Part 20 (1/2)
Peter had, however, over-rated his own strength in supposing that he could bear the long dozen in future; ere many months pa.s.sed he was scarcely able to reach the half of that number without sinking into intoxication. Whilst in this state, he was in the habit of going to the graveyard in which his wife lay buried, where he sat, and wept like a child, sang her favorite songs, or knelt and offered up his prayers for the repose of her soul. None ever mocked him for this; on the contrary, there was always some kind person to a.s.sist him home. And as he staggered on, instead of sneers and ridicule, one might hear such expressions as these:--
”Poor Pether! he's nearly off; an' a dacent, kind neighbor he ever was.
The death of the wife broke his heart--he never ris his head since.”
”Ay, poor man! G.o.d pity him! h.e.l.l soon be sleepin' beside her, beyant there, where she's lyin'. It was never known of Peter Connell that he offinded man, woman, or child since he was born, barrin' the gaugers, bad luck to thim, afore he was marrid--but that was no offince. Sowl, he was their match, any how. When he an' the wife's gone, they won't lave their likes behind them. The sons are bodaghs--gintlemen, now; an'
it's nothin' but dinners an' company. Ahagur, that wasn't the way their hardworkin' father an' mother made the money that they're houldin' their heads up wid such consequence upon.”
The children, however, did not give Peter up as hopeless. Father Mulcahy, too, once-more a.s.sailed him on his weak side. One morning, when he was sober, nervous, and depressed, the priest arrived, and finding him at home, addressed him as follows:--
”Peter, I'm sorry, and vexed, and angry this morning; and you are the cause of it”
”How is that, your Reverence?” said Peter. ”G.o.d help me,” he added, ”don't be hard an me, sir, for I'm to be pitied. Don't be hard on me, for the short time I'll be here. I know it won't be long--I'll be wid her soon. Asth.o.r.e machree, we'll' be together, I hope, afore long--an', oh! if it was the will o' G.o.d, I would be glad if it was afore night!”
The poor, shattered, heart-broken creature wept bitterly, for he felt somewhat sensible of the justice of the reproof which he expected from the priest, as well as undiminished sorrow for his wife.
”I'm not going to be hard on you,” said the good-natured priest; ”I only called to tell you a dream that your son Dan had last night about you and his mother.”
”About Ellis.h.!.+ Oh, for heaven's sake what about her, Father, avourneen?”
”She appeared to him, last night,” replied Father Mulcahy, ”and told him that your drinking kept her out of happiness.”
”Queen of heaven!” exclaimed Peter, deeply affected, ”is that true? Oh,”
said he, dropping on his knees, ”Father, ahagur machree, pardon me--oh, forgive me! I now promise, solemnly and seriously, to drink neither in the house nor out of it, for the time to come, not one drop at all, good, bad, or indifferent, of either whiskey, wine, or punch--barrin'
one gla.s.s. Are you now satisfied? an' do you think she'll get to happiness?”
”All will be well, I trust,” said the priest. ”I shall mention this to Dan and the rest, and depend upon it, they, too, will be happy to hear it.”
”Here's what Mr. O'Flaherty an' myself made up,” said Peter: ”burn it, Father; take it out of my sight, for it's now no use to me.”
”What is this at all?” said Mr. Mulcahy, looking into it. ”Is it an oath?”
”It's the Joggraphy of one I swore some time ago; but it's now out of date--I'm done wid it.”
The priest could not avoid smiling when he perused it, and on getting from Peter's lips an explanation of the hieroglyphics, he laughed heartily at the ingenious s.h.i.+fts they had made to guide his memory.
Peter, for some time after this, confined himself to one gla.s.s, as he had promised; but he felt such depression and feebleness, that he ventured slowly, and by degrees, to enlarge the ”gla.s.s” from which he drank. His impression touching the happiness of his wife was, that as he had for several months strictly observed his promise, she had probably during that period gone to heaven. He then began to exercise his ingenuity gradually, as we have said, by using, from time to time, a gla.s.s larger than the preceding one; thus receding from the spirit of his vow to the letter, and increasing the quant.i.ty of his drink from a small gla.s.s to the most capacious tumbler he could find. The manner in which he drank this was highly ill.u.s.trative of the customs which prevail on this subject in Ireland. He remembered, that in making the vow, he used the words, ”neither in the house nor out of it;” but in order to get over this dilemma, he usually stood with one foot outside the threshold, and the other in the house, keeping himself in that position which would render it difficult to determine whether he was either out or in. At other times, when he happened to be upstairs, he usually thrust one-half of his person out of the window, with the same ludicrous intention of keeping the letter of his vow.
Many a smile this adroitness of his occasioned to the lookers-on: but further ridicule was checked by his wobegone and afflicted look. He was now a mere skeleton, feeble and tottering.
One night, in the depth of winter, he went into the town where his two sons resided; he had been ill in mind and body during the day, and he fancied that change of scene and society might benefit him. His daughter and son-in-law, in consequence of his illness, watched him so closely, that he could not succeed in getting his usual ”gla.s.s.” This offended him, and he escaped without their knowledge to the son who kept the inn.
On arriving there, he went upstairs, and by a douceur to the waiter, got a large tumbler filled with spirits. The lingering influences of a conscience that generally felt strongly on the side of a moral duty, though poorly instructed, prompted him to drink it in the usual manner, by keeping one-half of his body, as, nearly as he could guess, out of the window, that it might be said he drank it neither in nor out of the house. He had scarcely finished his draught, however, when he lost his balance, and was precipitated upon the pavement. The crash of his fall was heard in the bar, and his son, who had just come in, ran, along with several others, to ascertain what had happened. They found him, however, only severely stunned. He was immediately brought in, and medical aid sent for; but, though he recovered from the immediate effects of the fall, the shock it gave to his broken const.i.tution, and his excessive grief, carried him off in a few months afterwards. He expired in the arms of his son and daughter, and amidst the tears of those who knew his simplicity of character, his goodness of heart, and his attachment to the wife by whose death that heart had been broken.
Such was the melancholy end of the honest and warm-hearted Peter Connell, who, unhappily, was not a solitary instance of a man driven to habits of intoxication and neglect of business by the force of sorrow, which time and a well-regulated mind might otherwise have overcome. We have held him up, on the one hand, as an example worthy of imitation in that industry and steadiness which, under the direction of his wife, raised him from poverty to independence and wealth; and, on the other, as a man resorting to the use of spirituous liquors that he might be enabled to support affliction--a course which, so far from having sustained him under it, shattered his const.i.tution, shortened his life, and destroyed his happiness. In conclusion, we wish our countrymen of Peter's cla.s.s would imitate him in his better qualities, and try to avoid his failings.
THE LIANHAN SHEE.
One summer evening Mary Sullivan was sitting at her own well-swept hearthstone, knitting feet to a pair of sheep's gray stockings for Bartley, her husband. It was one of those serene evenings in the month of June, when the decline of day a.s.sumes a calmness and repose, resembling what we might suppose to have irradiated Eden, when our first parents sat in it before their fall. The beams of the sun shone through the windows in clear shafts of amber light, exhibiting millions of those atoms which float to the naked eye within its mild radiance. The dog lay barking in his dreams at her feet, and the gray cat sat purring placidly upon his back, from which even his occasional agitation did not dislodge her.
Mrs. Sullivan was the wife of a wealthy farmer, and niece to the Rev.