The O'Briens and the O'Flahertys; a national tale

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HARVARD COLLEGE
LIBRARY

BOUGHT WITH

MONEY RECEIVED FROM
LIBRARY FINES

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vA

THE

O'BRIENS

AND

THE O'FLAHERTYS;

A NATIONAL TALE.

BY LADY MORGAN.

IN FOUR VOLUMES.

" A Plague 0' both your Homes."

SbAkbpbarb.

*'Je me tnit enquls au mielz ^ne j'ai sseu et pv ; et je certifle k
touts que ne Pay fait ny pour or, oy pour argent, uy pour sallaire, ny
pour eompte 4 faire qui loit, ny homme ny femme qui veteut: ne
▼onlant ainti fayoriser ny blamer nul 4 mon pouToir, fore seulmeni
declarer les chotet adTennes."

Dv Clbbcq— Pr^/a«« de* CkrotUqut,

SECOND EDITION.

VOL. II.

LONDON:
HENRY COLBURN, NEW BURLINGTON STREET.

1828.

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THE O^BRIENS,

OTLAHERTYS.

CHAPTER I.

THE GUARD-HOUSE.

Turn melancholy forth to funerals ;
The pale companion is not for our pomp.

MlLlON.

Meaawbile welcome joy and feast,

Midnight shout and revelry.

T'pay dance and jollity,

itig-our now is gone to bed,
> And. advice, with scrupulous head,

^ Strict age and sage severity,

J W'itU their grave laws, in slumber lie. MiiiToH.

It has sd^^^ays been the policy of the ruU^g
part/ in Xrc-Unrl. to exaffeerate tiooulai^ coia-

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2 i ^ THE O'jrRIEXS AKD

as»ij^D ^to (disturbances^ merely local, a political
origin.

The drunken ript at the Strugglers had
scarcely commenced, when it was bruited about,
by the secret service men of the government, as
a tumult of the most deep-laid conspiracy — a
guerre a la morty between the people and the
military, the volunteers and the garrison ! the
preliminary explosion of a long-concerted plot,
which was to be followed up by the rising of the
White Boys in the south, the Right Boys in
the east, the Heart-of-Oak Boys in the west,
and the Heart-of-Steel Boys in the north, with
every other " wild variety*" of " Boys," which
in Ireland, at all times (and particularly in the
epoch alluded to), served as terms of terrorism,
to scare the timid at home, and flatter the pre-
judices of the ignorant and credulous abroad.

The review in the Phcenix Park, distinguished
by the most brilliant sham fight that had been
exhibited on any similar occasion, evinced to the
suspicious vigilance of government, that the old

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THE o'^FLAHEBTYS. 3

spirit of eighty-two had suddenly received a
new impulse, and was again bursting forth with
more than its original splendour.

Other scintillations of public spirit, it was
asserted, were hourly exploding ; which threw a
light upon the state of public opinion. From
the academic eloquence of the young and ardent
members of the Historical Society (then the
glory and pride of the university), to the less
developed, but more formidable associations of
the sober, civilized dissenters of Ulster, every
thing intimated, to the heated imagination of
the public authorities, some powerful impulsion ;
against which their vigilance was to be directed.
The faintest breathing in favour of parliamen-
tary reform, or Catholic emancipation, was
deemed sedition ; and the commonest street broil
was considered an insurrectionary commotion.

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4 THE OBRIENS AND

Mayoralty ; the castle sentinels were doubled,
the castle gates were closed; and a captain's
guard was thrown into, what was then called, the
"Old Guard Room,'* (situated in the lower court,
near the ancient Chapel and Wardrobe Tower)
a building long since swept away by modem
improvement, and then only occupied in cases
of emergency. Commands were issued to hold
the troops in readiness to march upon the people ;
patrols were sent out ; piquets established ; the
streets were cleared, the shops closed ; and the
awful silence of the capital was disturbed only
by the trampling of steeds and the roll of car-
riages; whose flambeaux, flaring behind, reflected
a murky glare from the arms of the military.

Power and pleasure, despotism and dissipation,
were then inseparable images in Irish society :
and while the city exhibited the appearance of

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THE O FLAHSETT8. O

kmicha kukJwo party at the provost'^a bpu^e, or
the. more select meeRanocheo{ the castle,— *wbicli|
Ske those of Versailles in the pious and profligate
riogn of Louis the Fourteenth, were at once
puerile and licentious.

Composed of persons, congregated like mon*
kies, for the sole purposes of love and mischief—
frequently beginning in a game of romps, and
occa^mially ending in a suit at Doctors' Com-
mons-^these private relaxations vere independent
c^all controul from, the cares of public duty.
Nor were any public disturbances permitted
to intrude upon the elegant dilassemeiia of the
high officials and their particular cdteries ; except
iluch.as might be discussed to the amusement of
the Lord Lieutenant after dinner ; when fun
and frolic gave a zest to business, when puns
were manufactured with insurre^ions, heads
and walnuts were cracked togethe^^nd rows
and risings,— a drunken broil, or a Whnli|a3oy
irruption,— were treated with equal seriousness!*
that is, with equal levity.

The account of the tumult had reached the

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6 THE 0'*BRIENS AND

castle, just as the lovely vice-queai and her
bevy of beauties- had risen from table, amidst
acclamations -much too loud for the quietude
oX-^modem* bon^ ton. These were called forth
by the true Irish, gallantry of a young and
devoted admirer of her Excellency'*s, who ob-
serving the water in her finger-glass tinged
with the,dye of -blacb gloves, which had sullied
the rosy- tips of -her '^ fingers, drank off the
polluted beverage to her health; declaring in
all the- ardour: of 'Tipperary. enthusiasm, " that
it was^weeter than necthar, and far suparior to
Hi&£xcellency'sCliampaigne,'UhoughYAa^ was
Fems!s-:best ! ! . ' '

It was reserved for the fortunate Captain
O'Mealy to announce the event of the tumult
at the Strugglers ; for which purpose he called
out the under secretary, a pretty boy diplo-
matist, the Honourable Freddy Fitzjohn, in the
hopes of being called in himself, (for the Cap-
tain's social and civil manoeuvres were infinitely
more scientific than his military). The. result
answered to the intention. The Capt^n was

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THE OFLAHERTYS. 7

called in, and while the under secretary whis-
pered the news to the chief, the chief passed it,
(with the bottle), to the chancellor ; who gave it,
with the toast " of Kitty Cut-a-dash'" to the
commander of the forces ; and the commander
communicated it, without note or comment, to
the Lord Lieutenant. Captain O'Mealy was then
called. on for a song; and he chaunted forth
" None can love like an Irishman,^ an * axiom
denied by his Excellency, who was seconded
by all the English officials present. /

i The board then proceeded to transact business;
and the members of His Majesty's, most honour,
able privy-council filled their glasses, and gave
their opinions. The contents of many wise heads,
and many bright flasks were now poured forth
together. More troops were ordered out, and
more wine was ordered up. The state butler
and the first aid-de-camp were kept in perpe-
tual activity. The wine was declared prime,
and the times perilous. The disbanding of the
volunteers, and the knighting of Ferns, were

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8 THE O'BRIENS AND

orders carried in council, without a dissenting
voice. The policy of elevating some tb the
peerage, and others to the gallows, was then
started by Lord Knocklofty, whose family had
progressively prospered by such measures ; and
it was agreed to by the Lord Chancellor, with
a comment on the propriety of exterminating
all the Catholics (one of his lordship's, most
favourite schemes) ; while the wisdom of mul-
tiplying jails and jobs, of raising barracks, for
which there were no troops, and building foun-
tains, for which there was no water,* was
admitted nem. con.

The genial current of private feeling now

* When the erection of fountains for the accommoda'
tion of the poor was decreed, the jobbers fixed upon Mer-
non-square as one of the sites. The inhabitants justly
objected that there were no poor in the immediate vicinity,
and that a fountain would be a public nuisance in the
most elephant square of the capital. Sir Jno. De — , the

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THJfi O'FLAHEKTYS. 9

flowed freely, with other genial currents. Par-
li^lar uiterests mingled with general concerns ;
and, as con6denceand claret circulated together,
politics and pretty women were discussed with
equal frankness and ardour. Then were brought
upon the table, the services done to the state by
the Ladies Knocklofty and Honoria Stratton, in
a lateu contested election ; when the Proudforts
(the provincial bashaws of the country for half
a century) were nearly worsted by a patriot,
whose name was destined to make a part of the
history of his country^ In consideration of
such services, Lord Knocklofty solicited a cor-
netcy of Dragoons, for his fair friend Lady
Honoria (nothing else being get-at-able at the

fountain, to this day, continues as dry as if it had been
built for a powder n>agazine.

Over the edifice may yet be seen the following
appropriate inscription, as if in mockery of the
jjeople,—

" His saltern accumulem donis, etfungar inani
* Munere ;"

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10 THE 0*BRIEN» AKi>

time)) which was instantly granted ; and ^^ la
beUe soldatf'* was immediately toasted by Lord
Kilcoiman, in as good French and . as honest a
feeling as those in which one of his celebrated
countrymen, afterwards toasted " la belle aexe^^
at a similarly "highly contracting'' party. Lady
Knocklofty, too, was hinted at by his Excel-
lency, as a proper person to fill the station of
judge advocate^ on the demise of the present
incumbent ; and the Chancellor in compliment-
ing the high judicial talents of his own widowed
sister, declared that her sex only incapacitated
her for the situation of attorney general, which
he had recently vacated. In compensation for
this saUque disability, the . affectionate brother
said she would accept of a pension on the concor-
datum list, which was ordered to be enrolled
ifistanter.

Amidst such national discussions, the council
sat late and drank deep ; occasionally receiving
intelligence, and issuing orders ; and they ex-
hibited an unity and a mutual good under-
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THE o'FLAHERTYS. 11

standing, for which the Irish cabinet has not
always been remarkable. Even the Lord Lieu-
tenant and his chief secretary, agreed upon
most points ; his Excellency, for once, took the
lead at the board ; and his secretary, for once,
did not affect to act '* as viceroy over him."

While the Duke was thus giving up to a
" party, what was meant for mankind," a little
curly-headed page ran into the dining-room,
and with an arch look, presented him a bit of
twisted perfumed paper. It was opened and
read with empressement ; and the page was in-
stantly followed into the adjoining and but
half lighted throne room. The temporary ab-
sence of the governor, and general governor of
Ireland, afforded infinite mirth and inuendo to
the whole " council assembled ;"' and when he
returned, toasts were given, and puns were

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12 THE O'BRIENS AND

affairs of state must be attended to, ordered
every man to fill a bumper, called on the chan-
cellor for a toast, and desired " Nosey Tisdall"
(the court droll of the day) to sing a song,
a f apropos. The droll obeyed, and chaunted
forth—

*' Oons! neighbour, ne*er blush for a trifle like this j''

while all the " members present^' joined in the
chorus of —

** No age, no profession, no station is free j
To sovereign beauty mankind bends the knee:"
&c, &c. &c. &c. &c.

Meantime the Duchess and her ** allegra
brigata'^ waited in mortified impatience for the
breaking up of the privy council^ to begin her
games of magical music, blindman's buff^, or
puss in the corner ; amusing themselves as they
might, sometimes, like the ladies of the villa of
Schiffanoza, with tales and stories, which had some

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TltB a'7LABKftTT8. IS

^ adlifig a bafgain^' to aa HMmpeeliiigJudJe-
emap ; both of whom tlwyiorcaninwally seat £nth
as scouts to bring in news of the row, and to
make returns of << the killed and wcHinded.^
The arrival, of some of their own ^elect, the
dique of the castle in their romping frocks, drove
the |HTvy coundl out of the heads of the fair
stateswomen ; who soon found they could ^^ better
SfMure^ those '^ better men/' whose devotion to
business and to the. bottle outweighed Uie at-
traction of their oym splendid charms.
. The play of high ^rits, the excitement of
inordinate vanity, (the one so often mistaken for
wit, the other for passion,) were now in full^
cf)eration ; and called forth whatever was bril-
liant and buoyant, in look or temperament of
^her sex. Warm blushes bloomed warmer,
bright eyes shcme brighter, as. the jdumage of
tropical birds grows more vivid in the season of
those transient loves, which in flutt^ and in
brevity do not ill image the commerce so pecu- «
liar to British gaUaatry, called iiriation.

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14 THE O'BRIENS AND

While each was thus engaged with each, and
all with all, the patronized protegee of the even-
ing, a foreign female harpist, was led in by the
master of the ceremonies, in vain. The pedal
harp was then such a novelty, that its very form
was " a lion ;" and yet the splendid performer,
though anticipating the excellence of a Krump-
holtz, had scarcely run over a few modula-
tions, when she was called upon to symphonize
the game of magical music, — a game as favour-
able to particular tete-a-tetes^ as it is advanta-
geous to forms, which in their doubtful search
after the enigma of the mission, have the whole
range of graceful action at their command. The
paying and releasing of forfeits, however, con-
stituted the point of the game ; and Lady
Honoria, as judge, contrived to turn every
penalty into an epigram, shewing little mercy to
her enemies, and none to her friends.

It was now Lady Knocklofty's turn to be

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THE o'fLAHEKTYS. 15

grace of one to whom stage effect was not un-
known, vainly warned, by the harmonious per-
former, of her remoteness from the object of her
search, she became petulant, and got as much
out of temper as she had before been pre-occu-
pied; until tearing off her diamond necklace,
she flung it into the Duchess's lap, which held
the forfeits, exclaiming "there — give me a task
and I'll perform it ; but save me from the in-
sipidity of hunting under cushions for hidden
handkerchiefs, or the bore of taking Lady
Mary O'Blarney's scarf and tying it round
Lord Muckross's head.''

At that moment the Captain of the guard in
sash and gorget, all powder and importance,
joined the circle and soon became its centre.
Called upon for news of the tumult, he drew
up, took snuff, looked grave, and with the face
of one who brought " news of price," narrated

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16 THE 0*BEI£NS AND

military, of rescues and reprisals, of his rencontre
with the son of a catholic peer in disguise, (the
real Captain Right he shrewdly suspected ;) and
of his own feather cropped, and three hairs of
his whisker singed, (the parties were produced
in court as corroborating testimonies). But
when he discovered that Captain Right, who
had acted so very wrong, was not only the son of
a catholic peer in disguise, but the volunteer
victor of the Star Fort, " whose officiousness,''
added Captain O'Mealy, looking at Lady Knock-
lofty, " prevented every man on the ground
from flying to her Ladyship's assistance," then
the last " colpo di pennelh^''' was given to the
picture ; and though some doubted, and some
disbelieved, all were interested, because all were
amused and excited.

At the Duchess's request, however, the un-

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»H« O'FLAHEETYS. l7

the owner of that -supeffiise ihmgj'* decreed
that she diould fulfil a task'whidi appeared
impracticable to all, and whieh wa& pomUe
only to one too interested in it» performance to
hastily abandon the attempt.

While the collective wisdom of the nation had
been thus occupied in the dining-room of the
castle, in providing for the exigencies of the
times, and the ladies in the drawing-room, in
providing for their. own amusements, the tumult
had been quelled, by the wisdom, prudence,
and activity, of a single magistrate; and the
most conspicuous actor in the conflict, placed
under the guard of Captain O'Mealy (who had
been obliged to relinquish the distinction of his
Excellency's society, to take command of a
patrol), had been marched a prisoner to the
castle guard-house. He had walked firmly and
rapidly in the midst of his mounted guard;
while Captain O'Mealy, riding onone side, «nt1
occasionally throwing his eyes over the person
of his prisoner, somewhat shadowed by the

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18 THE O^BRI£NS AND

group in which he was merged, sung out, for
his own amusement, and the benefit of the
public, his favourite air of

*• We Irish boys, both high and low,

Are clivir, brisk, and handy,
And the ladies, every where we go.

All swear we are the dandy.
To be sure we are, and indeed we are;

Withmyhie! folathrumLeary.

To be sure, &c."

This jocund genuine Irish air he sometimes
varied for the more placid melody of ^^ Maw
chare amy^'' which he gave with a cantaiilc
that had often excited the admiration, and
drawn to the window many a " chere amie^^ to
whom his vocal powers were not unknown, in
the neighbourhood between the barracks and
the castle — his

^ Daily haunts and ancient neighbourhood.**

Though Ennis born, the Captain was Dublin
bred ; and he had served his time to a button-
maker in Wine Tavern-street, which had been

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THE oVlAHKETYS. 19

the scene of the night's conflict. With " a
soul above buttons/' and a voice above par, — ^with
the most dauntless impudence and the finest
barytone— Bamaby O'Mealy had pushed and
sung himself into the first company in the
capital, and into the last company of ^^ Royal
Irish,"*' one of those regiments *^ de circonstance,'*^
something between a job and an expediency,
which served the purposes of the govemment
. for the time being, and filled the pockets of the
Colonel permitted to raise it

When the patrol had reached Wine Tavern-
street, the Captain commanded a halt on the
scene of the recent action, which was still strewed
with commemorating fragments of the battle.
The old dilapidated tavern of " the Strugglers,'*
lay in deep shadow, (the moon rising behind it),
and was confounded with the formless mass
of walls of its ill-assorted neighbour, the Fran-
ciscan nunnery ; where a faint twinkle of light
streamed from the solitary grated casement
already noticed : haply some votive taper of a

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20 THE o'bRIENS and

vestal shrine, which was suddenly extinguished,
as the clanking of hoofs resounded on the
pavement beneath, and scared the vigilance of
the pious votarist " by sounds unholy." A
sentinel kept guard at the shattered door of the
tavern.

" Cintry," cried out Captain O'Mealy, *' did
this thing appear again to-night ?'' as Hamlet in
the immortal Shakspeare says ; — that is, did any
of thim rebelly, ruffianly, papist mob appear
here upon the premises ?^

An answer in the negative, with the assertion
"That all was right,'** satisfied the Captain;
who had only asked the question and made the
halt, in his love of habitual display. But a man
loitering near the place having volunteered some
vague information, instantly engaged his at-
tention; and much idle and unmeaning talk

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THE O'FLAHERTYS. ftl

Wh«i a full half hour had thus been dawdled

away, the word was again given to the guard,

and they continued their route, followed by

many of the mob ; while the captain again raised

his clear, mellow, but vulgarly modulated voice,

to the reiterated refrain of —

** Maw chare amy — he-he,
Maw chare amy.
Maw chare amy — he-he-he,
Maw chare amy,"

The party had now turned into High-street,

which was more spacious and better lighted than

the remoter avenues, giving to the Captain a

^ore perfect view of the person of his prisoner,

^hose head was now in strong relief, though the

J*est of hi^ figure was in shadow. Captain

O'Mea/j ne^red his horse, and taking the

place o{ on^ of his men, accosted the prisoner

TOi-^^r l>^ieve I have seen you somewhere

before, to-d^y . atlaste, I take it for granted,

ifnotmuclx mistaken?"

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22 THE o'bbiens and

young lad who led on the attack upon the Star
Fort, — I think I recollect your prawfile ?"

*' I had that honour/' said the youth, with
animation.

^* It was a mighty nate thing, 'pon my ho-
nour, — that is, for the volunteers. The reglars
(barring we cavalry) couldn't do it better ; you
must have had a good many rehearsals to get
it up so well, as we say at Lady Ely's Attic;
and it's a pity but so genteel a beginning should
have so — so—"

** So what, Sir ?" interrupted the prisonei",
petulantly.

" So unlucky an inding, Sir, that's all,'* said
the Captain, " for though a row is a good thing
in itself, and what no gentleman need be
ashamed of, yet it all depinds upon the style of
getting it up. It'^s only a little while ago, that
my friend. Lord Knock lofty, myself, Kilcol-
man, and the three Honourable 0*Mullins*s got
into the devil's own row, returriing a little dis-
guised, as we say in Ireland, from the Lord

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THE O FLAHERTYS.

Chancellor^ and were all clapped up in the
watch-house — ffve you my honour we were —
which reminded us of the prince and the chief
justice, in the immortal Shakespeare ; but there
is every diflFerence in life, in getting into a scrape
with men of quality, and fighting with the
commonalty, and taking their parts/'

"There is, indeed," replied the prisoner,
emphatically.

" And it's pity but a fine young fellow, like
yourself, should get into a scrape, that may be
the ruin of you ; for if you are an indintured
apprintice, as I suppose you are, — and, by the by,
may I ask your trade ?*'

"My trade. Sir?''

" Oh, ifs all in the way of kindness,^ con-
tinued Captain O'Mealy, with a patronizing
air ; " for I might be the making of you, in the
way of getting you the pathronage of the great-
est lady in Ireland ; for I'm hand in glove with
thim all, from the Lady-Lieutenant down—'' ^

The young man tossed his head haughtily.

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24 THE O'BRIRNS AND

and drawing up his college robe, which had
fallen mid-way down his figure, so wrapped its
folds over his arms, as to display, in full light,
the gold tassels still pendant from its hanging
sleeves. As they glittered in the moonlight,
they caught the eye of Captain O'Mealy, who
now first observed the University cap and robe
of his prisoner. He remained silent for a moment,
as if collecting himself for a new train of ideas ;
and then dismounting, he gave his horse to one
of his men, and taking his place beside the pri-
soner, observed — "I ask pardon if I've made a
little mistake in taking you for a mechanic, Sir;
but I believe I have the honour of addressinsr
a young collegian, and a non nobis domine.'^

"A what. Sir?" demanded the young man,
smilingly.

" Why, a nobleman's son ; at least I suppose
so, from the gold tassels. Sir, I beg to intro-

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25

** And mine, Sir,*' said the prisoner, touching
his cap, ** is Murrogh O'Brien."

** The Honourable Murrogh, son of the Earl
of Inchiquin, I presume?"

" No, Sir ; a son of Lord Arranmore."

" Lord Arranmore ! I have not the honour of
knowing his lordship, which is extraordinary ; as
I may say the whole rid binch are my intimate
frinds and particular acquaintances; a new
crayation, I presume ?"

" No, Sir, a very old title revived."

" Humph ! Mr. O'Brien, you are a happy
man, Sir."

Mr. O'Brien smiled, in the probable concep-
tion that his position was a singular one for a
happy man; while Captain O' Mealy, passing
his arm familiarly through that of his prisoner,
continued — ** A very happy man. Sir ; for 1 be-

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26 THE O^BEIENS AND

" Was that Lady Knocklofty ?'^ interrupted the
prisoner, with an obvious interest in the question.

^' It was. Sir ; the most intimate friend I
have upon earth, and wonder but you should
know her, Mr. O'Brien ; for, if I'm not intirely
dacaived and much mistaken, all people of qua-
lity know each other."

