Tom Burke Of "Ours" Volume Ii Part 51

The range of swelling hills, dotted with cottages and waving with wood; the fields of that emerald green one sees not in other lands; the hedge-rows bounding the little farms,--all so unlike the spreading plains of France,--struck me with delight, and it was with a rapture of happiness I called the land my country.

Directing my steps towards Dublin, I set out at a good pace, but following a path which led near the cliffs, in preference to the highroad; for I was well aware that my appearance and dress would expose me to curiosity, and perhaps subject me to more serious annoyance. My first object was to learn some news of my brother; for although the ties of affection had been long since severed between us, those of blood still remained, and I wished to hear of, and it might be to see him, once more. For some miles I had kept my eyes directed towards a little cabin which crowned a cliff that hung over the sea; and this I reached at last, somewhat wearied and hungry.

As I followed a little footpath which conducted to the door, a fierce terrier rushed out as if to attack me, but was immediately restrained by the voice of a man within, calling, "Down, Vicksey! down, you baste!"

and the same moment a stout, middle-aged man appeared at the door.

"Don't be afeard, sir; she's not wicked, but we're unused to strangers down here."

"I should think so, friend, from my path," said I, throwing a glance at the narrow footway I had followed for some miles, over hill and precipice; "but I am unacquainted with the country, and was looking out for some house where I might obtain a breakfast."

"There's a town about three miles down yonder, and a fine inn, I 'm tould, sir," replied he, as he scrutinized my appearance with a shrewd eye; "but if I might make so bould, maybe you 'd as lief not go there, and perhaps you 'd take share of what we have here?"

"Willingly," said I, accepting the hospitable offer as freely as it was made, and entered the cabin at once.

A good-featured countrywoman and some young children were seated at the table, where a large dish of potatoes and some fresh fish were smoking, a huge jug of milk occupying the middle of the board. The woman blushed as she heard that her husband had invited a gentleman to partake of his humble meal; but the honest fellow cared little for the simple fare he offered with so good a grace, and placed my chair beside his own with the air of one who was more anxious for his guest's comfort than caring what impression he himself might make upon him.

After some pa.s.sing words about the season and the state of the tides,--for my host was a fisherman,--I turned the conversation on the political condition of the country, avowing frankly that I had been for some years absent, and was ignorant of what had occurred meantime.

"'Twas that same I was thinking, sir," said he, replying to the first and not the latter part of my remark. "When I saw your honor's face, and the beard you wore, I said to myself you wor a Frenchman."

"You mistook there, then; I am your countryman, but have pa.s.sed a good many years in France."

"Fighting for Boney?" said he, as his eyes opened wide with surprise to behold one actually before him who might have served under Napoleon.

"Yes, my good friend, even so; I was in the army of the Emperor."

"Tare an ages! then, are they coming over here now?" cried he, almost gasping in his eagerness.

"No, no," replied I, gravely; "and be thankful, too, for it, for your own and your children's sakes, that you see not a war raging in the fields and cities of your native land. Be a.s.sured, whatever wrongs you suffer,--I will not dispute their existence, for, as I told you, I am ignorant of the condition of the country,--but whatever they may be, you can pay too dearly for their remedy."

"But sure they 'd be on our side, would n't they?"

"Of course they would; but think you that they 'd fight your battles without their price? Do you believe that Frenchmen so love you here that they would come to shed their blood in your cause without their own prospect of advantage?"

"They hate the English, I'm tould, as bad as we do ourselves."

"They do so, and with more of justice for their hate. But that dislike might suffice to cause a war; it never would reward it. No, no; I know something of the spirit of French conquest. I glory in the bravery and the heroism that accomplished it; but I never wish to see my own country at the mercy of France. Whose soldier would you become if the Emperor Napoleon landed here to-morrow?--his. Whose uniform would you wear, whose musket carry, whose pay receive, whose orders obey?--his, and his only. And how long, think you, would your services be limited to home?

What should prevent your being sent away to Egypt, to Poland, or to Russia? How much favor would an Irish deserter receive from a French court-martial, think you? No, good friend; while you have this warm roof to shelter you, and that broad sea is open for your industry and toil, never wish for foreign aid to a.s.sist you."

