The Dodd Family Abroad Volume I Part 30

I wonder at myself how I keep my temper, and condescend to argue with you about points on which an old bachelor, or widower (for it's the same), must necessarily be ignorant. Don't you perceive that for you to discourse on family matters is like a deaf man describing music?

And you wind up about the privileges of old friendship, and so on! It's a new notion of friendship that makes a man impudent! Where did you ever hear that knowing people a long time was a reason for insulting them?

As to your kind inquiries for the girls, I 'd have liked them as well if not coupled with those "natural fears" for the consequences of foreign contamination. Mary Anne and myself got a hearty laugh out of your terrors; and so I forgive your mention of them.

James is quite well; and would, he says, be better, if that remittance you spoke of had arrived.

You tell me that the McCarthy legacy is paid, and the money lodged at Latouche's. But what's the use of that? It's here I want it. Find out a safe hand, if you can, and send it over to me; for I 'm resolved to have nothing to do with bills as long as I live.

And now I believe I have gone through the princ.i.p.al matters in your last, and I hope given you my ideas as clearly as your own. It may save you some time and stationery if I say that my mind is made up about K.I.; and if it was Queen Victoria was interceding for him, I'd not alter my sentiments. It's no use appealing "to the goodness of my heart, and the feminine sweetness of my nature;" all that you say on that head is only a warning to me not to let my weaknesses get the upper hand of me: a lesson I will endeavor to profit by, so long as I write myself,

Your very obedient to command,

Jemima Dodd.

LETTER XXVII. MRS. DODD TO MRS. MARY GALLAGHER, HOUSEKEEPER, DODSBOROUGH

Dear Molly,--I send you herewith a letter for Tom Pur-cell, which you 'll take care to deliver with your own hands. If you are by when he reads it, you 'll maybe perceive that it's not the "compliments of the season" I was sending him. He says he likes plain speaking, and I trust he is satisfied now.

You are already aware of the barbarous manner K. I. has behaved. I 've told you how he deserted me and the family, and the disgrace that he has brought down upon us in the face of Europe; for I must observe to you, Molly, that whatever is talked of here goes flying over the whole world, and is the common talk of every Court on the Continent. I could fill chapters if I was to describe his wickedness and inhumanity. Well, my dear, what do you think! but in the face of all this Mr. Tom Purcell takes the opportunity to read me a long lecture on my "congenial"

duties, and to instruct me in what manner I am to treat K. I. on his return.

Considering what he knows of my character, Molly, I almost suspect that he might have spared himself this trouble. Did he, or did any one else, ever see me posed by a difficulty? When did any event take me unawares?

Am I by nature one of those terrified creatures that get flurried by misfortune; or am I, by the blessing of Providence, gifted in a remarkable manner with great powers of judgment, matured by a deep knowledge of life, and a thorough acquaintance with the wickedness of the human heart? That's the whole question,--which am I? Is it after twenty-six years' studying his disposition and pondering over all his badness, that any one can come and teach me how to manage him? I know K.

I. as I know my old slipper; and, indeed, one is worth about as much as the other! I have n't the patience--it would be too much to expect from any one--to tell you how beautifully Mister Tom discourses to me about the innocent freedoms of the Continent, and the harmless fragilities of female life abroad! Does the old sinner believe in his heart that black is white abroad? and would he have me think that what's murder in Bruff was only a justifiable hom'-a-side at Brussels? If he doesn't meau that, what does he mean? Maybe, to be sure, he 's one of the fashionable set that make out that the husband is always driven to some kind of vice or other by his wife's conduct! For, I must remark to you, Molly, there 's a set of people now in the world--they call themselves "The Peace Congress," I think--that say there must be no more wars, no fighting, domestically or nationally!

Their notion is this: everybody is right, and n.o.body need quarrel with his neighbor, but settle any trifling disagreement by means of arbitration. Mister Tom is, perhaps, an arbitrator. Well, I hope he likes the office! Since I knew anything of life myself, I always found that if there was three people mixed up in a shindy there was no hope of settling it, on any terms.

He says, K. I. is coming home. Let him come, says I. Let him surrender himself, Molly, and justice will take its course. That's all the satisfaction I 'll give either of them.

"Don't be vindictive," says Mister Tom. Isn't that pretty language to use to me, I ask? Is the Chief Justice "vindictive," Molly, when he says, "Stand forward, and hear your sentence"? Is he behaving "unlike a Christian" when he says, "Use the little time that's left you in making your peace"?

