The Ned M'Keown Stories Part 25

"'Here's a stone, Tom!'

"'No, no, this stick has the lead in it. It'll do him, never fear!'

"'Let him alone, Barney, he's got enough.'

"'By the powdhers, it's myself that won't: didn't he kill Paddy?--(crack, crack). Take that, you murdhering thief!'--(whack, whack).

"'Oh!--(whack, crack)--my head--I'm killed--I'm'--(crack--kicks the bucket).

"'Now, your sowl, that does you, any way--(crack, whack)--hurro!--huzza!--huzza!--Man for man, boys--an O'Hallaghan's done for--whoo! for our side--tol-deroll, folderoll, tow, row, row--huzza!--fol-deroll, fol-deroll, tow, row, row, huzza for the O'Callaghans!'

"From this moment the battle became delightful; it was now pelt and welt on both sides, but many of the kippeens were broken: many of the boys had their fighting arms disabled by a dislocation, or bit of fracture, and those weren't equal to more than doing a little upon such as were down.

"In the midst of the din, such a dialogue as this might be heard:

"'Larry, you're after being done for, for this day.' (Whack, crack.)

"'Only an eye gone--is that Mickey?' (whick, whack, crick, crack.)

"'That's it, my darlings!--you may say that, Larry--'tis my mother's son that's in it--(crack, crack,--a general huzza.): (Mickey and Larry) huzza! huzza! huzza for the O'Hallaghans! What have you got, Larry?--(crack, crack).

"'Only the bone of my arm, G.o.d be praised for it, very purtily snapt across!' (whack, whack).

"'Is that all? Well, some people have luck!'--(crack, crack, crack).

"'Why I've no reason to complain, thank G.o.d--(whack, crack!)--purty play that, any way--Paddy O'Callaghan's settled--did you hear it?--(whack, whack, another shout)--That's it boys--handle the shilleleys!--Success O'Hallaghans--down with the b.l.o.o.d.y O'Callaghans!'

"'I did hear it: so is Jem O'Hallaghan--(crack, whack, whack, crack)--you're not able to get up, I see--tare-an-ounty, isn't it a pleasure to hear that play?--What ails you?'

"'Oh, Larry, I'm in great pain, and getting very weak, entirely'--(faints).

"'Faix, and he's settled too, I'm thinking.'

"'Oh, murdher, my arm!' (One of the O'Callaghans attacks him--crack, crack)--

"'Take that, you vagabone!'--(whack, whack).

"' Murdher, murdher, is it strikin' a down man you're after?--foul, foul, and my arm broke!'--(crack, crack).

"'Take that, with what you got before, and it'll ase you, maybe.'

"(A party of the O'Hallaghans attack the man who is beating him).

"'Murdher, murdher!'--(crack, whack, whack, crack, crack, whack).

"'Lay on him, your sowls to pirdition--lay on him, hot and heavy--give it to him! He sthruck me and me down wid my broken arm!'

"'Foul, ye thieves of the world!--(from the O'Callaghan)--foul! five against one--give me fair play!--(crack, crack, crack)--Oh!--(whack) Oh, oh, oh!'--(falls senseless, covered with blood).

"'Ha, h.e.l.l's cure to you, you b.l.o.o.d.y thief; you didn't spare me with my arm broke'--(Another general shout.) 'Bad end to it, isn't it a poor case entirely, that I can't even throw up my caubeen, let alone join in the diversion.'

"Both parties now rallied, and ranged themselves along the street, exhibiting a firm phalanx, wedged close against each other, almost foot to foot. The ma.s.s was thick and dense, and the tug of conflict stiff, wild and savage. Much natural skill and dexterity were displayed in their mutual efforts to preserve their respective ranks unbroken, and as the sallies and charges were made on both sides, the temporary rash, the indentation of the mult.i.tudinous body, and the rebound into its original position, gave an undulating appearance to the compact ma.s.s--reeking, dragging, groaning, and buzzing as it was, that resembled the serpentine motion of a rushing water-spout in the clouds.

"The women now began to take part with their brothers and sweethearts.