I saw that the poor fellow was discouraged by my words, and gradually led him to speak of those evils for whose alleviation he looked to France. To my surprise, however, he descanted less on political grievances than those which affect the well-being of the country socially. It was not the severity of a Government, but the absence of encouragement to industry,--the neglect of the poor,--which afflicted him. England was no longer the tyrant; the landlord had taken her place.

Still, with the pertinacity of ignorance, he visited all the wrongs on that land from which originally his first misfortunes came, and with perverse ingenuity would endeavor to trace out every hardship he suffered as arising from the ill-will and hatred the Saxon bore him.

It was easy to perceive that the arguments he used were not of his own devising; they had been supplied by others, in whose opinion he had confidence; and though valueless and weak in reality, to him they were all-convincing and unanswerable,--not the less, perhaps, that they offered that value to self-love which comes from attributing any evils we endure to causes outside and independent of ourselves. These, confronted with extravagant hopes of what would ensue should national independence be established, formed his code; and however refuted on each point, a certain conviction, too deeply laid to be disturbed by any opposing force, remained; and in his "Well, well, G.o.d knows best!

and maybe we'll have better luck yet," you could perceive that he was inaccessible to any appeal except from the quarter which ministered to his discontent and disaffection.

One thing was clear to me from all he said, that if the spirit of open resistance no longer existed towards England, it was replaced by as determined and as rancorous hatred,--a brooding, ill-omened dislike had succeeded, to the full as hostile, and far less easily subdued. How it would end,--whether in the long-lingering fear which wastes the energies and saps the strength of a people, or in the conflict of a civil war, the prospect was equally ruinous.

Sadly pondering on these things, I parted with my humble host, and set out towards the capital. If my conversation with the Irishman had taught me somewhat of the state of feeling then current in Ireland, it also conveyed another and very different lesson; it enabled me to take some account of the change years had effected in my own sentiments. As a boy, high-flown, vague, and unsettled ideas of national liberty and independence had made me look to France as the emanc.i.p.ator of Europe.

As a man, I knew that the l.u.s.t of conquest had extinguished the love of freedom in Frenchmen; that they who trusted to her did but exchange the dominion of their old masters for the tyranny of a new one; while such as boldly stepped forward in defence of their liberties, found that there was neither mercy nor compa.s.sion for the conquered.

I had seen the Austrian prisoners and the Russian led captive through the streets of Paris; I had witnessed the great capital of Prussia in its day of mourning after Jena; and all my idolatry for the General scarce balanced my horror of the Emperor, whose vengeance had smitten two nations thus heavily: and I said within my heart, "May my countrymen, whatever be their day of need, never seek alliance with despotic France!"

CHAPTER x.x.xIV. A CHARACTER OF OLD DUBLIN

It was about nine o'clock of a calm summer evening as I entered Dublin,--nearly the same hour at which, some ten years before, I had approached that city, poor, houseless, friendless; and still was I the same. In that great capital of my country I had not one to welcome me; not one who would rejoice at my coming, or feel any interest in my fortunes. This indeed was loneliness,--utter solitude. Still, if there be something which weighs heavily on the heart in the isolation of one like me, there is a proportionate sense of independence of his fellow-man that sustains the courage and gives energy to the will. I felt this as I mixed with the crowds that thronged the streets, and shrank not from the inquisitive glances which my questionable appearance excited as I pa.s.sed.

Though considerable changes had taken place in the outskirts of the capital since I had seen it last, the leading thoroughfares were just as I remembered them; and as I walked along Dame Street, and one by one each familiar object caught my eye, I could almost have fancied the long interval since I had been there before like a mere dream. National physiognomy, too, has a strange effect on him who has been long absent from his country. Each face you meet seems well known. The traits of features, to which the eye was once so well accustomed, awake a memory of individuals, and it is sometimes a moat difficult task to distinguish between the acquaintance and the pa.s.sing stranger.

This I experienced at every moment; and at length, as I stood gazing on the s.p.a.ce before the Bank, and calling to mind the last scene I witnessed there, a tall, strongly-built man brushed close past me, and then turning round, fixed a steady and searching look on me. As I returned his stare, a sudden thought flashed upon me that I had seen the face before; but where, how, and when, I could not call to mind. And thus we stood silently confronting each other for some minutes.