The old creature then goes on to quote Scripture to me, and talks about the prodigal son. "Very well," says I, "be it so. K. I. may be that if he likes, but I 'll not be the fatted calf,--that's all!" The fact is, Molly, I'm immutable as the Maids and Prussians. They may talk till they 're black in the face, but I 'll never forgive him!

Would n't it be a nice example, I ask, to the girls, if I was to overlook K. I.'s conduct, and call it a "venal" offence? And this, too, when the eyes of all Europe is staring at us. "How will Mrs. D. take it?" says the Prince of this. "What will Mrs. D. say to him?" says the Duke of that "Does _she_ know it yet?" asks the Archduke of Moravia.

That's the way they go on from morning till night; so that, in fact, Molly,--as Lord George observes,--"he is less of a private culprit than a great public malefactor."

There's the way I am forced to look on the case; and think more of the good of society than of my family feelings.

Such are my sentiments, Molly, after giving to the case a most patient and careful consideration; and it's little good in Tom Purcell's trying to oppose and obstruct me.

If it were not for this unhappy event, I must own to you, Molly, that we never enjoyed ourselves anywhere more than we do here. It's a scene of pleasure and gayety all day,--and, indeed, all nightlong; and nothing but the antic.i.p.ation of K. I. 's return could damp the ardor of our happiness. However it's managed, I can't tell; but the most elegant b.a.l.l.s and entertainments are given here free and for nothing! Who keep up the rooms, pays for the lighting, the servants, and the refreshments, is more than I can say. All I know is, that your humble servant never contributed a sixpence to one of them. Lord George says that the Grand Duke is never happy except when the place is crammed; and that he 'd spend his last shilling rather than not see people amuse themselves.

And there's a Frenchman, too,--a Mr. Bega.s.set, or Bena.s.set, or something like that,--who is so wild about amus.e.m.e.nt that he goes to any expense about the place, and even keeps a pack of hounds for the public.

Contrast this, my dear Molly, with one of our little miserable subscription b.a.l.l.s at home, where Dan Ca.s.sidy, the dancing-master, is driving about the country, for maybe three weeks, in his old gig, before he can sc.r.a.pe together a matter of six or seven pounds, to pay for mutton lights, two fiddles, and a dulcimer; and, after all, it's perhaps over the Bridewell we 'd be dancing, and the shouts of the dirty creatures below would be coming up at every pause of the music. Now, here, it's like a royal palace,--elegant l.u.s.tres, with two hundred wax-lights in each of them,--a floor like gla.s.s. Ask Mary Anne if it isn't as slippery! The dress of the company actually magnificent! none of your little shabby-colored muslins, or Limerick lace; none of your gauze petticoats, worn over glazed calico, to look like satin, but everything real, Molly,--the lace, the silk, the satin, the jewels, the gold tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs, the feathers,--all the best of the kind, and fresh as they came out of the shop. You don't see the white satin shoes with the mark of a man's foot on them, nor the satin body with four fingers and a thumb on the back of it, as you would at a Patrick's Ball in Dublin!

Everything is new for each night.

How Mary Anne laughs at the Irish notions of dress, of what they call in the "Evening Post," "a beautiful lama petticoat over a white satin slip!"

or "a train of elegant figured tabinet." Why, Molly darling, you might as well wear a mackintosh, or go out in a suit of glazed alpaca cloth. Mary Anne says that the ball at the Castle of Dublin is like a tournament, where all the company dance in armor; and, indeed, when I think of the rattling of bead bracelets, false pearls, and Berlin necklaces, it rather reminds me of a hornpipe in fetters!

I must confess to you, Molly, there 's nothing as low anywhere as Dublin, and latterly, when anybody asks Mary Anne or me if it's pleasant, we always say with a strong English accent, "Our military friends say, vastly, but we really don't know ourselves." Is n't that a pretty pa.s.s to be reduced to? But I 'm told that all the Irish, of any distinction, are obliged to do the same, and never confess to have seen more of Ireland than one does from the Welsh mountains. It's no want of patriotism makes me say this. I wish, with all my heart, that Ireland was a perfect paradise; and it's no fault of mine that Providence intended otherwise.

If I was n't writing with my head so full of Tom Purcell and his late impudence, I 'd have plenty to tell you about the girls and James. Mary Anne is more admired than any girl here, and so would Cary, if she 'd only let herself be so; but she has got a short, snubby, tart kind of way with people, that never goes down abroad, where, as Lord G. says, "every cat plays with his claws covered."

And as to Lord George himself, I wonder is it Mary Anne or Cary that he's after. I watch him day by day, and can make nothing of it; but sure and certain it is he means one of the two, and that is the reason why he left this suddenly the other morning for England, and saying,--

"There 's no use letter-writing; I'll just dash over and have a talk with my governor."