" I have not been long in Ireland ; and since
my return to my native country, my time has
been exclusively occupied by my collegiate pur-
suits. Had I gone into society, I could not fail
to have distinguished a person so attractive as
Lady Knocklofty.''

<* Oh, that alters the case intirely," said Cap-
tain O' Mealy; " but thim that never went
among the people of fashion, might know Lady
Knocklofty: she drives on Sundays in the
Phaynix, and on the Circular every day in the

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For there aehc day ilie drives her gig»
With her hair tied up like a barber's wig.**

" Is her ladyship a widow ?" asked the young
man, with interest^ and pre^occupation.

** A widow, is it she ? Why, Mr. O'Brien,
you must be a stranger indeed, not to know that
Albina, Countess Knocklofty, is the wife of the
Right Honourable Claudius Antoninus Marcus
Frederick Proudfort, Earl of Knocklofty, Baron
St. Grellan, Viscount Mount Raven — a Baronet
and Lord Lieutenant of the county of Mayo ; a
member of his Majesty's most honourable Privy
Coundl, Enigfat of the most noble Order of St.
Patrick, Colonel of the Royal Irish, Ciptaitt of
the St Grellan Loyal Vohmteers, Keeper of the
Privy Sale, Chief Remembrancer of the Ex-
chequer, First Commissioner of the Customs,
Reversionary Secretary of State, Govettfdr of
the Lying-in and Foundling Hospitals, Master
of the Revels, and Searcher, Packer, and
Guager of the Port of St. Grellatt. B«)ther to
\ c2

\

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28. THE 0*BSIENS AND

one archbishop, and nephew to another ; unde
to three bishops, four deans, and two arch-
deacons, and the head of the greatest, most
powerfullest, and loyallest family of his Majesty's
dominions of Ireland.'*

The captain here paused for want of breath,
and his prisoner observed—** He is a happy
man ; Lady Knocklofty is a very attractive and
beautiful person."

" Oh, she's a lovely fine crature surely —

' The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars.
As daylight does thim lamps,*

as the immortal Shakespeare says; only she
wears too much rouge, as I often tell her.
Lady Knocklofty, dear, says I, 1 wish you
would allow me to rouge you; for its I have
the notes for it, and paints all the faces at Lady
Ely's for stage eflTect. By-the-bye, Mr. O'Brien,
if you get out of this scrape, as I expect you
will, being a lord's son, I'll inthroduce you at
Knocklofty House, I will, pon my honour;

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THE O'^FLAHEBTTS. 29

and between ourselves (lowering his voice con-
fidentially), you are not quite unknown to bar
Ladyship, for I pointed you out to her as
she was driving off after the accident Lady
Knocklofty, says f, that^s your baro, says I,
— ^pon your honour ! says she ; pon my ho-
nour, says I : upon which, O'Mealy, says she,
tell him, says she — ^in fact, she said as much,
as that she meant to provide for you de viv

The prisoner was a moment silent ; and then
ssdd, " Any mark of Lady Knocklofty^s notice,
could not fail to be a distinction ; and I would
certainly rather receive it de vive voix^ tbim
by any intermediate means.

The answer evidently puzzled Captain
O'Mealy; but resolved rather "to burst in
ignorance," than betray it, he continued to
hum, " If you would wish to see her Grece,"^
while debating in his mind what sort of an ap*
pdintment de viv wau might be, which the son
of a nobleman preferred to any other.

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so THK o'bRIENS and

The party had now passed by the guarded
gates of the upper Castle-yard (the residence
of the viceroy), and decending Cork-hill, pre-
sented themselves at the lower court; when
signs and countersigns were asked and given,
pass words whispered, and all the military
mysteries of times of civil broil, strictly ob-
served. They were then permitted to enter.

The Castle of Dublin, a strong fortress,
erected in the thirteenth century, for the defence
of the capital, and of the English government,
had once contained within its moated walls, the
high court of Parliament, and courts of justice,
with state prisons, state dungeons, state chapel,
state gambling houses, and all the other ap-
pendages of state, belonging to an order of
things, founded on force and violence. Though
few vestiges now remained of these features of a

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tnt o'FLAIlKttTYS. 81

or ttxiop of arefaerS) tfr pike-mM beaded thit
ramparti, to iCAB su(5h ^ mce entering them^
**]ett hope behind,*' — dtill this ancient £(»rt,
0hd modern chateau, appeared to the imagine
ation, and low totted i^rits of the prisoner,
sufBciently awful. He had been in lands, where
fludi strong holds were more than monuments
of the lawless power (^darker and more distant
times : he had Bred under institutions, which
made the will of one, the law of all ; and where a
word or breath suffleed to incarcerate for life in
such fearful edifices, the young and hopeful,
the brave and bold. But recently returned to
his native country, with a memory stored by
reading, and early associations, with its ancient
history, the towers of the Castle of the pale
were still beheld with emotion, by one who
considered himself by name and by descent the
representative of the " mere Irish.**

The lower castle^yard still indeed bore some
resemblance to the description made of it in the
preceding century, as a ^ space or court, to the

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32 THE O'^BRIEKS AND

east of the Castle, where stood the chapel for the
service of the household, a lodging for the office
of groom-porter, or gaming table, the Provost-
Marshal's prison, the armoury and dwelling to
the smiths and armourers, the wardrobe tower,
the stable of the chief govemour, and a range of
fair buildings, the offices of war, ordnance, trea-
sury, and for the regulating of the deeds and
conveyances of the kingdom and the like.''*
Most of these offices remained, and were now
guarded by pacing sentinels ; while the moon,
as it shone from behind the wardrobe tower,
and its ancient adjunct, the Castle chapel, threw
a broad and picturesque shadow upon the pave-
ment, with a singular effect.

** * I do not like the towers of any place,' as
th' immortal Shakspeare says ;'' observed Cap-
tain O' Mealy, pointing to the building.

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THE oVlAHEBTTS. SS

^^ Did Julius Caisar build that tower ?'^
asked the Captain, still quoting from the
gdIj author with whom chance had made him
acquainted.

" No,'' said the prisoner, replying with
fuuveie to the question, and falling into the
general error of mistaking the wardrobe tower
for the Birmingham. <^ It was erected, I have
read, by the English deputy, John de Birming*
ham. Baron of Athenry, in 1342. From that
tower the gallant O'Donnel, of Tyrconnel, es-
caped from the tyranny of Elizabeth. From that
tower, high as it is, escaped the brave Lord
Delvin, one of the unfortunate few who, strug-
gling for the independence of Ireland, sought
to effect it at every risk."

** Lord Delvin, do you tell me that ? — why,
he is one of our private thayathricals at Lady
Ely's, and acts in ^the gang' to my Mac-
heath.''

<^ I mean the Lord Delvin of 1600, who was
committed in ward here for joining in a con-
c 8

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84 THE O^BUlZTftn AKH

qwracy with the Earls of Tyrone and Tyrcon-
nel, my own ancestors***

^«The Earl of Tyrone,** interrupted the
Captain, confused by names so familiar. ^^ Is
it the great Beresfoid, Earl of Tyrone, my par-
tiklar acqiuiintance and intimate friend P"

^ No/* said the youth, smiling, ^^ the great
O'Neal, Earl of Tyrone, who^ in league with
the Lord Maguire. . . ."

" Oh ! I know,— a rdative of the honourable
Kitty's?*'

*^ O'Caban, and other chieftains of the

sept of Ulster, intended to surpise the castle
of Dublin, cut off the Lord Deputy and coun^
cil, dissolve the state, and set up a government
of their own."

*• O the rebelly papist thieves,^ interrupted
Captain 0'Mealy^,Tirdignantly.

^< On the contrary," said the youth, with an
earnestness singular in one in his poi^tion, ^^ it
was a papist who betrayed this conspiracy ; but
though Lord Delvin was in charge of the con^

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THE O^FLAHEXTW. 35

«tabk, iJie stern Tristram Eedeston,^ he escaped.
There are resoorcet in the braTe and the
enterprising, which, like those of Heaven, are
inscrutable.'*

As the prisoner spohe with vehemence^ Cap»>
tain O'Mealy gazed on him in evident doubl
and amazement, mentaUy observing, *^ I wouldn't
wonder if the Honourable Murrogh was Cap«-
tain Right, devil a wonder ;" a suspuaon that
brought with it a host of speenlatiens, whkh
afterwards formed the ground- work of his de«
tails in the Dudiess's drawing-room. «

The party had now drawn up to the guards
house, which formed a p»rt of the mass of
builcUi^ adjoining to the dd chapel, and had
been one of those ^^ nameless towers"* which
have smce been taken down to make room for
other necessary buildings. The prisoner was
conducted in the usual form, and ^ven up to
the lieutenant of the guard, a pursy, ponderous,
elderly gentleman, whom Captain O^Mealy in»
♦ Ware.

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36 THE O'BltlRifS ANB

^ troduced as Lieutenant Ellis, of the Royai.
. Irish* . In consideration of the prisoner's rank,
as Captain O'Mealjr observed, he would be per-
mitted to remmn in the officer's room, to which
he was at once conducted, till he i^ould be
given up to the civil power in the morning.
. " And now, my dear O'Brien,'' said the Cap-
tain, ^miliarlj, and drawing his dear O'Brien
into a little den, which a camp-bed and dress-
ing-table shewed to 1^ the sleeping-room of the
officer on guard ; " I've just a word for your
private ear, while I tii-cu-vate myself a taste
for her Excellency's little private paurty, and
shake a dust of powdher into my whiskers. I
needn't tell you, you've a friend in court in
your humUe servant, and will spake to Lady
Knocklofty to back you out of this bit of a
scrape : I'm just stepping in to meet her at
her Grace's private paurty, and — "

** To Lady Knocklofty ! no, I intreat you,''
interrupted his prisoner eagerly.

** Death alive, man ! the women of quality

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THE o'flahertys. 87

will like you the better for a Irit of a row. •Why,
what is there so much the go as Viscount Kill-
kelly and Baron Killcoachy, as we call my
friend Sir Terence Flynn^ of county Galway,
the chief of the Pinking Dindies, who nateley
pinked his friend in a duel in the morning, and
killed his coachman with a tinis ball in the
afternoon ; and an't them Cherokee^ too, an't
they the life of the place ; frightening all th'
ould ladies in their sedan chairs, smashing the
£ne furniture of their particular friends, and
playing H-U and Tommy through the town ?
But at all events hadn't I better go to my lord
your father, for I suppose he knows nothing of
your situation, and inthroduce myself to him
as "

^^ I am not quite sure that my father is in
town, at least he was not this evening.'^

** Well, any how. Til go and thry to-mor-
row," said Captain O' Mealy officiously; and
secretly determined to add his lordship's name

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88 THE O'BRIENS AND

to his -list of titled acquaintance—" where does
he keep, when he is in it ?^*

" At O'Brien House," answered the prisoner
with some hesitation.

" O'Brien House ! humph ! Well, sure I'll
be there at cock-crow ; some where about the
new squares, or Stephens'* Green, I suppose ?"

" No, its an ancient family mansion, and lies
in what was once the principal quarter of
Dublin.''

" And where is that P**' O'Brien hesitated —
then replied, "along the south bank of the
river.''

" Oh, aye, I know, — near Moira House, where
I*m to be inthroduced next week.**'

" Further still, it occupies part of that
ground, called Lord Gal way's walk."*'

" Why ? it's like the house that Jack built
at the back of God's speed ; but stay,"' said
Captain O* Mealy, taking up the almanack that

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THE O'FLAHEllTYS. «^9

truth of O'Brien's information. " Here's ould

tell truth ; let us see Lord Arranmore ! aye, here

it is, the Right Honourable Terentius O'Brien,

Baron of Arranmore— O'Brien House, Dublin —

Castle of Dunn Engus, isles of Arran — Grouse

Lodge» Connemara. Well, Sir, if your father

isn't well lodged, it isn't for want of houses ;

though, to be sure, they are something out of

the line of fire, as we say in the Rojal Irish.

But now, mindj have a bit of a note ready by

the time I come back from Her Excellency's

small, little, private paurty, and Til find out his

lordship, if he's above ground, and make your

pace with him, to-morrow morning, 'pon my

hcHiour I will."

" To save you all trouble,'' said O'Brien,
impatiently, ** my college-porter will deliver
him a letter from me, if you will have the
kindness to let your servant leave it at the

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40 . THE 0*BEI£N8 AMD

are out of this scrape, and enters bail, and that
sort of thing, will get you to inthroduce me to
my lord your father, and hopes you will both
take a friendly dinner with me. So keep your-
selves disengaged for some day next week ; and
1*11 ask Enocklofty and the Chancellor, and a
few others, to meet you : and now I lave you
the reversion of my toylit, since you're a little
flustered or so; and wash the blood spots off
that comely fine face of your's, and I*li sind
Serjeant Flanagan, who is a great bone-setter,
to put a taste of gold*baither's lafe over the
scratch on your timple, and a bit of bldck
plaister over that, which will look for all the
world like a beauty spot ; and then Lieutenant
Ellis will invite you to supper. So, fare you
well till we meet, which will be soon, as I must
return to my guard in an hour or two.'*

O'Mealy then once more recommended his
noble prisoner to the attention of his ancient
Pistol, Lieutenant Ellis, and, tittivated and
powdered up to the highest bent of his personal

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THE o'flAHERTYS. 41

ambition, the captain of the guard sallied forth
to parade his vulgar absurdities to h» Excel-
lency's select cdterte^ where his reception has
been already described.

The reversion of the toilette of the Irish
military Adonis, was an advantage of which
O'Brien was happy to avail himself; and
having benefited by the skill and black patch
of Seijeant Flanagan, and pulled up his black
stock, after the manner of. Captain O'Mealy,
ruffled his handsome head into a mass of curls,
laid aside his customary robe of ^^ inky black,^'
and permitted the serjeant to brush the dust
from his green uniform, he presented himself in
the guard-room.

Lieutenant Ellis, a coarse, dashing, vulgar-
looking person, alone occupied this apartment ;
and was seated at the fire, poring over the orderly
book, and sipping brandy and water. He mo-
tioned to the prisoner to take a seat, and insisted
on his swallowing a glass of the potation, with
such importunity, that it was vain to resist The

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42 THK 0*BIIIENS AND

refusal of a second glass^ and a cold answer to
his idle questions, soon gave him impressions of
the prisoner's character and designs, not very
advantageous. Silence and sobriety were, in the
estimation of Lieutenant Ellis, misprisions of
treason: with him, the man who would not
talk or drink, was " fit for plots and stratagems ; ^
and unwilling to keep company with one at once
so dangerous and so dull, so sober and so sedi-
tious, he drained off his goblet, read out the last
order to the serjeant of the guard, and retired to
the little bed-room, where he soon gave audible
intimation of his manner of keeping watch and
ward.

The prisoner, meantime, had seated himself
on an old-fashioned settle, beside the guard-
room fire, and availing himself of some writing
materials, which lay on the table, began a letter,
dated from the castle guard-house. Having
written " my dear father,'' he paused. To

aU:^ a ^ i*^4.1 "U^ U^^ «v^..^V. 4-rx t^ntr • Kii4- « Vi ^

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THE o'flahertys. 43

bauBtion of fatigue fell heavily both on body
and mind ; nature had gone to her uttermost ;
and the will and the intellect were alike in
abeyance. The pen fell from his hand, his eyes
closed ; he sank gradually on the old settle,
and life was soon to him as though it were
not. As he lay with one arm pillowing his
head, the other thrown listlessly over his breast,
he imaged, in the grace of his attitude, and the
youth and beauty of his person, the " sommeil
d'Endg/mion^''* such as the genius of painting, in
various ages, has represented it.

The clock of the castle had struck, but he
had taken no note of time ! Ages or hours,
a minute or a night, might have elapsed between
the last sensation of slumbering drowsiness and
the first of awakening consciousness, which was
occasioned by a painful tingling that ran across

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44 THE o'briexs and

more and more intense; till starting up, in sudden
and full wakefulness, he perceived that the un-
easiness arose from a burst of light, held close
to his face.

At his waking, the person who held it,
drew back abruptly into a remote corner ; and
he could just perceive that it was a stranger,
muffled in a military cloak, and that they were
alone. Before, however, he could make further
observation or inquiry, Serjeant Flanagan came
forth from Lieutenant Ellis's room, and giving
the stranger a paper, said, " Plaze your honour,
if s all right — that's enough. Sir, if a man was
condemned to five hundred — the prisoner is to
attind you."

The stranger now advanced a little, in the
direction of a small, low arched door in the
guard-room, which seemed to lead into the in-
terior of the building. There he paused, and
touching his hat with a slight degage military

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THE o'flahertts. 45

my order ; or, stay — ^you had better shew it to
him/'

Flanagan presented the paper to the prisoner,
who was now on his feet, and had taken up his
cap, and drawn on his robe. It was an order,
in the proper technical form, empowering the
lieutenant of the guard to give up the prisoner,
the Honourable Murrbgh O'Brien, to the bearer.
What was most extraordinary in the event was,
(hat it was dignified by tlie signature of the
XfOrd Lieutenant.

<< May I ask, Sir,*' demanded O'Brien,
" whither I am to be removed ?**

<* For the present," replied the young officer,
^^ not I hope beyond the castle walls ; for it is
cursed cold," (and he folded his cloak more
closely round him), ^^ and to-nigh t^s duty is no
joke.''

^^ I suppose I'm about to be called, up for
examination then ?'' demanded the prisoner.

" Yes, for examination— there is no doubt of
that."

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46 THE o'briens and

" Before a civil or a military tribunal ?** asked
O'Brien anxiously.

" Oh, very civil^^^ replied the officer, in an
accent, that struck upon the just then irritable
nerves of his prisoner to be jocular even to
jeering. All the blood of the O'Briens rushed
into his face; and resolving to ask no more
questions, he followed his guide in sullen
silence ; who led the way through a low, arched
postern — the serjeant lighting them with his
guard-room light, which, as he held it on high,
discovered an obscure stone passage.

" There,*" said the young officer, ^* take away
your greasy light ; the smell is suffocation. Can't
government light guard-rooms, with something
that an*t grease ? pah !"

The Serjeant offended by the haughty man-
ner of this " officer, who was no soldier,'' but
appeared to be some dandy youth of qua-

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THE O'rLAHXETYS. 47

and left the guard «nd the guarded aHke in titter
darkness.

*' By Jove," exclaimed the young officer,
*^ this is a pleasant adventure i The lamp that
hung here, too, is extinguished; but don't be
afraid. Sir/'

<^ 'Tis not my habit. Sir," replied the pisoaer,
abruptly.

" I know the way," (omtinued the young
leader) ^* ^tis a private one, between the lower
and upper court ; a short cut, though an u^y
one. It saves exposure, however, to nigh^ air.
Stay, Sir, here are three steps— -give me your
hand — one, two, three*-and now on, and step
boldly-"

The prisoner, with a feeling of extreme pre^
vocation, literally obeyed hit finical guide^ gave
his hand, and *^ ste[q)ed on boldly ;" wh^ audf-
denly, and with a movement not unobserved^
he iavoluntanly removed his cap ; for by some
illusion of the senses, some dream of the fSuicy,

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48 THE 0*BR1£NS AND

he was struck by the odd omviction, that the
ungloved hand that led him—

" to whose soft seizure,

The cygnet's down was harsh,"

was — a woman's !

" You had better not uncover your head,"
said the officer, looking over his shoulder, as a
gleam of light, from the further extremity of
the passage, discovered the act.

" I did so upon instinct," said the prisoner,
laughingly, " I was scarcely conscious that I
did it at all/'

" It must have been a strange instinct; to
what conclusion did it lead you ?"

" For an instant, that I was in a woman's
presence.**

" Well, stand not upon the gallantry of your
instinct, but resume your cap ; for these passages
are damp. Curse these boots ; I wish the fellow

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THE o'flahsetys. 49

the last of the Irish giant. I beg your pardon
for a moment, pray hold my spur,*' — and he
paused to arrange the ^^ cursed boot,'- which he
had hitherto evidently dragged after him wiUi
difficulty. " And so (he continued, in his lisping
tone) you have had the romance to turn diis
no very pleasant event, of being brought up for
midnight examination, into — a bonne fortune?^
' ** A bomie fortuncy^ repeated the prisoner
angrily, and feeling his cheek tingle with a
sudden bliish at the coxcombical supposition.

*• Aye, to be sure,^* repUed the officer, still
fiddUng with his boot, *^ for if you could think
that a lady led you along these mysterious
passages, at this witching time of night, it
foUows of course,"

*^ No, Sir,*' (interrupted the prisoner petu-
lantly), ^^ I thought nothing about the matter.
The fact is, I am not yet half awake. I was
taken by surprise out of a deep sleep ; a soft
voice and a soft hand did the rest, and led to
the absurd idea/*

VOL. II. D

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50 THE 0*BBIKK8 AVD

*< Not SO absurd neith^^^ (said the o£Bicer).
^^ This castle is a frolicsome place; and wo*
men, who keep grown gentlemen at armV
length, do sometimes int«*e8t themselves for us
boys.''

<^ Because it is for us boys only, they can do
so with impunity,'* was the reply.

** Humph ! not always^ we flatter ourselves,"
said the officer conceitedly, taking back his
q)ur and moving on. ** It sometimes happens
our sjririts are too bold for our years."

^ Say rather," said the prisoner laughing,
" that ova years are too few for our sjririts.''

*^ You may uncover your head now, if you
will,*' (observed the offica^, passing through a
little grated door, through which the faint light
had hitharto proceeded), ♦^ for now you are on
holy ground.*'

The ofiBcer paused; and the prisoner per-
c^ved with surprise, that they stood in the
eentre of an ancient chapd, doubly, but dimly
lighted by the waning moon, which streamed

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THE oVlAHEBTTS. 51

through its gothic casements of painted glass in
many vivid lines^ borrowed from the robe of
St. Patrick, or the girdle of St Bridget,— and
l^ the flickering red light of a waxen taper,
in a brazen chandelier, 8usp^[ided above a little
gallery, which had the air of a royal tribune in
a Catholic church.

<^ Many a stout heart has quailed here^^ said
the young officer, with theatrical emphaas;
** for this chapel ccnnmunicates with Birming-
ham Tower, the State Prison. Many an Irish
rebel, many an O'Neil, nn O'Donnel, and rni
O^Brien too, were duiven l^re, on their way to
execution: ^arch rebek aU, time immemoml,
they say.' "

^^ Rebds, indeed !^ exclaimed the prisoner
with vehemence : ^^ there are still many, I be-
lieve, in Ireland^ who sigh for die return of
those terrible times, when love of country was
a pendi crime, and the life of a native Irishman
had its price, like the head of the Irish woit;
but there ace i^ili^be it hoped, many who would

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52 THE o'bBIENS and

die a thousand deaths, to prevent their recur-
rence.**'

^^ Let such be silent here,^ said the young
officer, in an admonitory tone ; and proceed-
ing on, they passed through a lateral door,
under the gallery, — but not before the prisoner
thought he heard a rush of sounds above, like
the flutter of birds disturbed into sudden
flight. He was now much struck by the oddity
of this manner of being ^* brought up for exa-
mination.^ A doubt, a confusion of ideas, or
rather of sensations, left him without the power
of reflection or inference ; and all other functions
w«re, for the time, " smothered in surmise."

