noticed that, even whilst she intimated her obedience, her averted eye betrayed a rebel tear, and she only awaited the moment when it might gush out with safety, and relieve her.

I perceived that, unless some step was taken to occupy George’s mind, a residence at Shrewl Castle would surely proclaim to the world both his folly and his ruin. I therefore applied to Mr. Pelham, then secretary in Ireland, to appoint Hartpole to the office of high sheriff for Queen’s County for the ensuing year, 1794. My application was immediately conceded. I also took out for him a commission of the peace. Meanwhile his old castle was in part newly furnished, and I was happy to see that he felt a sort of gratification in the appointment of sheriff; and though in a state of health badly calculated to execute the duties of such an office, the occupation of his mind would, I hoped, make ample amends for his necessary personal exertions. If that year had passed favourably, it was my intention to have recommended a tour to some foreign country, where change of climate and of scene might tend to restore my friend’s health, to amuse his mind, and perhaps to make a desirable alteration in the feelings both of himself and his wife:—but Heaven decreed otherwise.

While on their visit at my house, I perceived, in Hartpole’s disposition, among other traits which so close a communion could scarcely fail to develope, one which I had never before suspected in him, and calculated to prove the certain and permanent source of unhappiness. Jealousy is of all others the most terrible of human passions. When once it fixes its roots in a hasty, sanguine nature, it becomes master of every action and every word; and reason, justice, and humanity, all fly before it! When it pervades a less ardent spirit, impetuosity is bridled; but the desire of revenge is no less powerful, and too often seeks gratification in the exercise of cold treachery or petty annoyance: in either case, the eye magnifies every object which can at all feed the greediness of suspicion. When this passion has any fair cause, it may be justifiable, and a crisis generally ends it; but when no cause exists, save in the distempered fancy of a sinking constitution, it is permanent and invincible.

Such was the case with my friend: his jealousy had no fixed object on which to fasten itself, but wandered from person to person. Indeed, it could have no resting-place; for, in this point of view, Maria was blameless. But in the eye of my friend she had guilt—the guilt of being attractive. He conceived that every body must love her as he did himself, and fancied that a female universally admired could not be universally ungrateful.

This melancholy and morbid state of mind appeared to me likely to increase from residence in a metropolis, and I hastened his departure for Shrewl Castle, to take upon himself the office of high sheriff. I did not go with them, for my mind misgave me: her mother met them there, and innocently completed the ruin of her children by a step the consequences whereof should ever be a warning to wives, to parents, and to husbands!

At Shrewl, Mrs. Otway perceived George’s ideal malady: she was a silly woman, who fancied she was wise, and thought she never could do wrong because she always intended to do right. She proposed to Maria a most desperate remedy to cure her husband of his jealousy, though she did not reflect that it might probably be at the expense of his existence, and certainly of her daughter’s duty. They conspired together, and wrote two or three letters directed to Mrs. Hartpole, without signature, but professing love and designating meetings. These they took measures to drop so as Hartpole might accidentally find some of them, and thus they thought in the end to convince him of his folly, and laugh him out of his suspicions.

The result may be easily anticipated by those who have read with attention the character of the husband. He became outrageous; the developement did not pacify him; and his paroxysm was nearly fatal. Maria was in consequence but little better, and the unexpected result of her own injudicious conduct nearly distracted the unhappy mother. But it was too late to retrieve their error: the die was thrown. Hartpole was inflexible; and the first I heard of it was Maria’s departure to her father’s, and a final separation:—and thus, after a marriage of a few months, that ill-starred young man, completely the sport of fortune, became once more solitary! Labouring under the false idea that he could soon conquer his attachment, he made Maria an ample separate maintenance, and determined to go to Lisbon, where he thought a change of scene might, perhaps, restore his peace, and the climate his shattered constitution.

Before he sailed, I endeavoured in vain to reconcile them. She did not love him well enough to risk a further residence at Shrewl, in the absence of her connexions; and his mind was case-hardened against the whole family from which she sprang. His reasons to me for parting from her finally were at least plausible.

“I acquit her at once,” said he, “of ever having shown a symptom of impropriety, nay, even of giddiness: there I was wrong, and I own it: but she has proved herself perfectly capable of, and expert at, deception; and the woman that has practised deception for my sake would be equally capable of practising it for her own. So far from curing my error, she has confirmed me in it; and when confidence ceases separation ought to ensue.”

Hartpole shortly after embarked for Portugal, and only returned to terminate his short career by a lingering and painful death.

On his arrival at Lisbon without any amendment either in mind or body, I felt, and I am sure he did himself, that the world was fast receding from him. The rough manners of one Lieutenant Waters, the person whom he had chosen as a led captain, were little congenial to his own characteristic mildness. He had, however, Simon, a most faithful Scotch valet; and after a few posts, I conceived, from his letters, that his spirits had very much improved, when a circumstance occurred which, had he been in health, would have been merely ludicrous; but which the shattered state of his nerves rendered him almost incapable of bearing up against.

On his marriage he had given the commission in the army which he then held to Mr. Otway, his brother-in-law (I believe, now, General Otway); on his separation, however, he determined to resume the profession, and accordingly purchased a commission in a regiment of the line then raising by his uncle the late Lord Aldborough; and he had been gazetted previously to his departure.

After he had been a short time at Lisbon, some mischievous person, for some mischievous object, informed his uncle that he had been dead a fortnight! and, without further inquiry, that nobleman resold George’s commission, and an announcement appeared in the newspapers, that Hartpole had fallen a victim at Lisbon, to consumption, the rapid progress of which had rendered his case hopeless even before he quitted Ireland,—adding the name of the party who had succeeded him in his regiment.

Now the fact was, that the climate of Lisbon had been of great service to his health; and he was quickly recovering strength and spirits when, taking up, one day, an English paper, he read the above-mentioned paragraph.

His valet described to me coarsely the instantaneous effect of this circumstance on his master’s mind. It seemed to proclaim his fate by anticipation:—his commission was disposed of, under the idea that he was actually dead; every melancholy reflection crowded upon him; he totally relapsed; and I firmly believe that paragraph was his death-blow. After lingering several months longer, he returned to England, and I received a letter requesting me to meet him without delay at Bristol, and stating that he had made his will. I immediately undertook the journey, and took him over a horse which I conceived adapted to him at that time. His sister (the present Mrs. Bowen, of Rutland-square) was with him. His figure was emaciated to the last degree, and he was sinking rapidly into the grave. He was attended by a very clever young physician of that place, a Doctor Barrow, and I soon perceived that the doctor had fallen a victim to the charms of Miss Hartpole.

The patient had, however, declined but little in appetite, when the disorder fixed itself in his throat, and he ceased to have the power of eating: he now entirely gave himself up as a person who must die of hunger. This melancholy scene almost distracted me. The doctor gave us little consolation; and Hartpole himself, though reduced to such a state, was really the most cheerful of the party, evincing a degree of resignation at once heroic and touching. His will had been prepared by Mr. Lemans of Bristol, (to me a perfect stranger,) and executed whilst I was in Ireland: he informed us all that I was joint executor with two of his uncles.

On the morning of Hartpole’s death he sent for me to rise and come to him. I found him in an agony of hunger—perspiration in large drops rolling down his face. He said neither food nor liquid could descend into his stomach; that his ribs had contracted inward, as if convulsively drawn together; and that he was in great pain. I cannot describe my emotion! He walked about his room and spoke to me earnestly on many subjects, on some of which I have been, and ever shall be, totally silent. At length he called me to the window:—“Barrington,” said he, “you see at a distance a very green field?” “Yes,” I replied. “Well,” continued George, “it is my dying request that I may be buried there to-morrow evening.”

He spoke so calmly and strongly, that I felt much surprised. He observed this, and said, “It is true: I am in the agonies of death.” I now called in the doctor and Hartpole’s servant: the invalid sat down upon the bed; and when he took me by the hand, I shuddered, for it was burning hot, whilst every nerve and sinew seemed to be in spasmodic action, then iced and clammy. I never had been in collision with a dying person before: he pressed my hand with great fervour, and murmured, “My friend!”—these were the last words I heard him utter. I looked in his face: his eyes were glazed—his lips quivered—he laid his head on the pillow, and expired.

This awful scene, to me so perfectly new, overpowered me, and for a few minutes I was myself totally insensible.

I disobeyed Hartpole’s injunctions respecting his funeral; for I had his body enclosed in a leaden coffin and sent to be interred at Shrewl Castle, in the cemetery of his ancestors, wherein his remains were not admitted without much reluctance by his ungrateful sister and her husband, who resided there in his absence.

On the reading of the will, his first bequest appeared to be to “his friend Barrington, six thousand pounds,” together with the reversion of his landed estates and collieries, by moieties, on the death of each of his sisters without children: one had been some years married and had none; the other was unmarried, but soon after made a match with a respectable gentleman of very considerable property, but whom I should think few young ladies of fortune would have fancied.

The uncles would not act as executors; considered me as an interloper; and commenced a suit to annul the will, as prepared under undue influence. Fortunately for my reputation, I had never known or even seen the persons who prepared it. I was in another kingdom at the time, and had not seen Hartpole for many months before its execution: his sister was with him; not I.—I was utterly unacquainted with his will or its contents.

I got a decree without delay. The family of Stratford, who preferred law to all other species of pastime, appealed. My decree was confirmed, and they were burdened with the whole costs; and in effect paid me six thousand pounds, on an amicable arrangement. My reversion yielded me nothing; for I fancy the sisters have since had nearly twenty children between them to inherit it.

Thus ended Hartpole’s life, and thus did a family become extinct, of the most respectable description. I neither looked to nor expected any legacy from my friend, beyond a mourning-ring. He left numerous other bequests, including a considerable one to Mary Sleven, whose fate I never heard.

The sequel of Maria Otway’s history was not much less melancholy than that of her unhappy partner, as she died prematurely, by the most affecting of all deaths, some time after—childbirth. I saw her after the separation, but never after George’s decease. As I predicted, her style of beauty was not calculated to wear well; and even before she was out of her teens, Maria Otway had been much handsomer. Her manner became more studied—of course, less graceful: and that naïveté, which had rendered her so engaging to my friend, was somewhat superseded by the affectation of fashionable manners.

Maria, I think, never had been attached to Hartpole; and within two years after his decease, she made another and a most unexceptionable match—namely, with Mr. Prittie, the present member for Tipperary: but Providence seemed to pursue fatally even the relict of my friend; and, at the age of twenty-three, death cut off the survivor of that union which an unconcerned spectator would have deemed so auspicious. It was said and believed, (but I do not wish to be understood as vouching the report,) that after Mrs. Prittie’s death a prediction of that event was found written by herself six months before it occurred, designating the precise time of her departure.

I have been diffuse on the memoirs of Hartpole, because I felt myself interested in almost every material event of his career. To overlook our friendship, indeed, and his liberality, would have been ungrateful, in any memoir of myself.[^[17]]

Before I quit these “records,” and the associations which they excite, I am tempted once more to revert to the peculiarities of the Stratford family, which indeed present an ample field for anecdote. More curious or dissimilar characters never, surely, bore the same name.

Earl Robert, one of those who declared war against me on Hartpole’s death, was surnamed “The Peer of a Hundred Wills;” and it is matter of fact, that, upon a trial at law in County Wicklow, since his Lordship’s death, fifty-one different wills were produced, together with a great number of affidavits, &c., also signed by the Earl. Several of these documents are of the most singular description, highly illustrative of the Earl’s character, and I should think among the most extraordinary papers existing.

[17]. George Hartpole was sponsor to my only son.

It was a general rule with this peer to make a will or codicil in favour of any person with whom he was desirous of carrying a point,—taking especial care that the party should be made acquainted with his proceeding: no sooner, however, was his end accomplished, and other game started, than a fresh instrument annulled all the provisions of the preceding one! Thus, if desirous of obtaining a lady’s regards, he made a will in her favour, and let her find it by accident. He at length got 50,000l. with a grand-daughter of the Duke of Chandos, and brought her over to Belan.

In the cause before mentioned I was specially retained by the late Earl John, to argue that his brother was mad, and Mr. Plunkett was retained specially as my opponent, to argue that he was sane. In support of our positions it was that the fifty wills were produced; and I hesitate not to say, that either of them, had it emanated from any other individual than his Lordship, would have been deemed conclusive of insanity. But the jury had known the party whose vagaries they were summoned to decide upon; and therefore found, as usual, in favour of his Lordship’s last will. I subsequently asked one of those gentlemen the grounds of their verdict; and his answer was—“We all knew well that the testator was more * * * * * than fool: did you ever hear of any body taking him in?”—and, the truth is, the jury were right; for I never met with a man who had more worldly tact than Robert, Earl of Aldborough, and, owing to my close connexion with his nephew, Hartpole, I had abundant opportunities of judging, as well as by his extraordinary correspondence and transactions with myself.

The present Countess Dowager of Aldborough was in the habit of uttering jeux d’esprit with more spirit and grace than any woman in the world: she often cut deeply; but so keen and polished was the edge of her wit, that the patient was never mangled; or if he was, nobody consoled him in his tortures.

The cause of her naming the Honourable and Reverend Paul Stratford, her brother-in-law, “Holy Paul,” was droll enough. Mount Neil, a remarkably fine old country-house, furnished in the ancient style, was that ecclesiastic’s family mansion, wherein he resided many years, but of which it was thought he at last grew tired. One stormy night, this house (some time after it had been insured to a large amount) most perversely and miraculously took fire: (the common people still say, and verily believe, it was of its own accord:) no water was to be had; of course the flames raged ad libitum: the tenants bustled, jostled, and tumbled over each other, in a general uproar and zeal to save his Reverence’s “great house:” his Reverence alone, meek and resigned, beheld the voracious element devour his hereditary property—piously and audibly attributing the evil solely to the just will of Providence as a punishment for his having vexed his mother some years before, when she was troubled with a dropsy. Under this impression, the Honourable and Reverend Paul adopted the only rational and pious means of extinguishing the conflagration: he fell on his bare knees in front of the blazing pile, and, with clasped and uplifted hands, and in the tone of a saint during his martyrdom, besought the Lord to show him mercy, and extinguish a flame which was setting all human aid at defiance! The people around, however, did not place equal reliance on the interposition of Providence,—which, as a country fellow very judiciously observed, “might be employed somewhere else at the time, and unable to look to his Reverence’s consarns:” so they continued, while practicable, to bring out the furniture piecemeal, and range it on the grass-plat. Paul no sooner perceived the result of their exertions than, still on his knees, he cried out—“Stop! stop! throw all my valuable goods and chattels back into the flames! never fly, my friends, in the face of Heaven! When the Almighty resolved to burn my house, he most certainly intended to burn the furniture. I feel resigned. The Lord’s will be done! Throw it all back again!”