I would n't ask him about what, but I saw the way the girls looked down when he spoke, and that was enough to show me in what quarter the wind was blowing.

I wish from my heart and soul the proposal would come before K. I. came back. I 'd like to have to show the superior way I have always managed the family affairs; for I need n't tell you, Molly, that _he_ never had an eye to the peerage for one of his daughters! but if he returns before it's settled, he 'll say that he had his share in it all! As to James, he is everything that a fond and doting mother could wish. Six feet two and a half,--he grew the half since he came here,--with dark eyes, and a pair of whiskers and moustaches that there's not the like here, dressed in the very top of the fashion, with opal and diamond studs to his shirt and waistcoat, and a black velvet paletot with turquoise b.u.t.tons for evening wear. The whole room turns to look at him wherever he goes, for he walks along just for all the world as if he owned the place. You may suppose, my dear Molly, how little he resembles K. I.; and, indeed, I have heard many make the same remark when we were at Bonn.

I made Mary Anne write me down a list of the great people here who have all called on us; but what 's the use of sending it, after all? You could n't p.r.o.nounce them if they were before you! I send you, however, a bit I cut out of "Galignani's Messenger," where you 'll see that we are put down amongst the distinguished visitors as "Madame M'Carthy Dodd, family and suite!" James still thinks if K. I. would call himself "The O'Dodd," it would serve us greatly; and Mary Anne agrees with the opinion; and perhaps now, when he comes back under a cloud, as one may say, it may not be so difficult to make him give in. As James remarks, "Print it on your card, call out and shoot the first fellow that addresses you as Mr.--make it no laughing matter for anybody, before your face at least,--and the thing is done." Maybe we 'll live to see this yet, Molly, but I fear it won't be till Providence sends for K. I.

I spoke rather sharply to Waters in my last; and I find now that the legacy is paid into Latouche's. Will you remind Purcell that to be of any use to me the money ought to be here? As to the Loan Fund, I wonder how you have the face to ask me for anything, knowing the way I 'm in for ready cash, and that I 'd rather borrow than lend any day. Tell Peter Belton, also, that I stop my subscription after this year to the Dispensary; and I am quite sure the old system of physic is nothing but legalized poisoning. Looking to the facilities of the country, and the natural habits of the people, I 'm convinced, Molly, that the water-cure is what you want in Ireland; and I 've half a mind to write a letter to one of the papers about it. Cheapness is the first requisite in a poor country; and any one can vouch for it, water is n't a dear commodity with you.

Father Maher's remarks upon poor Jones M'Carthy is, I must say, very unfeeling; and I don't coincide with the conclusions he draws from them; for if he was half as bad as he says, ma.s.ses will do him little good; and for a few thousand years, more or less, I can't afford to pay fifty pounds! Ask him, besides, is it reasonable that when the price of everything is falling, with Free-trade, that the old tariff of Purgatory is to be kept up still? That would be downright absurd! Priests, my dear Molly, must lower their rates, as the Protectionists do their rents: that's "one of the demands of the age, and can't be resisted." As Lord George says, "The Church, like the railroad people, fell into the mistake of lavish expenditure! Purgatory was like a station, and ought never to be made too costly. No one wants to live there: the most one requires is to be decently comfortable, till you can 'go on.' What's the use of fine furniture, elegant chairs and carpets? they 're clean thrown away in such a place." If Father Maher thinks that the remarks are not uttered in a respectful spirit, tell him he's wrong; for Lord G. and all his family are great Whigs, and intend to do more mischief to the Established Church than any party that ever was in power; and I must say, I never heard Father Maher abuse Protestants, bigotry, and intolerance more bitterly than Lord G. It is so seldom that one ever hears really liberal sentiments, or anything like justice to Ireland, I could listen to him for hours when he begins. If I 'm right in my conjecture about the object of his journey to London, it will be the making of James; since, once that we are connected with the aristocracy, Molly, there's nothing we cannot have; for, you see, the way is this: if you belong to the middle cla.s.ses, they expect that you ought to have some kind of fitness for the occupation you look for; and they say, "This would n't suit you at all;" "That's not your line, in the least;"

but when you are one of the "higher orders," there's, so to say, a general adaptiveness about you, and you can do anything they put before you, from ranging Windsor Forest to keeping a lighthouse! When one reflects upon that, it's no wonder that one of our great poets says, "Oh, bless," or "preserve"--I forget which--"our old n.o.bility!"

