Part 14 (2/2)
”The next morning Kelly's landlord, Sir W. E------, and two magistrates, were at his house, but he lay like a log, without sense or motion.
Whilst they were there, the surgeon arrived and, after examining his head declared that the skull was fractured. During that and the following day, the house was surrounded by crowds, anxious to know his state; and nothing might be heard amongst most of them but loud and undisguised expressions of the most ample revenge. The wife was frantic; and, on seeing me, hid her face in her hands, exclaiming.
”'Ah, sir, I knew it would come to this; and you, too, tould him the same thing. My curse and G.o.d's curse on it for quarrelling! Will it never stop in the counthry till they rise some time and murdher one another out of the face?'
”As soon as the swelling in his head was reduced, the surgeon performed the operation of trepanning, and thereby saved his life; but his strength and intellect were gone, and he just lingered for four months, a feeble, drivelling simpleton, until, in consequence of a cold, which produced inflammation in the brain, he died, as hundreds have died before, the victim of party spirit.”
Such was the account which I heard of my old school-fellow, Denis Kelly; and, indeed, when I reflected upon the nature of the education he received, I could not but admit that the consequences were such as might naturally be expected to result from it.
The next morning a relation of Mrs. Kelly's came down to my brother, hoping that, as they wished to have as decent a funeral as possible, he would be so kind as to attend it.
”Musha, G.o.d knows, sir,” said the man, ”it's poor Denis, heavens be his bed! that had the regard and reverence for every one, young and ould, of your father's family; and it's himself that would be the proud man, if he was living, to see you, sir, riding after his coffin.”
”Well,” said my brother, ”let Mrs. Kelly know that I shall certainly attend, and so will my brother, here, who has come to puy me a visit.
Why, I believe, Tom, you forget him!”
”Your brother, sir! Is it Master Toby, that used to cudgel the half of the counthry when he was at school? Gad's my life, Masther Toby (I was now about thirty-six), but it's your four quarters, sure enough! Arrah, thin, sir, who'd think it--you're grown so full and stout?--but, faix, you'd always the bone in you! Ah, Masther Toby!” said he, ”he's lying cowld, this morning, that would be the happy man to lay his eyes wanst more upon you. Many an' manys the winther's evening did he spind, talking about the time when you and he were bouchals (* boys) together, and of the pranks you played at school, but especially of the time you both leathered the four Grogans, and tuck the apples from thim--my poor fellow--and now to be stretched a corpse, lavin' his poor widdy and childher behind him!”
I accordingly expressed my sorrow for Denis's death, which, indeed, I sincerely regretted, for he possessed materials for an excellent character, had not all that was amiable and good in him been permitted to run wild.
As soon as my trunk and traveling-bag had been brought from the inn, where I had left them the preceding night, we got our horses, and, as we wished to show particular respect to Denis's remains, rode up, with some of our friends, to the house. When we approached, there were large crowds of the country-people before the door of his well-thatched and respectable-looking dwelling, which had three chimneys, and a set of sash-windows, clean and well glazed. On our arrival, I was soon recognized and surrounded by numbers of those to whom I had formerly been known, who received and welcomed me with a warmth of kindness and sincerity, which it would be in vain to look for among the peasantry of any other nation. Indeed, I have uniformly observed, that when no religious or political feeling influences the heart and principles of an Irish peasant, he is singularly sincere and faithful in his attachments, and has always a bias to the generous and the disinterested. To my own knowledge, circ.u.mstances frequently occur, in which the ebullition of party spirit is, although temporary, subsiding after the cause that produced it has pa.s.sed away, and leaving the kind peasant to the natural, affectionate, and generous impulses of his character. But poor Paddy, unfortunately, is as combustible a material in politics or religion as in fighting--thinking it his duty to take the weak side*, without any other consideration than because it is the weak side.