"Does your spirit flag?" asked the officer,
as they passed from a matted gallery into a stone
and vaulted passage, in utter darkness, save
from a distant flash which gleamed at its further
extremity.

" Not a jot," was the careless reply. *< Come
what come may, I am prepared.**"

" Give me a proof of your presence of mind,*'

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THE O'FLAHERTYS. 65

said the officer, turning short round to his
prisoner.

" What proof do you ask ?" was the laughing
reply.

" Quote me a line instantly from any au-
thor, in any language, no matter what ; but be
quick.'"

'* * Di mia sciochezza tosto fui pentito,
Ma troppo mi trovai lungo dal lito,* **

replied the now almost amused, and thoroughly
awakened prisoner.

" Oh ! you know Italian : where did you
learn it?'*

« In Italy.''

*' In Italy ? but you are an Irishman !**

" Soul and body."

" Humph !*' said the interrogator, signifi*
cantly. " Tant pis pour vous. — You have, at
least, the Irish qualities of wit and courage:
but wit and courage, without discretion, will
not avail, where you are about to appear/*

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64 THE O'BRIENS AND

" I fear I should want both," (said the pri-
soner, in evident excitement, and again strangely
puzzled by the oddity of the adventure,) " if
that which is impossible should be true ; like
some dogmas in religion.'^

" Oh ! you are at your instincts again, are
you ?" asked the guide archly.

** May I beg to ask you a question ?" was
the eager reply.

" I can answer no questions now, Sir," said
the officer coldly, and quickening his creeping
pace : "I have already held too much parley
with a prisoner, though all about nothing at all ;
and nothing can come of nothing. So now,
follow, and be silent.'*

As he spoke, they issued from the stone pas-
sage, into a spacious, handsome, and architec-
tural vestibule. Its roof was supported by
massive pillars ; and its marble pavement was
heavily paced by sentinels, who carried arms to

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THE oVlAHUBTTS. 5S

ftuend a "broad and ncible stairoase, whioh
brandi^ into two flighty at the fint landing,
the state-portec in the outer hall, cried poai«>
pooslj, '^ The Lord Chief Justice's chair.'*

^ The Lord Chief Justice is coining down,**
rej^ied the footman, in the same vociferatix^
tone, tram the corridor above.

^The Commander ci the Forces' carriage
stops the way," cried the porter, below*

^^ The Commando: of the Forces is commg
down,*' was the answer from above*

At this solemn announcement of the approach
of two great <^cers oi state, the guide and
guard of the prisoner suddenly turned ]back on
his steps, beckoning to his charge to iic^ow.
Tripping lightly back, through the passi^ th^
had dready cleared, he opened a door to the
left of that matted gallery, througli which they
had issued frcon the chapel, and silently, but
with a significant gesture, ascended a flight oi
nanxiw, ill-lighted, stone st^is, terminating at

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56 THE o'b&iens and

another door. The door opened, and discovered
an unexpected vista tq the amazed prisqner. It
was a long corridor, with a stuccoed and orna-
mented roof, containing many small cupolas ;
from each of which were pendant massy gilt
diandeliers, filled with wax^lights. It opened
on either side by a succession of doors, to dif-
ferent suites of apartments ; while the intervals
were filled with sofas of scarlet, on which
lounged or slept, a numerous train o[ pages,
grooms of the chamber, and footmen in gor-
geous liveries. A door, flung open, at the
further extremity, discovered an armoury, where
a group of beef-eaters were gathered round
the fire. To the right, a foreshortened view
appeared of the broad stone stairs, with the
pacing battle-axe; from which the officer had
turned at the approach of the Chief Jus*,
tioe: (an incident which convinced the pri-
soner, that he was acting under some private
and secret authority, unknown to the privy.

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THE o'flahebtys. 57

counsellors). Beyond all, and terminating the
perspective, was visible the moon-lighted vast-
ness of St. Patrick's Hall.

At about the middle of the corridor, the officer
paused. A groom of the chamber flew to open a
door to the right, which as they entered was
quickly closed after them ; and the parties found
themselves in a dimly lighted room. A solitary
wax candle here and there just dispelled the
utter darkness, and faintly designed the stately
forms of a throne and canopy, with heavy
draperies of dark velvet, and a few old pictures
in cumbrous frames. All was silent and still,
save a faint burst of merriment, which was
scarcely caught through the double doors of im
adjoining apartment ; and which was soon over-
powered by the full tones of a harp.

The air performed was not unknown to ils
spell-bound auditor; whose senses responded
to the mellifluous sounds in most amazed
sjrmpathy. It was peculiar to that re^on,
where he last had heard it ; and was part of
d3

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58 THE O'BRIENS AND

a celebrated litany, • sung in the Santa Chiesa
di Loretto at Rome, to which the modem audi-
tory of Europe have since listened with undi-
minishing rapture.*

" Where is that music ?" demanded O^Brien,
eagerly.

" In the spheres/' was the reply.

Though too confused for conjecture, O'Brien
was now half inclined not to advance further, till
he had some explanation with his leader ; who,
with his hand upon the lock of a double door,
(within the deep and dark embrasure of which
he already stood,) beckoned him on.

" I cannot, Sir," he said : " I will not proceed
further, till you tell me for what purpose I have
been brought thus far.''

" A soldier, and afraid !" exclaimed the
young officer, scoffingly. *' What danger do
you suspect. Sir ?""'

• Well known, by Rossini's adoption of it, as the mo-

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tuz oVlahebtt^. 59

« None ; but I fear ';

« What ? Out with it, man !'*

^< A ridicule,^ returned the bewildered pri-
soner.

^^ A ridicule ! a dainty fear truly for the ringr
leader of a riot, and a prisoner in the Castle of
Dublin."

^< You talked of the castle being a frolicsome
j^ce,*^ said the priKmer, advancing to the door*
way, and now full of the idea that he was the
victim of some anti-chamber mystificatioii — per-
haps in the hands of a mischievous pi^,jor pos*
sibly in those of the vulgar O' Mealy, who might
be engaged to shew him up for the amuacHaaent
of bis friends, " the pec^e of quality.'*

" Why, yes,'* said the young c^Scer, lowering
his voice, and beckoning to his charge to advance,
^^ so it is a frolicsome place; and I know it
was even proposed this night to Lady Knock*
lofty, whose life, by the by, you saved to-
day **

" Lady Knocklofty,*' said her champion,

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00 THE O'BEIENS and

with emotion, and entering the embrasure to
catch the words.

^< Stay," said the officer, speaking in a whis-
per, ^^ close the door behind you, and I'll tell
you all.*'

The prisoner obeyed, and they were for an in-
stant in utter darkness. The music ceased,and the
officer, taking his hand, emphatically whispered,
from the motto of his own colours — " Fats ce
que doy^ arrive que pourray'' — thai throwing
open the second door, drew him quickly for*
ward, into a blaze of light and beauty, — into the
presence of the vice-queen, and her merry court.
A shout of ** bravos," received the officer and
his charge ; and while the latter ^^stood a statue,"^
the former threw aside his helm and cloak, and
knocking oflF the ** cursed boots,'** from the
nlken slippered feet they had encumbered, dis-
covered the imposing and splendid figure of
Albina Countess Knocklofty.

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THE oVlaHEBTYS 61

CHAPTER II

THE FROLIC

ATM in ogni saa parte un laecio teso,
O parli, rida, o canti, o pasno mora,
N6 maraviflio b Me Raggier n' 6 pre«o«
* Poi che tanto benigna se la truva.

Quel cbe di lei g\k avea dal roirto inteio
Com' k peifida e ria, pooo gli giora.
Che inganno o tradimento non gli € avvi«o,
Che poMa itar con li soave rieo.

Obl. Fuft. Yii. 16.

" There," said Lady Knocklofty, throwing
off her ponderous helmet, shaking out her ruffled
drapery of soufflet gauze, (which the cloak, of
Captain O'Mealy, borrowed for her disguise,
had crushed,) and resuming her turban i la
Roxcdcme — " There, good folks, give me your
applause, for I have won it hard and well.''

" I fear we must give you more than that,"
said Lady Honoria peevishly, ** if you hold us
to the letter of our foolish bets."

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m THE O 3EIEM8 AK9

'^ Hold you ! to be sure I shall, my dear,^
returned Lady Ejiocklofty, in the greatest pos-
sible excitement, and evidently concealing some
flutter of feeling, under an affected eagerness
about her bets, " I have done my part ; — now
for yours. Duchess, my diamonds ; Eilcolman,
your cool hundred; Freddy Fitz John, your
ten to one; Lady Hohoria, name your night
tor the sally-lun and raking pot of tea, after the
play ! A good let off, let me tell you, dear ; so
no grumbling."

" I rise to explain," said Lady Honoria,
affecting humour, to cover out her real annoy-
ance; for she had taken up some by-bets aa the
non-performance of Lady Knocklofty'^s froUc,
which were not as ^sily paid off, as the sally-
lun, and its raking accompaniment — ^^ I be-
lieve. Lady Knocldofty, that the bets stood
thus "

^< My dear H(»iori^" said Lady Knocklofty,
laughing violently, and speaking vehemently,.
" all your wit won't save your tea-pot. * Till

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THE O'FLAHEETyS. 65

Uiou ean^st rial my seal from off my bond/ ^'
she added, theatrically, ^^ ^ thou but offendest
thy luDgs to speak/ "

" The betting-book will decide all," said the
Honourable Freddy Fitz John, (a pretty little
sucking secretary,) who, pert and priggish, passed
the precocity of a smart school-boy, as the
earnest of future talents he was destined never
to exhibit ; and who, as a considerable loser in
the betting speculations of the evening, was
mentally applying his " Giles-Gingerbread '*
diplomacy to the raising supplies for the liqui-
dation of his " losses."

** The betting-book, the betting-book," called
out the comptroller of the household, (over
which he held no controul).

*^ The book, the book," re-echoed, the Ho-
nourable and Reverend the Dean of the Chapel,

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64 THE 0*BRI£NS AND

which might have been the Talmud or the
Alcoran, Joe Miller or Jonathan Wild, for all
he knew to the contrary.

The " compte rendu '* of the aid-de^camp^s
room was immediately produced ; and one of the
gentlemen in ordinary read out as follows from
its pages : —

*' The Countess Knocklofty having, at the
game of magical music, forfeited her diamond
necklace, engages to redeem it by the perform-
ance of the following feat, viz., she will release
the prisoner brought this evening to the guard-
bouse, in the lower castle-yard, by Captain
0*Mealy, and produce him in the presence of
her Excellency the Duchess of Belvoir, before
the clock strikes twelve.

** N. B. It is understood, as stated by the
Captain of the guard, that the prisoner in
question must be a gentleman, namely, the
Honourable Murrogh O'Brien, son of Lord
Arranmore, and the same who distinguished
himself as the leader of the Volunteer corps of

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THE O'^Fl.AHERTYS. 6»5

the Irish brigade this day, in the sham fi^t
at the Phoenix park ; and therefore presentable
in the society of Her Grace the Duchess of
BelrcMr/'

A long list of bets followed, for and against
the pps^ble performance of this enterprize;
made according to the confidence of the several
bett^^ in the ways and means, headlong temper,
and dauntless and romantic spirit of the chief
actress in this frolicsome drama.

All eyes were now turned on him, who was
recognized as the hero of the day ; and whose
captivity had thus so pleasantly been cut short.
There he was, and consequently, the conditions
being performed, there was no more to be said
on the subject. Those who could pay their
debts of, honour on demand, paid them ; and
those who could not, pledged their honour to do
so when they could.

" There !" said Lady Enocklofty, sweeping
her winnings into her handkerchief, and still
laying the agitation of her manner to the ac-

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66 THE O^BBIENS AND

eount of her cupidity. *' There ! I flatter my-
self this is fairly won, and daringly earned;
for what woman dare do, I have done."

^^ Which is the short way for a womani to be
nndone,^^ said Lady Enocklofty's dear friend,
Lady Honoria, to Lady Knocklofty's grateful
proUgie^ the Honourable Catherine Macguira
Between these ladies there exkted a confidenoe^
if not a friendship, which had insensibly grown
out of similar tastes and humours — a sense of
the ridiculous — and that talent for ridicule
which is so often found unalUed with any oth^.

To the axiom of her ally, as applied to her
protectress. Miss Mac^uire acceded, with one
of those comical grimaces, which constituted
a leading trait in her list. of amusing abilities;
and she added, ^^ You know, of course, how this
was done ?"

*•' Not by a coup de baguette^''* replied Lady
Honoria. ^* She has had an audience, I take
it ; and the Eccellenza has yielded to ^ her most
petitionary Tehemence,* and given her an txAxst

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THE O^FLAHEBTYS. 67

tar tbe prisoner's release. Undo: the double
influence of beauty and of Burgundy, the poor
dear Duke would give away the whole kingdom,
if there were any one fool enough to accept it.**'
" Exactly," said Miss Macguire ; and pursing
up her comical mouth, ^e hummed in her
friend^s ear, from the fashionable burletta of the
« Golden Pippin,^^

•* Jovey, my soul !

What does it say ?
Fire the north-pole —

Jove's your valet I"

*^ Exactly," said Lady Honoria, laughing.

^ But now/' said Miss Macguire, <^ that she
has got that handsome, stupified creature here,
what will she do with him ?'^

^^ You do not know, then, that he is the
engaiumenty the Prince Lee Boo of the moment?**

<< Enffouemeni ! yes, perhaps ; but here ! and
the Lord Lieutenant, the cavaliere pagantc of
the day!''

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68 THE O'BRIENS AND

*^ Well ; this handsome, stupified creature
will be the cavaliere pagato^ comme de raison^
replied Lady Honoria^ and both the ladies
laughed loudly, but prettily ; as ladies c^ fashion
only know how to laugh, when to laugh is
notoriously becoming, and the object some par-^
ticularly dear friend.

Meantime, the ^^ handsome, stupified crea-
ture," the Astolfo of the adventure, had passed
the short interval in a confusion of all the
senses, which extended minutes to mondis, and
gave to sopnething less than half a quarter of an
hour the importance of a century. Stunned,
dazzled, abashed in the first instance; indignant,
irritated, and perplexed in the next; gazed at
by many, noticed by none, (not even by
O'Mealy, whose broad, vulgar face was notable
over the shoulders of more elegant, though less
lofty spectators,) knowing not how to retreat, nor
how to advance without making a scene, or giving
prise to a ridicule, he still stood where his fair
and false guide had left him. He leaned against

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THK o'fLAHEBTYS. 69

the projecting wood-work of a window near the
door hy which he had entered ; and was half
involved in its crimson draperies, with an effect
which rendered his person a picture. He
still wore his black gown half drawn over his
dark uniform ; and his fine head, lighted by a
chandelier, came out in strong relief, and har-
monized with the rich hues of the well draped
back ground.

The audible reading of the betting book had
put him in full possession of the nature of the
embroglio in which he was involved ; and though
there was clearly more of idle frolic than of
premeditated insult in the part allotted him,
still the conviction neither diminished his awk-
wardness, nor dissipated his perplexity. The
dim, mysterious avenues he had passed ; the soft
hand that had guided him — that sudden burst
of light and loveliness that had succeeded to
darkness and solitude —the brilliancy of the
drawing-room, and the persons by whom' it was

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70 THE o'bBIENS and

occupied, and by whom he was surrounded, all
alike confounded and bewildered him. That
he was then occupying a q)ot, in what he had
deemed the den of political corruption ; that he
was simronnded by those who drew their very
edstence from the misery of his country (that
country he would die to serve or save) ; that he
stood confounded with those against whose sys-
tem of aggression he had registered a protest,
sdbmn and sincere as the patriot's last sigh on
the scaffold of his martyrdom ; that he was Ae
laugh, peihaps the sctxrn of those he sooraed,-^
were Amcies or convictions^ rendered insupport-
lible by the morbid state of his fedings, and
the previcMis depression of his spirits. They left
him without the power, almost withouit the will
to act; and wholly deprived him of that pre-
sence oi mind, the want or possession of which
mais or makes a fortune. What ought have
been turned to the account of personal advance-
meat by those who knew how to make the. most

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THE o'fLAHEETYS. 71

of it, was, by one '* so green and young in this
old wcxrld,*^ only considered as a personal in-
dignity, or a mark of disrespect.

In qpirit and bearing, O'Brien was a ** petit
DunoisJ^ He had hitherto, during his shcM^
life, acted as if

" D*Orlando e di Rinaldo era cugino.*'

With a temperament all Irish, and a character
made up of those elements, which in the poetry
of life form its sublime, but in its prose tend a
little to the ridiculous, — ^impetucnis and spirited,
as the genuine Hibernian always is, petulant
and fierce as a foreign militaire usually affects
to be, — his natural and national qualities had
been sharpened rather than subdued by a Hfe
of early excitement and vici^itude. Too sus-
ceptible to impressions, as they flattered or mor-
tified his passions and his pride, he now stood
ki a poeiticm the most painfully opposed to all
that was strongest or weakest in his nature.
He who had fought his way through half

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72 THE O^BBIENS AND

Europe sword in hand, had not now the courage
to pass through a group of frivolous coxccnnbs
of both sexes. He who had desperately led
more than one forlorn hope, now in the midst
of gaiety and pleasure, looked the picture of a
forlorn hope himself. Infinitely more willing to
be shot, than to be laughed at, he was de-
voutly wishing himself up to the neck in the
trenches before Belgrade, where he had already
distinguished himself, rather than in this en-
chanted palace of a " possente Alcinay^ when the
possente Aldna herself came forward,

'* Con allegra faccia.
Cod modi graziosi e reverenti,"

and chatiged in a moment the whole character
of his sensations and course of his ideas.

The Irish Vice Queen, the beautiful Duchess
of Belvoir, had hitherto stood in the centre of
a group, the members of which, with the true
effrontery of fashion — that affects no feeling,
and knows no restraint — ad coolly ani delibe-

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THB oVlahertys. 78

*

ratelj were pmntiog their glasses and their
glances at the victim of their supercilious no*
tice, as philosophy directs its microscope at the
insect it studies. But now, supported on either
side by Lady £nocklofty and the old Earl oi
Muckross (the latter, par parenihise^ a dried
specimen of a genus now almost extinct, the
travelled Irish nobleman of the old school), she
advanced in the direction where O^Brien stood,
who retreated ^^ deeper and deeper stiU,^' within
the recess of the window. With her beautiful
eyes fixed smilingly upon him, she said, in a
good-natured and half audible whisper, " Speak
to him. Lady Knocklofty ; the frolic, you know,
was your own.*"

" Mine, dearest duchess ? It was every one's
frolic But, cotne, I have had the glory, and
will perfonn the duties arising firom it, — evext
that of asking Mr. O'Brien's pardon for the
liberty I have taken with him."

0*Brien bowed, as men only bow who have
learned to bow abroad ; and blushed, as men only

VOL. II. £

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74 THE o'bbiens ani>

•

blu^ to whom the world is still new. His bow
and his blush had their due effect ; and were
received at their full value.

" I am sure,** continued Lady Knocklofty,
" he will for^ve the means, for the sake of the
result, if your Grace will permit me to present
him to you.**'

^^ I desire particularly to make the acquaint-
ance of Mr. O'Brien,^ said the Duchess, with
her bland smile and tone ; ^^ and to offer my
apology at the same time. For though not a
party concerned in the frQhc, yet, as consenting
thereunto, I believe I should come in toir part
of the blame."

Lady Knocklofty then, with the manner of a
master of the ceremonies, said, ^^ Duchess, in
the absence of Sir Phelim O'Kelly, I will pre-
sume to do the honours, and present to your
Grace the Honourable Murrogh O'Brien.'*

O'Brien again bowed, and the old Lord
Muckross, with an air between that of Lord
Herbert of Cherbury, and Sir Lucius O'Trig^

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THE o'flahertys. 75

ger, requested his introduction also of the
" Camerara Mayor^'^ as he termed Lady
Knocklofty, and complimented the victor of the
Star Fort on his military skill ; adding, "that he
hoped his laurels, won in the morning, would
not be tarnished by the adventures of the night ;
for that the saviour of Lady Knocklofty
could not fail to be an object of interest to all
who had the honour of knowing her ladyship.'^

*' It was a gallant rescue,*' said the Duchess.
*' I saw it all, and for a moment it struck me
that your life was more in danger, than'that of
the object of your protection. How can you,
my dear Lady K., drive such horses ? I am
not a timid whip ; yet I would not trust myself
to your greys, within sound of a cannon shot
— ^no, 'not for a wilderness of monkeys.' "

"Except," interrupted Lady Knocklofty*

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76 THE O'BRIENS AND

'^Aye," said Lord Muckross, "there it is.
What is death to others, is sport to you tyrants.
There is not on earth a more pitiless savage than
a beautiful woman ; and whether —

' Her hero perish, or her sparrow fall,'

dcst egalf provided she shews her power.**'

" Votes parlez avec connoissance de caused'
said the Duchess, tapping him with her fan.

" I have seen service," replied his lordship,
taking snufF, conceitedly : *" they alone jest at
scars, who never felt a wound."

" Mr. O'Brien, you do not seem to have es-
caped unhurt from the field, to judge by the
mark on your brow. I hope it was not in my
service.'*'' said Lady Knocklofty, fixing her eyes
on the black patch, which rather became than
disfigured the wearer.

"I wish it had been, Madam," replied
O'Brien, confusedly. " It is, however, so

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tmn o'FrAHBatyg. 77

*<I hear/' sdd the Duchess, <<that Lord
Charles Fitzcharles has got into the same scrape
Aat has brought you, Mr.O^Brien, into the ^ dur-
ance tile^ of our strong hold ; and to which, by
^^ by> your deUverer, Lady Knocklofty, must
soon yield you up. For you must not be found
here by the big wigs,'' she added, laughingly,
"who all dine with the Lord-Lieutenant to-
day.''

** Oh, I'll send him back in due time, under
the care of the Captain of the guard," said Lady
Knocklofty; ^^but, dear Duchess, as one good
turn deserves another, pray present 971^ to Mr.
O'Brien, for he cannot, upon instinct, know
who I am." And she laid an emphasis on the
wordy that brought a rush of odd recollectiotM
to the mind of O'Brien,., which tingled in every
fibre.