Go into any of the great public offices--the Foreign or the Colonial, for instance--and they tell me that such a set of incapable-looking creatures never was seen, with spy-gla.s.ses stuck in their eyes, airing themselves before a big fire, and reading the "Times;" and yet, Molly,--confess it we must,--the work is done somehow and by somebody.

It reminds me of a paper-mill I once saw; and no matter how dirty and squalid the rags that went in, they came out "Beautiful fine wove," or "Bath extra."

As to the questions in your last, I can't answer a t.i.the of them. You go on, letter after letter, with the same tiresome demand,--"Are we as much in love with the Continent as we were? Is it so cheap? Is the climate as fine as they say? Is there never any rain or wind at all? Is everybody polite and agreeable? Is there no such thing as backbiting or slandering? Are all the men handsome and brave, and all the women beautiful and virtuous?" This is but a specimen taken at random out of your late inquiries; and I 'd like to know that if even you gave me "notice of a question," as they do in the House, how could I satisfy you on these points? The most I can do is to say that there may be some slight exaggeration in one or two of these,--the rain, for instance, and the virtue,--but that, generally speaking, the rest is all true. I can be more explicit in regard to what you ask in your last postscript,--"After living so long abroad, can we ever come back to reside in Ireland?" Never, Molly, never! I make neither reserve nor qualification in my answer. _That_ would be clearly impossible! for it's not only that Ireland would be insupportable to us, but, as Mary Anne remarks, "we would be insupportable to the Irish." Our walk, our dress, our looks, our accent, our manner with men, and our way with women; the homage we 're used to; the respect we feel our due; the topics we discuss with freedom, and the range of our views generally over life,--would shock the whole population from Cape Clear to the Causeway.

It's not easy for me to explain it to you, Molly; but, somehow, everything abroad is different from at home. Not only the things you talk of, but the way you talk of them, is quite distinct; and the whole world of men, morals, and manners have quite another standard! It is the same with one's thoughts as with their diet; half the things we like best are only what is called acquired tastes. Trouble enough we often have to learn them; but when once we do so, who'd be fool enough to go back upon his old ignorance again? High society and genteel manners, Molly, however you may like them when you are used to them, are just like London porter,--mighty bitter when you first taste it. I know there are plenty of people will tell you the contrary, and that they took to it naturally like mother's milk; but don't believe them, it's quite impossible it could be true.

Once for all, I beg to tell you that there's no earthly use in tormenting and teasing us about the state the house is in at Dodsborough; how the roof is broken here, and the walls given way there.

I trust sincerely that it may soon become perfectly uninhabitable, for I never wish to see it again! I often think it would n't be a bad plan for K. I. to go back and reside there. I 'm sure if he collected his rents himself, instead of leaving all to Tom Purcell, it would be "telling him something." You say that the country is getting disturbed again, and that they're likely to have a "sharp winter for the landlords;" but if it was the will of Providence anything should happen, I hope I have Christian feelings to support me! Indeed, I'm well used to trials now!

It's a mistake, besides, Molly, to suppose that these--I hate to call them "outrages," as the newspapers do--these little outbreaks of the boys have any deep root in the country. The Orangemen, I know, would make them out as a regular system, and say that it's an organized society for murder; but it's no such thing. Father Maher himself told me that he spoke against it from the altar, and said: "What a pa.s.s the country has come to," says he, "that the poor laboring hard-working man has no justice to right him, except his own stout heart and strong arm!" What could he say more than that, Molly? But even these beautiful expressions did n't save him from the "Evening Mail"!

The English are always boasting about their bravery and their courage, and so on; and when any one says, "Why don't you buy property in Ireland?" the answer is, "We 're afraid." I have heard it myself, Molly, with my own ears. But their ignorance is even worse than their cowardness, for if they only knew the people, they 'd see there was nothing to be frightened at. Sure, I remember myself, when we lived at Cloughma.n.u.s, Sam Gill came up to the house one morning, to say that there was two men come from below Lahinch to shoot K. I.

"They have the pa.s.swords," says he, "and all the tokens, and though I 'm, your honor's man, I was obliged to take them into my house and feed them."

"It's a bad business, Sam," says he. "What are they to get for it?"

"Five pound between them, sir,--if it's done complete."

"Would they take three," says K. I., "and let me live?"

"I don't know, sir; but, if you like, I'll ask them."

"I would like it, indeed," says K. I.

And down went Sam to the gate-house, and spoke to them. They were both decent, reasonable men, and agreed at once to the offer. The money was paid, and the two came up and ate a hearty breakfast at the house, and K. I. walked more than a mile of the road with them afterwards,--talking about the crops and the state of the country down westward,--and shook hands with them cordially at parting.