The tenants reluctantly obeyed his orders; but, unfortunately for “Holy Paul,” the Insurance Company, when applied to for payment of his losses, differed altogether from his Reverence as to the agency of Providence, and absolutely refused to pay any part of the damage incurred. Paul declared it would be a crime in him to insist by a law-suit upon payment; and that he’d rather lose all his insurance than bring any act of Providence into the Court of Exchequer, which never was renowned for any great skill in ecclesiastical polity. In tithe cases, they showed no sort of partiality to the clergy; and never would pay the least attention in any instance to assertions from the board of first-fruits without putting the clergy to the trouble of producing their witnesses.

The Honourable and Rev. Paul, however, got into disrepute by this occurrence, and his nephew declined being married by him. In fact, the fault of Holy Paul was, love of money: he had very good property, but was totally averse to paying away any thing. He was put into prison by his niece’s husband, where he long remained rather than render an account; and when at length he settled the whole demand, refused to pay a few pounds fees, and continued voluntarily in confinement until his death. Notwithstanding, greatly to his credit, he bestowed large sums in charity.

HAMILTON ROWAN AND THE BAR.

Sketch of the character of Mr. Hamilton Rowan—His Quixotic spirit of philanthropy—Case of Mary Neil taken up by Mr. Rowan—Dinner-club among the briefless barristers of Dublin—Apparition of Mr. Hamilton Rowan and his dog—More frightened than hurt—An unanswerable query—Mr. Rowan’s subsequent adventures—The Rev. Mr. Jackson—He is brought up to receive sentence for high-treason, and expires in Court.

There were few persons whose history was connected with that of Ireland during my time, who excited my interest in a greater degree than Mr. Hamilton Rowan. Points of this gentleman’s character have been unfavourably represented by persons who knew little or nothing of his life, and that too, long after he had ceased to be a politician. I may claim perfect disinterestedness when I state that I never had the least social intercourse with Mr. Rowan, whose line of politics was decidedly opposed to my own.

Archibald Hamilton Rowan (I believe he still lives) is a gentleman of most respectable family and of ample fortune: considered merely as a private character, I fancy there are few who will not give him full credit for every quality which does honour to his station in society. As a philanthropist, he certainly carried his ideas even beyond reason, and to a degree of excess which I really think laid in his mind the foundation of all his enthusiastic proceedings, both in common life and in politics.

The first interview I had with this gentleman did not occupy more than a few minutes; but it was of a most impressive nature, and though now nearly forty years back, appears as fresh to my eye as if it took place yesterday: in truth, I believe it must be equally present to every individual of the company who survives, and is not too old to remember any thing.

There is generally in every metropolis some temporary incident which serves as a common subject of conversation; something which nominally excites interest, but which in fact nobody cares a sous about, though for the day it sells all the newspapers, and gives employment to every tongue, till some new occurrence happens to work up curiosity and change the topic.

In 1788, a very young girl, of the name of Mary Neil, had been ill-treated by a person unknown, aided by a woman. The late Lord Carhampton was reported to be the transgressor, but without any proof whatsoever of his Lordship’s culpability. The humour of Hamilton Rowan, which had a sort of Quixotic tendency to resist all oppression and to redress every species of wrong, led him to take up the cause of Mary Neil with a zeal and enthusiastic perseverance which nobody but the knight of La Mancha could have exceeded. Day and night the ill-treatment of this girl was the subject of his thoughts, his actions, his dreams: he even went about preaching a kind of crusade in her favour, and succeeded in gaining a great many partisans among the citizens; and, in short, he eventually obtained a legal conviction of the woman as accessory to a crime, the perpetrator whereof remained undiscovered, and she accordingly received, and most justly, sentence of death. Still Mary Neil was not bettered by this conviction: she was utterly unprovided for, had suffered much, and was quite wretched. Yet there were not wanting persons who doubted her truth, decried her former character, and represented her story as that of an impostor: this, though not credited, not only hurt the feelings and philanthropy, but the pride of Hamilton Rowan; and he vowed personal vengeance against all her calumniators, high and low.

At this time about twenty young barristers, including myself, had formed a dinner-club in Dublin: we had taken large apartments for the purpose; and, as we were not yet troubled with too much business, were in the habit of faring luxuriously every day, and taking a bottle of the best claret which could be obtained.[^[18]]

[18]. One of us, Counsellor Townley Fitgate, (afterwards chairman of Wicklow County,) having a pleasure-cutter of his own in the harbour of Dublin, used to send her to smuggle claret for us from the Isle of Man: he made a friend of one of the tide-waiters, and we consequently had the very best wines on the cheapest possible terms.

There never existed a more cheerful, witty, nor half so cheap a dinner-club. One day, whilst dining with our usual hilarity, the servant informed us that a gentleman below stairs desired to be admitted for a moment. We considered it to be some brother-barrister who requested permission to join our party, and desired him to be shown up. What was our surprise, however, on perceiving the figure that presented itself!—a man, who might have served as a model for a Hercules, his gigantic limbs conveying the idea of almost supernatural strength: his shoulders, arms, and broad chest, were the very emblems of muscular energy; and his flat, rough countenance, overshadowed by enormous dark eyebrows, and deeply furrowed by strong lines of vigour and fortitude, completed one of the finest, yet most formidable figures I had ever beheld. He was very well dressed: close by his side stalked in a baggy Newfoundland dog of corresponding magnitude, with hair a foot long, and who, if he should be voraciously inclined, seemed well able to devour a barrister or two without overcharging his stomach:—as he entered, indeed, he alternately looked at us and then up at his master, as if only awaiting the orders of the latter to commence the “onslaught.” His master held in his hand a large, yellow, knotted club, slung by a leathern thong round his great wrist: he had also a long small-sword by his side, adorned by a purple ribbon.

This apparition walked deliberately up to the table; and having made his obeisance with seeming courtesy, a short pause ensued, during which he looked round on all the company with an aspect, if not stern, yet ill-calculated to set our minds at ease either as to his or his dog’s ulterior intentions.

“Gentlemen!” at length he said, in a tone and with an air at once so mild and courteous, nay, so polished, as fairly to give the lie, as it were, to his gigantic and threatening figure: “Gentlemen! I have heard with very great regret that some members of this club have been so indiscreet as to calumniate the character of Mary Neil, which, from the part I have taken, I feel identified with my own: if any gentleman present hath done so, I doubt not he will now have the candour and courage to avow it.—Who avows it?” The dog looked up at him again: he returned the glance; but contented himself, for the present, with patting the animal’s head, and was silent: so were we. He repeated, “Who avows it?”

The extreme surprise indeed with which our party was seized, bordering almost on consternation, rendered all consultation as to a reply out of the question; and never did I see the old axiom, that “what is every body’s business is nobody’s business,” more thoroughly exemplified. A few of the company whispered each his neighbour, and I perceived one or two steal a fruit-knife under the table-cloth, in case of extremities; but no one made any reply. We were eighteen in number; and as neither would or could answer for the others, it would require eighteen replies to satisfy the giant’s single query; and I fancy some of us could not have replied to his satisfaction, and stuck to the truth into the bargain.

He repeated his demand (elevating his tone each time) thrice: “Does any gentleman avow it?” A faint buzz now circulated round the room, but there was no answer whatsoever. Communication was cut off, and there was a dead silence: at length our visitor said, with a loud voice, that he must suppose, if any gentleman had made observations or assertions against Mary Neil’s character, he would have had the courage and spirit to avow it: “therefore,” continued he, “I shall take it for granted that my information was erroneous; and, in that point of view, I regret having alarmed your society.” And, without another word, he bowed three times very low, and retired backward toward the door, (his dog also backing out with equal politeness,) where, with a parting salute doubly ceremonious, Mr. Rowan ended this extraordinary interview. On the first of his departing bows, by a simultaneous impulse, we all rose and returned his compliments, almost touching the table with our noses, but still in profound silence; which bowing on both sides was repeated, as I have said, till he was fairly out of the room. Three or four of the company then ran hastily to the window to be sure that he and the dog were clear off into the street; and no sooner had this satisfactory dénouement been ascertained, than a general roar of laughter ensued, and we talked it over in a hundred different ways: the whole of our arguments, however, turned upon the question “which had behaved the politest upon the occasion?” but not one word was uttered as to which had behaved the stoutest.

This spirit of false chivalry, which took such entire possession of Hamilton Rowan’s understanding, was soon diverted into the channels of political theory; and from the discussion of general politics, he advanced blindly, but I really believe with the best intentions, to the contemplation of sedition. His career in this respect was short:—he was tried and convicted of circulating a factious paper, and sentenced to a heavy fine and a long imprisonment, during which, political charges of a much more serious nature were arrayed against him. He fortunately escaped from prison to the house of Mr. Evans, of Portranne, near Dublin, and got off in a fishing-boat to France, where, after numerous dangers, he at length arrived safely.—Mr. Rowan subsequently resided some years in America, in which country he had leisure for reflection, and saw plainly the folly and mischief of his former conduct. The government found that his contrition was sincere: he eventually received his Majesty’s free pardon; and I have since seen him and his family at the Castle drawing-rooms in dresses singularly splendid, where they were well received by the Viceroy and by many of the nobility and gentry: and people should consider that his Majesty’s free pardon for political offences is always meant to wipe away every injurious feeling from his subjects’ recollection:—where the error was unaccompanied by any moral crime, it left no stigma whatever on private character.

The mention of Mr. Rowan reminds me of an anecdote of a singular nature, extremely affecting, and which at the time was the subject of much conversation: and as a connexion was alleged to exist between him and the unfortunate gentleman to whom it relates, (which connexion had nearly proved fatal to Mr. Rowan,) I consider this not an inappropriate place to allude to the circumstance.

Mr. Jackson, an English clergyman, who had come over to assist in organising a revolution in Ireland, had been arrested in that country, tried, and found guilty of high treason in corresponding with the enemy in France. I was in court when Mr. Jackson was brought up to receive sentence of death; and I believe whoever was present must recollect it as one of the most touching and uncommon scenes which appeared during that eventful period.

He was conducted into the usual place where prisoners stand to receive sentence. He was obviously much affected as he entered; his limbs seemed to totter, and large drops of perspiration rolled down his face. He was supposed to fear death, and to be in great terror. The judge began the usual admonition before he pronounced sentence: the prisoner seemed to regard it but little, appearing abstracted by internal agony. This was still attributed to apprehension: he covered his face, and seemed sinking: the judge paused—the crowd evinced surprise—and the sheriff, on examination, declared the prisoner was too ill to hear his sentence. Meanwhile, the wretched culprit continued to droop: and at length, his limbs giving way, he fell! A visitation so unexampled created a great sensation in the court: a physician was immediately summoned, but too late; Jackson had eluded his sentence, and was no more.

It was discovered that, previous to his coming into Court, he had taken a large quantity of arsenic and aqua-fortis mixed in tea. No judgment of course was pronounced against him. He had a splendid funeral: and, to the astonishment of Dublin, it was thoughtlessly attended by some members of parliament and barristers!

It is a singular but a true observation, that I was always on friendly, nay intimate, terms with many leading persons of the two most hostile and intolerant political bodies that could possibly exist together in one country; and in the midst of the most tumultuous and bloody scenes, I did not find that I had an enemy. It is nearly unaccountable, that my attachment to the government, and my activity in support of it, yet placed me in no danger from its inveterate enemies:—and in several instances I was sought as mediator between the rebels and Lord Kilwarden (then attorney-general).[^[19]] Now he is no more, it is but justice to say, that of all the law officers and official servants of the Crown I ever had communication with, the most kind-hearted, clement, and honourable, was he whose manners and whose name conveyed a different impression. I know that he had been solicited to take some harsh measures as to the barristers who attended Jackson’s funeral; and though he might have been colourably justified in doing so, he said “that both the honour of his profession and the feelings of his own mind prevented him from giving publicity to, or stamping as a crime, what he was sure in its nature could only be inadvertency.”

[19]. He was at that time Mr. Wolfe. An information ex officio had been filed against a printer in Cork for a seditious newspaper: it turned out that the two Counsellors Sheers were the real editors. They begged of me to mediate with the attorney-general. He had always a strong feeling for the honour and character of his profession, and forgave all parties, on conditions which I all but vouched for, but to which they certainly did not adhere.

SELF-DECAPITATION.

An Irish peasant cutting his own head off by mistake—His reputed ghost—Humours of an Irish Wake—Natural deaths of the Irish peasantry—Reflections on the Excise laws.

Among my memorandums of singular incidents, I find one which even now affords me as much amusement as such a circumstance can possibly admit of: and as it is, at the same time, highly characteristic of the people among whom it occurred, in that view I relate it. A man decapitating himself by mistake is indeed a blunder of true Hibernian character.[^[20]]

[20]. This anecdote has been termed “fabulous” by some of the sapient periodical critics, and a “bounce” by others. “’Tis quite impossible,” say the scribblers, “for any man to cut his own head off.” This no doubt singular decapitation, however, happens to be a well known and comparatively recent fact; and if either of the aforesaid sceptics will be so obliging as to try the same species of guillotine that Ned did at the Barrow water, he may, with the greatest facility, get rid of, probably, the thickest and heaviest article belonging to him.

The Emperor of Morocco, it is said, to convince his subjects what an easy matter decapitation was, and what an uncertain tenure a head has in his dominions, used to cut off the head of a jack-ass every morning with one back stroke of his sabre. Should his copper-coloured Majesty honour England with his august presence, to be feasted, fire-worked, and subsidised like Don Miguel the First, what noble practice at decapitation, in the absence of his jack-asses, he might have in London among the periodical scribblers—without doing much injury to the animals themselves, and none at all either to the “Société des lettres,” or what is called in England the “discerning public.”

I think it was in or about the year 1796, a labourer dwelling near the town of Athy, County Kildare (where my mother then resided), was walking with his comrade up the banks of the Barrow to the farm of a Mr. Richardson, on whose meadows they were employed to mow; each, in the usual Irish way, having his scythe loosely wagging over his shoulder. Lazily lounging close to the bank of the river, they espied a salmon partly hid under the bank. It is the nature of this fish that, when his head is concealed, he fancies no one can see his tail (there are many wise-acres in the world, besides the salmon, of the same way of thinking). On the present occasion the body of the fish was visible.

“Oh! Ned—Ned, dear!” said one of the mowers, “look at that big fellow there: it is a pity we ha’nt no spear, now, isn’t it?”

“Maybe,” said Ned, “we could be after piking the lad with the scythe-handle.”

“True for you!” said Dennis: “the spike of yeer handle is longer nor mine; give the fellow a dig with it at any rate.”

“Ay, will I,” returned the other: “I’ll give the lad a prod he’ll never forget any how.”

The spike and their sport was all they thought of: but the blade of the scythe, which hung over Ned’s shoulders, never came into the contemplation of either of them. Ned cautiously looked over the bank; the unconscious salmon lay snug, little imagining the conspiracy that had been formed against his tail.