** Oh, my dear," said Lady Honoria, who,
with the rest of the exclusives, had now gathered
round the party, << we all take it for granted,
that you and Mr. O'Brien made your acquaint

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78 TBJK o'bsiei^s ANir

jftnce ii]i your journey through those long pas-
sages, which do not always ^ lead to nothing.''**

*^ No, upon my honour/' said Lady Enocki.
lofty, vehemently, ** Mr. O'Brien never dis-
covered the disguise ; and took me for an oflSoer
on duty, till I threw off O'Mealy^s doak and
cap in this very room. I appeal to you, Mr.
O'Brien.''

^* Appeal to him !" abruptly interrupted Lady
Honoria, in the same jeering tone. **Why,
child, on sUch an occasion, his testimony would
go for as little as O'Mealy's did, in the cause
of Miss Juliana O'Gallagher, O'Mealy de-
^d^nt.''

" Pray, let us have that/' said Lord Eilcol-
man. . " Now, Lady Honoria, in your best
manner. O'Mealy, my boy, come into court-
Miss O'Gallagher plaintiff."

O^Mealy came forward, puUing up his stock,
and roughing out his whiskers, with a look of
^ected bashfulness, that only added to the
habitual expression of his invincible impudence.

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THE o'FLAHBBTYS. T9

^^ 6iv6 your lorddhip my honour, I have no
notion of what Lady Honoria is going to tell :
but I hope she will speer the leedy ; that^s all/'

" Now, Lady Honoria," said Lord Kilcol-
man, rubbing his hands — ^for O'^Mealy was his
butt^" now for it. Silence in Court."

" Well,* said Lady Honoria, ** when Coun-
sellor Cornelius 0*6allagher insisted on know-
ing the Captain^s intintions, in consequence of
a Visit to the barracks of the Royal Irish, paid
by Miss JuHana, and when he demanded that
theCaptain should pledge his honour that the lady
was still as well qualified to preside as priestess
in the Temple of Vesta, as before the aforesaid
▼isit ; the Captain then and there replied,
^ Upon my honour, Counsellor Comehus, your
inster is as innocent for me, this day, as the child
unborn : and if she were not. Counsellor, I*d
swear, upon my honour, to the fact, ail the
same.^ ''

^^ I don't see the application of the anecdote.

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80 THS o'bmbns and

however well told,^ said Lady Enocklc^ty,
coldly and haughtily.

** Nor I,'' said the Duchess^ endeavouring to
kx^ grave ; while all the rest of the party
laughed loudly, on the pretext of Lady Ho-
noria's admirable imitation of 0'Mealy*8 mincing
manner and indomitable brogue. Meantime
O'Mealy, encouraged by being noticed at all,even
for his absurdities, and now seeing that O'Brien
had obtained a '^ grand sucds,^^ shook him by the
hand, and with the whisper of " I tould you t
would do the needful for you,'' turned to
Lady Honoria, exclaiming fEuniliarly, <<Upon
my honour, your Ladyship is too sevaire upon
me entirely. All that story of Juliana 0*6al^
lagher had not a spark of foundation ; for at
that veiy time when people were talking of my
seducing the young oratur's affections, and
carrying her off to the barracks, I waft in fact
deeply and sariously attached to' Miss O'KeUy,
<» at ail events to Miss O'Tool."

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THK O^FLAHERTYd. 81

This confestdon^ the retult of garrulous tanity
tad inoitliiiats &dly, produced a general laugh,
louder than the first ; and all agreed that the
price of 0*Mealy was beyond that of rulttes.

With all her wit and humour. Lady Honoria
was sometimes tm pen trop forie for the Duchess.
Although her Grace had thrown off somewhat of
the high manner of English bonton since her ar-
riiral in Ireland, she had not familiarized herself
with that breadth and freedom c^ speech which
distinguished a particular class (and that th^
highest) in Irish society, among whom wit was
seldom impeded by prc^priety ; said who, whether
they ^'sold abargfitn," or tcdd an anecdote,
did both, with little t^erence to that Men-
Uance^ which though coming undi^ the head of
sdiior mwals, is raf^ly found separated from
the great.

The Dudiess did not therefore join in a
laugh, so coarsely and indelicately raised at the
ex pence even of a rival ; and without appearing
to notice the application, she coolly presented

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8S THE O'BEXENS and

O'Brien to the Countess Enockloftyj as the
lady whose life his gallantry had probably saved
in the morning. With a graceful gravity that
imposed 911 all, she then took Lady Knocklofty*a
arm; and seating herself on a sofa, motioned
O'Brien to approach, and (by one of those acts
of conscious power which dares do all, or of
female caprice, which does do all,) placed, him
between Lady Knocklofty and herself.

The effect of this conduct was instiantaneous.
Laughter was hushed into sneers; and sneers
gradually were subdued into approving smiles.
Hitherto through i^l the apparent cordiality of the
Duchess's n^anner to her accidental guest, there
was a by play, directed to the initiated, which
spoke her subjection to the worthless and the
worldly, by^ whom she was environed. A sly
glance at Lady Honoria, or a significant, nod to
Lord Kilcolman, evinced the. necesaty of prov-
ing to the high tribunal of Irish ton that her
gracious. reception was but a mockery, a civil
mystification, played off on one whom, ^^ nobody^

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THE OFLAHKETYS.; 83

knew, and who had been seen ** no where."
The few who composed the oligarchy of fashion
and of faction in Ireland, were then deemed
"everybody;" and the whole of space not
occupied by them, was termed **no where."
" Le mime propos par le mhne jargouy^ has
served the purposes of society under all its
changes and modifications ; and from the swear-
ing, slanging, drinking Duchesses of Whitehall
and the Cockpit, to the coarse, petulant Peer-
esses who presided at Kew, and who hunted
down *^ the pretty fellows'' at Ranelagh ; and
from them to the cold, brusgues^ dull dames who
reign amidst the more decent but less amusing
cot^es of modem fashion, all, in their passing
supremacy, have condemned to utter insigni-
ficance the nobodies who were out of their clique,
and have consigned to obscurity the places whicb
were not consecrated by the exhibition of their
follies, or the display of their power.

But the Duchess had now pris son parti ; and

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84 THE O^B&IXirs AXD

natuit, or of female capnce^ the object to whom
it was devoted profited largely by its direction,
and yielded gradually to its seduction. For
man, however he may adhere to principles, can-
not always command sansations ; and if there is
an age in which the influence of politics and df
pretty women are at odds, O'Brien was yet
far from having attained it He was, indeed,
a devoted patriot. His love of countary partook
of an that passion which leads men to things,
deemed great, or desperate, as circumstances
direct. Life to him was of no vdue, when its
sacrifice could promote the great cause of its
adopticm. But if such is the enthusiasm which
in all causes makes martyrs, 'tis time only that
makes saints; and the honest, but ardent
novice, who now sat exposed to such temptations
as St. Anthony never dreamed of, sighed to
think how much easier it is to sufier with a Mu-
tius, than to resist with a Scipio. Convinced
that the ^^Englnh interest'* was, for obce,
committed to fair hands, he Mty in every lSbte>

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THE O^FLAHERTYft. 85

that it was the female, and not the male oli*
garchy, which could most effectually **do the
king's business."

The society of the vice-regal drawing-room
was now broken up into groups, and formed
into petit pelotons. Incipient flirtations were
forming in the recesses of every window, and
decided affairs were yawning out their ^/^-o-
iStes in evexj corner. Some of the Coryphcei of
the Curragh were betting upon their Eclipses
and their Mrs. Slamakins ; and some histrionici^
of the private theatricals were holding forth on
the rival merits of Mrs. O'Neil and Mrs. Gar-
diner.* The intimates, or particular cortege of
the vice-queen now drew near, and took their
places, as ease and grace directed, round her.

* Two beautiful and accomplished leaders of ^jjat ^^*
best and most intellectual in the Irish hon ton of the ^^^'

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86 TBS o'bbibvs and

who, though many among the attendant graces
were all divine —

^ Yet still the fiedrett queen.
Like Dian *midst her circliDg nymphs, appeared.**

The group was picturesque, and with its acces-
sories of light and shade, of ponderous mirrors,^
md grotesque girandoles, would have painted
well. From the variety ^ colour, form, and
costume, it looked, indeed, like a carnival party
designed by a Callot or a Canaletti, or like an
antique masque got up by Ben Jonson, or de-'
scribed, by Scott. The epoch alluded to was,
indeed, a sort of saturnalia of the toilette; it
was the only interregnum in the despotism of
fashion on record, between the final breaking up
of the old German costume, which came in with
the English revolution, and the Greek, which
came in at the French ; — a brief pause, when
beauty, for once emancipated from the tyranny.

vGooqIc

THS o'fizahsetts. 87

of ion^ pranked, herself as die pleased, and never
looked more beautiful.

The dress of the Duchess (her fstvourite
dress)> a hat and corsage of black velvet, mth
diamond loop and cross, and a petticoat of rose-
coloured satin, full in folds and hue, recalled
the heroine of the ** Merry Wives of Windsor;*'
while Lady Enocklofty (in the same turban and
caftan, in which, a night or two before, she had
played Roxalana), imaged one of those —

•• Formi
Which the bright sun of Persia warms."

Lady Honoria, always original and always
simple, the glass of fashion, but not its reflector.
Height have passed for a Swiss peasant, the
Claudine of Florian, or the prima BaUermaot
the Italian opera. Miss Macguire, plump and
pretty, fat, fair, and twenty-five, wanted but
the cornucopia, to exhibit as the goddess ot*
plenty. The Ladies O'filamey (the Duchess*s
inseparables) who had obtained the name of the.

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88 THX O'BBIBIW AK9

Graces, whom theyreMinbled in liuttib^ai)d
nudity, were draped as if escaping frotn iht
bath, or ready to plunge into it. Others almost
• as fair, and quite aa fanta8tic,^n large, full*
feathered hats, and loosdy flowing tresses^^^-i*
their zones scarcely bound, and their drapery
tearoely fastened (even by the preoautioMTy
jnn of Sir Peter Lely), form^ the outward
line of this nucleus of beauties, who all

** In circles as they stood.
More lovely seemed than wood-nymphs or feign'd
goddesses.**

Hiepresdding deity, the ^* pukherrima UkT
of Irish jobs, and Irish gallantry, beheld the
arms and back of her sofa, surrounded by the
manly, handsome representatives of the youi^
oligsarchy ; while Lord Muckross, the last rdio
of the old, lay at her feet, in the attitude of
Hamlet's fantastic gallantry, playing with her
fans, as iims were played widi when such occu-

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THB O^FLAHtEtTS. 89

pations had their use and influ^ce ; — ^when a
course of ffirtation was not a course of science ;-^
and when love, not lecturing, was the end and
object of the social system of the day.

Among the divauis who were crowding round
tins queen of hearts, were two young looking
persons, evidently in the first evening of their
noviciate at the Irish court. They were both
distinguished by the inalienable inheritance of
the Geraldine race, golden hair, full blue
eye, and a mild benignity of look and smile.
As they now stood, in the prime of youth-
ful beauty, there was a contrast between the
el^ant but manly softness of their thorough
bred air and manner, and the style and bearing
of the o£Scial hierarchy, the cold hauteur of the
Proudfort party, or the broad dashing swagger
of their political followers, and social disciples,
the Kilcolmans, the Eilmallocks, the Eilmain-
faams, and <^ othGa*s.'*

The elder of these two youths was frequently

vGooqIc

90 THE 0*BBIE^8 AND

addressed by the Duchess^ by the title of Lord
Walter Fitzwalter; and the latter by that of
some inherited knighthood of romantic sound,
and historic reminiscence, which bespoke him a
descendant of that heroic branch pf the Geral-
dine family, the Desmonds. They had both
already taken their stand under the oriflamme of
patriotism ; the one destined to attes( the ^n-
cerity of his vocation with his blood, the other
by the sacrifice of almost all ^^Jbrs VhonneurJ^
Such were the men whom the Machiavelian policy
of the day endeavoured to lute into the snares
of power, by baits which rarely fail, but . which
in the present instance did not succeed ; for, if
the heart sometimes yielded, the principle stood
firm.

O'Brien thus encircled, enthralled in ^^ doke
pngicnCy^ was smiled upon by the three graces,
interrogated on his adventures of the night by
Lady Knocklofty (with that anxious maternity
of manner, the more dangerous because the
least suspicious), insidiously cross questioned by

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THE O'FLAHESTTa* 91

Lady Honoria, drawn upon idth a flattering
familiarity by Miss Macgmre^ (who had pro-
mised Lord Kilcolman to ** trot him out**)> ^^
plied by the Duchess with those courteous com-
mon places, which princes and their representa-
tives so well know how to dispense. He replied
to all with an impassioned bashfulnessy and
with an earnestness and ndivetS^ the naturcd
expression of strong excitement. This was hS^
first introduction to the society of British beauty 5
almost the first to the female socitety of any
country. His , young life had been divided
between the ascetic solitude of the wildest part
o£ Ireland, the monastic cells of a foreign coL
lege, and the rude haimts of a foreign camp^
With his eyes now turned on the naturally
impassioned countenance of Lady Knocklofty^
^d now fixed on the splendid orbs of the
Duchess, who archly enjoyed his confusion, —
he answered their multifarious questicms f ^ un-
willingly, he knew not what." But what*

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92 TH£ O'BRIENS AKD

ever he did answer, pleased ; and pleased per-
haps for that very reason: for women ever
prefer the confusion they excite to the wit they
inspire.

" How well he speaks !" said Lady Knock*
lofty to Lady Honoria.

** So did Balaam's ass, when the angel ad-
dressed him/' said Lady Honoria ; '* and you
see the Duchess, the irresistible Duchess, has
already inspired your Cymon.'*

This intimation fell, as it was intended, on
the heart of Lady Knocklofty; who suddenly
interrupting one of her Grace's questions, rose
and said : ** Come, Mr. O'Brien, the Duchess
must not make you forget that you are a
prisoner on parole, that I am responsible for
your surety, and that Captain O'Mealy must
return to his guard, and will conduct you to
your prison-house."

"As long,^^ said the Duchess, laughing, ** as

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THJ5 O'FLAWPITTS. 9*

, *• Mr. O'Brien does not, perhaps, fed to,^
said Lord Muckross.

<^ Whea cUef xpeets chiefs then cornea the
tug of waTf" iwhispared Lady Honoria to Mis$
Macguire, delighted wkh the struggle to power
betwe^a the rival beauties.

Lady Enooklofiy replied eoldly to the
Duchess's observation, <^ I believe my guard is
relieved. But Mr. O'Brien should know that
the Serjeant waits for him in the yeoman^s hall ;
and he must not be found here, when the Lord
Lieutenant comes out of the dining-room.*'

" That wont be ere rise of sun," sung forth
Miss Macguire, a stock witch in Macbeth : ^< for
I have observed, when once his Grac^ passes
midnight at table, like other spirits, he never
retires till cock-crow."

** Then let us have supper,^ said the
Duchess; ^ and place little Gore, aa a vi-
dette to warn us of the enemy^s approach.
When ^tis time to dismiss our Captain, I'll
give him his iouguei d^aditu.

vGooQle

94 THE o'brieks and

** Give it him now then," said Lady Knock*
lofty, whose temper brooked no controul ; ^* for
I must go ; and I will not stir till Mr. C^Brien
is delivered back to the serjeant of the guard.^

** Well, do give it to him. Duchess, and
rdieve Lady Knocklofty from her responsi-
bility," said Lady Honoria significantly, and
throwing her eyes, with a look, understood by
the Duchess, on that beautiful bust where

** Nel bel sen le peregrine rose,
Giunte ai nativi gigli.''

The Duchess, with more of playfulness than of
discretion, and more occupied with teasing an
imperious rival, than in supporting her own
dignity, actually drew from the bouquet that
onmmented her bosom, a rose, and then looked
and smiled; but still she paused! O'Brien^s
eyes followed the movement of her beautiful
hand ; and his unpractised gallantry, antidpat-
ing her intention, was almost ready to bend

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THE O'FLAHEETYS. 95

his knee to the ground, to receive the precious
flower, half held out to him,

** Fairies use flowers for their charactery.
You are a happy man, Mr. O'Brien,'* said Lord
Muckross ; •^ and he cast a reproving look at
the Duchess ; who, at once recalled to herself
by the remark, let the flower carelessly fall upon
the carpet O'Brien darted forward to seiae
it, but it was already under the foot of Lady
Knocklofty.

" Tour de comidie des plus plmsans,^^ said
Lady Honoria, clapping her hands; while the
Duchess, piqued, and now ^* every inch a wo-
man,*^ and not an inch a queen, said,

f^ Well, Mr. O'Brien, never mind, you shall
have a fresher flower, another day ; and it shaU
not be a bouquet d^ adieu f"

^^ Your Grace may console, but cannot com-
pensate,'' said the object of this flattering contest,
almost inarticulate from emotion. <f The flower
with which you intended to honour me, was'*
r-f^ consecrated,'*' he was about to say ; but he

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96 THK o'bEIENS AXD

paused. He felt he was saying too much, and
saying it awkwardly; and yet he had said
nothing, nothing that expressed his feelings.

" 'Tis sport to you, but death to him,*'
whispered Lord Walter in the Duchess's ear,
in strong sympathy, with feelings fresh and
ardent as his own.

" Come," said the Duchess, good humour-
edly, " sit down, my dear Lady Knocklofty, and
grant a few minutes longer furlough to your
prisoner : he must take some refreshment
before he goes. So, Arthur,^' (turning to the
youngest aid-de-camp in waiting), " order sup-
per, and gather up those flowers, which Lord
Kilcolman has thrown down with his Atlas
shoulders."

Arthur flew to execute his lady's commands,
— to order supper, ere the fulness of time sent
him to order armies ; and to pick up prostrate

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TH£ 0*FLAH£RTYS. 97

Ccmntess and her captive had entered, and A%^
covered the little apartment leading to the round
rocmi in fiirmingham Tower ; which looked like
<^ Pozncnia^s bower,^ ornamented with spring
foliage and aromatic shrubs, and filled with
tables, which, though not piled with ^^angei
food,^ groaned under more substantial fare, and
were set off with

** fruits of delicious vines
With freshest flowers crowned."

The odour of rSis and ragouts, more gracious
to the exhausted forces of rompers and rattlers,
than that " shed from love'*s dewy wings,**' now
caused an universal desertion from the drawing^
iDom. A genenil rush took place; none standing
^^ on the order of their going"**but going ^^ at
once," with an indifference to forms and eti-
quettes «[iough to make the majei^c portrait of
^e Dudhess of Ormond (which hung over the
reigning Duchesses head) start irom its frame,

VOL. II. V

vGooqIc

98 THE 0*BBI£1QS AND

and to faire frinivr d^horreur^ the presiding
chamberlains of castle ceremonies, v A hiffei
was served in the drawing-room, in the centre of
the Duchesses select . circle, with fairy elegance
and magical celeri,ty. . Iced Champagne, and ah
high seasoned Mayence yfcre the principal item$
selected by her Excellency's rnaztre d'hoteli
who, besides being lineally descended from, that
preux of the kitchen, Vatel, had served in the
petits appartemens of Monceaux ; where luxury
still raised altars, of which Madame de Genlis
doubtless never dreamed, amidst the convent
cells of Belle. Chasse.

. At ,this period, supper was no less the ftu
vourite meal of the Irish, than it had been of the
Romans and the French. Conviviality was then
the predominant quality of their temperament ;
and the most excitable of all people were most
excited by that light but stimulating meal,
pver which care in any country rarely holds, an
influence. The guests of her'Grace^s round t$ibk

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THE o'FLAHEETYS, 99

seemed to quaff wit with their wine ; many a bon
mot followed many a bonne botiche ;

•* Et Pesprit qui vient du corps,
£n bien mangeant r^monte ses ressorU/*

Tokay was recommended, Burgundy was sipped,
the Champagne circulated rapidly ; and looks as
sparkling, though not as cold, gave it a zest
worth all the boraccio in the world. The old
Irish fashion of kissing the cup, to pass it to the
re^ was quoted by the young knight of the
G^aldines, and practised by the fair lady he
pledged. The old. earl repeated his usual
chanson cL boire —

^* Nous n'avons qu*un terns k vivre
' Amisy passons le gaiement/'

and there was not a dissenting voice to the

doctrine ; while all, in the full enjoyment of the

hour, seeined to feel that the present is the miU

r2

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teniiiuiD of die wise, *^ et que Vavenir est aux
fausr

While the grosser senses were thus (engaged,
that which is most the slave of the imagination
was fed with the magic of sweet sounds. A
jSne Grerman miUtary band played in an adjoin-
ing room, those deUcious, languid measures,
(then a novelty in Ireland,) which have since
had such vogue; — an appropriate accompani-
ment to the smothered '^ colloquies divine,"
which say so little and mean so much. It was
in that tone of voice, so indistinct to all but the
ear to which alone it is addressed, that Lady
Knocklofty continued to flatter to intoxication
the auditor, to whom she addressed herself;
who, inspired by the double philtre, poured
from flasks and eyes, was jdelding up the reserve
of pride and the shyness of inexperience, to
blandishments, powerful in proportion to their
novelty. The canon law against grandmothers
is not 80 absurd as some may imagine ; and the

vGooQle

THB o'FI^AHERTyg. 101

syren of forty has always a chance against the
sylph of fifteen, when the object is still of that
age, when passion is not nice, and when the smile
that solicits is, under all circumstances, worth
the frown that repulses.

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102 TUS O^BBIEKS A^i>

CHAPTER III.

THE FEOLIC CONTINUED.

Puis dit k I'ane ; ** Or conte moi ta vie,
Bt guardes tol Men d'omettre an seul fait ;
Car li ta faux, je ne te fandrai pas."
L'ane eraignant de reeevoir puissance
R^pond ainsi.

Whtle chacun avec sa chacime. uttered an
infinite deal of nothings that meant every thing,
and said every thing that meant nothing, the
excitement of the scene passed with all, for the
exuberance of sensibility, or the fervour of wit.
Every man fancied himself in We^ and every
woman believed it. All in their turn contributed
to the general festivity, and kindled at the re-
dprocal corruscations of gaiety, emitted from eyes
that sparkled, and lips that smiled. Even per-
sons, by thdr calling and mamhe d'Sire, the
most displaced in such revels, partook oft the
tone and spirit of the moment, and sanctioned

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THE o'FLAHERTYS. 103

i)y their presence the follies which they did not
]^)ersonall J promote ; while their individual pe-
culiarities and professional exterior of gravity
served to promote the fun, which such contrasts
ever heightens.