"I see you are a stranger here, sir," said he, touching his hat courteously; "can I be of service to you with any information as to the city?"

"I was curious to know, sir," said I, still more puzzled by the voice than I had been by the features of the stranger, "if Miley's Hotel, which was somewhere in the neighborhood, exists still?"

"It does, sir; but it has changed proprietors several times since you knew it," replied he, significantly. "The house is yonder, where you see that large lamp. I perceive, sir, I was mistaken in supposing you a foreigner. I wish you good-evening." And again saluting me, he resumed his way.

As I crossed the street towards the hotel, I remarked that he turned as if to watch me, and became more than ever embarra.s.sed as to who he might be.

The doorway of the hotel was crowded with loungers and idlers of every cla.s.s, from the loitering man about town to the ragged newsvendor, between whom, whatever disparity of condition existed, a tone of the most free-and-easy condition prevailed; the newsmen interpolating, amid the loud announcements of the latest intelligence, the reply to the observation beside him.

One figure was conspicuous in the group. He was a short, dwarfish creature, with an enormous head, covered with a fell of black hair, falling in ma.s.ses down his back and on his shoulders. A pair of fierce, fiery black eyes glared beneath his heavy brows; and a large, thick-lipped mouth moved with all the glib eloquence of his cla.s.s and calling. Fearfully distorted legs and club feet gave to his gait a rolling motion, which added to the singularity of his whole appearance.

Terry Regan was then at the head of his walk in Dublin; and to his capacious lungs and voluble tongue were committed the announcement of those great events which, from time to time, were given to the Irish public through the columns of the "Correspondent" and the "Dublin Journal."

I soon found myself in the crowd around this celebrated character, who was, as usual, extolling the great value of that night's paper by certain brief suggestions regarding its contents.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 410]

"Here's the whole, full, and true account (bad luck to the less!) of the great and sanguinary battle between Boney and the Roosians; with all the particklars about the killed, wounded, and missing; with what Boney said when it was over."

"What was that, Terry?"

"Hould yer peace, ye spalpeen! Is it to the likes of yez I 'd be telling cabinet sacrets? (Here, yer honor),--'Falkner,' is it, or 'The Saunders'.

With the report of Mr. O'Gogorman's grand speech in Ennis on the Catholic claims. There's, yer sowl, there's fippence worth any day ay the week. More be token, the letter from Jemmy O'Brien to his wife, wid an elegant epic poem called 'The Gauger.' b.l.o.o.d.y news, gentlemen! b.l.o.o.d.y news! Won't yez sport a tester for a sight of a real battle, and ten thousand kilt; with 'The Whole Duty of an Informer, in two easy lessons.' The price of stocks and shares--Ay, Mr. O'Hara, and what boroughs is bringing in the market."

This last sally was directed towards a large, red-faced man, who good-humoredly joined in the laugh against himself.

"And who's this, boys?" cried the fellow, turning suddenly his piercing eyes on me, as I endeavored, step by step, to reach the door of the hotel. "Hurrool look at his beard, acushla! On my conscience, I wouldn't wonder if it was General Hoche himself. 'Tis late yer come, sir," said he, addressing me directly; "there's no fun here now at all, barrin'

what Beresford has in the riding-house."

"Get away, you ruffian!" said a well-dressed and respectable-looking man, somewhat past the middle of life; "how dare you permit your tongue to take liberties with a stranger? Allow me to make room for you, sir,"

continued he, as he politely made an opening in the crowd, and suffered me to enter the house.

"Ah, counsellor, dear, don't be cross," whined out the newsvendor; "sure, isn't it wid the bad tongue we both make our bread. And here,"

vociferated he once more,--"and here ye have the grand dinner at the Lord Mayor's, wid all the speeches and toasts; wid the glorious, pious, and immortial memory of King William, who delivered us from Popery (by pitched caps), from slavery (by whipping), from bra.s.s money (by bad ha'pence), and from wooden shoes (by bare feet). Haven't we reason to bless his--? Ay, the heavens be his bed! 'Tis like Molly Crownahon's husband he was."

"How was that, Terry?" asked a gentleman near.