“Now hit the lad smart!” said Dennis: “there, now—there! rise your fist: now you have the boy! now, Ned—success!—success!”

Ned struck at the salmon with all his might and main, and that was not trifling. But whether “the boy” was piked or not never appeared; for poor Ned, bending his neck as he struck at the salmon, placed the vertebræ in the most convenient position for unfurnishing his shoulders; and his head came tumbling splash into the Barrow, to the utter astonishment of his comrade, who could not conceive how it could drop off so suddenly. But the next minute he had the consolation of seeing the head attended by one of his own ears, which had been most dexterously sliced off by the same blow which beheaded his comrade.

The head and ear rolled down the river in company, and were picked up with extreme horror at a mill-dam, near Mr. Richardson’s, by one of the miller’s men.

“Who the devil does this head belong to?” exclaimed the miller.—“Oh Christ—!”

“Whoever owned it,” said the man, “had three ears, at any rate, though they don’t match.”

A search being now made, Ned’s headless body was discovered lying half over the bank, and Dennis in a swoon, through fright and loss of blood, was found recumbent by its side. The latter, when brought to himself, (which process was effected by whisky,) recited the whole adventure. The body was attended to the grave by a numerous assemblage of Ned’s countrymen; and the custom of carrying scythes carelessly very much declined. Many accidents had happened before from that cause, and the priest very judiciously told his flock, after the de profundis, that Ned’s misfortune was a “devil’s judgment” for his negligence, whereby he had hurt a child a day or two before.

From that time none of the country-people would on any occasion go after dark to the spot where the catastrophe happened, as they say the doctor stole the head to natomise it; which fact was confirmed by a man without any head being frequently seen by the women and children who were occasionally led to pass the moat of Ascole, not three miles from Athy, in the night-time; and they really believed the apparition to be no other than the ghost of poor Ned Maher looking every where for his head that the doctor had made away with.[^[21]]

[21]. This is only mentioned as indicative of the singular flow of ideas of the Irish peasantry. The most serious and solemn events are frequently converted by them into sources of humour and of comic expression that altogether banish any thing under the head of gravity.

The lower orders are never half so happy as at a wake—when they can procure candles, punch, a piper, and tobacco, to enable them to sit and smoke round a human corpse! No matter what death it suffered, or disorder it died of (except indeed the bite of a mad dog). Their hilarity knows no limits; their humorous phrases and remarks flow in a constant stream of quaint wit and pointed repartee, but not in the style or tone of any other people existing. The wake is also their usual place of match-making; and the marriages or misfortunes of the ladies are generally decided on “going home from the wake.”

The cheerfulness of the wake, however, is intermitting:—every hour or two the most melancholy howling that human voices could raise is set up by the keeners, and continued long enough to give the recurrence to mirth and fun increased excitement. These keeners, or mourners, are a set of old women, who practise for general use the most lachrymose notes, high and low, it is possible to conceive—which they turn into a sort of song (without words), at one time sinking into the deepest and most plaintive strains, then, on a sudden, raised into a howl, loud, frightful, and continued nearly to a shriek; and then in long notes descending in a tone of almost supernatural cadence.

They say that this is mimicking wicked souls “undergoing their punishment in purgatory,” and is used as a defiance to the devil, and to show him that the corpse they are waking does not care a “mass for him.” But then, they never trust the corpse to be left alone, because it could make no resistance to Belzebub if he came for it; and a priest always remains in the room to guard the body, if the keeners should happen to go away.

If you ask a country fellow how he can be so merry over a “dead man”—

“Ough! plase your honour,” he will probably reply, “why shouldn’t we be merry when there’s a good corpse to the fore?”

“What do you mean?”

“Mane is it?—fy, sure enough, your honour, Father Corcoran says (and the devil so good a guess in the town-land) that after the month’s mind is over, Tom Dempsey, the corpse, will be happier nor any of us.—Ough! your honour! hell to the rap of tythe-cess or hearth-money, he’ll have to pay proctor nor parson!—There’s many a boy in the parish, plase your honour, would not object to be Tom Dempsey, the corpse, fresh and fasting, this blessed morning!”

If you begin to reason with him, he will perhaps say—“Why, plase your honour, sure it’s only his corpse that’s corpsed;—after the masses he’ll be out of pain, and better off nor any gentleman in this same county, except our own landlord, God bless him up or down!”

If you seem to think the defunct’s family will be unhappy in consequence of his death—

“Oh, plase your honour! Tom was a good frind, sure enough, and whilst there’s a shovel and sack in the neighbourhood his family won’t be let to want nothing any how.”

“But his poor wife?”

“Ough! then it’s she that’s sorry for poor Tom, your honour! Whilst the keeners were washing and stretching the corpse, and she crying her eyes out of her head—oh, the cratur!—Father Corcoran whispered all as one as a mass, and plenty of comfort into Mrs. Dempsey’s own ear, cheek by jowl, and by my sowl the devil a drop of a tear came out of her afterward, plase your honour!”

What is termed the Irish cry, is keening on an extensive scale, and is perhaps the most terrific yell ever yet practised in any country.

It is used in processions on the roads, as the people are carrying a dead body to its place of interment—and occasionally, on any great misfortune where the lamentation should be general.

If there are twenty thousand persons in a procession, they all set up the same cry as the keeners, but a hundred times more horrid and appalling. It may be heard many miles from the spot.

One mode formerly of raising the people in the least possible time, was the carrying a coffin under pretence of a burial. The procession, which sets out probably with only a dozen persons, amounts in the course of an hour to some twenty thousand. When once the yell is set up, every person within hearing is expected immediately to join the corpse by the shortest road—scampering across fields, ditches, &c.; so that, as the numbers increase, the roar becomes more tremendous, and answers better than a hundred bells in bringing a population together.

It is usual for every man, woman, and child to pick up a stone or two, as they go along, and throw them into a heap, which tradition sometimes marks out as the site of some remarkable battle, murder, &c.

The above plan was occasionally resorted to by the insurgents in the year 1798; and there can be no doubt, if they all set out with processions at one hour of any given day, that it would be a tremendous species of muster for such a people as the Irish, who are as little known or understood by the generality of the English, as the Cossacks.

This cry certainly is not calculated to excite so great a variety of passions as Mr. Dryden attributes to the music at Alexander’s Feast. But I will venture to assert, that if his Macedonian Majesty had been ever so tipsy, and thoroughly bent upon ever so much mischief, one sudden, thundering burst of the Irish cry in his banqueting-room would have quickly brought Alexander and all his revellers to their senses—rendered their heels as light as their heads—and Miss Thais would have been left by her lover to the protection of Captain Rock and his merry men.

I believe the very best of our composers would find it rather difficult to set the Irish cry to music—though by the new light, every noise whatsoever must be a note or half a note; and it is reported that Mr. Moore and Sir John Stephenson used their joint and several efforts to turn this national cry into melody, but without success. I cannot see why such able persons should fail on so interesting a composition. There are plenty of notes in it whole and half, sharp, flat, and natural;—sufficient to compose any piece of music. It is only therefore to select the best among them scientifically; put an “andante affettuoso” in front; then send it to a barrel organ-builder;—and no doubt it would grind out to the entire satisfaction of the whole Irish population.

This leads me to a digression more important. The superstition of the lower orders of Irish, when death occurs in any peculiar manner, is superlative. In truth, the only three kinds of death they consider as natural are, dying quietly in their own cabins;—being hanged, about the assize-time;—or starving when the potato crop is deficient. All these they regard as matters of course; but any other species of dissolution is contemplated with much horror; though, to be sure, they make no very strong objection to being shot at by a regular army. They say their “fathers and forefathers before them were always used to that same;” and all they expect in such case is, that there should be some sort of reason for it, which they themselves frequently furnish. But those manslaughters which occur through the activity of the revenue-officers in prevention of distillation, they never can reconcile themselves to, and never forgive. They cannot understand the reason for this at all, and treasure up a spirit of savage revenge to the last day of their lives against excisemen.[^[22]]

An ignorant poor cottager says to his landlord, naturally enough, “Ough! then isn’t it mighty odd, plase your honour, that we are not hindered from eating oats, whenever we can get any? but if we attempt to drink them, by J——s, we are kilt and battered and shot and burned out like a parcel of dogs by the excisemen, that’s twice greater rogues nor we are, plase your honour.”

In truth it is to be lamented that this distinction between solids and fluids should not be better reconciled to the common sense of the peasantry, or be somehow regulated so as to prevent perpetual resort to that erroneous system of mountain warfare and revenue bloodshed, which ever has kept, and ever will keep, whole districts of Ireland in a state of excitement and distraction. I know that I speak the sentiments of some of his Majesty’s enlightened Ministers on this subject.

[22]. To the imperfection of the excise laws, and the totally erroneous system of licensing public houses, (as to numbers, qualifications, and police regulations respecting them,) is greatly to be attributed the increase of crime of late years.

An unconnected and independent board, for the exclusive purpose of granting licenses and registering complaints; convenient and responsible country branches, and monthly reports, would tend much to produce sobriety, and check those drunken conspiracies, the common sources of robbery and murder. Punishment rather than prevention is the greatest error a police can fall into.

FATHER O’LEARY.

Humorous story of Father O’Leary and a bear—Mistaken notions respecting Ireland on the Continent—Lord Ventry and his tenant: an anecdote characteristic of the Irish peasant.

I frequently had an opportunity of meeting at my father-in-law’s, Mr. Grogan’s, where he often dined, a worthy and celebrated priest, Father O’Leary;—and have listened with great zest to anecdotes which he used to tell with a quaint yet spirited humour quite unique. His manner, his air, his countenance, all bespoke wit, talent, and a good heart. I liked his company excessively, and have often regretted I did not cultivate his acquaintance more, or recollect his witticisms better: but I was then young, not a public person, and somewhat out of his line in society. It was singular, but it was fact, that even before Father O’Leary opened his lips, a stranger would say, “That is an Irishman,” and at the same time guess him to be a priest.

One anecdote, in particular, I remember his relating with singular animation. Coming from St. Omer, he told us, he stopped a few days to visit a brother priest in the town of Boulogne sur Mer (who lives there still). Here he heard of a great curiosity which all the people were running to see,—a curious bear that some fishermen had taken at sea out of a wreck; it had sense, and attempted to utter a sort of lingo which they called patois marine, but which nobody understood.

O’Leary gave his six sous to see the wonder, which was shown at the port by candle-light, and was a very odd kind of animal, no doubt. The bear had been taught a hundred tricks, all to be performed at the keeper’s word of command. It was late in the evening when O’Leary saw him, and the bear seemed sulky: the keeper, however, with a short spike at the end of a pole, made him move about briskly. He marked on sand what o’clock it was with his paw, and distinguished the men and women in a very comical way; in fact, our priest was quite diverted. The beast at length grew tired; the keeper hit him with the pole; he stirred a little, but continued quite sullen: his master coaxed him—no! he would not work! At length, the brute of a keeper gave him two or three sharp pricks with the goad, when he roared out most tremendously, and rising on his hind legs, cursed his tormentor in very good Irish. O’Leary went immediately to the mayor, whom he informed that the blackguards of fishermen had sewed up a poor Irishman in a bear-skin, and were showing him for six sous! This civic dignitary, who had himself seen the bear, would not believe it: at last O’Leary prevailed on him to accompany him to the room. On their arrival the bear was still upon duty; and O’Leary, stepping up to him, says, “Gand e tha hawn, Pat?” (How do you do, Pat?)—“Slonger a mahugouthe,” (Pretty well, thank’ee,) says the bear. The people were surprised to hear how plainly he spoke: but the mayor directly ordered him to be ripped up; and after some opposition and a good deal of difficulty, Pat stepped forth (stark naked) out of the bear-skin wherein he had been fourteen or fifteen days most cleverly stitched. The women made off; the men stood astonished; and the mayor ordered the keepers to be put in gaol unless they satisfied the bear and the authorities, which was presently done. The bear afterward told O’Leary that he was very well fed, and did not care much about the clothing, only they worked him too hard. The fishermen had found him at sea on a hen-coop, which had saved him from going to the bottom with a ship wherein he had a little venture of dried cod from Dungarvon, and which was bound from Waterford to Bilboa. He could not speak a word of any language but Irish, and had never been at sea before. The fishermen had brought him in, fed him well, and endeavoured to repay themselves by showing him as a curiosity.

O’Leary’s mode of telling this story was quite admirable. I never heard any anecdote (and I believe this one to have been true) related with so much genuine drollery, which was enhanced by his not changing a muscle himself, while every one of his hearers was in a paroxysm of laughter.

Another anecdote he used to give, though dry enough in itself, with incomparable dramatic humour. By-the-bye, all his stories were in some way national; and this affords me occasion to remark, that I think Ireland is at this moment nearly as little known on many parts of the continent as it seems to have been then. I have myself heard it more than once spoken of in Brittany as an English town.

At Nancy, where Father O’Leary, as he told us, was travelling, his native country happened to be mentioned; when one of the société, a quiet French farmer of Burgundy, asked in an unassuming tone, “If Ireland stood encore?”—“Encore!” said an astonished John Bull, a courier coming from Germany, “encore! to be sure she does: we have her yet, I assure you, Monsieur.”—“Though neither very safe nor very sound,” interposed an officer of the Irish brigade, who happened to be present, looking over significantly at O’Leary, and not very complacently at the courier.—“And pray, Monsieur,” rejoined the John Bull to the Frenchman, “why encore?”—“Pardon, Monsieur,” replied the Frenchman, “I heard it had been worn out, (fatigué) long ago by the great number of people that were living in it!”

The fact was (I believe it not at all exaggerated), the Frenchman had been told, and really understood, that Ireland was a large house where the English were wont to send their idle vagabonds, and from whence they were drawn out again as they were wanted to fill the ships and army:—and (I speak this from my own personal knowledge,) in some interior parts of the continent the existence of Ireland, as a kingdom, is totally unknown; it is at best considered as about a match for Jersey, or some other little island. On the sea-coasts they are better informed. This need not surprise us, when we have heard of a native of St. Helena formerly, (who never had been out of the island,) who seriously asked an English officer “If there were many landing-places in England?” This may be a standing jest, but it is highly illustrative.

Some ideas of the common Irish are so strange, and uttered so unconsciously, that in the mouths of any other people they might be justly considered profane. In those of my countrymen, however, such expressions are idiomatic, and certainly spoken without the least idea of profanity.

The last Lord Ventry was considered, before his father’s death, the oldest heir-apparent in the Irish Peerage, to which his father (originally low enough) had been raised in 1800, in consequence of an arrangement made with Lord Castlereagh at the time of the Union. He had for many years been bed-ridden, and had advanced to a very great age latterly without any corresponding utility: yet little apprehensions were entertained of his speedy dissolution, and the family were in despair.