Among the latter class, was the Honourl
able and Reverend Lady Mary Sullivan,
mcnre usually called the " good Lady Mary,"
sister of Lord Knocklofty, and the wiffe of the
bishop of St. Grdlan. ' Her place, as she de-
dared, being assigned by Providence " among
publicans and sinners/' she yielded with sub-
mission to its dispensations ; and was as seldom'
absent from the public entertainments, or private
parties of the castle, as her husbiand; the bishop,
was from its levees and audiences. Gifted, how-
ever, like the rest of her order, with a restless
abounding of sanctity, in season and out of
season, her precepts and her preachments
yidded ample food for mystification, while they
awakened an affected respect for her "good-
ness 'f* and when she got credit for her intentions

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104 THE O^BBIENS AND

she did not the less provoke infinite mirth by
their displaced fervour and sincerity. She now-
sat at the Duchess's petit saiiper^ eating her
ice with an air of sober self-denial, such as that
with which Madame de Maintenon fasted on a
herring, while all around feasted on flesh at the
merry banquets of the Hotel Scarron,

Next to Lady Mary stood the very reverend
the Archdeacon of St. Grellan, soaking a Na-
ples biscuit in a glass of Tokay ; himself suffi-
ciently soaked to render the advice of that dear
friend and patroness nearly unavailable. To her
urgent entreaties that he should follow the ex-
ample of the Bishop, who had retired from the
dining-table, without appearing in the Duchess's
circle, he opposed the pertinacity of a fuddled
man ; and he continued to hold his ground,
though he could scarcely keep his feet ; and to
stick to a theme which had enlisted some of the

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105

youth, who, being pkoed between thow to
whom <^ all Ushops, priests, and deacons^ then
bowed, as ^^ the givers of all good things," had
become the aceidental object of the Archdeaccm's
envy, as he habitually was the natural sub-
ject of his malice. For the Reverend Joshua
Hunks was the son and successor, in the arch*
deaconry, of the Reverend James Hunks, whose
title to the estates of Moycullen had been de-
feated by O'Brien's father, some three-and-twenty
years before, in favour of the Count O'Flaherty.
Hovering near, without being invited to join
the gay and fair party of the Duchesses petU
couverty he resembled, in his dusky canonical^
a croaking raven among a flock of birds of bril-
liant song and feather ; and he fixed the victim of
his meditated attack, (as monkeys and maniacs se-
lect the objects of their mischievous antipathies,)
with an obstinacy which the prudent councils of
the *^ good Lady Mary,'* fiwr once, could not
disturb. Primed with port and persecution, the
flu^h of excess burning on his cheek, the power
f3

f

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106 THE O'BBIENS and

of protestant asc^idancy. beetling pa his brow, ^
the consecrated bacchant was a prophetic image
of the ^ore modem members pf his caste, who,
intolerant at the board as in the pulpit, and in- •
temperate in both, make <^ sweet religion .a living .
fountain of gall,'^ and render society . one pro-
tracted feast ,of the Lapithae. Full of ire . and
envy, with every irascible passion mopnted by
wine, the Archdeacon had, with difficulty, re-
ibtrained himself from a formal attack on the lion
of the ni^ht, at the first moment when he had
found him engaging the attentions of Lady
Knocklofty ; and when the Duchess, with the
ktourderk oi a great lady, remembering nothing
that did not directly concern herself, inquired of
Mr. O'Brien, ** if he was not of the illustrious
house of Inchiquin,'^ the Archdeacon suddenly
burst forth, and interrupting the answer of the
person addressed, exclaimed —

^^ Lest the young gentleman ^ould be too
modest to answer for himself, Madam, I can
answer for him that he is not of the Inchiquin

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THE O'PLAHEETYS. 107

family. He is, I think, the son of a townsman
of mine, one Terence O'Brien, an attorney, who,
having first brought himself into note by a
litigious victory over my father, the late Arch-
deacon of St. Grellan, in favour of a foreign
papist, contrived afterwards to ruin himself by
the pursuit of a dormant title ; for the recovery
of which he was indebted to the impatience of a
committee of privilege, to which the king had
rrferred him. Worried out with his pretensions,
contained in volumes of fiisty parchments, they,
some time back^ declared him a peer on his
petition in forma pauperis. Upon which, by
way of a grateful return, he must needs become
a relapsed papist. I believe the young gentleman
is also nephew to the two jacobite old ladies, the
Misses Mac Taaf, who so vehemently opposed
the Proudforts at the last election, and with a
few paltry freeholders nearly turned the scale in
favour of young Mr. Daly.*" j ;

The brutality of this speech, whidi would not
have been made in so gross a form, except under

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108 THE o'BSISVS AVB

the iniMnoe of inebriety, bad its natural effect ;
it produced di^ust towards tbe reverend cfaro->
nider, in all not prejudiced against O'Brien ; and
these were principally tbe women. By putting
Lady Knocklofty in the wrong, it put her in a
rage, not the less violent for being necessarily
suppressed; and by clouding the gaiety of the
moment, it annoyed the Duchess, and almost
tempted her to desire the page in waiting to
order the archdeacon's carriage ; since, like all
the great, her Grace could suddenly draw up,
and dash down obtrusive presumption, with the
same hand that had capriciously caressed it into
its perilous familiarity. But O'Brien instantly
and exclusively fixed her attention on himself,
by coolly observing to her inquiries, (while the
expression of his countenance spoke the struggle
of indignant fdeling, and the effort he made
upon himself)—

«* I am much flattered by your Grace's in-
quiries, and as I could ^ but little grace my tale
in speaking of myself,' as the archdeacon has

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THE «>VM«EBTy8. 109

ob^rted, I sm much oMiged by his antictpath^
the little I could say. I am, indeed. Madam,
the son of the poorest peer in the realm, whose
misfortunes are involired in those of his country ;
and who, in early life, pwsecuted into apostacy
by that gentleman's family, has lately redeemed
an involuntary error, by abjuring it. Of the
anecdote he has rdated of my two female re*
kitions, I was ignorant ; but I rejoice to learn
that they have had the moral courage to oppose
power in its strong hold, to assert the elective
franchise, and permit their tenants to vote as
conscience dictates. For the rest. Madam, I
have no occasion to blush for a family, whose
hereditary rank sanctions the condescenmon
which places me in the enviable position I now
occupy ; and whose poverty is at least a proof of
the uncompromising honesty which has accom*
panied a title that never was bought or sold."

*< Bravo ! Mr, O'Brien,'' said the Duchess,
who, with every woman in the room, was, for
the moment, a partizan of the frank and spirited

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110 THE O'BRIENS AND

speaker—" Bravo ! I will take my iced sherbet
to your Champagne. Will you, Lady Knock-
lofty, like a generous enemy, be de la partie ?"

^* With all my heart," said Lady Knocklofty,
gaily ; and both ladies, laughing and nodding,
touched their glasses with that of O'Brien ; while
the rest of the fair guests bowed, and sipped, and
smiled at one, " who, rich in title, if not in
wealth," had been endowed by nature with grace,
spirit, eloquence, and beauty, — qualities which
never fall unacknowledged upon female appre-
hensions.

From these, however, were to be excepted the
Lady Honoria and Miss Macguire: the latter had
views on Lord Kilcolman, which an obvious
admiration of the hero of the evening might not
promote ; and the former, on the arrangements of
the house of Proudfort, which the prepossession
of Lady Knocklofty, if carried beyond a mere

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THE o'FLAHSBTYS. Ill

omened bird of prey, dmppointed in his aim,
and waitii^ for another pounce.

"I suspect, Mr. O'Brien,*' said Lord Muck-
ross, who fancied he saw in the spirited youth
^' un mtUador de sa jmntaw^^ ^^ that notwith-^
standing your very Irish name and birth, your
education has been foreign, and '^

^^ Oh ! that is obvious from his bow," inter<-
rupted Lady Honoria, in her wonted tone of
irony, ^* which bow, by the bye, I remarked at
the review to-day. You mere Irish may smile
as you will, but there i^ an air acquired by
foreign education, which not all the dmicing
masters in Ireland, from dear Fontaine, ^ avec
sesgraces^^ to Faddy Flanaghan, with his ^ dance
up to the griddle, and down to the broom,^ can
neither give nor take away. You have lived
much in other and better worlds than this, our
iMma Thvle, Mr. O'Brien,'' added Lady Ho.
noria, with a significant look at Lord Kileol-
man, and a knot of kindred spirits of which he
was the centre and the soul.

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Ill

With the sensitive iqpprehensiQn of a morind
pride, always on the qui tme^ because ahrays
at odds with finlune, O'Brien had intercepted
this look ; and ik>w suspecting himself the butt
of the foolish and fashionable practice of hoax-
ii^ (the quizzing of that day), he took hb
position of defence, and with lance in guard,
was ready to meet the assault with at least as
much force, if not with as much coolness as it
was made. He replied therefore, drily,

" I have served abroad. Madam."

" Mass,'' whispered Miss Macguire to JLord
Kilcolman, who ans!^ered in his Munster
brogue —

*" I'll ingage ! I wonder what the devil
Lady Knocklofty and the Duchess see in the
fellow, to make such a fuss about him P"

** Oh ! he is very handsome," said Miss
Macguire. ** Lady Knocklofty says he has
quite a Roman head."

" Roman catholic, I suppose she manes,"
said Lord Kilcolman, laughing at his own wit,

vGooQle

m O'TLAHfilJtTYS. lis

and unmuidful of Miss Macgiiire'K precaution-
ary faint of *' Hudi, for gracious sake, Lord
K. ; if you don*t take care, we shall all be pro*
perly unpopular. You had better go with the
itream?**

^* If I do I'll be d— Hi!'^ said his Lord,
ship. ** Upon my honour and soul, I never saw
such a coxcomb in my life.^

<^ Do you mean,** smd Lord Muckross to
O'Brien, " by having served abroad, that you
have borne a commis^on in some foreign
army ?"

" I mean, my Lord,*" said O'Brien, now sus-
picious of every question, and irritated by the
look and laugh of Miss Macguire and Lord
Kilcolman, ^* I mean that I have served abroad
as other mercenaries have served at home ; and
have been driven by neces»ty to turn that into
a trade, which ought to be a profession — fighting
for any cause, good or bad, that I wias hired to
defend. I have been for some years in the Aus*
trian army — ^

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114 THE O^BRIENS AND

^ Lord Muckross drew up, and* bridled like
one of Richardson's "charmerfe." There was
something revolutionary in this;, answer, some-
thing of the new democratic school, that touched
his aristocracy to the quick, and^ diminished
his prepossession in favour' of the imprudent
speaker* . *

" Your definition is a singular one, Sir," said
an old Colonel 6f the battle-axe, whose service had
been confined to the castle yard; "and allow-
me to say, as one who has borne His Majesty's
commission for thirty years, that if it be a trcide
to serve one's king and country, hired or not,
it is a glorious one.''

" It has not been my good fortune to be per-
mitted to serve either. Sir," ' said O'Brien.-
. *' In the late war I should have fought against
the interest and honour of both ; and I rejoice'
that I was then too young to bear arms in a
ocmtest, which lost England the best of h^
cdonies abroad, and exposed the weakness of

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rtHE o'flahebtys. 115

tfa<s.coiincils which t6o long had governed her
at home;."

r " Ou/r exclaimed Lady Honoria, ** and
this witiiin two steps of Birmingham towe^ r
. Eyery one looked astonished at the utterance
of a speech^ to say the least of it, so impudent and
misplaced ; while the divine chuckled, rubbed
hi3 bands, and whispered something in the ear
<rf the good Lady Mary, who in reply added — ^
**i'Ay,. and atheistical too." Even the good
humoured Duchess looked displeased ; and Lady
Knocklofjby, rousing a little page, who lay half
asleep on a. pile of cushions behind her, said,

f ** Go, my dear, into the supper-room, and-
t^. Captain O'Mealy, that Mr. O'Brien is ready
io attaad him to the guard^house whenever he
l^easesi'^

The sleepy page toddled off, rubbing his eyes, *
and told O'Mealy that. he might return to the
guard^room whenever he pleased. Captain
O'Mealy^ however, Ylid not please to return till

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116 THE O'BRIENS AN1>

he had finished a tumbler of punch royal, in
which he was joined by his friend, Sir Phelini
O'FIyn.

" If you have served in the Emperor of
Austria's army," continued Lord Muckross,
" which, for one so young, is a singular event,
and for a student of Trinity College, I believe,
an unprecedented circumstance, you proba->
bly have seen my old friend the Marechal
Lacy, and can give me some account of him ;
and of that Prince of wits and preux, the charm-
ing Prince de Ligne, the boon companion of
some of my gayest days, aye, and nights too.^'

" I carried the colours of the Prince's regi-
ment under the walls of Oczakow,** said O'Brien
eagerly, "and had the honour of serving as his aid-
de-camp in the last campaign. To the Marechal
Lacy I have the honour to be related, and the
happiness of being obliged, I owed to his pro-

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THE o'FLAHERTYS. 117

des HtToadu siiclej* the other the model and in-
spiration of oU the young military, for whom he
has done so much^ boUi by precept and example.*'

^^ I am enchanted to hear it,'* said the old
£arl, warming to the reflection of his early
reminiscences : for he had been the Adonis
of Maria Theresa's Court; and the imperial
prude had even ^ven him the name of Le bel
Irlcmdois^ with a snuff-box, which he now
proudly produced, exhibiting her formal fea--
iures and powd^ed Umpie^ ornamented with a
sky-blue ribbon, and a rose on her exp^ded
bosom, as full and faded as her cheek. He
<K>ntiiiued, in a tone of great exhilaration, <^ Ah!
e'itoient des beaua Jours r

*« What an old twaddle !" said Lady Ellen
O'Blorney, passing the box to Miss Mac-
guire.

^^ Twaddle ! She w^as beautiful !*^ exclaimed
Lord Muckross. " Beautiful, as she was clever.
Your Emperor, Mr. O'Brien, was a great man,
but not so great a man as Ins mother.'*

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118 THE o'bBIENS AKB

A general laugh succeeded this observation.
Lord Muekross pleaded his privilege.
' ^^ I should have said, not so great a sovereign
as his mother."

- *^ There are many in the present day, my
lord," said O'Brien, ** of. a -different opinion."

'^ Yes, the French democrats,'Vsaid his Lord*
ship, . with whom O'Brien again lost ground,
'5 who expect that the emperor will some day
lay down his sceptre, like his great ancestor,
and joining their convention, exchange his iron
crown for a bonnet rouged

" The emperor himself, my lord,^ said O'Brien,
^^ has encouraged no such expectations ; for.
though less foolish than many of his royal con-
temporaries, he has frankly declared, ^ son metier
a lui est d^etre roi,^ Opposed, as he is, to the
dull race of Hapsburg, laugh as he may at the
follies of his aulic council, and disposed as he
has.been to partial reforms in the barbarous in-
sututions of his. Gothic government, he is at^
best but an hi^py accident in a bad system^'

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THE O^FLAHEBTYS. 110

irhpse defects he may ameliorate! but will never
remove."

^* The government of Austiia,'' said Lord
Muckross, " is at least as good, as the wretched
people for whom it exists deserve. But, I sus«-
pect, Mr. O'Brien, that you have lived more in
France than in Germany,. from the colour of
your (pinions ; for. these are not the doctrines of
th^ salons of Vienna.'' * .

** I have only visited France, my lord, for a
few months in my way hpme," was the reply ;
f' and only remained there as the.guest of a dear
old friend, and former preceptor, the now cele-
brated Bishop of J - " , one of the constitutional
clergy of France."

" You must have seen some hot work," said
the Earl, " during your service in the Austrian
army. Your emperor did not let the swords of
his troops rest in their scabbards. He was, how-
ever, sometimes more prompt, than prudent.
The Tuffks beat you back pas a pas, in spite

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120 THE 0*BRIE\S AND

of the united arms of Potemkin and Saxe Co-
bourg, at one time."

" I had not the mortification of witnessing the
defeat you allude to— I was then with my regi-
ment at Florence. But it was my good luck,
shortly after, to join the grand army, under
Marshal Loudhon, at Belgrade, and to see the
power of the barbarous masters of the Greeks
crumble before a force at least one degree less
barbarous than themselves."

'' Are you a disciple of the Greek cause ?''^
asked Lord Walter eagerly; who had hstened
with much attention and interest, to the im-
prudent but emphatic answers of one, whose
ardour he shared, but whose misplaced frank-
ness he regretted.

" I am fanatically so, my Lord," answered
O'Brien, smiling.

"* I wonder you do not volunteer your service

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^

fTHs o'flahebtys. 121

, << I have no great confidence in her int^i-
Uoas ;'* said CBrien* ^* A Russian autocrat
Boay plan the erection of a throne on the borders
0t the Euxine ; but the partitioner of Poland,
can never advance the cause of freedom and
justice, nor the mistress of a nation of slaves,
give liberty to other nations."

" Liberty and equality for ever f muttered
'Lord Kilcolman«

^^ French atheism and philosophy," whifi^red
die Archdeacon to Lady Mary.

^^ If you take the Greek cause out of the
bands of Russia,^' said Lord Walter, *^ I fear
you leave it hopeless.^

♦* I should hope not," said O'Brien. <* There
if a nation, which nature points out as the ally
^ the Greeks, (resembling them in character
and intellect),— a nation, which now struggling
for its own liberty, may one day assist in giving
back to Greece the rights that called into
existence her Pericles and her Themistocles,
her Solons and Lycurguses,-^^ nation, which

VOL. II. tt

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182 THE o'brijens ako

having already annihilated the exclusive aiyd
pernicious privileges' of its own worn out insti-
tutions, may—"

^^ France, of course !" nodded Lord Muck*
ross. O^Brien bowed assent.

"How eloquent!*' whispered Lady Knock-
lofty to Lady Honoria.

. ^^ And how discreet,"" replied her Ladyship.
" How he * consults in all the genius of the
phice.''^

" One may be goaded to say anything, any-
where," rejoined Lady JB^nocklofty ; ** but it is
delightful to see any one think so freshly, and
speak so frankly, and so unlike every thing and
every body else/*

** I am sorry to perceive, Mr* O'Brien,*' said
Lord Muckross, ^^ that like many other young
Irishmen of the present times, whose heads are
as hot as their hearts, you are infected with
doctrines of the new revolutionary school ; and
though it always shews blood, when a young
steed resents the bit, and kicks at the curb s^t

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THE O'FLAHEBTYS. 1M

first starting, jet it b necessary to take care
that such a spirit does not degenerate into vice.'"
^^ In this country^ my Lord, our spirit has
been so thoroughly broken, that it is the spur,
and not the curb, that is wanting. Those who
have been for centuries under the yoke, and like
the racers of the Roman corso, are hemmed in
on all sides, may be trusted without bit or rider.
It requires but a little hooting and whooping
to drive them to the desired goal.^*

^^ Nothing can save him, my dear," said Lady
Honoria. " Tite de victime^ entendez xfousf^*

'* I suppose. Sir,"** said Lord Kilcolman, **you
have returned here, for the purpose of offering
your services in reviving that deficient spirit,—
that spirit which has already produced such
admirable effects in France."

" I would do so. Sir, with all my soul," re-
plied O^Brien, with uncontrollable petul^mce,
^' if I thought such services as mine could
become available."

"Jockey of Norfolk be not too bold r tnuttared
g2

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144 THE o'bbieks and

Lady Honork ; while Lord Muckross, feeHng
for the perilous impetuosity of one so unguarded,
whom he himself had drawn out, said, good
Jiaturedlv,

' *' Come, Mr. O'Brien, I will not take advan-
tage of a fervour kindled, I suppose, in the
Historical Society of the University, where
you young orators, I hear, sometimes say very
eloquent, but very foolish things. I will venture
to assert now, that you are the Demosthenes of
that, or of some other debating society, where
young people overthrow old empires and ima^ne
Kfew.**

V ^^ The ^ Devil' in Temple Bar, or the « Black
Boar,' in the Strand," said Lord Kilcolman, in-
solently and laughingly.

** My Lord, I have the honour of being an
humble member of the society you mention," said
O'Brien, turning to Lord Muckross ; " a society
which, so long as it is permitted to exist,
with Locke for its legislator, and Grattan for
its model, will, indeed^ assist in reviving that

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THE o'FLAHERIYS. IH^

national spirit, and awakening that national elo-
quence, without which, nations can have no po^
litical existence, nor any adequate champions of
their rights. I have also recently been present at
another assembly, not held at the ' Devils,' or
the * Black Boar/ but in the Jeti de Paume,
at Versailles, consisting of the representatives of
the greatest nation upon earth. I was present
when they swore never to separate, till they give
a constitution to their country, founded upon
the overthrow of those oligarchical privileges in
church and state, which had been alike fatal to
the independence of the king and to the rights
of the people* I was present, also, at the de-
molition of the Bastile, and I cannot help add-
ing to this confession, the boast of having been
one of those young men who gave the first coup
de hachet to the chains of the portcullis, which
led to all that followed."

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126 THE o'beiens and

ceptions, all admired the speaker, even though
they disapproved the speech. A short silence
ensued, which was broken by Lord Kilcolman's
observing, in a half whisper to Lady Honoria,
" He is come of a good school."

" To try the bird, the spur must touch his
blood," said Lord Walter to Lady Knocklofty.

" Yes," said Lady Knocklofty, " and the bird
turns out to be a young eagle."

" A young goose !" whispered Lady Honoria ;
" and a goose more likely to betray than to save
the Capitol, I suspect."

*' Come,"' said the Duchess, no longer amused
by the conversation, and therefore now fully
alive to its impropriety, "'no more politics,
for patience sake. Miss Macguire, pray sing,
* Arrah ! wall you marry me ;' ' La Marmotte^
or any thing you please ; only sing."

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THB O'FLAHEETTS. 127

lively^ and rising to break the circle and to draw
€^ others from the quarry which (in the language
of hawking) she had ruffed, but not carried.

^^ I cannot ^g without my guitar,'^ said Misft
Macguire^ to whom such imperious commands
were familiar, as they were unresented.

^< Do somebody get her a guitar/^ cried Lady
Knocklofty, who, in the conscious power of
greatness, expected to find every thing ishe
wanted, every where she wished.

;" Do look for a guitar, Freddy Fitzjohn,^
said the Duchess.

^^ Where shall I look for it ?"* drawled out the
little secretary, with his mouth full of sugar-
plums, as in all the dignity of office, he sat
apart from the group.

^^ Look into the back-gammon box," said Lady
Honoria, gravely.

<' Will this do," said Lady Mary O'Blam^,
drawing her fingers ovef the chords of a beauti-
ful French harp, which, with its highly oma*

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1S8 THB o'bribkb A^ny

mented Hui, stood in a remote comer oi tb^

room.

Its deep soft tones, even when touched by

unskilAil bands, brought to the preoccupied

mind of 0*Brien, a recollection of the air he bad

heard in the throne room. It also recalled to
i

the Duchess the performer who had so finely
played it, unasked and unrewarded.