Those who had no bachelors among the opposite factions, fought along with their brothers; others did not scruple even to a.s.sist in giving their enamored swains the father of a good beating. Many, however, were more faithful to love than to natural affection, and these sallied out, like heroines, under the banners of their sweethearts, fighting with amazing prowess against their friends and relations; nor was it at all extraordinary to see two sisters engaged on opposite sides--perhaps tearing each other as, with dishevelled hair, they screamed with a fury that was truly exemplary. Indeed it is no untruth to a.s.sert that the women do much valuable execution. Their manner of fighting is this--as soon as the fair one decides upon taking a part in the row, she instantly takes off her ap.r.o.n or her stocking, stoops down, and lifting the first four pounder she can get, puts it in the corner of her ap.r.o.n, or the foot of her stocking, if it has a foot, and marching into the scene of action, lays about her right and left. Upon my credibility, they are extremely useful and handy, and can give mighty nate knockdowns--inasmuch as no guard that a man is acquainted with can ward off their blows. Nay, what is more, it often happens, when a son-in-law is in a faction against his father-in-law and his wife's people generally, that if he and his wife's brother meet, the wife will clink him with the _pet_ in her ap.r.o.n, downing her own husband with great skill, for it is not always that marriage extinguishes the hatred of factions; and very often 'tis the brother that is humiliated.

"Up to the death of these two men, John O'Callaghan and Rose's father, together with a large party of their friends on both sides, were drinking in a public-house, determined to take no portion in the fight, at all at all. Poor Rose, when she heard the shouting and terrible strokes, got as pale as death, and sat close to John, whose hand she captured hers, beseeching him, and looking up in his face with the most imploring sincerity as she spoke, not to go out among them; the tears falling all the time from her fine eyes, the mellow flashes of which, when John's pleasantry in soothing her would seduce a smile, went into his very heart. But when, on looking out of the window where they sat, two of the opposing factions heard that a man on each side was killed; and when on ascertaining the names of the individuals, and of those who murdered them, it turned out that one of the murdered men was brother to a person in the room, and his murderer uncle to one of those in the window, it was not in the power of man or woman to keep them asunder, particularly as they were all rather advanced in liquor. In an instant the friends of the murdered man made a rush at the window, before any pacifiers had time to get between them, and catching the nephew of him who had committed the murder, hurled him head-foremost upon the stone pavement, where his skull was dashed to pieces, and his brains scattered about the flags!

"A general attack instantly took place in the room, between the two factions; but the apartment was too low and crowded to permit of proper fighting, so they rushed out to the street, shouting and. yelling, as they do when the battle comes to the real point of doing business. As soon as it was seen that the heads of the O'Callaghan's and O'Hallaghans were at work as well as the rest, the fight was recommenced with retrebled spirit; but when the mutilated body of the man who had been flung from the window, was observed lying in the pool of his own proper brains and blood, such a cry arose among his friends, as would cake (* harden) the vital fluid in the veins of any one not a party in the quarrel. Now was the work--the moment of interest--men and women groaning, staggering, and lying insensible; others shouting, leaping, and huzzaing; some singing, and not a few able-bodied spalpeens blurting, like over-grown children, on seeing their own blood; many raging and roaring about like bulls;--all this formed such a group as a faction fight, and nothing else, could represent.

"The battle now blazed out afresh; and all kinds of instruments were pressed into I the service. Some got flails, some spades, some shovels, and one man got his hands upon a scythe, with which, unquestionably, he would have taken more lives than one; but, very fortunately, as he sallied out to join the crowd, he was politely visited in the back of the head by a brick-bat, which had a mighty convincing way with it of giving him a peaceable disposition, for he instantly lay down, and did not seem at all anxious as to the result of the battle. The O'Hallaghans were now compelled to give way, owing princ.i.p.ally to the introvention of John O'Ohallaghan, who, although he was as good as sworn to take no part in the contest, was compelled to fight merely to protect himself. But, blood-and-turf! when he did begin, he was dreadful. As soon as his party saw him engaged, they took fresh courage, and in a short time made the O'Hallaghan's retreat up the church-yard. I never saw anything equal to John; he absolutely sent them down in dozens; and when a man would give him any inconvenience with the stick, he would down him with the fist, for right and left were all alike to him. Poor Rose's brother and he met, both roused like two lions; but when John saw who it was, he held back his hand:--

"'No, Tom,' says he, 'I'll not strike you, for Rose's sake. I'm not fighting through ill will to you or your family; so take another direction, for I can't strike you.'

"The blood, however, was unfortunately up in Tom.

"'We'll decide it now,' said he, 'I'm as good a man as you, O'Callaghan: and let me whisper this in your ears--you'll never warm the one bed with Rose, while's G.o.d's in heaven--it's past that now--there can be I nothing but blood between us!'

"At this juncture two of the O'Callaghans ran with their shillelaghs up, to beat down Tom on the spot.

"'Stop, boys!' said John, 'you mustn't touch him; he had no hand in the quarrel. Go, boys, if you respect me; lave him to myself.'