A tenant on the estate, the stability of whose lease depended entirely on the son surviving the father, and who was beginning to doubt which of them might die of old age first, said seriously to the heir-apparent, but without the slightest idea of any sort of impropriety either as respected God or man—

“Ah, then, Master Squire Mullins, isn’t it mighty strange that my poor ould landlord (Heaven preserve his noble Lordship!) shou’d lie covered up in the bed all this time past?—I think, plase your honour, that it would be well done to take his Lordship (Lord bless his honour!) up to Crow-Patrick, and hold him up there as high as could be—just to show his Lordship a bit to the Virgin. For I’m sure and sartin, plase your honour, if God Almighty hadn’t quite forgot his Lordship, he would have taken him home to himself long and many a day ago.”

The relation of this anecdote appears to have been ominous, as my Lord the son was also carried off to his forefathers (if he could find them) a few months after the first edition of this work was published.

The eccentric traits of the genuine Irish character are certainly wearing fast away; and if some contemporary of by-gone persons and customs did not take the trouble of recording those traits, they would be considered (if related in future times) as ridiculous fabrications.

DEATH OF LORD ROSSMORE.

Strictures on Dr. Johnson—His biographer, Boswell—False definitions and erroneous ethics—Superstition—Supernatural appearances—Theological argument of the author in favour of his peculiar faith—Original poetry by Miss T * * *—The author purchases Lady Mayo’s demesne, County Wicklow—Terrific and cultivated scenery contrasted—Description of the Golden Belt of Ireland and the beauties of the above-mentioned county—Lord Rossmore—His character—Supernatural incident of a most extraordinary nature, vouched by living witnesses, and attendant on the sudden death of his Lordship.

It is not pleasant to differ essentially from the general opinions of the world, and nothing but a firm belief that we are right can bear us up in so doing. I feel my own fallibility poignantly, when I venture to remark upon the celebrated personage yclept “the great moralist of England.”

To criticise the labours of that giant of literature I am unequal: to detract from his ethics is not my object. But it surely savours not of treason to avow that parts of his Lexicon I condemn, and much of his philosophy I dissent from.

It is fortunate for the sake of truth that Boswell became Johnson’s biographer; for, as the idolaters of China devoutly attach a full proportion of bad qualities to the object of their adoration, so in like manner has “Bozzy” shown no want of candour as to the Doctor’s failings; and if he had reflected on the unkind constructions of this wicked world, his eulogiums would probably have been rendered less fulsome, and his biography yet more correct.—It could not be more entertaining.

The English language had been advancing gradually in its own jog-trot way from the days of Bayley to those of Johnson: it travelled over a plain smooth surface and on a gentle ascent. Every body formerly appeared to understand each other tolerably well: words were then very intelligible, and women, in general, found no difficulty in pronouncing them. But the great lexicographer soon convinced the British people (the Irish are out of the question) that they had been reading, writing, and spouting in a starved, contracted tongue, and that the magnificent dapimibominus’s of the Grecian language were ready in polysyllables to relieve that wretched poverty under which ours had so long languished.

This noble revolution in letters has made a progress so rapid, that I found in one essay of a Magazine, a few months ago, no fewer than twenty words which required me to make as many references to our great Lexicon.

Nobody can deny the miraculous labour which that work must have required: yet now, when enthusiasm has somewhat abated, and no danger exists of being clapper-clawed by the Doctor himself, some ungrateful English grammarians have presumed to assert that, under the gaberdine of so great an authority, any body is lawfully entitled to coin any English word he chooses out of any foreign language he thinks proper; and that we may thus tune up our vocabulary to the key of a lingua franca, an assemblage of all tongues, sounds, and idioms, dead or living. It has also been asserted, since his decease, that the Doctor’s logic is frequently false both in premises and conclusion, his ethics erroneous, his philosophy often unintelligible, and his diction generally bombastic. However, there are so many able and idle gentlemen of law, physic, and divinity, amply educated, with pens stuck behind their ears ready for action, who are much better skilled in the art and practice of criticism than I am, that I shall content myself with commenting on one solitary word out of forty thousand, which word not only bears strongly on my own tenets and faith, but also affects one of the most extraordinary occurrences of my life.

This comprehensive and important word, (which has upon occasion puzzled me more than any other in the English language,) is “superstition:”—whereof one of the definitions given by the Doctor, in his Lexicon, appears to be rather inconsiderate, namely,—“religion without morality.”—Now, I freely and fully admit that I am superstitious, yet I think it is rather severe and somewhat singular in the Doctor to admit my religion and extinguish my morality, which I always considered as marching hand in hand—or, in truth, I thought the latter should go foremost.

When Dr. Johnson began to learn his own ideas of morality does not appear (certainly not from his friend Savage):—I suppose not until he got an honorary degree from the pedants of Oxford. Collegiate degrees in general, however, work no great reformation, I am inclined to believe, in morality; at least I am certain that when I became a Doctor of Laws I did not feel my morals in the least improved by my diploma. I wish the candid Boswell had mentioned the precise epocha of the Doctor’s reformation (for he admits him to have been a little wild in his youth); and then we might have judged under what state of mind he gave the strange definition of “religion without morality.”

For myself, I consider faith, grounded on the phenomena of Nature, not the faith of sectarianism or fanaticism, as the true source and foundation of morality;—and morality as the true source and foundation of religion.

No human demonstration can cope with that presented by the face of Nature. What proof so infallible as that the sun produces light and heat and vegetation?[^[23]]—that the tides ebb and flow—that the thunder rolls—that the lightning flashes—that the planets shine?[^[24]] Who can gaze on the vast orb of day without feeling that it is the visible demonstration of a superior Being, convincing our reason and our senses, and even the scanty reason of illiterate savages?

[23]. The following lines are by Miss M. Tylden, the young poetess whom I have before mentioned, and shall again allude to more fully. In my humble opinion, there are not fourteen consecutive lines in the English language superior in true sublimity both of thought and language:

The sun is in the empire of his light,

Throned in the mighty solitude of heaven:

He seems the visible Omnipotent

Dwelling in glory:—his high sanctuary

Do the eyes worship, and, thereon as if

Impiety to gaze, the senses reel,

Drunk with the spirit of his deep refulgence.

Circle of glory!—Diadem of heaven!

Cast in the mould of bright eternity,

And bodying forth the attributes of Him

Who made thee of this visible world supreme;

And thou becamest a wonder and a praise,—

A worship—yea, a pure idolatry!

The image of the glories of our God.

I look upon the personification of God to be the excess of blasphemy.

[24]. The reader may deem it curious to compare the two following stanzas—the first graced with the great name of Mr. Addison; the second the performance of my accomplished young friend, and extracted from her common-place book, without any opportunity given for revision.—She is ignorant that I have published a line of hers.

ON THE PLANETS.

The spacious firmament on high,

With all the blue ethereal sky,

And spangled heavens—a shining frame!

Their great Original proclaim.

In Reason’s ear they all rejoice,

And utter forth a glorious voice;

For ever singing, as they shine,

“The hand that made us is divine!”

Addison.

ON THE PLANETS.

Ye living fires in yon eternal dome,—

Ye lamps, whose light is immortality,—

Hung forth in mercy from our Father’s house,

As beacon-lights to guide us to our God!

Ye are ordain’d man’s faithful monitors,

Gazing like heavenly eyes upon our deeds,

Till guilt is awed, and shrinks beneath your glance.

Ye bright and visible rewards! held forth

From God’s high sanctuary, to work in us

A pure ambition for eternal things,

And glories which our spirit heaves to grasp!

M. Tylden.

It is foreign from the intention of this work to dilate on theoretical subjects of any kind: suffice it to say, that the following are simply my own sentiments, which I must be permitted to retain, and which indeed nothing on this side the grave can shake.

The omnipotence of the Deity in our creation and destruction—in the union and separation of our bodies and souls—and in rendering the latter responsible for the acts of the former,—no Christian denies: and if the Deity be thus omnipotent in forming, destroying, uniting, separating, and judging, he must be equally omnipotent in reproducing that spirit and that form which he originally created, and which remain subject to his will, and always in his power.

It follows, therefore, that the Omnipotent Creator may at will reproduce that spirit which he reserves for future judgment, or the semblance of that body which he created, and which once contained the undecaying soul. The smallest atom which floats in the sunbeam cannot (as every body knows), from the nature of matter, be actually annihilated: death consequently only decomposes the materials whereof our bodies are formed, and the indestructible atoms remain susceptible of recombination. The Christian tenets maintain that the soul and body must appear for judgment, and why not before judgment,—if so willed by the Almighty? The main argument which I have heard against such appearances tends nearly as much to mislead, as a general disbelief or denial of Omnipotence—namely, that though this power may exist in the Deity, he never would permit such spectacles on the earth, to terrify the timorous, and give occasion to paltering with the credulity of his creatures.

It is truly surprising how rational and pious men can resort to the reasoning of infidels. When we admit the Omnipotence, we are bound likewise to admit the Omniscience of the Deity; and presumptuous indeed must that man be who overlooks the contractedness of his own intellectual vision, or asserts that, because he cannot see a reason for a supernatural interference, none therefore can exist in the eye of the Supreme.

The objects of God are inscrutable: an appearance of the departed upon earth may have consequences which none—not even those who are affected by it,—can either discover or suppose.[^[25]] Can any human wisdom presume to divine—why man was originally created at all? why one man is cut short in high-blooming health and youth, and another lingers long in age and decrepitude? why the best of men are frequently the most unfortunate, and the greatest villains the most prosperous? why the heinous criminal escapes in triumph, and the innocent being is destroyed by torture? And is the production of a supernatural appearance, for the inscrutable purposes of God, more extraordinary, or less credible, than these other ordinations of the Deity, or than all those unaccountable phenomena of nature, which are only, as the rising and setting sun, disregarded by common minds from the frequency of their occurrence?

[25]. Nothing in print places my theory in so distinct, clear, and pleasing a point of view as Parnell’s Hermit,—a strong, moral, and impressive tale,—beautiful in poetry, and abounding in instruction. There the Omniscience of God is exemplified by human incidents, and the mysterious causes of his actions brought home to the commonest capacity. The moral of that short and simple tale says more than a hundred volumes of dogmatic controversies!—The following couplets appear to me extremely impressive:—

The Maker justly claims that world he made:

In this the right of Providence is laid:

Its sacred majesty, through all, depends

On using second means to work its ends.

What strange events can strike with more surprise

Than those which lately struck thy wondering eyes?

Yet, taught by these, confess the Almighty just;

And where you can’t unriddle, learn to trust.

This is a subject whereon I feel, and always have felt, strongly and seriously; and hence it is that I have been led into so long an exordium. I regard the belief in supernatural apparitions as inseparable from my Christian faith and my view of Divine Omnipotence; and however good and learned individuals may impugn my reasoning, I have the consolation of knowing that the bench of bishops, the Pope, the very best and wisest Doctors in Divinity and Masters of Arts; in fact, all the collegians and scholars in the universe, can possibly have no better or truer information upon the subject than myself; that I am as much in my senses as any of them; and that the Deity has made no sort of distinction between the intellectual capacity of a bishop and a judge; the secrets of Heaven being divulged to neither. The judge does justice to other people, and the bishop does justice to himself; but both are equally ignorant of the mysteries of futurity, and must alike wait until they pass the dim boundary of this world before they can gain any practical information as to the next. When a military captain is ordained a clergyman, (as is somewhat the fashion during the peace establishment,) does he become one atom wiser or more knowing as to futurity than when he was in the army?—probably, on the other hand, he thinks much less about the matter than when standing upon the field of battle.

I would not have the reader imagine that I should be found ready to receive any idle ghost story which might be told me.—So far contrary, I have always been of opinion that no incident or appearance, (and I have expressed as much before in this work,) however strange, should be considered as supernatural which could in any way be otherwise accounted for, or referred to natural or human agency.

I will proceed at once to the little narrative thus importantly prefaced. The circumstances will, I think, be admitted as of an extraordinary nature: they were not connected with the workings of imagination; depended not on the fancy of a single individual: the occurrence was, altogether, both in its character and in its possible application, far beyond the speculations of man. But let me endeavour to soften and prepare my mind for the strange recital by some more pleasing recollections connected with the principal subject of it.

Immediately after the rebellion of 1798, the Countess Dowager of Mayo discovered a man concealed under her bed, and was so terrified that she instantly fled from her country residence in the most beautiful part of County Wicklow: she departed for Dublin, whence she immediately sailed for England, and never after returned. Her ladyship directed her agent, Mr. Davis, immediately to dispose of her residence, demesne, and every thing within the house and on the grounds, for whatever they might bring. All property in the disturbed districts being then of small comparative value, and there having been a battle fought at Mount Kennedy, near her house, a short time previous, I purchased the whole estate, as it stood, at a very moderate price, and on the ensuing day was put into possession of my new mansion. I found a house not large, but very neat and in good order, with a considerable quantity of furniture, some excellent wines, &c. and the lands in full produce. The demesne was not extensive, but delightfully situated in a district which, I believe, for the union of rural beauties and mild uniformity of climate, few spots can excel.

I have already disclaimed all pretensions, as a writer, to the power of scenic description or imaginary landscape—though no person existing is more gratified than myself with the contemplation of splendid scenery. In saying this, however, I do not mean that savage sublimity of landscape—that majestic assemblage of stupendous mountain and roaring cataract—of colossal rocks and innumerable precipices—where Nature appears to designate to the bear and the eagle, to the boar or chamois—those trackless wilds which she originally created for their peculiar accommodation. To the enthusiastic sketcher and the high-wrought tourist I yield an exclusive right to those interesting regions, which are far too sublime for my ordinary pencil. I prefer that luxurious scenery where the art and industry of man go hand in hand with the embellishments of Nature, where beauty is unaccompanied by danger,—sublimity has no horrors; and Providence, smiling, combines her blessings with her beauties.

Were I asked to exemplify my ideas of rural, animated, cheering landscape, I should say—“My friend, travel!—visit that narrow region which we call the Golden Belt of Ireland;[^[26]] explore every mile from the metropolis to the ‘meeting of the waters:’ journey which side you please, you will find the native myrtle and indigenous arbutus glowing throughout the severest winter, and forming the cottage fences, together with the waving cypress and the sweet acacia.”

[26]. That lovely district extends about thirty miles in length, and from four to seven in breadth: it commences near Dublin, and ends at a short distance beyond Avondale: the soil is generally a warm gravel, with verdant valleys, bounded by mountains arable to their summits on one side, and by the sea upon the other. The gold mine is on a frontier of this district; and it is perhaps the most congenial to the growth of trees and shrubs of any spot in the British dominions.