^^ By the bye, what has become of the harpist.
Sir James?" she inquired, languidly.

<< She has just slipped oflP, I believe,^ sud the
chamberlain: ^^a few minutes back I goth^m
glass of wine and some macaroons ; fen: she was
yery weary, and perhaps a little mortified at not
h&ng asked to perform again."

<^ Poor thing ! donH fail to send her something
in the morning— fiv.^, or ten guineas, or what-
": ever you think right She sung that Italian air
prettily, though she had a very husky voice."

/* Husky r said Lord Muckross, a professed
amitteur, and president of the IriabPhilharmonios.

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THE oVlaheutts. ^ 199

" The very finest contra-alto ! a quality of voice
which has become extremely rare, even in Italy.
But you all made such a xioi^se, it was quite
enough to confound her. Where did you jMck
her up. Duchess?^

. *< Don't remember at all,'^ said the Duchess ;
*<so many send petitions to exhibit before *her
Excellency, at the castle,' that somehow or other
I mix them all up together. I thought we were
to have had the musical passes, Sir James, or
the harmonica, or something.''

*' Mr. Cartwright, Madam, sent an apology
to say he was ill ; so I accepted this Italian
lady's proposition, whpse note I read to your
Grace at your toilette, on your return from the
l»view."*'

^* Oh, yes I I remember — that is, I forget
311 about it''

" It was simply to beg your Grace's patron-
age, and permission to play at your party
this evening ; desirous, of course, to be brought
forward by your Grace's notice. It appears
g3

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13d

THE O^BRIBNS AVU

^ is but just ani?ed in Dublin, and means to
give concerts.

** WeD," said the Duchess, ** we are all
down, I suppose, for subsciiptions ; but send her
something all the same.^

^* I really. Madam, do not know where to
send to her. There is no address to her note,
and her messenger waited for his answer."

^* Don*t be alarmed,'^ said Lady Honoria,
^^ she will not let you forget her. Besides, th^re
is her harp in pledge, which will be redeemed
with ten dozen of tickets, and a request for
your Grace'^s name, patronage, and protec*
tion."

^< What an odd. lookmg old trot it is,^ said
Lady Eleanor O'Blamey, ^^ coming here in a
coal-box bonncft, and black mode cloak. These
foreigners are always such odd, ugly creatures ;
don't you think so. Lord Walter?"

♦* Not always," said Lord Walter, laughing.
^^ This person, though disfigured by her dress,
outd buried under the shadow of her horrible

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'81

tHE O'tLAHERTYS. 181

bonnet and balloon handkerchief, seemed nddier
old nor ugly. Her eyes, when they glanced
through the short, black curtain which shaded
them, were most enchantingly fine; but as I could
not speak Italian, I could make nothing of her."^
At this moment a little page entering the
room, cried out in a fluttered voice ** the Lord
Lieutenant !" while the aid-de-camp on service,
throwing open another door, the dinner
party (those at least who, at an earlier bout
had not left the table, gone home, or remained
under it) came forth. They entered the draw-
ing-room with a burst of noise and laughr
ter, which called from Lady Honoria the
invocation of ** Mirth, admit of your crew !"
Taking the offered arm of Lord Enocklofty,
she led him to a sofa, with a vigilant precau-
tion, of which the president of the privy council
seemed to stand in need. The Duke mean-
time hurried joyously, but not very steadily on,
followed by his merry court ; his eyes sparkling,
his cheek flushed, and his hair disordered ; and

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IS2 THE o'bRIEVS AN0

beauty and inebriety combining to give to
his fine person the air of the youthful Bacchus,
chiselled by a Buonaroti, or painted by an Al-
bano. It was in vain that his privy council
endeavoured to look as sober as their calling.
The keeper of the seals could not keep his legs
— the attorney-general was served with a ru>l%
prosequi — the speaker could not articulate a
syllable — and the King's solicitor suffered judg-
ment to go by default ; while the chief baron
(an old stager), rejected the admonition of hi«
brother, who was also his register, with '' be aisy,
you omadaun*^'^ and spouted out theatrically —

•* We are state drunkards —

Who shows a sober eye's a traitor.

And I arrest him in the name of the Viceroy."

On the first announce of the Lord Lieu-
tenant, Lady Knocklofty (who, under the pre-

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XHS O^FLAHEETTS. 1S3

have been a violation of th^ articles of her
treaty with the Dukei and of all the forma of
iiensiance)y gently drew him from the room
into St Patrick's hall. The spacious amplitude
was hghted only by a single lamp, placed for
the convenience of the servants, and by the
silver beams of a bright full moon. Through
an open door at the furthest extremity of 4he
apartment, was visible the long, illuminated vista
of the corridor^ by which they had first entered
the apartments, with the armoury intervening, .

** There is your route," she said : " I will send
0*Mealy to join you, if he be not already gone ;
but,^' she added, emphatically, ^< if he be, I
think, Mr. 0*Brien, I may with safety trqst to
your honour.'*

^^ In the present instance, Madam,^ said
O'Brien, laughing, << the trust is so trifling, that
I think you may. But, in any instance, I hope
you will believe, that pne whom you have dis-
tinguished by your notice^ wiU never prove unr
worthy of your confidence."

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134 THE o'BEIENS AVi}

** yes,** she «aid, gaily; " but you ver^
young men have such odd ideas of honour.
Beffldes, you are so indiscreet — so impetus
ous. You compromised yourself this evening,'
in a manner which, had you been my son, I
should indeed have gloried in, but not without
trembling."

*' Vour son ! Oh, Lady Enocklofty, what an
incongruous idea!— But would you have your
brotha*, or your friend, under such circum-
stances, speak otherwise, than as truth and feel-
ing dictated; or truckle to the insolence of
arrogant rank, and deny the principles by which
he is ready to stand or fall ?'^

" All this is very noble and very fine, but
very imprudent: I cannot, however, stay to
dispute against qualities J adniire ; were I
to consult my own feelings and sentiments, I
-should not perhaps have you think or speak
<itherwise than you did. Strange as it may
«ppear to you, Mr. O'Brien, though obliged by
circumstances to live with those, whom I—: — but

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JTHE O^PLAHKRTYS. 1S£

(she added, with a deep sigh, for she had be-
gun to " ef^Uer la grande route du sentimeniy^)
^^ I must bid you good night, or good mom*
ing. Yet, ere I go. Jet me gratefully acknow-
ledge a debt, the sum of which is nothing less
than life. I am aware it is not to be cancelled ;
but this — ^give me your hand,'' — (and she placed
a ring on his finger) — ** this, when you look on
it, may recal one, whose will to serve you, you
must never doubt, however feeble her power."

^^ Good heavens ! Madam, how can you talk
thus of a commcm act of instinctive hiunanity !^
siud O'Brien, in confusion, and retaining the
hand, while he gently rejected the ring it pre-
sented. " I cannot,'' he added, " indeed, I
cannot accept of any thing so valuable, or
rather so valueless, when compared with words
so precious as have now fallen from lips
which "

" Valueless, indeed," interrupted Lady Knock-
lofty, scarcely struggling to withdraw her hand.
^^ Valueless, but for the sentiment it expresses ;
for, see," and she held it to the lainp: ** it is

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1S6 THB 0*BEI£M8 AND

but a single Lough Corrlb pearl, set in Irish
gold. 'Tis the family crest, with the family
motto round the circle—^ Q^i me cherche, me
trouve.* You cannot refuse so Irish an offering
— ^you cannot forget so sincere an intimation ;**
and she again passed the ring on a finger of the
hand which lay trembling in her own. — " And
now,"^ she continued, " never mind O'Mealy, ,
but return to the guard-house, as soon as you
see a clearance in the battle-axe hall. To*
morrow must provide for itself! Meanwhile,
remember, qui me cherchcy me trouve ;'^ and with
the smile and air of the Roxalana she personated
io dress, she suddenly disappeared, closing the
door, with a violence that extinguished the light
on the table^ and left 0*Brien in the vast, cold
moonlighted hall.

The freshness of its air was balm, its silence
was repose ; after the heated atmosphere, and
noisy and imposing circle he had quitted. In
the distant vista light and bustla still prevdled«
Battle-axes, footmen and pages, the uproar of
announced ourriages and chairs,— -of servants

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THB o'flahertys. 187

called for, or lords and ladies ^^ coming down^*^
afforded an obstacle to O'Brien's immediately
unobserved departure, of which he gladly availed
himself, to remain, for a little while, where he
was. In a confusion of ideas, more rapid
in their succession, than ^^ the galloping of
heaven's wings/^ he was glad to pause, and ti^
tranquillize, if it were possible, the emotions by
which he was agitated. The little wine he
had drank (the more exciting to one who had
hitherto lived "in the darkness of sobriety'^)
— the eyes he had gazed on, — the ring whose
circlet pressed his finger, — the promise that ac-
companied it, breathing so sweetly on his ear, —
the resulting exaltation pf spirit and confusion
of thought, all rendered the singular solitude in
which he was placed, a resource and an enjoy*
ment. Throwing himself, therefore, along one
of those red benches,* (to obtain a place upou
which, such sacrifices have been made of honour,

• The privileged seats of the peerage, on the birth-
Hight and other court festivities, held in St. Patrick's hall.

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188 THE O^BRIENS AXD

principle, and patriotism), he gave free course
to that illusory, but delicious, train of reverie,
which lends to feeling its highest tone, and to
thought its brightest scintillations. As he lay,
with his right arm pillowing his head, and his
eyes turned upward, he unconsciously fixed
them upon the superb and richly painted
ceiling; where the sycophancy of the times
had depicted the regal state of Henry Fitz-
empress, who is represented receiving the
hom^ige of the subdued Irish chieftains, at
they stood, spiritless and crouching, before the
Majesty of English power. The full and
doudless moon poured through the lofty
windows the full tide of its beams ; and the
accidents of reflection gave a transient distinct-
ness to the picture, that was strengthened by
the deep shadows of the unillumined portions
of the apartment

For some moments O'Brien, pre-occupied by
the world within, almost <^ above the sense of
sense," saw nothing, heard nothing, and felt iJl

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THV o'flahebtts. 189

that men feel under the double inebriety of the
senses and the imagination. By degrees, as the
moon shone more brightly on the frescoed story
of Ireland's shame, he was struck by the sul>-
Ject, although but indistinctly seen. He sighed
aa he gazed. The image was opposed to fafs
-present condition, with a mortifying contrast,
which awakened the compunctious visitings of
conscience; so goading to those in whom prin-
ciple and passion are at Variance. His feelings,
lus views, with respect to l^ady Enocklofty,
were so vague, such mere phantoms of fancy and
of vanity, of gratitude and admiration, that diey
had neither character nor consistency. But the
wife of the leader of the Irish oligarchy, had
jshe not hinted that she did not participate

. In recalling her words, his memory failed

him ; the exhaustion of his spirits, the distant
hum, the immediate silence, contributed to his
abstraction, and thoughts became dreams. His
eyes still fixed on the picture of Henry the
Second, his imagination still dwelling on his

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140 TH£ O^BRIEl48 ANI>

beautiful protectress, — his ideas by degreed

faded, and he slept: if that could be called

aleep, which, while it absorbed the corporeal

faculties, and suspended the willj^ left the fancy

wild and energetic beyond its waking powen^;;

and bodied forth visions of such palpable form

and plausible combination, that mid-^ay con-

«;iousness could scarcely have given perceptions

more acute.

From the chaos of incoherent images that

attends the first slumbers of weariness, gra^

dually arose a fairy fabrick, the Pomona

bower, of which he had caught a view

through the open door of the room in which

he supped. It seemed all light and verdure;

and canopied the fair, majestic, and voluptuous

form of Lady Knocklofty« at whose feet, he

thought he lay, again receiving the pearl of

Lough Corrib, and with it

** Such honied words and smiles
As made the gift seem dearer/*

Suddenly the flowers faded, the garlands fell.

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THE o'fLAHERTYS. 141

the lights grew dim, and the rude, dark walls
of Birmingham tower, appeared in all their ori^-
nal strength and dreariness. The bower of love
assumed its ancient aspect of a state prison.
No longer at the feet of the lady of his vision,
he believed himself chained down to a stone
bench, above which appeared, in dark and
smoky letters, the names of *^ O'Donnel,**
" O'Neil," " Delvin," " Lord Thomas Fitz-
gerald," ^^ Lord Desmond,*' and other illus-
trious patriots, both of the Irish and EngUsh
stock, who, by resisting power, had been in-
carcerated in despotism^s strongest hold. Pre«
serving in idea the same uneasy attitude, in
lirhich he actually lay, his eyes were involun-
tarily fixed upon the same grim figure, as in
the pictured roof represented Henry the Second.
Gradually, however, that stem countenance re-
solved itself into the cold, phlegmatic features of
Lord Knocklofty. His ancient armour wa»
covered with the sash of St. Patrick. One ex-
tended hand was armed with a dagger, which

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14S THE O'BRIENS AKD

was gradually and slowly directed to O'Brien*^
thick-beating heart ; while with the othc^r
he drew from the finger of his spell-bound
Yictim's hand, his wife's most prized and trea«
aured ring. O'Brien heaved and panted to
resist or evade the murderous intent ; and still
half in dream and half awakened by his suf-
fering, he caught the uplifted hand and griped
it firm and fast. Its death-like coldness chilled
him to the heart The prickling of a thousand
arrows tingled through his frame; yet still he
continued to grasp the unearthly hand^ no
longer in a dream, but aWake^-and conscious^
though still motionless. He looked around him^
and recognized every object. The light of the
retiring moon faintly sketched the shadows of St.
Patrick's banners on the floor. The glittering
throne was still visible ; the hum in the battle-
axe hall was heard; still, in spite of these tokens
of returning sensation, he held the hand. Makii^
an efibrt to move, the motion, slight as it was^
restored the blood to its circulation; and h«

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THE o'flahebtys. 14iS

perceived that the cold hand he clasped waa—
his own ; — the hand of that arm on which hit
bead had pressed. The clock at that moment
struck three : the whole baseless fabric of hit
vision had vanished, still however leaving a
wreck behind, in his excited imagination. He
ttarted on his feet, rubbed his hands, and
walked about the obscure and spadous haU,
under the disagreeable influence, which a ter*
rible nightmare always leaves behind it. Then
re^sdving to proceed without further delay to
the guard-house, he passed the battle-axe hall un-
remarked, though not unseen ; and was proceed-
ing to the lower castle-yard, by the state porter's
lodge (instead of the passage by which he had
entered), when a chair passed him, preceded by
a tall, gaunt figure, wrapped in a long, dark
cloak.

The extraordinary height of this gigantic per-
9on, just sufficiently awakened O'Brien's curiosity
to induce him toglancehis eye under the stranger's
broad flapped hat ; when to his amazement and

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144 THE O'BRIENS AND

horror, he again saw or fancied he saw, that
wild and weird countenance which had so often,
in the course of the day, congealed him by its
apparition. The figure strided rapidly on, and
0*Brien unable to resist the impulse, was about
to follow, when he was suddenly seized by the
shoulder, with an exclamation of ** I arrest you
in the King^s name.^' He turned and encoun-
tered Captain O'Mealy, who, though not tipty,
was just sufficiently elevated by his punch royat^
to throw his natural humour mid Tulgarity off
their guard.

** What a pretty fellow you are," he con-
tinued, in an unminced brogue, passing his; ana
through O'Brietfs, " to lade me such a dance.
Sure, I've had the devil's own search after you.
Lady K. desiring me to talce eare of you ; but
sorrow ghost of you was to be seen nor heard
^ther. So I thought you were carried off by
the fairies. For, touch my honour, touch my
life* I knew you were not the man to give
leg bail for your surety. Wdl, you had the

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tHE o'flahertys, 145

devirs own luck, Sir ; and owes it every taste
to myself. I gave them th' whole history of you ;
and first I butthered them up about you, and
then I slither'd them down, Sir ; so that nothing
would do, but you must be served up : so you

see ''

" Have you any idea who was in that chair,
that passed before us, just as you came up?"
interrupted O'Brien, much preoccupied, and
attending but slightly to O* Mealy 's vulgar
egotism.

" Is it any idea I have ? Ay, have I, every
idea in life. It was that poor cratur of a fur-
reigner, that played so iligantly upon the harp ;
though nobody listened to her, only myself and
a few conishures. When I came down, a little
taste ago, there she was standing in a corner,
behind the futmen and the flambeaux, waiting
for her sedan. So I did the genteel thing by

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146 1»B Q'bKUUIS AHfP

<^ Had she no senrant wUh her?'' asked O'BrieOy
with an affected carelessness, and fearful of draw-
ing the attention oi the captain of the guard to
the mysterious person who appeared to have offi<-
oated io that capacity, when the chiur passed*

*' Sorrow, soul, or servant, or christian era*
tur."

<< And where was the chair cnrdered P'' asked
O'Brien.

<<Why, have you a mind to be better ac-
quainted with her too ? You are a pretty lad^-r
at all in Uie rii)g. Why then, I think you have
enough to do ; and if you mind your hits and take
the ball at the hop, and keep the game in your
own hands, devil a fear of you, but you'll prosper.
Why, Sir, that handsome phy sognomy , and pide,
|M»etrating eyebrows of yours, is as good as board
wages. The little furreigner is a swarthy, poor
cratur, and not w(»th picking out of the gutther,
in oomparison with them that . , . • Well^ na-
bodish^ ' mum,' says I, ^ budget,* says y^u,
that's the talk, as the great Shakspeare say».'* .

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Th(
as &Q0
O^Me
guard
light ^
room
glance
his hi
cious
expiri
coveri
its pr
onyx,
etigra

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148 THE O'BHIENS ANX>

CHAPTER IV.

THE OLIGAECHS.

And when we see the figure of the house.
Then must we rate the cost of the erection.

Shakspbarb.

Proudfobt House was one of those magni-
ficent mansions which, before the Union, were
the town residences of the Irish aristocracy ; and
which, since that fatal period, have been con-
verted into public ofiices. For such have been
the anomalies of that country, *^ where (Swift
says) an honest man ought to be ashamed to
live,'* that its official splendour has increased,
in proportion as its resources have dwindled, and
its business diminished.

Proudfort House, at all times of the year, the
shrine of place-hunters and pension-mongers, — of

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T^ 0*FLAH£&TT8« 149

the needy and of the corrupt, was,— at that par-
ticular season, which is the carnival of life, as
of society, the rendezvous of all the rank and
fashion of the country. Ireland, during the
last quarter of a century has fallen far behind
the rest of Europe ; but it was at this period of
its active demoralization, more liberal, than it now
is in its stultified degradation. Society, though
corrupt, was joyous. Party threw no cloud
over pleasure. Fashion took no note of faction ;
and if many of the hereditary guardians of the
country and counsellors of the crown — the first
in rank as in talents — stood dignified imd aloof
from the Froudf<»t cabal and its chiefs; if
they boldly entered their protest in the senate*
against the scandalous measures originated by
these political vampires, they did not sufier
their patriotic feeUngs to interfere with social
festivity ; nor, in that narrow and illiberal jea-
lousy, which has since broken up society into

* See the protest in the House of Peers, in 1790, signed
by such names as Leinster, Charlemont, Moira, Portar«
lington, &c. &c.

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150 THE o'bbiens and

cliques and cdteries, refuse to mingle on public
nights in the balls, masquerades, theatricals,
and ridottoes of their political opponents. The
members of all parties then filled up the ranks
of amusement ; and by encouraging trade, ener-
gizing industry, and stimulating the arts, they
enabled the country to make a better stand
against its oppressors ; and, for a while, to up-
hold its struggling, but decaying manufac-
tures.*

But if wit and beauty discountenanced the
domestic display of party violence, they had not
to encounter the resistance of that dark bigotry,
which now lies like an incubus on the public
pleasures. A feeble race of imbecile fanatics had
not yet succeeded to a generation, whose vices,
bold as their manners, did not permit them to

* These remarks apply only to the political and social
intercourse between protestant and protestant. At all
times catholics rarely and difficultly obtained admission

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THE oVlAHSSTYS. 151

v^ their patricidal enonnities under the sanc-
timonious garb of religious hypocrisy. Even
the harpies who devoured the vitals o( the land,
shewed more sense and more feeling fc^ the
people, than their heartless, brainless successors ;
and if they helped themselves largely and im-
pudently from the public purse, they had not
yet exhiUted the scandal of purchasing heaven
At the expence of their impoverished country,
— of congregating to suflFocation round the
itinerant declaimer, to squander their super-
fluities upon foreign missions, — nor of overlook-
ing the thousands perishing in their streets and
their highways, to administer with profusion to
the fanciful wants of proselytes at the furthest
extremities of the globe. As yet, the gayest
capital of Europe was unclouded by the gloom
of controversial theology; and the charities and
the graces of life still lingering, where the sterner

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15S THE 0*BBIBNS AKt>

House, the daily guests of Its lord, were how*
ev^r, exclusively selected from the oligarchy, of
which h« was the leader. Strenuously occupied
in the barter of power and principles, they ex*
ercised an unrestrained rule over the less pri*
vileged classes, engrossing all the offices of state,
owning most of the property in the soil, and
supplying from amongst their own cadets, the
" jiur^ng fathers of the church,'* (to use a phrase
of archbishop King's) whose fosterage was more
fatal to the interests and tranquillity of Ireland,
than that of the olden times, against which so
many acts were fulminated by early parliaments^
At the head of this caste, in power and in
influence, stood the family of the Proudforts ;
whose numbers, like the " race d! Agamemnon
qui ne Jinit jamms^ seemed to increase and
multiply, with the resources they extorted from
the revenues of the country. Arrogating to
themselves an exclusive loyalty, as " King's
raen,^ they mistook the subjection of the crown
to their will, for their devotion to its possessor:
and if A minister, offended by iheir pride, or

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THE o'flahertys. 153

scandalized at their greediness, hesitated to up-
hold their political juggling, or questioned their
right to a monopoly of place, they were as
ready to turn against the sovereign, as against
the people. More than once, a concerted
soulevement of the whole privy council, a
levSe en masses against the viceroy, marked
their determination to suffer no minister in Ire-
land, who was not of their own selection : and
tm one occasion " seven of the eleven" con-
stituting the Irish ministry, put the King into
Coventry, and tfiemselves hors du combat.
Kings, however, like wits, have sometimes short
memories ; and his majesty forgetting to call in
those who had so foolishly gone out, resigned
them to the original obscurity for which Jnature
had intended them.