* A gentleman once told me an anecdote, of which he was an eye-witness. Some peasants, belonging to opposite factions, had met under peculiar circ.u.mstances; there were, however, two on one side, and four on the other-- in this case, there was likely to be no fight; but, in order to balance the number, one of the more numerous party joined the weak side--”bekase, boys, it would be a burnin' shame, so it would, for four to kick two; and, except I join them, by the powers, there's no chance of there being a bit of sport, or a row, at all at all!” Accordingly, he did join them, and the result of it was, that he and his party were victorious, so honestly did he fight.
When we entered the house I was almost suffocated with the strong fumes of tobacco-smoke, snuff, and whiskey; and as I had been an old school-fellow of Denis's, my appearance was the signal for a general burst of grief among his relations, in which the more distant friends and neighbors of the deceased joined, to keep up the keening.
I have often, indeed always, felt that there! is something extremely touching in the Irish cry; in fact, that it breathes the very spirit of wild and natural sorrow. The Irish peasantry, whenever a death takes place, are exceedingly happy in seizing upon any contingent circ.u.mstances that may occur, and making them subservient to the excitement of grief for the departed, or the exaltation and praise of his character and virtues. My entrance was a proof of this--I had scarcely advanced to the middle of the floor, when my intimacy with the deceased, our boyish sports, and even our quarrels, were adverted to with a natural eloquence and pathos, that, in spite of my firmness, occasioned me to feel the prevailing sorrow. They spoke, or chaunted mournfully, in Irish; but the substance of what they said was as follows:--
”Oh, Denis, Denis, avourneen! you're lying low, this morning of sorrow!--lying low are you, and does not know who it is (alluding to me) that is standing over you, weeping for the days you spent together in your youth! It's yourself, _acushla agus asth.o.r.e machree_ (the pulse and beloved of my heart), that would stretch out the right hand warmly to welcome him to the place of his birth, where you had both been so often happy about the green hills and valleys with each other! He's here now, standing over you; and it's he, of all his family, kind and respectable as they are, that was your own favorite, Denis, _avourneen dhelis.h.!.+_ He alone was the companion that you loved!--with no other could you be happy!--For him did you fight, when he wanted a friend in your young quarrels! and if you had a dispute with him, were you not sorry for it?
Are you not now stretched in death before him, and will he not forgive you?”
All this was uttered, of course, extemporaneously, and without the least preparation. They then pa.s.sed on to an enumeration of his virtues as a father, a husband, son, and brother--specified his worth as he stood related to society in general, and his kindness as a neighbor and a friend.
An occurrence now took place which may serve, in some measure, to throw light upon many of the atrocities and outrages which take place in Ireland. Before I mention it, however, I think it necessary to make a few observations relative to it. I am convinced that those who are intimately acquainted with the Irish peasantry will grant that there is not on the earth a cla.s.s of people in whom the domestic affections of blood-relations.h.i.+p are so pure, strong, and sacred. The birth of a child will occasion a poor man to break in upon the money set apart for his landlord, in order to keep the christening, surrounded by his friends and neighbors, with due festivity. A marriage exhibits a spirit of joy, an exuberance of happiness and delight, to be found only in the Green Island; and the death of a member of a family is attended with a sincerity of grief, scarcely to be expected from men so much the creatures of the more mirthful feelings. In fact, their sorrow is a solecism in humanity--at once deep and loud--mingled up, even in its deepest paroxysms, with a laughter-loving spirit. It is impossible that an Irishman, sunk in the lowest depths of affliction, could permit his grief to flow in all its sad solemnity, even for a day, without some glimpse of his natural humor throwing a faint and rapid light over the gloom within him. No: there is an amalgamation of sentiments in his mind which, as I said before, would puzzle any philosopher to account for.