The scenery of Wicklow is doubtless on a minor scale, quite unable to compete with the grandeur and immensity of continental landscape; even to our own Killarney it is not comparable; but it possesses a genial glowing luxury, a contrast and a variety, whereof more elevated extensive scenery is often destitute. It is small, but it is in the world: its beauties seem alive. It blooms: it blossoms: the mellow climate extracts from every shrub a tribute of its fragrance; and the atmosphere, saturated with the perfumes of nature, creates that delicious medium through which refreshing showers descend to brighten the hue and revive the odour of the lively evergreen!

I frankly admit myself an enthusiast as to that lovely district. In truth, I fear I should have been enthusiastic on many points, had not law, the most powerful antidote to all refined enthusiasm, interposed to check its growth.

The site of my sylvan residence, Drummon, was nearly in the centre of the Golden Belt, about fifteen miles from the capital;—but owing to the varied nature of the country, it appeared far more distant. Bounded by the beautiful glen of the Downs, at the foot of the magnificent Bellevue, and the more distant sugar-loaf mountain of the Dargle, Tynnehinch, (where is seated that cottage celebrated for its unrivalled scenery, and honoured by the residence of Ireland’s first patriot,) the dark deep glen, the black lake, and mystic vale and rocks of Luggelough, (that nursery of eagles and of falcons,) contrasted quite magically with the highly cultivated beauties of Drummon: (the parks, and wilds, and sublime cascade of Powerscourt, and the newly-created magnificence of Mount Kennedy, abundantly prove that perfection itself may exist in contrasts:) in fine, I found myself enveloped by the hundred beauties of that enchanting district, which, though of one family, were rendered yet more attractive by the variety of their features; and had I not been tied to laborious duties, I should infallibly have sought refuge there altogether from the cares of the world.

One of the greatest pleasures I enjoyed whilst resident at Drummon, was the near abode of the late Lord Rossmore, at that time commander-in-chief in Ireland. His lordship knew my father, and, from my commencement in public life, had been my friend, and a sincere one. He was a Scotsman born, but had come to Ireland when very young, as page to the lord lieutenant. He had married an heiress; had purchased the estate of Mount Kennedy; built a noble mansion; laid out some of the finest gardens in Ireland; and, in fact, improved the demesne, as far as taste, skill, and money could accomplish. He was what may be called a remarkably fine old man, quite the gentleman, and when at Mount Kennedy quite the country gentleman. He lived in a style few people can attain to: his table, supplied by his own farms, was adapted to the viceroy himself, yet was ever spread for his neighbours: in a word, no man ever kept a more even hand in society than Lord Rossmore, and no man was ever better repaid by universal esteem. Had his connexions possessed his understanding, and practised his habits, they would probably have found more friends when they wanted them.

This intimacy at Mount Kennedy gave rise to an occurrence the most extraordinary and inexplicable of my whole existence—an occurrence which for many years occupied my thoughts, and wrought on my imagination. Lord Rossmore was far advanced in years, but I never heard of his having had a single day’s indisposition. He bore, in his old age, the appearance of robust health. During the viceroyalty of Earl Hardwick Lady Barrington, at a drawing-room at Dublin Castle, met Lord Rossmore. He had been making up one of his weekly parties for Mount Kennedy, to commence the next day, and had sent down orders for every preparation to be made. The lord lieutenant was to be of the company. Every second week his house was filled by persons of the highest circle, interspersed with neighbours.

“My little farmer,” said he to Lady Barrington, addressing her by a pet name, “when you go home, tell Sir Jonah that no business is to prevent him from bringing you down to dine with me tomorrow. I will have no ifs in the matter—so tell him that come he must!” She promised positively, and on her return informed me of her engagement, to which I at once agreed. We retired to our chamber about twelve; and towards two in the morning, I was awakened by a sound of a very extraordinary nature. I listened: it occurred first at short intervals; it resembled neither a voice nor an instrument; it was softer than any voice and wilder than any music, and seemed to float in the air. I don’t know wherefore, but my heart beat forcibly: the sound became still more plaintive, till it almost died away in the air; when a sudden change, as if excited by a pang, changed its tone: it seemed descending. I felt every nerve tremble: it was not a natural sound, nor could I make out the point whence it came.

At length I awakened Lady Barrington: she heard it as well as myself, and suggested that it might be an Eolian harp; but to that instrument it bore no similitude: it was altogether a different character of sound. She at first appeared less affected than myself, but was subsequently more so.

We now went to a large window in our bedroom which looked directly upon a small garden underneath: the sound, which first appeared descending, seemed then obviously to ascend from a grass-plot immediately below our window. It continued: Lady Barrington requested that I would call up her maid, which I did, and she was evidently much more affected than either of us. The sounds lasted for more than half an hour. At last a deep, heavy, throbbing sigh seemed to issue from the spot, and was shortly succeeded by a sharp but low cry, and by the distinct exclamation, thrice repeated, of “Rossmore!—Rossmore!—Rossmore!” I will not attempt to describe my own sensations; indeed I cannot. The maid fled in terror from the window, and it was with difficulty I prevailed on Lady Barrington to return to bed: in about a minute after the sound died gradually away, until all was silent.

Lady Barrington, who is not superstitious, as I am, attributed this circumstance to a hundred different causes, and made me promise that I would not mention it next day at Mount Kennedy, since we should be thereby rendered laughing-stocks. At length, wearied with speculations, we fell into a sound slumber.

About seven the ensuing morning a strong rap at my chamber-door awakened me. The recollection of the past night’s adventure rushed instantly upon my mind, and rendered me very unfit to be taken suddenly on any subject. It was light: I went to the door, when my faithful servant, Lawler, exclaimed, on the other side, “Oh Lord, Sir!”—“What is the matter?” said I hurriedly: “Oh, Sir!” ejaculated he, “Lord Rossmore’s footman was running past the door in great haste, and told me in passing that my lord, after coming from the Castle, had gone to bed in perfect health, but that about half-after two this morning, his own man hearing a noise in his master’s bed (he slept in the same room), went to him, and found him in the agonies of death; and before he could alarm the other servants, all was over!”

I conjecture nothing. I only relate the incident as unequivocally matter of fact: Lord Rossmore was absolutely dying at the moment I heard his name pronounced! Let sceptics draw their own conclusions: perhaps natural causes may be assigned; but I am totally unequal to the discovery.

Atheism may ridicule me: Orthodoxy may despise me: Bigotry may lecture me: Fanaticism might burn me: yet in my very faith I would seek consolation. It is in my mind better to believe too much than too little, and that is the only theological crime I can be fairly accused of.

MEMORANDA CRITICA.

Remarks on Lady Morgan’s novel of “The Wild Irish Girl,” &c.—Prince O’Sullivan at Killarney—Miss Edgeworth’s “Castle Rackrent”—Memoir of Jonathan Clerk—“Florence Macarthy”—Comparison between Lady Morgan and Thomas Moore as writers—The author’s knowledge of both—“Captain Rock” condemned—The “Irish Melodies” by Moore—The harmonising of them by Sir John Stevenson injurious to the national music—Anecdote of Mr. Thomas Moore and Mrs. K * * * y.

It is remarkable that the various gradations of habit and society in Ireland have been best illustrated by two female authors,—the one of more imaginative, the other of purer narrative powers; but each, in her respective line, possessing very considerable merit.

Though a fiction not free from some inaccuracies, much inappropriate dialogue, and forced incident, it is impossible to peruse “The Wild Irish Girl” of Lady Morgan without deep interest, or to dispute its claims as a production of true national feeling as well as literary talent.

That tale was the first and is perhaps the best of all her novel writings. Compared with others, it strikingly exhibits the author’s falling off from the simple touches of unsophisticated nature to the less refined conceptions of what she herself styles “fashionable society.”

To persons unacquainted with Ireland, “The Wild Irish Girl” may appear an ordinary tale of romance and fancy; but to such as understand the ancient history of that people, it may be considered as a legend. The authoress might perhaps have had somewhat in view the last descendant of the Irish princes, who did not altogether forget the station of his forefathers.

O’Sullivan, lineally descended from the King of the Lakes, not many years since vegetated on a retired spot of his hereditary dominions at Killarney; and, though overwhelmed by poverty and deprivation, kept up in his mind a visionary dignity. Surveying from his wretched cottage that enchanting territory over which his ancestors had reigned for centuries, I have been told he never ceased to recollect his royal descent. He was a man of gigantic stature and strength; of uncouth, yet authoritative mien—not shaming his pretensions by his presence. He was frequently visited by those who went to view the celebrated lakes, and I have conversed with many who have seen him: but at a period when familiar intercourse has been introduced between actual princes and their subjects, tending undoubtedly to diminish in the latter the sense of individual respect and distance, so wholesome to royalty, the poor descendant of the renowned O’Sullivan had no reason to expect much commiseration from modern sensibility.

The frequent and strange revolutions of the world within the last forty years, the radical alterations in all the material habits of society,—announced the commencement of a new era: and the ascendancy of commerce over rank, and of avarice over every thing, completed the regeneration. But, above all, the loosening of those ties which bound kindred and families, in one common interest, to uphold their race and name;—the extinction of that spirit of chivalry which sustained those ties;—and the common prostitution of the heraldic honours of antiquity;—have steeled the human mind against the lofty and noble pretensions of birth and rank; and while we superficially decry the principles of equality, we are travelling toward them, by the shortest and most dangerous road degeneracy and meanness can point out.

I confess myself to be a determined enemy to the Utopian vision of political and social equality: in the exercise of justice alone should the principle of equality be paramount; in any other sense, it never did, and never can, for any length of time, exist in Europe.

Miss Edgeworth’s “Castle Rackrent” and “Fashionable Tales” are incomparable in truly depicting several traits of the rather modern Irish character: they are perhaps on one point a little overcharged; but, in some parts, may be said to exceed the generality of Lady Morgan’s Irish novels. Fiction is less perceptible in them: they have a greater air of reality—of what I have myself often and often observed and noted in full progress and actual execution throughout my native country. Nothing is exaggerated: the stories and names are coined, but the characters and incidents are “from life.” The landlord, the agent, and the attorney of “Castle Rackrent” (in fact every person it describes) were neither fictitious nor even uncommon characters: and the changes of landed property in the county where I was born (where perhaps they have prevailed to the full as widely as in any other of the united empire) owed, in nine cases out of ten, their origin, progress, and catastrophe to circumstances in no wise differing from those so accurately painted in Miss Edgeworth’s narrative.

Though moderate fortunes have frequently and fairly been realised by agents, yet, to be on the sure side of comfort and security, a country gentleman who wishes to send down his estate in tolerably good order to his family should always be his own receiver, and compromise any claim rather than employ an attorney to arrange it.

I recollect to have seen in Queen’s County a Mr. Clerk, who had been a working carpenter, and when making a bench for the session justices at the court-house, was laughed at for taking peculiar pains in planing and smoothing the seat of it. He smilingly observed, that he did so to make it easy for himself, as he was resolved he would never die till he had a right to sit thereupon: and he kept his word:—he was an industrious man, and became an agent; honest, respectable, and kind-hearted, he succeeded in all his efforts to accumulate an independence: he did accumulate it, and uprightly: his character kept pace with the increase of his property, and he lived to sit as a magistrate on that very bench that he sawed and planed.

I will not quit the subject without saying a word about another of Lady Morgan’s works—“Florence Macarthy,” which, “errors excepted,” possesses an immensity of talent in the delineation of the genuine Irish character. The judges, though no one can mistake them, are totally caricatured; but the Crawleys are superlative, and suffice to bring before my vision, in their full colouring, and almost without a variation, persons and incidents whom and which I have many a time encountered. Nothing is exaggerated as to them; and Crawley himself is the perfect and plain model of the combined agent, attorney, and magistrate—a sort of mongrel functionary whose existence I have repeatedly reprobated, and whom I pronounce to be at this moment the greatest nuisance and mischief experienced by my unfortunate country, and only to be abated by the residence of the great landlords on their estates. No people under heaven could be so easily tranquillised and governed as the Irish: but that desirable end is alone attainable by the personal endeavours of a liberal, humane, and resident aristocracy.

A third writer on Ireland I allude to with more pride on some points, and with less pleasure on others; because, though dubbed “The bard of Ireland,” I have not yet seen many literary productions of his on national subjects that have afforded me unalloyed gratification.

He must not be displeased with the observations of perhaps a truer friend than those who have led him to forget himself. His “Captain Rock” (though, I doubt not, well intended), coming at the time it did and under the sanction of his name, is the most exceptionable publication, in all its bearings as to Ireland, that I have yet seen. Doctor Beattie says, in his Apology for Religion, “if it does no good, it can do no harm:” but, on the contrary, if “Captain Rock” does no harm, it could certainly do no good.

Had it been addressed to, or calculated for, the better orders, the book would have been less noxious: but it is not calculated to instruct those whose influence, example, or residence could either amend or reform the abuses which the author certainly exaggerates. It is not calculated to remedy the great and true cause of Irish ruin—the absenteeism of the great landed proprietors: so much the reverse, it is directly adapted to increase and confirm the real grievance, by scaring every landlord who retains a sense of personal danger, and I know none of them who are exempt from abundance of it, from returning to a country where “Captain Rock” is proclaimed by the “Bard of Ireland” to be an Immortal Sovereign. The work is, in fact, dangerous: it is an effusion of party, not a remonstrance of patriotism. It is a work better fitted for vulgar éclat than for rational approbation. Its effects were not calculated on; and it appears to me, in itself, to offer one of the strongest arguments against bestowing on the lower orders in Ireland the power of reading. Could reading Captain Rock be of service to the peasantry?

Perhaps I write warmly myself.[^[27]] I write not however for distracted cottagers, but for proprietors and legislators; and I have endeavoured honestly to express my unalterable conviction that it is by encouraging, conciliating, reattaching, and recalling the higher, and not by confusing and inflaming the lower orders of society, that Ireland can be eventually tranquillised.

[27]. In my Memoirs of Ireland.

Most undoubtedly Mr. Thomas Moore and Lady Morgan are among the most distinguished modern writers of our country: indeed, I know of none (except Miss Edgeworth) who has at present a right to be named with either.

But I can never repeat too often that I am not a literary critic, although I choose to speak my mind strongly and freely. I hope neither my friend Moore nor her ladyship will be displeased at my stating thus candidly my opinion of their public merits: they would perhaps scout me as an adulator were I to tell them what I thought of their private ones. I dare say some of the periodical writers will announce, that my telling the world I am a very inefficient critic is mere work of supererogation: at any rate, it must be owned that making the confession in advance is to the full as creditable as leaving the thing to be stated for me.

In my rambling estimate of the merits of these two justly celebrated authors, let me bear in mind that they are of different sexes, and recollect the peculiar attributes of either.