The foundation of the Proudfort power was
the Proudfort property : and this property was
based on the church. The founder of ^e
family had been the chaplain of King William's

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134 THE O'BRlEyS AND

enJiUi had added to a small original grant of land
(made by the military head of the church, to the
chaplain of the church militant), a succession of
estates, each purchased from the ample dower
of the estabUshment. This vast landed pro-
perty, spotted as it was with boroughs, (close
and rotten,) was the materiel of family influence;
and amply fulfilled the prophecy, " that to hiro
who has much, more shall be given." For the
rest, the Proudforts, without one quality which
naturally places men above their fellows, were
destitute of every means for attaining to emi-
nence, save the pertinacity which usually ac-
. companies the passion for family aggrandizement.
They were indeed the happiest illustrations of
what dogged dulness may effect, when unen-
cumbered by genius to withdraw it from the
beaten track of self-interest, or by sympathy
with human suffering to distract it from the
steady pursuit of personal ambition. Dull as

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to the army; and 8t(^)fMDg short only where dis-
tinctioa was to be exclusively acquired by mtnU
they had engrossed all places and all patronage^
without giving to the Irish senate one orator, or
to the Irish bar one advocate of eminence.

The Earl of Knockloftyi the head and repre*
sentative of this prosperous dynasty, was more
distinguished by the family organ of self- ap-
propriation, than by any trait of individual
idiosyncracy* Plodding, without an head for
business; sensual, without a taste fcnr pleasure;
the gravity of his manner passed for wisdom,
and the solenmity of his carriage for dignity.
Always ready to scoff at public virtue as a
phantom, he affected great respect for alt the
external forms of society ; and he talked with
plauability of ^^ the great bonds which keep men
together.^ Regular in his attendance at church
on Sundir^s, and at Daly's Club-house, on every
other day of the week, he prayed and played
with equal devotion. But though religious and
loyal in the extreme, a pillar of the state and a

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1S6 THE O^BBIEKj» ANiy

comer stone of the church, he was, on certain
pCHnts and mcntds, with which going to church
has Jittle to do, as relaxed, as the members of
his caste then usually were in Ireland. He had
long survived the passion, which had led hin^,
into a second marriage with Lady Albina
O'Blamey, whose portionless rank, and power*
f ul beauty, had suited his ambition, and gratified
his vanity. But his liberality of ,the wealth
which she knew so well how to distribute, and
which gratified his ostentatious habits, and the
pride be took in his handsome children, ob^
tained for him the reputation of an excelleni
private character; as if the selfishness which
leads to public (X)rruption, could be made ^com-^
patible with private worth. Living with mag«
nificence, his table exhibited all that luxury Jiad
then invented, in a department which has since
become one of the fine arts; and his wines .and
his influence brought him a multitude of guests,
who learned from his example, to enjoy, ^thout
j^morse^ those public emoluments which were

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THE O'FLAHERTYS. 157

purchased without restraint— by the ruin of the
countiy. He had recently been elevated to the
Earldom of Knocklofty ; and the higher dignity
of a Marquisate was said to be reserved for
those future services, which the proprietor of
many boroughs can always render to the party
of his adoption.

The Countess Knocklofty was, by her social
position, the great autocrat of Irish fashion ; and
she presided over the bel air of the Irish capital,
as her husband ruled its political junta. Pre-
serving all the beauty which does not exclusively
depend on youth, (a passionate expression, a
graceful toumure), brilliant, though no longer
blooming ; her rank and influence gave her all
the charms she had lost, and heightened all she
had retained: for even beauty, in that little
world called " the great," has no intrinsic value.
It is the stamp of fashion that gives it currency ;

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158 THE o'beien^ and

is rejected with disdain. Educated by a feebie
and bigotted grandmother, with prejudices which
passed for principles, and phrases which passed
for ideas ; and brought up in respect for forms,
and in ignorance of reaUties, she threw off ties,
on coming into the world, which, being founded
not in influence but in authority, had no hold
either on her judgment or her heart. Launched
from the romantic solitudes of her father's castle
in Connaught, upon the bustle and temptation
of the world, she brought into society the un-
regulated romance of a retired education ; with
all the headlong propensities to pleasure of a
wilful temperament. Vain, credulous, and im-
petuous, her vivacity was mistaken for passion,
and her fancies for feelings. The reigning
manners of the day, and the influence of her
position, conspired to sanction the boundless in-

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i|h£ o'flahkrtys. 159

otgects. With men of the worlds there is «
shorter road to the heart than even through their
passions— their vanity; and none ever took it
with more success than Lady Knocklofty*

It is a maxim of Fra[ich gallantry (and axioms
in love, like dogmas in faith, are always numerous
in proportion as the religion is doubtful,) that,
'^ la femme^ qtumd Vamour est passion^ est con^
HatUe; quand l*arAour n'est que go^t, eUe est
Ugh'ey According to this canon^ Lady Knock-
lofty was the most passionless, as she was the
most engouie of women. Yet her predilecticms
and her preferences, such as they were, were noC
the episodes^ but the history of her life. Pla^
tonic or passionate, the fancy of a day, or the
aacitiment of a year, her flirtations or attach^
ments were the business of her existence. ** Frr-
tueuse, elle jouU de ses refus ; JbUde, eUe Jouit
de ses remordsJ' Hitherto, borne out by that
deUKH^alization in the higher circles, which ever
goes with despotic governments, and living on
those terms of decency with her Icnrd, which the

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160 TH£ o'B&IENS AKD

world only requires (for nothing can save an
imprudent wife, but the dupery of her husband^
—or his depravity), Lady Knocklofty, though
blamed by some, suspected by many, and talked
pf by all, still retidned the reins of society in her
own possession ; and kept opinion in check, by
having the whip hand, in the great career of
rank, influence, and fortune.

To preserve her Ladyship in this enviable*
but critical position, which enabled her to pre*-
side over the largest house, and command the
highest drcles in the Irish capital, was the vigi«-
lant, as^duous, and not very disinterested object
of her friend, monitor, and constant companion^
Xady Honoria Stratton. More gifted, more
accomplished, more corrupt, and more expe^
rienced, than her noble protSgSe^ Lady Honoria,
was one of the many illustrations of that golden
maxim, ^< that gallantry is the least fault of a
WQinan of gallantry.*" The " vertu de moiruT
.of Lady Honoria was indeed the only point in
h^r character that had the semblance of ami-

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THB oVLAHEaXYS. 161'

ability. But the frailty which, in ftome, indicates
a susceptibility to " loving too well," was in her
the result of a necessitous poverty, which obliged
her to love " too wisely." In risking her cha-
racter, she calculated only on the profit and loss
of a tender attachment; and with Werter in
one hand, and Cocker in the other, she formed
her estimates as much by the arithmetical con-*
elusions of the one, as by the high-flown senti-
mentalities of the other. The world, however,
always more apt to piu'don the folly of vice, than
its wisdom, had nearly thrown her beyond itfl
pale, for the ruin she had brought on a young
and popular Irishman of moderate fortune;
when, luckily, her well directed coquetry at the
cold phlegmatic vanity of Lord Knocklofty, and
bar knowledge of the world, as cleverly directed
at the assumption of his wife, gave her an in-
fluence at Proudfort House ; which opened the
door of every other house in Dublin to her
reception, and restored her to the caste which
^e had nearly lost by that which should have

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IGS TfiB o'beieks ado

been deemed an additional cause for banishing
her for ever from its ranks. Beautiful and wittj^
bold and adroit, the naturally fine dispodtiontf
and brilliant qualities of Lady Honoria had been
perverted in her earliest youth by a neglected
education at home, and a depraved one abroad.
Living on the. continent from her fifteenth yetit
to her five-and-twentieth with a libertine father
(a poor Irish pea:), in the refined but profligate
cirdes of the French court, she married at that
epoch ^n the expectation of a reversionary title
and large fortune,) the drivelling l»*other of an
Irish nobleman, whose celibacy was deemed
certain, till he wedded his cook ; when the birth
of an heir blasted the hope for which Lady
Honoria had made such sacrifices.

Obliged by circumstances to live in Ireland
— mched in a large empty house, in Stephen's
Green, belonging to her brother-in-law, who
resided habitually on his estate in Munster, — and
conscious of her own superiority to those to
whom her necessities obliged her to bend, she

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THE O^FLAHXBTYS. 168

paid back the obUgations her ruined fortunes
compelled her to accept, by secret oontempt, or
by open sallies of wit and bittemessy whick
frequently purchased dyiUties that gratitude
and complaisance might not have extorted.
Admired by the men, and feared by the women,
she used both as she wanted them ; and called
upon to *^ dksennuyer la satHse^^* she repaid the
dinners ^he could not return, and the entertain^
ments she could not rival, by a wit which wav
always amusing, though not always refined ; and
a humour which was reckoned somewhat toor
broad even for the Irish coiut*

A constant and welcome guest at Proudfort
House, she gave a life to its festivities, and a
style to its entertainments, which the taste and
refin^Dtient of its owners were insufScient to
confer* Flattering the dull vanity of the bus*
band, and engrossing the confidence of the
wife, she soon became a necessity to both ; and
was frequeirtly a mediatrix in disputes; which
her devemess and subtilty prevaited firom ex-

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164 THE O'JRIEXS AND

ploding, to the total rupture of the matrimonial
tie, that would have involved the overthrow of
her own interests.

While Lady Honoria thus acted as premier
in the diplomacy of the Knocklofty mSnage,
the Honourable Catherine Macguire was not
without her utility in the domestic system of
those, who by the very fortune which raises
them, are disposed to depend so much more
upon the resources of others, than on their own*
The daughter of an aunt of Lord Knocklofty^
who had run away with a, landless papist lord^
and had been ever afterwards thrown off by the
family, the Honourable Catherine was received
by her noble kinsman, as poor Iri$h cousins
usually are — ^partly from pity, and partly from
pride : and being destitute of that fine tone of
feeling, which makes dependence misery, — and
as highly endowed with that stout huckaback
fibre, which stands the wear and tear of capricious
favour and insolent pretension, she steadily kept
the " even tenor of her way," False without

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THtE oVlahertts. 165

feigning, insincere without hypocrisy, she frankly
shewed up to the world's laughter her present
friends and her former creed ; and quizzed the
Proudforts, and ridiculed the papists, with equally
unsparing candoiu*. To the proselyting humour
of " the good Lady Mary" she was indebted
■for the new creed, which had been the passport
to her cousin's protection ; and she abandoned
the faith of her fathers, with a conviction quite
as clear as that with which she had originally
received it. Pleasant as she was heartless, she
had already passed through the world's hands ;
and had contracted from its contact, that simple
hardihood of manner, which often gives to the
hacknied the fuiiveiSy that is the charm of the
recluse. Sure to please, as long as she amused
'the solemn mediocrity of her kinsman and host,
she was well aware of her tenure at Proudfort
House ; and, resolved that it should be a lease
renewable for ever, she silently inserted a
clause of surrender, in case she should attain jto

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166 THE O'BRIENS AND

the fee-simple of any other more advantageous
possession.

*^ The good Lady Mary/' by whose agency
Miss Macguire had been induced to accept the
thirty-nine articles, and a seat at Lord Knock-
lofty's luxurious table, — to swallow the precepts
of the sister, with the pates of the brother, —
was a happy precursor of all the good ladies of
the present day, who have come forward in
such numbers " to justify the ways of God to
man," to complete what the Redeemer had left
undone, and, in the fulness of time, accomplish
and expound that revelation, which ordinary
Christians imagine to have been perfected some
eighteen hundred years ago. She was the first
to bring into notice an inspired work, generally
thought to have been long well known : and she
was the original inventor of the protestant dray
for carrying converted papists on their road to

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THUR o'ltiAHiaTYf. 167

«od to i^n religious shqps for go-carts mounted
upon protestant prindples, toys against tole-
rance, and bible-only babies. It was in Lady
Mwrys cheap repository, that employment was
given to idle Isidies of fashion,* at the slight
expence of those humble dependents on thmr
own industry for their daily bread, who are
perscms of no fashion ; and it was in her schools
that education was first made subservient to the
purposes of an in^dious proselytism. ^ Dull and
mischievous, arrogant and interfering, she was
among the first to contribute and collect for the
conversionof Asiatic Jews; while the poor Irish
peasant perished at the gates of the Episcopal
Palace, unheeded, and the needy artizan fainted

• ** She works rel^ious petticoats : for flowers
Shell make church histories. Her needle doth
So sanctify my cushionets^ — ^Besides,
My smock-sleeves have such holy embroidery.
And are so learned, that I £sar in time
All my apparel will be quoted by
Some pure instructor/*

Oid Pk^

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168 THE o'bbieks and

under the windows of the metropolitan mansi(»t^
unrelieved* In her domestic capacity, toq deeply
occupied in saving the souls of her neighbour's
children^ she had no time to attend to the com-
forts of her own ; and, while driving about
from school to school, to teach tenets with tent-
stitch, and encourage the growth of piety and
plain work, she gradually saw the objects of
her natiu'al affections disappear beneath her un-
observing neglect. One of her children had
fallen into a pond, another had fallen out of
a window. The eldest. Miss Sullivan, who was
thrown from unwholesome confinement into a
galloping consumption, galloped off with the
apothecary ; and the youngest, suffered to run
wild from apprehension of her sister's fate, had
been so much in the habit of trotting behind
the coachman, that she trotted away with him
one day to Gretna Green. Her three surviving
sons, however, following in the Bishop's track,
(the " milky way" of church promotion,) bid fair
for the Bishop's fortune. They already en-

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THE o'flahektys: 169

grossed the three best livings in the Bishop's
gift.

The bishop himself, who, as tutor to Lord
Knocklofty, had won Lady Mary's heart, and
as dean of St. Grellan had obtained her hand,
was one of those " pers&nnages de position^
qui viennent Ungours au secours du vainquetir,^^
He had wriggled himself into his proud eminence
by siding successively with every party that
prospered, and dedicating his various polemical
volumes alternately to whig and tory. A
Foxite to-day, a Pittite to-morrow — ^now a ca-
thdic advocate, and now the apostle of catholic
extermination — his true religion was a mitre,
his ■ political principle a peerage; and knowing
that the world, like the Baron in La fatisse
AgneSy ^^ est toujoiirs dans Vadmirdtion de ce
qu'U n'entend pas^ he took for the subject of a
work, which was designed as the key^stone of his
fortune, a theme, which being beyond human
X5amprehensiori, left no just measure of the intel-
lect which he brought to bear upon its mystery.

VOL. II. I

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170 THE O BRIENS AND

Having arrived at the object of his ambition,
the pliant candidate for church promotion stood
erect upon the pediment of dburch supremacy,
with a look that might be translated, <^ Sono
PctpcL*^ A little Sixtus Quintus in his way, his
air became as papstical, as his infallible preten-
sions : and whoever saw him mounted upon his
ecclesiastical Aaquenie, ambling through the
streets of St. Grellan, saw the most faithful copy
of an Italian Monsignore ever exhibited beyond
the Roman corso:-^all purple and pertness,
pious priggery and foppish formality, with
a beetling brow, and the best flapped hat that
ever was perched upon three hairs of the erect
head of a high, haughty, and overbearing
churchman, — the genius of cancatui^ could
have added nothing to the picture.

Lord Chesterfield has said, that " of all men
who can read and write, a parson is, perhaps,
the most ignorant." This apothegm described
the Archdeacon of St Grellan to a tittle.
Ignorant of all but his own interests, his want

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THE O'fLAHERTYS. 171

of mwoir was well supplied by his savoir
faire ; and the success of his well directed sub-
serviency to the bishop, to Lady Mary, and to
the whole Proudfort dynasty, proved that he had
neither mistaken his means nor misunderstood
his persons. The nephew of their law agent,
Solicited* Hunks,— the son of their chaplain and
proiegS^ the late Archdeacon, — he had in his
favour the habit of the Proudforts to provide
for his family ; and he did not suffer that habit
to wear out for want of frequent solicitation.

Pertinacious, as men of limited intellects
usually are, irascible, as churchmen are accused of
being, and envious, as mediocrity ever is, he had
viewed the young and hardy " engrosser of fame^'
and favour, the hero of the castle frolic, with a
deeply founded aversion, sharpened by the sense
of hereditary wrongs. O'Brien, as the son of him,
who had contrived to embezzle a part of the
archdeacon's family property, by embezzling the
daughter of its richest member — of him whose
legal knowledge had reduced the Archdeacon's
I 2

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172 THP O'BRIENS AND

inheritance almost to his hopes in the Proudfort
interest, — ^had claims on his hatred, which he was
determined should not lie idle ; even at the risk
of opposing the impetuous predilections of Lady
Knocklofty.

Such was the party, which, with the addition
of Lord Kilcolman and Captain O'Mealy, as-
sembled for dinner in the great saloon of Proud-
fort-house, at the then late hour of six o'clock--*a
quarter of an hour before the lady of the mansion
made her appearance. Miss Macguire, however,
received, amused, and talked with the guests;
while Lord Knocklofty, always silent and ab-
stracted before dinner, walked up and down,
occasionally assenting, by a nod, to the bishop's
emphatic philippics against the bad spirit of the
times, as illustrated by the volunteer reviefw of
the preceding day, the tumult at the Strugglers,
and other signs equally portentous of a state of
things, which called on every loyal and religious
man to put it down. To this all agreed in their
diflferent ways ; from Captain O'Mealy's " "'tis

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THE o'flahertys* 173

true for you^ my lord, for as the immortal Shak-
speare says, * the times themselves are out of
sayson/ " to the pious ejaculations of Lady
Mary, and the never-failing concordance of the
Archdeacon with the sentiments of his superior.

** By the by, Albina," said Lord Knocklofty,
turning short upon his wife, as she entered and
flung herself in an arm-chair, with a very slight
inclination of the head to her guests — " By the
by, how have you disposed of your hero ?"

** Disposed of my hero?" re-echoed Lady
Knocklofty, evasively, and looking for resource
to her friend. Lady Honoria.

" What ! has she got a hero de poclic f^ asked
Lady Honoria, laughing. " Oh! I suppose
you mean the volunteer, who, under heaven,
saved our lives yesterday. I hope. Lady Knock-
lofty, you will assist me in paying the debt, by
saying a word in his favour to the Provost ; for,
of course, he will be brought before the board,
with the rest of the college boys concerned in the,
row last night."

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174 THE o'beieks ani>

*^ I believe," said the ArchdeaccMi^ ^* that is
past praying for. The Provost can do m>tlung ;
the whole affair being referred to the visitc»^
The Chancellor, as Vice-chancellor of the Uni-
versity, has been long waiting to make an ex-
ample of some of those young incendiaries, who
are known agents of the Jacobinical societies, now
so numerous."

" And this very O'Brien,'* observed the Bishop,
" the leader in the riot, to whom your lady-
ship imagines yourself so much indebted, will,
most probably, be rusticated, if not expelled:
but as long as the historical society is permitted
to exist in the College, and Locke aa Grovem*
ment to form part of the College course, you will
have a hot-bed of sedition and a code of repub-
licanism, whose influence is obvious.''

" Ay, and of atheism too, as the ArchdeacoKi
says," observed Lady Mary.

♦' I think," said the Archdeacon, " that the
denial of innate ideas leads irresistibly to such a
conclusion.**

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THE o'FLAHEBTYS. 175

^' I am quite of the Arehdacon'^s oinnionr
said O^Mealy, pulling up his stock ; ** I am,
upon my honour; and so I believe is every
loyal man in Dublin, in or out ot College. For
there is all the difference upon earth between a
nate idaya, and an innate idaya.*^

A general titter followed the asserticm, and
Lady Honoria demanded — ^* Now, honour
bright, O'^Mealy, what is the predse difference
between a ncUe and an innate idea ?'^

"Why, Lady Honoria?'' said O^Mealy,
calling fearlessly oa a stock ot impudence which
he knew to be exhaustless, '^ an innate idaya
may be any man's idaya ; but your ladyship*s
must always be a nate one, intirely, upon my
honour."

^^ Pas malj'^ said Lady Honoria, nodding her
head approvingly ; while Lcnrd Eilcolman cried
out, " Hear him, hear him !"

" You are aware, my Lord," continued the
Archdeacon, returning to the charge, " that
this Mr. O'Brien, who affected to stop X'ady

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176 THE o'bKIICNS ANDi

Knocklofty*s horses, when they had stopped of
themselves, is — ''

" That is not true/' interrupted Lady Knock*
lofty, vehemently and haughtily ; " it is utterly
false : the horses were quite unmanageable, and
both Lady Honoria and myself would have
been dashed to pieces, but for the interference
of this Mister O'Brien, who had the humanity
to risk his life, and save ours. Is it not true.
Lady Honoria ?''

'" I'll schwear to that,"" said Lady Honoria,
in the tone and accent of the Jew, in the School
for Scandal.

*^ Well, then," continued the pertinacious
Archdeacon, *Uhis saviour of her ladyship'slife
is the youth, my lord, who, in the historical
society, made a sort of killing-no-murder oration
on the death of Caesar ; defending the re^cide
act of Brutus upon a great principle of popular
right, applicable to all times ; taking occasion,
apropos to nothing at all, to introduce an invective
against those whom he called the Dictators of |^

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THE o'flaHEETYS. 177

land, and sketching three illustrious characters
high in the Irish government, as the triumvirate,
who, with the same patricidal views as those of the.
Roman, triumvirs, wanted only the courage and
the talents to effect the same ends. The speech
got into the opposition journal, which compli-
maated the speaker with tl^e title of the Irish
Mirabeau, an imitation of whose eloquence, by
the by, he gave us last night at the castle."

" Indeed r said Lord Knocklofty^ pausing in
his measured pace before his wife : *^ and is this
the person. Lady Knocklofty, whom you
brought forward, as I hear you did, in so ex-
traordinary a way, last night; availing yourself
of the Duke's complaisance and good nature —
is this the hero of your frolic ?''

**Pooh, nonsense*** said Lady Knocklofty,
carelessly, " my frolic was every body's frolic ;
and it was neither as improper as Lady Glen-
more^s frolic with the sweep ; nor as fatal as
your lordship's, when you and your friends
personated highwaymen, in the Phoenix Park,
i3

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178 THE O'BBIEKS AND

to frighten the Ladies Butler ; when you not
only upset their carriage and broke Lady Anne's
arm, but shot one of the postilions by accident,
and scared to death old Lady Castletown, who
never recovered the fright. Archdeacon, you
are like old Croaker, in Goldsmith^s " Good-
natured Man;" you have always some stock
horror, some omspiracy or sedition on hands.
I wish they would make you a bishop, and then
you would be quiet. Kitty Macguire, do ring
the bell for dinner; what are the people about?*'

«* Won^t you wait for the Chancellor ?^ asked
Miss Macguire, while the Countess's sortie
produced a momentary silence in all; for even
Lord Knocklofty's solemn haughtiness was at
times borne down by his wife's vehemence.

" Does the Chancellor dine here .^'* asked
Lady Knocklofty, with a look of annoyance.