Yet it would be wrong to say, though his grief has something of an unsettled and ludicrous character about it, that he is incapable of the most subtle and delicate shades of sentiment, or the deepest and most desolating intensity of sorrow. But he laughs off those heavy vapors which hang about the moral const.i.tution of the people of other nations, giving them a morbid habit, which leaves them neither strength nor firmness to resist calamity--which they feel less keenly than an Irishman, exactly as a healthy man will feel the pangs of death with more acuteness than one who is wasted away by debility and decay. Let any man witness an emigration, and he will satisfy himself that this is true. I am convinced that Goldsmith's inimitable description of one in his ”Deserted Village,” was a picture drawn from actual observation. Let him observe the emigrant, as he crosses the Atlantic, and he will find, although he joins the jest, and the laugh, and the song, that he will seek a silent corner, or a silent hour, to indulge the sorrow which he still feels for the friends, the companions, and the native fields that he has left behind him. This const.i.tution of mind is beneficial: the Irishman seldom or never hangs himself, because he is capable of too much real feeling to permit himself to become the slave of that which is fact.i.tious. There is no void in his affections or sentiments, which a morbid and depraved sensibility could occupy; but his feelings, of what character soever they may be, are strong, because they are fresh and healthy. For this reason, I maintain, that when the domestic affections come under the influence of either grief or joy, the peasantry of no nation are capable of feeling so deeply. Even on the ordinary occasions of death, sorrow, though it alternates with mirth and cheerfulness, in a manner peculiar to themselves, lingers long in the unseen recesses of domestic life: any hand, therefore, whether by law or violence, that plants a wound here, will suffer to the death.
When my brother and I entered the house, the body had just been put into the coffin and it is usual after this takes place, and before it is nailed down, for the immediate relatives of the family to embrace the deceased, and take their last look and farewell of his remains. In the present instance, the children were brought over, one by one, to perform that trying and melancholy ceremony. The first was an infant on the breast, whose little innocent mouth was held down to that of its dead father; the babe smiled upon his still and solemn features, and would have played with his grave-clothes, but that the murmur of unfeigned sorrow, which burst from all present, occasioned it to be removed. The next was a fine little girl, of three or lour years, who inquired where they were going to bring her daddy, and asked if he would not soon come back to her.
”My daddy's sleeping a long time,” said the child, ”but I'll waken him till he sings me 'Peggy Slevin.' I like my daddy best, bekase I sleep wid him--and he brings me good things from the fair; he bought me this ribbon,” said she, pointing to a ribbon which he had purchased for her.
The rest of the children were sensible of their loss, and truly it was a distressing scene. His eldest son and daughter, the former about fourteen, the latter about two years older, lay on the coffin, kissing his lips, and were with difficulty torn away from it.
”Oh!” said the boy, ”he is going from us, and night or day we will never see him or hear him more! Oh! father--father--is that the last sight we are ever to see of your face? Why, father dear, did you die, and leave us forever?--forever--wasn't your heart good to us, and your words kind to us--Oh! your last smile is smiled--your last kiss given--and your last kind word spoken to your children that you loved, and that loved you as we did. Father, core of my heart, are you gone forever, and your voice departed? Oh! the murdherers, oh! the murdherers, the murdherers!”
he exclaimed, ”that killed my father; for only for them, he would be still wid us: but, by the G.o.d that's over me, if I live, night or day I will not rest, till I have blood for blood; nor do I care who hears it, nor if I was hanged the next minute.”
As these words escaped him, a deep and awful murmur of suppressed vengeance burst from his relations. At length their sorrow became too strong to be repressed; and as it was the time to take their last embrace and look of him, they came up, and after fixing their eyes on his face in deep affliction, their lips began to quiver, and their countenances became convulsed. They then burst out simultaneously into a tide of violent grief, which, after having indulged in it for some time, they checked. But the resolution of revenge was stronger than their grief, for, standing over his dead body, they repeated, almost word for word, the vow of vengeance which the son had just sworn. It was really a scene dreadfully and terribly solemn; and I could not avoid reflecting upon the mystery of nature, which can, from the deep power of domestic affection, cause to spring a determination to crime of so black a dye. Would to G.o.d that our peasantry had a clearer sense of moral and religious duties, and were not left so much as they are to the headlong impulse of an ardent temperament and an impetuous character; and would to G.o.d that the clergy who superintend their morals, had a better knowledge of human nature, and a more liberal education!
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