Both of them are alike unsparing in their use of the bold language of liberty: but Lady Morgan has improved her ideas of freedom by contrasts on the European continent; while Thomas Moore has not improved his by the exemplification of freedom in America. Lady Morgan has succeeded in adulterating her refinement; Thomas Moore has unsuccessfully endeavoured to refine his grossness: she has abundant talent; he has abundant genius; and whatsoever distinction those terms admit of, indicates, in my mind, their relative merit. This allowance, however, must be made; that the lady has contented herself with invoking only substantial beings and things of this sublunary world, while the gentleman has ransacked both heaven and hell, and “the half-way house,” for figurative assistance.

I knew them both before they had acquired any celebrity and after they had attained to much. I esteemed them then, and have reason equally to esteem them now: it is on their own account that I wish some portion of their compositions had never appeared; and I really believe, upon due consideration, they will themselves be of my way of thinking. But let it be remembered, that my esteem and friendship were never yet increased or diminished by the success or non-success of any body. Besides, while a man is necessitated to read much law, he cannot read much literature; and hence I scarcely saw the writings of either until the general buzz called my attention to them.

I recollect Moore being one night at my house in Merrion Square, during the spring of his celebrity, touching the piano-forte, in his own unique way, to “Rosa,” his favourite amatory sonnet: his head leant back;—now throwing up his ecstatic eyes to heaven, as if to invoke refinement—then casting them softly sideways, and breathing out his chromatics to elevate, as the ladies said, their souls above the world, but at the same moment convincing them that they were completely mortal.

A Mrs. K * * * y, a lady then d’âge mûr, but moving in the best society of Ireland, sat on a chair behind Moore: I watched her profile: her lips quavered in unison with the piano; a sort of amiable convulsion, now and then raising the upper from the under lip, composed a smile less pleasing than expressive; her eye softened, glazed,—and half melting she whispered to herself the following words, which I, standing at the back of her chair, could not avoid hearing: “Dear, dear!” lisped Mrs. K * * * y, “Moore, this is not for the good of my soul!”

Almost involuntarily, I ejaculated in the same low tone, “What is not, Mrs. K * * * y?”

“You know well enough!” she replied (but without blushing, as people used to do formerly); “how can you ask so silly a question?” and she turned into the crowd, but never came near the piano again that night.

I greatly admire the national, indeed patriotic idea, of collecting and publishing the Irish Melodies, so admirably acted on by Mr. T. Moore; and it were to be wished that some of them had the appearance of having been written more enthusiastically.[^[28]]

Sir John Stevenson, that celebrated warbler, has melodised a good many of these; but he certainly has forgotten poor Carolan, and has also melo-dramatised a considerable portion. I think our rants and planxties would have answered just as well without either symphonies or chromatics, and that the plaintive national music of Ireland does not reach the heart a moment the sooner for passing through a crowd of scientific variations. Tawdry and modern upholstery would not be very appropriate to the ancient tower of an Irish chieftain; and some of Sir John’s proceedings in melodising simplicity, remind me of the Rev. Doctor Hare, who whitewashed the great rock of Cashell to give it a genteel appearance against the visitation.

As I do not attempt (I ought to say presume) to be a literary, so am I still less a musical critic: but I know what pleases myself, and in that species of criticism I cannot be expected to yield to any body.

As to my own authorship, I had business more important than writing books in my early life: but now, in my old days, it is my greatest amusement, and nothing would give me more satisfaction than hearing the free and fair remarks of the critics on my productions.

[28]. I allude to the public trial as to copyright, by Mr. Power, when it was stated that Mr. Moore wrote the Melodies for so much a year. They are certainly very unequal.

I cannot omit one word more, in conclusion, as to Lady Morgan. It is to me delightful to see a woman, solely by the force of her own natural talent, succeed triumphantly in the line of letters she has adopted, and in despite of the most virulent, illiberal, and unjust attacks ever yet made on any author by mercenary reviewers.

MEMORANDA POETICA.

Poets and poetasters—Major Roche’s extraordinary poem on the battle of Waterloo—“Tears of the British Muse”—French climax of love—A man’s age discovered by his poetry—Evils of a motto—Amorous feelings of youth—Love verses of a boy; of a young man—“Loves of the Angels”—Dinner verses of an Oxonian—“The Highlander,” a poem—Extracts from the poetical manuscripts of Miss Tylden, &c.

There cannot be a juster aphorism than “Poeta nascitur, non fit:” the paucity of those literary productions which deserve the epithet of poetry, compared with the thousand volumes of what rhyming authors call poems, forms a conclusive illustration.

A true poet lives for ever; a poetaster, just till a new one relieves him in the circulating libraries, or on toilets, being used in private families to keep young ladies awake at night and put them to sleep in the morning.

There may possibly be three degrees of excellence in true poetry, but certainly no more. A fourth-rate poet is, in my idea, a mere forger of rhymes; a blacksmith of versification: yet if he minds his prosody, and writes in a style either “vastly interesting,” “immensely pathetic,” or “delightfully luxurious,” he will probably find readers among the fair sex from fifteen to forty-five: the measure he adopts is of no sort of consequence, so that it be tender.

Major Roche, an Irishman, who in 1815 printed and published at Paris a full and true hexameter account of the great battle of Waterloo, with his own portrait emblazoned in the front, and the Duke of Wellington’s in the rear, must certainly be held to exceed in ingenuity all the poets and poetasters, great and small, of the present generation.

The alphabetical printed list of subscribers to Major Roche’s poem sets forth the name of every emperor, king, prince, nobleman, general, minister, and diplomatist—Russian, Prussian, Austrian, German, Swedish, Danish, Dutch, English, Irish, Scotch, Hanoverian, Don Cossack, &c. &c. Such an imperial, royal, and every way magnificent list was in fact never before, nor ever will be again, appended to any poem, civil, political, military, religious, or scientific: and as the major thought very truly that a book so patronised and garnished must be worth vastly more than any other poem of the same dimensions, he stated that “a few copies might still be procured at two guineas each.” He succeeded admirably, and I believe got more money at Paris than any one of the army did at Waterloo, and I am glad of it.

His introduction of the Duke of Wellington in battle was well worth the money:—he described his grace as Mars on horseback (new!), riding helter-skelter, and charging fiercely over every thing in his headlong course; friends and foes, men, women, and children, having no chance of remaining perpendicular if they crossed his way; his horse’s hoofs striking fire even out of the regimental buttons of the dead bodies which he galloped over! while swords, muskets, bayonets, helmets, spears, and cuirasses, pounded down by his trampling steed, formed as it were a turnpike-road, whereupon his grace seemed to fly, in his endeavours to catch Buonaparte.

I really think Major Roche’s idea of making Lord Wellington Mars was a much better one than that of making him Achilles, as the ladies have done at Hyde-Park-Corner. Paris found out the weak point of Achilles, and finished him: but Mars is immortal; and though Diomed knocked him down, neither his carcase nor character is a jot the worse. Besides, though Achilles killed Hector, it certainly was not Lord Wellington who killed Buonaparte.

A remark of mine which, though of no value, is however rather a curious one, I cannot omit—namely, that every man who has been in the habit of scribbling rhyme of any description, involuntarily betrays his age and decline by the nature of his composition. The truth of this observation I will endeavour to illustrate by quotations from some jingling couplets written at different periods of life by a friend of mine, merely to show the strange though gradual transitions and propensities of the human mind from youth to maturity, and from maturity to age. I was brought up at a school where poetry was cultivated, whether the soil would bear a crop or not: I early got, however, somehow or other, an idea of what it was, which boys in general at that age never think of. But I had no practical genius, and never set up for it. Our second master, the son of the principal one, was a parson, and, as he thought, a poet, and wrote a thing called “The Tears of the British Muse,” which we were all obliged to purchase, and repeat once a month. In fact, of all matters, prosody was most assiduously whipped into us.

Love is the first theme of all the poets in the world. Though the French do not understand that matter a bit better than other folks, yet their language certainly expresses amatory ideas far more comprehensively than ours. In talking of love they do not speak of refinement: I never knew a Frenchwoman tie them together fast: their terms of gradation are—L’AMOUR naturel, bien sensible, très fort, à son goût, superbe: finishing the climax with pas nécessaire encore. (There certainly is a touch of despondency in the last gradation.) This classing of the passion with the palate is a very simple mode of defining its varieties.

However, the state of the feelings and propensities of men is much regulated by the amount of their years (ladies in general stick to their text longest). In early youth, poetry flows from natural sensation; and at this period verses in general have much modesty, much feeling, and a visible struggle to keep in with refinement.

In the next degree of age, which runs quite close upon the former, the scene nevertheless sadly alters. We then see plain amatory sonnets turning poor refinement out of company, and showing that it was not so very pure as we had reason to suppose. Next comes that stage wherein sensualists, wits, ballad-singers, gourmands, experienced lovers, and most kinds of poetasters, male and female, give their varieties. All the organs of craniology swell up in the brain and begin to prepare themselves for development: this is rather a lasting stage, and gently glides into, and amalgamates with the final one, filled by satirists, psalmists, epigrammatists, and other specimens of antiquity and ill-nature. But I fancy this latter must be a very unproductive line of versification for the writer, as few ladies ever read such things till after they begin to wear spectacles. Few persons like to see themselves caricatured; and the moment a lady is convinced that she ceases to be an object of love, she fancies that, as matter of course, she at once becomes an object of ridicule: so that she takes care to run no chance of reading to her own mortification till she feels that it is time to commence devotee.

I recollect a friend of mine writing a poem of satire so general, that every body might attribute it to their neighbours, without taking it to themselves. The first edition having gone off rapidly, he published a second, announcing improvements, and giving as a motto the words of Hamlet:—

“To hold the mirror up to Nature.”

This motto was fatal; the idea of holding up the mirror condemned the book: nobody would venture to look into it; and the entire impression is, I dare say, in the act of dry-rotting at the present moment.

One short period is the true Paradise of mortals, that delicious dream of life, when age is too far distant to be seen, and childhood fast receding from our vision!—when Nature pauses briefly between refinement and sensuality—first imparting to our wondering senses what we are and what we shall be, before she consigns us to the dangerous guardianship of chance and of our passions!

That is the crisis when lasting traits of character begin to bud and blossom, and acquire sap; and every effort should then be made to crop and prune, and train the young shoots, while yet they retain the principle of ductility.

During that period the youth is far too chary to avow a passion which he does not fully comprehend, satisfied with making known his feelings by delicate allusions, and thus contriving to disclose the principle without mentioning its existence. All sorts of pretty sentimentalities are employed to this end:—shepherds and shepherdesses are pressed into the service; as are likewise tropes of Arcadian happiness and simplicity, with abundance of metaphorical roses with thorns to them—perfumes and flowers.

A particular friend of mine, who, when a young man, had a great propensity to fall in love and make verses accordingly, has often told me his whole progress in both, and says positively that he should ascertain in a moment a man’s decimal from his versification. He entertained me one morning by showing me certain memorandums which he had from time to time made upon this subject, and from which he permitted me to take extracts, as also from some of his own effusions which he said he had kept out of curiosity.

It appears that at the age of fifteen he fell in love with a Miss Lyddy St. John, who was herself a poetess of fourteen, and the most delicate young Celestial he had ever seen. The purity of her thoughts and verses filtered all his sentiments as clear as spring water, and did not leave an atom of grossness in the whole body of them.

Before he left school he wrote the following lines on this young lady, which he has suffered to stand as the poetical illustration of his boyhood:

I.

What sylph that flits athwart the air,

Or hovers round its favourite fair,

Can paint such charms to fancy’s eye,

Or feebly trace

The unconscious grace

Of her for whom I sigh?

II.

As silver flakes of falling snow

Tell the pure sphere from whence they flow,

So the chaste beauties of her eye

Faintly impart

The chaster heart

Of her for whom I sigh.

Lyddy, however, objected to the last line of each stanza, as she did not understand what he meant by sighing for her; and he not being able to solve the question, she seemed to entertain rather a contempt for his intellects, and palpably gave the preference to one of his schoolfellows—a bolder boy.

In the next stage toward maturity the poet and lover began to know better what he would be at; and determined to pay a visit to the fair one, and try if any lucky circumstance might give him a delicate opportunity of disclosing his sentiments and sufferings, and why he sighed for her.

He unfortunately found that the innocent cause of his torment had gone on a tour, and that his interview must be adjourned sine die: however, he explored the garden; sat down in all the arbours; walked pensively over the flower-plats; peeped into her chamber-window, which was on the ground-floor, and embroidered with honeysuckles and jasmine: his very soul swelled with thoughts of love and rural retirement: and thus his heart, as it were, burst open, and let out a gush of poetry, which he immediately committed to writing in the garb of a lamentation for the fair one’s absence, and forced under the window-frame of her bed-chamber; after which he disconsolately departed, though somewhat relieved by this effort of his Muse.—The words ran thus:

LAMENTATION OF CRONEROE FOR THE ABSENCE OF ITS SYLVAN NYMPH.

I.

Ah, where has she wander’d? ah, where has she stray’d?

What clime now possesses our lost sylvan maid?—

No myrtle now blossoms; no tulip will blow;

And the lively arbutus now fades at Croneroe.

II.

No glowing carnation now waves round her seat;

Nor crocus, nor cowslip weave turf for her feet;

And the woodbine’s soft tendrils, once train’d by her hand,

Now wild round her arbour distractedly stand.

III.

Her golden-clothed fishes now deaden their hue:

The birds cease to warble—the wood-dove to coo:

The cypress spreads wide, and the willow droops low,

And the noon’s brightest ray can’t enliven Croneroe.

IV.

In the low-winding glen, all embosom’d in green,

Where the thrush courts her muse, and the blackbird is seen,

The rill as it flows, limpid, silent, and slow,

Trickles down the gray rock as the tears of Croneroe.

V.

Then return, sylvan maid, and the flowers will all spring,

And the wood-dove will coo, and the linnet will sing—

The gold-fish will sparkle, the silver streams flow,

And the noon ray shine bright thro’ the glen of Croneroe.

Nothing very interesting occurred for above two months to our amorous lyrist, when he began to tire of waiting for the nymph of Croneroe, and grew fond of one of his own cousins without being able to give any very particular reason for it, further than that he was becoming more and more enlightened in the ways of the world. But this family flame soon burnt itself out; and he next fell into a sort of furious passion for a fine, strong, ruddy, country girl, the parson’s daughter: she was a capital housekeeper, and the parson himself a jolly hunting fellow: at his house there was a good table, and a hearty style of joking,—which advantages, together with a walk in the shrubbery, a sillabub under the cow, and a romp in the hay-making field, soon sent poor refinement about its business. The poet became absolutely mortal, and began to write common hexameters. However, before he was confirmed in his mortality, he happened one day to mention a sylph to his new sweetheart; she merely replied that she never saw one, and asked her mamma privately what it was, who desired her never to mention such a word again.