"The boys withdrew to another part of the fight; and the next instant Tom struck the very man that interfered to save him, across the temple, and cut him severely. John put his hand up and staggered.

"'I'm sorry for this,' he observed; 'but it's now self-defence with me;'

and at the same moment, with one blow, he left Tom O'Hallaghan stretched insensible on the street.

"On the O'Hallaghans being driven to the church-yard, they were at a mighty great inconvenience for weapons. Most of them had lost their sticks, it being a usage in fights of this kind to twist the cudgels from the grasp of the beaten men, to prevent them from rallying. They soon, however, furnished themselves with the best they could find, videlicet, the skull, leg, thigh, and arm bones, which they found lying about the grave-yard. This was a new species of weapon, for which the majority of the O'Callaghans were scarcely prepared. Out they sallied in a body--some with these, others with stones, and making fierce a.s.sault upon their enemies, absolutely druv then--not so much by the damage they we're doing, as by the alarm and terror which these unexpected species of missiles excited. At this moment, notwithstanding the fatality that had taken place, nothing could be more truly comical and facetious than the appearance of the field of battle. Skulls were flying in every direction--so thick, indeed, that it might with truth be a.s.severvated, that many who were petrified in the dust, had their skulls broken in this great battle between the factions.--G.o.d help poor Ireland! when its inhabitants are so pugnacious, that even the grave is no security against getting their crowns cracked, and their bones fractured! Well, any how, skulls and bones flew in every direction--stones and brick-bats were also put in motion; spades, shovels, loaded whips, pot-sticks, churn-staffs, flails, and all kinds of available weapons were in hot employment.

"But, perhaps, there was nothing more-truly felicitous or original in its way than the mode of warfare adopted by little Neal Malone, who was tailor for the O'Callaghan side: for every tradesman is obliged to fight on behalf of his own faction. Big Frank Farrell, the miller, being on the O'Hallaghan side, had been sent for, and came up from his mill behind the town, quite fresh. He was never what could be called a good man,* though it was said that he could lift ten hundred weight. He puffed forward with a great cudgel, determined to commit slaughter out of the face, and the first man he met was the weeshy fraction of a tailor, as nimble as a hare. He immediately attacked him, and would probably have taken his measure for life had not the tailor's activity protected him. Farrell was in a rage, and Neal, taking advantage of his blind fury, slipped round him, and, with a short run, sprung upon the miller's back, and planted, a foot upon the threshold of each coat pocket, holding by the mealy collar of his waistcoat. In this position he belabored the miller's face and eyes with his little hard fist to such purpose, that he had him in the course of a few minutes nearly as blind as a mill-horse. The' miller roared for a.s.sistance, but the pell-mell was going on too warmly for his cries to be available. In fact, he resembled an elephant with a monkey on his back.

* A brave man. He was a man of huge size and prodigious strength, and died in consequence of an injury he received in lifting one of the cathedral bells at Clogher, which is said to be ten hundredweight.

"'How do you like that, Farrell?' Neal would say, giving him a cuff--'and that, and that; but that is best of all. Take it again, gudgeon (two cuffs more)--here's grist for you (half a dozen additional)--hard fortune to you! (crack, crack.) What! going to lie down!--by all that's terrible, if you do, I'll annigulate* you! Here's a dhuragh,** (another half dozen)--long measure, you savage!--the baker's dozen, you baste!--there's five-an'-twenty to the score, Sampson! and one or two in' (crack, whack).

* Annihilate--Many of the jawbreakers--and this was one in a double sense--used by the hedge-schoolmasters, are scattered among the people, by whom they were so twisted that it would be extremely difficult to recognize them.

** Dhuragh--An additional portion of anything thrown in from a spirit of generosity, after the Measure agreed on is given. When the miller, for instance, receives his toll, the country-people usually throw in several handfuls of meal as a Dhuragh.

"'Oh! murther sheery!' shouted the miller. 'Murther-an-age, I'm kilt!

Foul play!--foul play!'

"'You lie, big Nebuchodonosor! it's not--this is all fair play, you big baste! Fair play, Sampson!--by the same a-token, here's to jog your memory that it's the Fair day of Knockimdowny! Irish Fair play, you whale! But I'll whale you' (crack, crack, whack).

"'Oh! oh!' shouted the miller.

"'Oh! oh! is it? Oh, if I had my scissors here till I'd clip your ears off--wouldn't I be the happy man, any how, you swab, you?' (whack, whack, crack).