But by the time he set out for Oxford he had got tolerably well quit of all his ethereal visions, celestials, and snow-drops: and to convince his love what an admiration he had for sensible, substantial beauty, like hers, he wrote the following lines in a blank leaf of her prayer-book, which she had left in his way, as if suspecting his intention:—

I.

Refinement’s a very nice thing in its way,

And so is Platonic regard;

Melting sympathy too—as the highfliers says—

Is the only true theme for a bard.

Then give them love’s phantoms and flights for their pains;

But grant me, ye gods! flesh and blood and blue veins,

And dear Dolly—dear Dolly Haynes.

II.

I like that full fire and expression of eyes,

Where love’s true materiel presides;

With a glance now and then to the jellies and pies,

To ensure us good living besides.

Ye refiners, take angels and sylphs for your pains;

But grant me, ye gods! flesh and blood and blue veins,

And dear Dolly—dear Dolly Haynes.

I should not omit mentioning here an incident which at the time extremely amused me. A friend of mine, a barrister, whose extravagant ideas of refinement have frequently proved a source of great entertainment to me, was also a most enthusiastic admirer of Mr. Thomas Moore’s writings, prose and verse. I had read over to him the foregoing rather “of earthy” composition, to which he listened with a shrug of the shoulders and a contraction of the upper lip; and I was desirous of drawing out his opinion thereon by adverting to his own favourite bard.

“Here,” said I, “we have a fine illustration of the natural progress from refinement to sensuality—the amalgamation of which principles is so beautifully depicted by Mr. Thomas Moore in his ‘Loves of the Angels.’”

“Your observation is just,” replied my friend: “I cannot conceive why those elegant amours have been so much carped at—since their only object is to prove that flesh and blood is in very high estimation even with the spirituals.”

“What a triumph to mortality!” replied I.

“And why,” continued he, “should people be so very sceptical as to the authenticity of these angelic love-matches? surely there are no negative proofs; and are we not every day told by the gravest authorities that we are bound at our peril to believe divers matters not an atom more intelligible? For my part, I can’t comprehend why a poet should not be as credible a witness as a bishop on matters that are equally and totally invisible to both of them.”

“True,” observed I, smiling; “and the more so, as poets, generally residing nearer the sky than any other members of society, are likely to get better information.”

“Ay, poor fellows, ‘on compulsion!’” said my friend, with a compassionate sigh.—“But,” resumed he, falling in with my tone, “there is one point which I could have wished that our most melodious of lyrists had cleared up to my satisfaction—videlicet, what gender angels really are of?”

“Very little doubt, by logical reasoning, need exist upon that point,” answered I: “Mr. Moore represents his angels in the characters of gay deceivers, and those characters being performed by the male sex—ergo, angels must be males. You perceive the syllogism is complete?”

“Ay, ay,” said my friend; “but how comes it, then, that when we see a beautiful woman, we cry out involuntarily, ‘What an angel!’”

“The word homo signifies either man or woman,” replied I; “give a similar latitude to the word angel, and you have your choice of sexes! Divers of the classics, and some of the sculptors, perfectly authorise Mr. Moore’s delicious ambiguity.”

“That,” said my Moorish friend, “is certainly the fact, and most elegantly has our lyrist handled this question of celestial sexuality: he has paid the highest compliment ever yet conceived to human beauty, by asserting that ethereal spirits, instead of taking up with their own transparent species, prefer the opaque body-colouring of terrestrial dairy-maids—though fastidious casuists may, perhaps, call that a depraved taste.”

“No such thing,” replied I; “it is rather a proof of refined and filtered epicurism. The heathen mythology is crammed with precedents on that point. Every god and goddess in former times (and the sky was then quite crowded with them,)——”

“And may be so still,” interrupted my friend, “for any thing we know to the contrary.”

“They played their several pranks upon our globe,” continued I, “without the slightest compunction: even Jupiter himself frequently became a trespasser on the honour and peace of several very respectable fleshly families. The distinction between the spiritual and corporeal is likewise dexterously touched on by the dramatist Farquhar, who makes one of his characters[^[29]] exclaim to another, ‘I’ll take her body, you her mind: which has the better bargain?’”

[29]. Archer in “The Beaux Stratagem.”

“But,” rejoined my friend, “modern sentiment, which brings all these matters into collision, had not then been invented: now we can have both in one lot.”

Finally, we determined to consult Mr. Thomas Moore himself upon this most interesting consideration, agreeing that nobody could possibly understand such a refined subject so well as the person who wrote a book about it: we therefore proceeded (as I shall now do) to the next stage of years and of poetry.

The poet and lover was soon fixed at the university of Oxford, where he shortly made fast acquaintance with a couple of hot young Irishmen, who lost no time in easing him of the dregs of his sentimentality, and convinced him clearly that no rational man should ever be in love except when he is drunk, in which case it signifies little whom he falls in love with. Thus our youth soon forgot the parsonage, and grew enamoured of the bottle: but having some lees of poetry still remaining within him, the classics and the wine set them a fermenting; and he now wrote drinking-songs, hunting-songs, boating-songs, satires on the shopkeepers’ daughters, and lampoons on the fellows of Jesus and Brazen-nose; answered letters in verse; and, in a word, turned out what the lads called a genius.

The reverend private tutor of these young Irishmen wrote one day a letter to our poet in verse, inviting him to “meet at dinner a few fellow-countrymen, just arrived.” The tutor was a hard-going old parson, fond of wine and versification, who had been sent over from Ireland by the father of the two young men above alluded to, with direction to “take care that the lads did not fall into the d——d English morals, which would soon turn them into snow-balls, and disqualify them ever after from living in their own proper country and natural society.” These instructions the tutor faithfully acted up to; and the young poet very much amused the whole party by his humour and turn for rhyming; and was compelled to swear that he would pay them a visit, for a couple of years, near Belturbet in Ireland, where they would show him what living was. Their father was himself dotingly fond of poetry and the bag-pipes; and was induced to send them to Oxford only to please their mother’s brother, who was, most unfortunately, an Englishman.

My friend’s reply to the parson’s invitation was also in verse, and ran as follows: it was not amiss for a young tipster, and smacked, in some degree, both of Oxford and “Belturbet.”

Please your reverence,—

When parsons and poets their functions unite,

And court the old Muses to sing “an invite,”

The profane and the sacred connected we find,

And are sure of a banquet to every man’s mind.

Though on Pegasus mounted, to Bacchus we fly,

Yet we’ll quaff just like Christians;—our priest tells us why:

“’Tis moist hospitality banishes sin,

For the wine-open’d heart lets benevolence in.”

Then no long canting grace cools our spicy ragout,

While the impatient champagne bristles up his mousseu,

Which, darting toward heaven, cries “Come, goblets give!

’Tis my old Pagan cream teaches Christians to live!”

Then the pastor and flock quickly empty the bowl,

And its spirit divides ’twixt the head and the soul.

Though the Jove of our banquet no eagle can boast,

We’ll have plenty of “kites flying” all round our host:

Midst loud peals of laughter, undaunted we’ll sit,

And for flashes of lightning have flashes of wit:

Should his reverence perceive that our spirits are laid,

Then hot-pepper’d devils he’ll call to his aid,

And, all Christians surpassing, as Tantalus, see!

The more liquor we quaff, still the drier we’ll be!

But two modes of death sinful mortals should know,

Break their necks from Parnassus, or drown in Bordeaux;

And to which of those deaths I am doom’d from on high,

I’m sure of a parson, who’ll teach me to die.

Then who can refuse to accept of a dinner,

Where the host is from Erin—a priest—saint[^[30]]—and sinner?

In fact, this same friend of mine, of whose poetry, or rather versification, I have thus given samples to the reader, is a very peculiar personage: bred to a profession which he never followed, with ample means and no occupation, he has arrived at a ripe age without much increasing his stock of wisdom, or at all diminishing that of his peculiarity. He told me, he found his standard relief against ennui was invoking the Muses, which by ransacking his ideas and puzzling his genius, operated as a stimulus to his brain, and prevented that stagnation of the fluids which our ablest nosologists say is so often the inducement to suicide. My friend argues that the inexhaustible variety of passions, propensities, sentiments, and so forth, inherent to the human frame, and which poets (like noblemen’s fools in days of yore) have a license for dressing in all colours as they think proper, affords to the language of poetry a vast superiority over that of prose: which latter being in its nature but a hum-drum concern, is generally expected to be reasonably correct, tolerably intelligible, and moderately decent;—astringent qualifications, which some of our modern poets appear to have very laudably disregarded.

[30]. St. Ambrose.

My friend, however, observed, that he himself was not enabled to take other than a limited advantage of this license—inasmuch as he had been frequently jilted by the Muses, who never would do more than flirt with him; and hence, for want of a sufficient modicum of inspiration, he was generally necessitated to put up with the ordinary subjects of verse—such as epigrams, satires, odes on natal days, epitaphs on lap-dogs and little children, translations of Greek songs that he never saw, and of Italian poetry that had never existed, &c. It was true, he went on to inform me, he had occasionally flown at higher game in the regions of poesy; but, somehow or other, no bookseller would publish his effusions: one said they were too flat; another that they were too elevated; a third characterised them as too wild for the critics; and a fourth pronounced them too tame for the ladies. At length, however, the true state of the matter was candidly developed by a very intelligent presbyterian bookseller in the city, who told my friend that he was quite too late as to poetry, with which the publishers were crammed and the public farcied. Besides, he said, all the poetic stations in any way productive were already occupied:—for instance, a Poet Fitzgerald (whom Lord Byron calls “Hoarse Fitzgerald”) had, ever since the days of the “Rejected Addresses,” been considered as the writer, reciter, and proprietor of the fulsome line of poetry:—the amatory, celestial, and horticultural departments had long been considered the property of Mr. Thomas Moore; and every dactyl or spondee relating to roses, posies, dew-drops and thorns, grapes, lilies, kisses, blisses, blushes, angels, &c. would be considered as gross plagiarism, emanating from any other pen than that of our justly celebrated lyrist; while, as to historic or Caledonian poetry, Sir Walter Scott had not left an idea unappropriated for any fresh penman: he had raised an obscure people to eternal celebrity, by recording their murders in English versification; and by his “Battle of Waterloo” had proved that his own Muse, in the department of slaughter, was in a very languishing state, probably owing to the extraordinary fatigue she had previously undergone.

My friend was proceeding to detail further the admonitory conversation of this honest bibliopole, when I interrupted him by asking, naturally enough, how he could continue to derive any pleasure from a pursuit in which he admitted himself to have been so very unsuccessful? to which he adroitly replied, “On the very same principle that a bad shot may have just as much amusement as a capital sportsman; perhaps more,—one good hit being as gratifying to him as twenty to an undeviating fowler.” I coincided in my friend’s remark, adding, that the same sort of observation would apply to random jokers as well as rhymesters; and that I have more than once absolutely envied the inordinate happiness of a universal punster when he chanced to say any thing that had a symptom of wit in it.

My friend then, gravely opening his portfolio, selected two of his productions, which he gave me permission to publish, particularly as one of them had been most abruptly rejected by an eminent newspaper, and the other by a magazine of considerable reputation.

The intended Magazine article ran as follows:—but as one of the attachés was a northern gentleman of the Edinburgh Review, it was sent back to my friend with what he called a tantara rara.

THE HIGHLANDER.

I.

A sans culotte from Caledonia’s wilds,

Rasp’d into form by Nature’s roughest files,

Hearing of savoury meats—of monies made—

Of unsmoked women—and of dexterous trade;—

Resolved, from sooty cot, to seek a town,

And to the low-lands boldly stump it down.

But then, alas! his garb would never do—

The greasy kilt, bare loins, and tatter’d shoe:

Yet urged to better food and better fame,

He borrow’d breeches and assumed a name;

Then truck’d his kilt, barter’d his motley hose,

New nail’d his heels, and capp’d the peeping toes.

His freckled fist a swineherd’s bludgeon wields,—

His tried companion through the sties and fields,

(Full many a grunting brawn had felt its sway)

Now to a cane promoted, helps its master’s way.

Full fifty bawbees Sandy had in store,

And piteous tales had raised him fifty more:

His knife, his pipe, and eke his bawbee bank,

In Basil pouch hung dangling from his flank:

No empty wallet on his shoulder floats:

Hard eggs, soft cheese, tobacco, salt, and oats,

Cramm’d in one end, wagg’d o’er his brawny chest,

And what was once a blanket poised the rest:

Thus wealthy, victuall’d, proud, content, and gay,

Down Grampian’s sterile steeps young Sandy wound his way.

Hail food! hail raiment! hail that happy lot

Which lured such genius from the smoky cot,

To mingle in the ranks of breeches’d men,

And coin a name and family again!

II.

Where fam’d St. Andrew’s turrets tower on high;

Where frozen doctors lecture, doze, and die;

Where Knowledge sleeps, and Science seeks repose,

And mouldering halls more mouldering heads disclose,—

Where Roman Virgil pipes in Celtic verse,

And Grecian Homer sings to gods in Erse;—

’Twas there that Sandy form’d his worldly creed,

Brush’d gowns, swept book-shelves, learn’d to shave and read:

From craft to craft his willing genius rose;

When cash was scarce he wisely wrought for clothes,

And threadbare trophies, once the kirkmen’s pride,

Mickle by mickle swell’d his wallet’s side.

Well turn’d, well scoured, the rags denied their age,

While Sandy’s granite visage aped the sage.

Here, great Lavater! here thy science stands

Confess’d, and proved by more than mortal hands.

Though o’er his features Nature’s skill we see,

Her deepest secrets are disclosed through thee.

The green-tinged eye, curl’d lip, and lowering brows,

Which malice harrows, and which treachery ploughs,

In deep sunk furrows on his front we find,

Tilling the crops that thrive in Sandy’s mind.

No soft sensations can that face impart;

No gratitude springs glowing from the heart;

As deadly nightshade creeping on the ground,

He tries to poison what he cannot wound.

Yet Sandy has a most consistent mind,

Too low to rise, too coarse to be refin’d,

Too rough to polish, and too loose to bind:

Yet if * * * * *

On looking over the residue, I conceived that I could not with propriety continue the publication: were I to proceed five or six lines further, ill-natured people might possibly (though erroneously) affect to find a pretence for designation, and I should be very sorry to be considered as capable of becoming an instrument in so improper a procedure. My friend assured me he did not intend to particularise any individual: I, however, returned the copy to my portfolio, and subsequently to the author, mentioning my reasons, and advising him to burn the rest. His reply to me was laconic—“My dear B * * *, qui caput ille facit. If any man adopts it, ’tis not my fault.”

The other trifle is a mere jeu d’esprit, and cannot be disagreeable to any body, unless it may be taken amiss by some West-Indian proprietor, whose probable touchiness at the introduction of the word slavery I do not feel called on to compassionate.

EPIGRAM.

Sir Sidney Smith and Miss Rumbold.

Says Sidney—“I’ll put all white slavery down;

All Europe I’ll summon to arms;”

But fair Rumbold replied—“I’ll reverse my renown,

For all men shall be slaves to my charms.”

If thus, lovely champion, that tongue and those eyes

Can set all mankind by the ears;

Go—fire off your glances, explode a few sighs,

And make captive the Dey of Algiers!

Thus you’ll rival papa both in glory and gains;

He may conquer the tyrant—you’ll lead him in chains.

I cannot conclude these memoranda without adding a few fragments from some unpublished and nearly unknown works, the production of Miss Tylden, the amiable young lady to whom I have before introduced the reader, (see pages 71, 72, 141, 142,) and who commenced versifying at the early age of fifteen. Her compositions are numerous, and comprise a variety of subjects and of styles; but, with a natural and becoming modesty, (though in her case, in my opinion, unnecessary,) she refuses to submit them to the ordeal of the public. I sincerely hope she may change her resolution.

THE BARD.

Extracted from an unpublished Poem, called “Boadicea.”

By Miss M. Tylden.

Amid those aged sons of song

One seem’d to tower the rest among:

For though the heavy hand of Time

Had somewhat marr’d his youthful prime;

Though the sunny glow had faded

On the locks his brow that shaded;

Stern Time, not ev’n thy icy sway

Might quench the heaven-enkindled lay

Which waken’d to achievements high

Those heroes of antiquity.

Howe’er it were, from that bright band

Sadly apart he seem’d to stand,

And lowly on his harp he leant

With eye of gloom and eyebrow bent;

But still, despite his sterner mood,

By all with reverence he was view’d,

Such charm of dignity hath age

When on the brow experience sage

Hath stamp’d the worth of years that sleep,

And when the mind hath known to reap

Harvests of scientific lore,

And well secured the precious store;—

When all the stormy dreams of youth

Fade in the beacon-light of truth;

When fiery feelings are repress’d,

The spirit calm’d, the heart at rest!

Then in the form of age we find

Somewhat surpassing earthly kind.

Now forth his harp that minstrel drew,

And o’er the chords his fingers threw,

The while beneath their lighter sway

Murmur’d the scarcely-bidden lay,

In soft half-warbled cadence stealing

O’er the melting soul of feeling:—

But when he caught the transport high

Which mark’d the kindling melody,

His upturn’d eye and heaving breast

The mighty frenzy quick confess’d;

The sympathetic strings beneath

A wild inspiring chorus breathe,

And, borne the lofty halls along,

Floats high the patriot minstrel’s song:—

The mildew of time steeps the laurel-bound wreath,

And the war-sword ingloriously rusts in its sheath,

Which burst on the foe as the bolt from on high,

And sprinkled the blood of revenge to the sky.

The arm is unbraced and the nerves are unstrung

Of him who in combat that dark weapon swung;

For the souls of the heroes of loftier days,

Kindled high in their glory, have sunk in the blaze:

And the laurels of Britain, droop’d, wither’d and shrunk,

And her standard of freedom all hopelessly sunk,

And the sons of the isles, scatter’d thin on the hill,

Stood forsaken and drooping, but dauntlessly still.

Ye sons of the brave! is the bold spirit fled

Which to combat and conquest your forefathers led?

Oh no! it but sleeps in the souls it should warm,

The more fiercely to burn in the day of the storm.

But too long it hath slept: for the hearts of the brave

Are a country’s best bulwarks to guard and to save:

Oh then be the lion aroused in each breast,

Triumphant to conquer, or nobly to rest.

Be it yours to divulge the dark volume of fate;

Be it yours to revenge, ere revenge be too late:

Oh let not the spirit of freedom repose

Till it visit the wrongs of our land on its foes.

’Tis your country that calls; shall that cry be in vain?

All bleeding she lies in the conqueror’s chain:

Chiefs! one struggle more, and her freedom is won:

Let us triumph or die, as our fathers have done.

Like the lightning of heaven be your arms on the heath,

Loud, loud ring your shields with the thunder of death:

As the waves of your ocean rush down to the strife,

And each stroke be for Britain,—for freedom and life!

The bard has ceased: the lofty lay

In long vibrations dies away,

And melts upon the air around

Till silence blends away the sound.

The bard upon each warrior gazed,

To mark what thoughts his strain had raised.

The eye that late flash’d high with mirth

In alter’d cheer now sought the earth;

The cheek that bright with joy had blush’d,

Far other feeling now had flush’d.

It might have seem’d throughout the hall

(So motionless, so mute were all)

As though the spirit of the storm

Had swept along each stately form.

A moment—and what change was wrought

In every look and every thought!

Roused by the breath of life, they seem

To start at once from their death-like dream;

A sudden impulse, wild and strong,

Agitates the moving throng,

And like the billows of the deep,

When darkening tempests o’er it sweep,

In every freeborn heart, that strain

Concordant echoes roused again!

THEATRICAL RECOLLECTIONS.

The author’s early visits to Crow-street Theatre—Interruptions of the University men—College pranks—Old Mr. Sheridan in “Cato” and in “Alexander the Great”—Curious scene introduced, by mistake, in the latter tragedy—Mr. Digges in the Ghost of Hamlet’s father—Chorus of cocks—The author’s preference of comedy to tragedy—Remarks on Mr. Kean and the London moralists—Liston in “Paul Pry”—Old Sparkes—The Spanish débutante—Irish Johnstone—Modern comedy—The French stage.

From my youth I was attached to theatrical representations, and have still a clear recollection of many of the eminent performers of my early days. My grandmother, with whom I resided for many years, had permanent silver tickets of admission to Crow-street Theatre, whither I was very frequently sent.

The playhouses in Dublin were then lighted by tallow candles, stuck into tin circles hanging from the middle of the stage, which were every now and then snuffed by some performer; and two soldiers, with fixed bayonets, always stood like statues on each side the stage, close to the boxes, to keep the audience in order. The galleries were very noisy and very droll. The ladies and gentlemen in the boxes always went dressed out nearly as for court; the strictest etiquette and decorum were preserved in that circle; whilst the pit, as being full of critics and wise men, was particularly respected, except when the young gentlemen of the University occasionally forced themselves in, to revenge some insult, real or imagined, to a member of their body; on which occasions, all the ladies, well-dressed men, and peaceable people generally, decamped forthwith, and the young gentlemen as generally proceeded to beat or turn out the residue of the audience, and to break every thing that came within their reach. These exploits were by no means uncommon; and the number and rank of the young culprits were so great, that (coupled with the impossibility of selecting the guilty,) the college would have been nearly depopulated, and many of the great families in Ireland enraged beyond measure, had the students been expelled or even rusticated.

I had the honour of being frequently present, and (as far as in mêlée,) giving a helping hand to our encounters both in the play-houses and streets. We were in the habit of going about the latter, on dark nights, in coaches, and, by flinging out halfpence, breaking the windows of all the houses we rapidly drove by, to the astonishment and terror of the proprietors. At other times, we used to convey gunpowder squibs into all the lamps in several streets at once, and by longer or shorter fuses contrive to have them all burst about the same time, breaking every lamp to shivers and leaving whole streets in utter darkness. Occasionally we threw large crackers into the china and glass-shops, and delighted to see the terrified shopkeepers trampling on their own porcelain and cut-glass, for fear of an explosion. By way of a treat, we used sometimes to pay the watchmen to lend us their cloaks and rattles: by virtue whereof, we broke into the low prohibited gambling-houses, knocked out the lights, drove the gamblers down stairs, and then gave all their stakes to the watchmen. The whole body of watchmen belonging to one parish (that of the round church, St. Andrew’s) were our sworn friends, and would take our part against any other watchmen in Dublin. We made a permanent subscription, and paid each of these regularly seven shillings a week for his patronage. I mention these trifles, out of a thousand odd pranks, as a part of my plan, to show, from a comparison of the past with the present state of society in the Irish metropolis, the extraordinary improvement which has taken place in point of decorum within the last half century. The young gentlemen of the University then were in a state of great insubordination;—not as to their learning, but their wild habits: indeed, the singular feats of some of them would be scarcely credible now; and they were so linked together, that an offence to one was an offence to all. There were several noblemen’s sons with their gold-laced, and elder sons of baronets with their silver-laced gowns, who used to accompany us, with their gowns turned inside out: yet our freaks arose merely from the fire and natural vivacity of uncontrolled youth: no calm, deliberate vices,—no low meannesses,—were ever committed: that class of young men now termed “dandies” we then called macaronies; and we made it a standing rule to thrash them whenever we got a fair opportunity: such also as had been long tied to their “mothers’ apron-strings” we made no small sport with when we got them clear inside the college: we called them milk-sops, and if they declined drinking as much wine as ordered, we always dosed them (as in duty bound) with tumblers of salt and water till they came to their feeding, as we called it. Thus generally commenced a young man of fashion’s novitiate above fifty years ago. However, our wildness, instead of increasing as we advanced in our college courses, certainly diminished, and often left behind it the elements of much talent and virtue. Indeed, there were to the full as good scholars, and certainly to the full as high-bred, and much more talented gentlemen educated in the Dublin University then, than in this wiser and more cold-blooded era. But it has utterly degenerated.

I remember, even before that period, seeing old Mr. Sheridan perform the part of Cato at one of the Dublin theatres; I do not recollect which: but I well recollect his dress, which consisted of bright armour under a fine laced scarlet cloak, and surmounted by a huge, white, bushy, well-powdered wig (like Dr. Johnson’s), over which was stuck his helmet. I wondered much how he could kill himself without stripping off the armour before he performed that operation! I also recollect him particularly (even as if before my eyes now) playing Alexander the Great, and throwing the javelin at Clytus, whom happening to miss, he hit the cup-bearer, then played by one of the hack performers, a Mr. Jemmy Fotterel. Jemmy very naturally supposed that he was hit designedly, and that it was some new light of the great Mr. Sheridan to slay the cup-bearer in preference to his friend Clytus, which certainly would have been a less unjustifiable murder, and that he ought to tumble down and make a painful end, according to dramatic custom time immemorial. Immediately, therefore, on being struck, Mr. James Fotterel (who was the ugliest cup-bearer ever employed by any monarch) reeled, staggered, and fell very naturally, considering it was his first death; but being determined on this unexpected opportunity to make an impression upon the audience, when he found himself stretched out on the boards at full length, he began to roll about, kick, and flap the stage with his hands most immoderately; falling next into strong convulsions, exhibiting every symptom of exquisite torture, and at length expiring with a groan so loud and so long that it paralysed even the people in the galleries, whilst the ladies believed that he was really killed, and cried aloud at the misfortune.

Though then very young, I was myself so terrified in the pit that I never shall forget it. However, Mr. Jemmy Fotterel being dragged off by the legs, soon re-entered in rude health, and was more applauded than any Clytus had ever been;—even the slayer himself could not help laughing most heartily at the incident.

The actresses both of tragedy and genteel comedy formerly wore large hoops, and whenever they made a speech walked across the stage and changed sides with the performer who was to speak next, thus veering backwards and forwards, like a shuttlecock, during the entire performance. This custom partially prevailed in the continental theatres till very lately.

I recollect Mr. Barry, who was accounted the handsomest man of his day, and his lady (formerly Mrs. Dancer); also Mr. Digges, who used to play the Ghost in “Hamlet.” One night in doubling that part with (I believe) Polonius, Digges forgot, on appearing as the Ghost, previously to rub off the bright red paint with which his face had been daubed for the other character. A sprite with a large red nose and vermilioned cheeks was extremely novel and much applauded. There was also a famous actor who used to play the Cock that crew to call off the Ghost when Hamlet had done with him: this performer did his part so well that every body used to say he was the best Cock that ever had been heard at Smock-alley; and six or eight other gentry of the dunghill species were generally brought behind the scenes, who, on hearing him, mistook him for a brother cock, and set up their pipes all together: and thus, by the infinity of crowing at the same moment, the hour was the better marked, and the Ghost glided back to the other world in the midst of a perfect chorus of cocks—to the no small admiration of the audience.

The distinguishing merits of the old actors I cannot recollect, and indeed of many of the more modern ones I profess myself but a very moderate judge. One thing, however, I am sure of;—that, man or boy, I never admired tragedy, however well personated. Lofty feelings and strong passions may be admirably mimicked therein; but the ranting, whining, obviously premeditated starting, disciplined gesticulation, &c.—the committing of suicide in mellifluous blank verse, and rhyming when in the agonies of death,—stretch away so very far from nature, as to destroy all that illusion whereon the effect of dramatic exhibition in my mind entirely depends. Unless occasionally to witness some very celebrated new actor, I have not attended a tragedy these forty years; nor have I ever yet seen any tragedian on the British stage who made so decided an impression on my feelings as Mr. Kean, in some of his characters, has done. When I have seen other celebrated men enact the same parts, I have remained quite tranquil, however my judgment may have been satisfied: but he has made me shudder, and that, in my estimation, is the grand triumph of the tragedian’s art. I have seldom sat out the last murder scene of any play except “Tom Thumb,” or “Chrononhotonthologos,” which certainly are no burlesques on some of our standard tragedies.

In serious comedy, Kean’s Shylock and Sir Giles Overreach, seemed to me neither more nor less than actual identification of those portraitures: so much so, in fact, that I told him myself, after seeing him perform the first-mentioned part, that I could have found in my heart to knock his brains out the moment he had finished his performance.[^[31]]

[31]. Nothing could be more truly disgusting than the circumstance of the most ruffianly parts of the London population, under the general appellation of a “British audience,” assuming to themselves the feelings of virtue, delicacy, decorum, morals, and modesty—for the sole purpose of driving into exile one of the first performers that ever trod the stage of England!—and that for an offence which (though abstractedly unjustifiable) a great number of the gentry, not a few of the nobility, and even members of the holy church militant, are constantly committing and daily detected in: which commission and detection by no means seem to have diminished their popularity, or caused their reception to be less cordial among saints, methodists, legal authorities, and justices of the quorum.

The virtuous sentence of transportation passed against Mr. Kean by the mob of London certainly began a new series of British morality; and the laudable societies for the “suppression of vice” may shortly be eased of a great proportion of their labours by more active moralists, (the frequenters of the upper gallery) culled from High-street St. Giles’s, the Israelites of Rag-fair, and the Houses of Correction. Hogarth has, in his print of “Evening,” immortalised the happy state of the horned citizens at his period.

Two errors, however, that great actor has in a remarkable degree: some of his pauses are so long, that he appears to have forgotten himself; and he pats his breast so often, that it really reminds one of a nurse patting her infant to keep it from squalling: it is a pity he is not aware of these imperfections!

If, however, I have been always inclined to undervalue tragedy, on the other hand, the great comic performers of my time in Ireland I perfectly recollect. I allude to the days of Ryder, O’Keeffe, Wilks, Wilder, Vandermere, &c. &c. &c.