" He proposed to do so an hour back, when
I met him on the circular road,'' siud Lord
Knocklofty.

" So he told me,'' said the Bishop. ** I rode

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tH« O^FLAHEBTYS* 179

into town with him. He doesn't see the row
of last night in the same point of view as the
Lord Lieutenant, who considers it as a mere
street brawl He says that he has long had his
eye upon this O'Brien, who hoisted the seditious
flag in the park yesterday.**

^* Who the devil is he T' demanded Lord
Knocklofty.

Lady Mary and the Archdeacon both opened
thar mouths at once; and the latter exclaimed,
^^ He is the mischievous young scamp, who gave
my father the nick-name of the arch daemcm ; the
son of Terence O'Brien, the present Lord Arran-
more. Your Lordship may remember the Aiss
which was made about this scape-grace twelve
years ago, when I discovered that notwithstand-
ing his name having been entered on the books
of the diocesan school, he was, for the greater
part of the year, actually under the tuition of a
foreign priest in the isles of Arran : and this too
in the face of the statute, which provided that
the son of an attorney shall be bred in the

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380 THE o'brieKs and

established religion, and made it felony for any
catholic priest to keep a school/'

" Well ?" said Lord Knocklofty, impatiently.

" Well/' said the Archdeacon, " a writ hav-
ing been served, or rather sent by the proper
officer to force this priest to appear before the
constituted authorities of St. Grellan, the people
of the islands, followers of these O'Briens, and
bigotted papists, led on by one Shane, the son
of the noted Mor ny Brien, and of one, the
last of the Connaught rapparees, surrounded
the priest's house for his protection : and this
Shane, being pressed by one of the king's
officers, murdered him on the spot ; or rather
caused his death, for the murdered man died
within six months; and the fellow stood his
trial, and was hanged at St. Michael's Cross in
Galway.^'

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THE o'FLAHEBTTS. 181

afterwards disappeared, and his mother dying
(a sister, by the way, of those old catamaran
Jacobites, the Miss Mac Taafs), Terence O'Brien
came to Dublin to pursue his claims to the title ;
where he spent his time and fortune in haunting
the law courts, and searching the record and
rolls offices. The boy had been sent to Douay
to be made a priest of ; but he suddenly re«
appeared at Trinity College, where he entered
as Sijilms nobilis. As this happened just before
I resigned my fellowship, I was struck with the
name of Murrogh Mac Teig O'Brien on the
books; and on further inquiry, I found that
this youth had pt^ssed the last eight years of his
life as a soldier of fortune ; and has come from
the continent warmed with the precepts of his old
tutor, the ci-devant parish priest of St. Grellan.
Eor the Abbe OTlaherty, you must know, my
lord," he added, turning to the Bishop, " has
become a French bishop, and is one of those who
are called the constitutional clergy ; renegades
to their king and their God, who haye declared

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189 THE O'BBIEIQS AND

that the jxcapertj of the church is national pro-
perty ; and who have consented to the abolition
at tithes. In a pamphlet dedicated to his friend
Talleyrand) Bishop of Autun, he has advanced
on the authority o£ scripture, that the clergy
are the simple administrators of the church
wealth ; which was given for worship, and not to
the priesthood. Such is the school, and such
the precepts, to which the Irish university is in-
debted for its new honourable member."

" Le pauvre hommej'* said Lady Honoria,
looking dramatically at the Archdeacon ; who
was perq)iring at every pore at the horrors he
was relating.

^^ And who is this courageous Bishop,^ said
Lady Knocklofty, ^^ who dares to sacrifice his
own interests to the general good. What is his
name? Good heavens, how I should like to
know him.^

'* What nonsense you tailf, Albina,^' said
Lord Knocklofty.

" When in Ireland,^ said the Archdeacon,

t

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THE o'flahertys. 183

'^ he was called the Abb^ OTlaberty, and passed
foi* a cousin of Hiat famous, or rather infamous
Count OTlaherty, who, you may remember,
my Lord, contrived to rob my fether of a con-
siderable part of his property, through the chi-
canery of Terence O^Brien ; and who, rec^ved
in Connaught as the champion of popery,
ended by carrying off the iar&ga Abbess of St.
Bridget's, brought over from Italy by O'Brien'^s
Jesuit uncle, to reform the order in St. GreUan."'

A general laugh followed this narrative.

" I was at Cambridge then," said Lord
Knocklofty ; *^ but I remember something of the
matter.'"

** Pray go on. Archdeacon,'* said Lady
Knocklofty, now interested and excited ; " car-
ried off the Abbess ?"

" Yes, Lady Knocklofty ; or rather unfor-
tunately, he did not carry her off, till he had
scandalized the whole world, by taking her to
the Abbey of Moycullen ; where he had built
fipartraents for the celebration of his orgies,

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184 THE O BRIENS AXD

which . still attest, by their licentious pictures,
the purposes for which they wefc fitted up/'

"What purposes P*^ asked Lady Honoria,
demurely. ** What purposes, Archdeacon ?
pray tell us !*'

" Lady Honoria," said the Archdeacon,
" you will spare me the details*"

" Spare his blushes," whispered Miss
Macguire.

*' Suffice it to say," continued the Arch-
deacon solemnly, " that all that was ever said
of Caesar Borgia and Heliogabalus, and all the
profligate papists and pagans that ever lived,
did not exceed the life led by the Count and his
French friends ; so at least I am told : for I was
then a very young man, and such things were
studiously kept from my knowledge by my
father the late Archdeacon "

" Lepauvre innocent r whispered Lady Ho-
noria to Lady Knocklofty.

« I am told that he actually assumed the
habit of an Abbot, dressed up his companions in

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THE 0'FLAHKBTY«. 185

monk'^s tunics, and established a sort of licentious
club, called « The Mmks of the Vine: '^

^^ Something like the Monks of the Screw here
in Dublin, I suppose," said Lady Honoria.

"Oh, worse, worse a great deal, Lady Ho-
noiia. They exceeded in profligacy all that
was ever heard of.''

** Had they any six-bottle men among them,
like our Cherokees ?" demanded Lord Kilcol-
man.

"Lord Kilcolman, I know not what they
had : the proceedings at Moycullen were for-
tunately hid from the world. I believe the
Count admitted but few persons at the abbey ;
though, when he went out, he was well re-
ceived ; for he was a most insinuating and
winning man in his manners.'*

" He was indeed T. said Lady Mary. " I
was then almost a child ; but I remember he
always put me in mind of Richardson's Love-
lace/'

" And you, par hasardy might have been his

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186 THE O^BRIENS AND

Clarissa,*' said Lady Honoria, ** if the mammas
and papas had admitted him to Beauregard.'^

'" I assure you," said Lady Mary, evasively,
*' he was received and pushed on by the Clan-
rickards, the De Burghs, and other catholic
nobility; though my dear father refused to
visit him for many reasons."

" But from the time,*" continued the Arch-
deacon, " when he abducted, or rather was
suspected of abducting the Abbess (for it was
given out that she was drowned, her veil having
been found floating on the rocks at St. Grellan
at the back of the convent, and masses were
said for her soul in spite of the penal statutes),
he was cut by all."

^^ Well,"" said Lady Knocklofty, " and how
did the romance end ?"

*^ Oh ! the catholic church has a way of

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THE o'FLAHEETYS. 1S7

the truth should not be revealed. The Monks
of the Vine dispersed. The Count returned to
Prance, and was either killed in a duel, or
assassinated in the Bois de Boulogne ; and his
property was bequeathed in trust to some
foreign agent, for purposes which, if inquired
into, would, I doubt not, be found illegal.*"

Here the announcement of the Lord Chan-
cellor, and the order for dinner interrupted the
conversation; and objects of more immediate
importance at that season of the day, were dis-
cussed and digested, with a uniformity of
opinion, unbroken by a single dissentient voice.

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188 THE o'briexs and

CHAPTER V.

O BBIEN HOUSE.

Full of state and ancientry.

SaAKSPSAaii.

While the party at Proudfort House were
assembled round the sumptuous table of its
ostentatious host, the object of this recent dis-
cussion (released from his durance by means, at
which he himself blushed), proceeded to that
lonely and desolate house, where no sumptuous
table, nor brilliant guests awaited him.

At the epoch in question, when every thing
went by privilege and favour, and life and
liberty were in Ireland at the disposal of a
ruling caste; debts of a private nature were
easily paid off, at the expence of public justice
or public wealth ; and forms were daily violated,
as the spirit of the constitution was outraged

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THE O'^FLAHERTYS. 189

to answer some particular purpose of a powerful
individual, or to get rid of some obnoxious
opponent. O'Brien, at five o'clock of the day
which followed his arrest, found himself at
liberty. No charge had been brought (or
rather was permitted to be brought) against
him: and while the officious and boasting
O'Mealy acted as the immediate agent in the
affair, it was not doubtful to CBrien, that the
lovely and kind arbitress of his destiny, was the
all-powerful Lady Knocklofty.

O'Mealy having accompanied his protege to
the gate of the lower castle yard, left him in the
filthy defile of Ship-street; after having dis-
burthened himself of so much of the tediousness
of his undisguised vulgarity of mind and man-
ner, as excited new wonder, that one so below
the mark of ordinary education, should have
made himself the associate of those, whose rank

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190 THE O'SBICNS AXD

Captain's absurdities, recalled a precept which
be had often heard repeated by his Colonel, the
charming Prince de Ligne, to the young men
of his staff and re^raent, ^^ Je v&ux que U
mUitairey qui a (tS atissi aimable le soir^ que le
grand Condi Vitoit chez Ninon, soU d^aussi bonne
heure a sa troupe le mating que fut totijours le
brave Turenne,^^ Such were the maxims upon
which CBrien's miUtary education had been
formed. But the grand Cond6, Ninon, Tu-
renne, and Captain O' Mealy, of the Royal Irish !

what a comparison ! ! He shrugged his

shoulders, and sighed ; for he felt that this first
sacrifice to patriotism, on quitting the service of
a foreign despot, was not the least, as he was
beginning to feel, it would not be the last.

Released from the coarse and vulgar garrulity
of his companion, he hurried home to O'Brien
House by those obscure ways, bye streets, and
dirty koes and courts, which Stanihurst and
Ware have rendered historical ; but which are

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THE 0*FLAH£BTY& 191

now the purlieus of a squalid indigence, that
turns aside the eye of charity by the filth or
vice which accompanies its wretchedness.

Threading the dbgusting mazes of the liber-
ties, where epidemic maladies are perpetuated by
helpless, hopeless, irremediable poverty, his heart
recoiled, and his senses sickened. Figures and
faces presented themselves at every step, in
which the impress of crime, or the traces of
famine left scarcely a human feature : and this
too almost in sight of the architectural cupolas
and gilded vanes of the seat of that government,
which was answerable for every combination,
that had contributed to produce such an unpa-
ralleled order of things.

To these painful impressions succeeded re-
flections, rapid as his steps, on his own recent
adventures, — ^the occurrences of the preceding
day and night— his liberation — ^his liberatress.
The ring so mysteriously exchanged for one not
unknown, nor unconnected with his former life ;
the perpetual apparition of that wild, and to his

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i9S THE O'BEIEKS AKD

apprehension, supernatural figure ; the fate
too that awaited him at the college, where
he well knew that he was already watched;
.and above all, the annoyance which he must
have occasioned to his father, who, after an
absence of three months, had just returned in
time to witness the part he had taken in the riot,
all recurred to his ima^nation. He was almost
certain that he had seen Lord Arranmore at the
gable window of the attic on the preceding even-
ing ; and, that the paternal door had been closed
against him in a moment of such exigency, was
a proof how much and how deeply he had in-
curred the displeasure of one, who had but too
many annoyances to contend against.

It was at this point of a reverie (which had
more than once made him lose his way, and
obliged him to apply for information as to the
shortest cut to Watling-street), that he reached
O'Brien House. It seemed to him to wear
more than its usual air of sad and sombre dila-
pidation. The evening was bleak and gloomy.

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THE O'fLAHEETTS. IQS

A drizzling rain was beginning to fall, and
giists of wind were blowing down the river, to
which the solitary and isolated mansion stood
singularly exposed. Almost all the window-
shutters were closed; and some loose papers
flaunting in the wind and hanging on the walls,
intimated that an auction had taken place there
since the previous night. With a sinking heart
he tore down one of these advertisements, and
could just make out from the fragment, the
words " rfierifiTs sale — inch of candle— valuable
antiquities— materials of the house to be sold— •
ine old carved oak chimney-piece.'^ One of
the old gossips of the neighbourhood, familiarly
stepping and reading over O'Brien^s shoulder,
exclaimed,

** Why, then, they had better take it down
while it stands ; for sorrow long will it keep to-
g^her. See there. Sir, there's a beam that's
green and soaked with the wet, giving way
dready. I tould th' ould woman that, a week
ago and more; and if you are a frind of the

VOL. II. K

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194 THE o'briens and

family, you'd be doing well to tell them the
same."

O'Brien thanked her for her information, and
with a heavy heart knocked at the door. He
had repeated his knock, before the window in the
gable was slowly opened, and a head as suddenly
drawn in as it was put out. After the delay of
a few minutes, the door was opened by Robin.

*^ So, Robin," said O'Brien, a little startled
at the appearance of the porter, not only with-
out his livery, but without shoes and stockings ;
" is my father at home ?**

" My lard's not at home," was the mechanical
reply.

" Not at home ! why he arrived in town last
night, did he not?"

'* Ay, did he," said Robin; " but my lard's
not at home now."

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THE o'fLAHEETY«. 195

*^ Tbere,'^ said Robin, pointing to a parlour
on the left, which had never more than one win-
dow unshuttered, for nearly a century.

Murrdgh turned in to speak with the scarcely
more human, though more communicative Alice ;
but his blood chilled, and he stood fixed to the
threshold, as he gazed round him. Dark and
desolate, the spacious empty room was only
lighted by a single tallow candle, placed at the
head of the corpse of old Alice, which was
stretched on a mattress, and shrouded in a sheet.
The i^ht of death, under all its forms, is dread-
ful to the young, to whom life is an eternity.
After a short pause, O'^Brien demanded,

"When did she die ?^

The graceless progeny of the old woman, as be
stood coolly peeling and eating a turnip, aii^
swered, *' Last night, shure."

*< Of what did she die?"

^* I don't know, shure.''

*^ She was alive yesterday P''

" Ay,'' said kobin, filling his mouth with the

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196 THE O'BRIENS AKD

last slice of his turnip, and shutting up his clasp-
knife, his only property.

O'Brien, in equal disgust at the living and the
dead, moved away, shuddering; and slowly and
mechanically mounted the broad, old, creaking
stairs. He was proceeding to the sitting-room
on the first floor, when Robin, with more than
wonted energy, sprung after him, and catching
him by the coat, cried emphatically, '* Shure my
lard's not at home — no, in troth.*'

O'Brien shook him ofi^, though almost tempted
to believe him from his earnestness. He threw
back the door of the drawing-room, and found
it empty. It was a long, low room, which ran
nearly through the whole of the front of the
house ; save only where stood a dark closet,
which lay at the further extremity, and led by a
narrow passage to a flight of steep stairs that
ascended to the attics.

O'Brien entered the room ; the door of the
closet was suddenly shut, as if by a blast of
wind ; but he heard, or fancied that he heard, a

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THE o'flahebtys. 197

light retreating step. He flew to the door, but
could not open it.

** There is certainly, Robin, some one in this
doset.''

" My lard'^s not at home any how,**' said
Robin, with a dogged air; and O'Brien was
again inclined to believe that he told truth, and
to think that his own gloomy and heated ima-
gination had deceived him. Not doubting, how-
ever, that Lord Arranmore would sleep (perhaps
for the last time) in this miserable ^^ home ;^' and
struck with the little or no anxiety he had ex-
pressed relative to his son's late peculiar situation,
he resolved to await his arrival ; and not to return
to college, till the darkness of the night should
shroud his own somewhat disorderly appearance.
He had slept on, the guard-house settle in his
clothes (if that short feverish slumber he had
taken for an hour after daylight could be called
sleep) ; and the anxiety, fatigue, and dissipation
of the previous night had impressed their traces
on his countenance. Fortunately, a substantial

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198 THE o'baisns and

luncheon, taken with 0*MeaIy in the guard*
room, rendered him independent of that refrerii*
ment, which his father's house could not afford ;
for there ^^ pale fast that with the gods doth
diet*' seemed to have established his reign«

At no time, since the return of the hdtr of
O'Brien House, had its appearance been suitable
to the rank of its possessor. The greater
number of its nests and closets, by courtesy
called rooms, were utterly dilapidated and
unfurnished ; exhibiting upon their waUs, and
in their fixtures, curious relics of the style of
fitting up houses in Ireland, in former times;
when even the hangings were not permanent,
when the walls wereleft bare and rude ; and when,
on the removal of the family into the country,
the scantiness of the furniture obliged th^m to
carry away the carpeting, elo^, or leather, that
covered out the brick and mortar, — and nothing
but doors, windows, and chimney-pieces, re*
mained stationary. Thus, however, it was, in
the gorgeous reign of Louis the Fourteenth ;

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THE 0*FLAHERTYS, 199

when a princess of tbe blood, and the greatest
heiress in the world,* travelled from her house
in Paris, to her ch&ieaux in the provincesi with
her sumpter mules laden with the beds, on
which herself and her court slept alike in town
and coiwUrj. Comfort and order are the pri-
rileges of a free people ; and the French and
the Irish, who had not then tasted of the
blessings of constitutional liberty, were alike re-
mote from all its accessary advanti^es: both were,
even then, centuries behind England and Hol-
land, in all the accommodations of domestic life.
The only room furnished in CBrien House,
was the great drawing, room, as it was pompously
called by its lord; though its dimensions alone
justified the description, by a comparison with
the rest (tf the apartments. Even this state
chamber was destitute of every modem com-
fort No window closed, no door (and there
were four opening into the room) hung firmly
and freely on its hinges. All that an old,
faded and motlveaten tape^ry carpet did not
* Madame de Montpinsier;

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SOO THE O^BB.IKNS AKD

coter of the black oak narrow-ribbed floor, was
mouldered into rat-holes ; and nothing of the
original fixtures remained whole and complete,
but a superb and curious chimney-piece, of the
famous black oak of the once celebrated wood
of Stulelah, the shelter of so many rebel heads,
and the despair of so many English chieftains
of the Pale. This chimney-piece rose from the
surface on either side, and canopied, on high,
the spacious, open, and ungrated hearth. It
was curiously carved ; and its delicate and
laborious minutiae were not unworthy of the
chisel of Gibbons. It was crowned with the
arms and supporters of the O'Brien family,
surmounted by the royal Irish crown; under
which was carved upon a label, and in old Irish
characters, " Thou who madest heaven and
earth, bless this house, which Murrogh O'Brien
and Onor his wife caused to be raised in.
the year ..•..'' The ^ate was worn . out ;
but it was a tradition, that the house had been
occupied by the O'Brien family, since the reign .
of EUzabeth, whose favourite, (for the maiden

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THE o'fLAHERTYS. 201

queen had always a pet Irishman), the Lord
Thomond, her privy counsellor and president
of Munster, was the Murrogh O'Brien men-
tioned in the carving. This house was likewise
the " lodging,^' whence the famous Lord
Inchiquin (called the incendiary), the renegade
General of Cromwell, had dated many of his
letters ; and lastly, it had been occupied by
O'Brien, Lord Clare, of George the First's time,
who died Marshal Thomond, and Governor of
Alsace.

Thie purchase of this mansion-house by the
present Lord Arranmore, after it had been half
a century in litigation, was among the items
of uhcalculated and ruinous expenditure, into
which he had been betrayed ^^ par T amour de
rarUiquailUf'' (to use a phrase of Rabelais);
and the only furniture he had thrown into it
was so adopted to the genius of the place, that
the withdrawing-room of O'Brien House, would,
in the present day, have made the glory of a
genuine collector; and have rivalled the glass

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son TH£ O^RIEKS AVJ>

closet, blue rocm^ and Holbein chamber of
Strawberry Hill. There, had stood the famous
harp of Brian Borrtl, now the choicest q)ecimen
in the Museum of the Irish University. There,
too^ was treasured the beautiful ebony crorier,
tipped with gold, so powerfully wielded in the
Abbey of Quin, by the celebrated O'Brien,
Bishop of Killaloo, in Queen Elizabeth's day ;
a bisho[»ick which (said a label attached to the
crosier), ^< none could enjoy without the consent
of the Mac-i-Brien,'' the Tanist of the day.
There, flaunted, ** all tattered and tom,'^ over
an old Indian screen, the *<rich foot-cloth of
black velvet, trimmed up with gold and silver
lace," bequeathed in the will of the great Lady
Thomond, 1672, together with her " counter-
pane of tawny satin, quilted with silken twist.**
There, likewise stood much of the rich plunder
of Malahide Castle, the cabinets and portraits
of the Talbots ; given by Corbett during the
time that most beautiful of the castellated resi-
dences of the English lords of the Pale was in his

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QTHE O'tCJLHBBTTS.

possessibiiy to his friend and biother officer Inchi*
quin : together with such tables and chairs, such
tlools and yoydores, buhles and buffets, as had
gone out of fashion with the battle of the Boyne ;
and have come in, as anti-revoluticmary and
loyal, during the late reaction of all that is old
and useless, over all that is new and serviceable.

Such relics, however, with their historical
recollecdons, will always have the fand*
ful and imaginative on their side ; and the
young student of the University, in the
visits he had paid to his father^s antiquated
mansion, had examined them with intense
curiosity and interest ; more especially the fine
old portraits, in their carved oak frames, of the
bold, brave, and beautiful race from which be
was descended*

Now, however, he was struck even to sorrow-
ful amazement, on the life nerve of that family
pride, so curiously mingled with his democratic
opinions,— an amalgamation of incompatibles,
which forms the weakness of almost all the

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904 THE 0*BEI£KS AXI>.

liberal descendants of the great feudal families, ^
both of the Scotch and Irish.. A total change
had been effected in the apartment, since he last
had visited it. The portraits of the Bishop of
Kiljaloo, of Marshal Thomond, and of the beau-
tiful Lady Mary O'Brien of King Charles's
court, were gone. So were the exquisite crozieK
of the Abbot of Quin, the screen, tlie foot-,
cloth, and the counterpane of the great Lady
Thomond, — relics which O'Brien had often seen
his father kiss with pious reverence. The cabi-
nets and curious carved altar-piece of Malahide
Castle still remained ; but they were packed up
carefully, and labelled, " purchased by Colonel
Talbot, of Malahide Castle, duty to be paid
by the purchaser." Nothing, of all the objects
he had been accustomed to look upon with in-
terest and pride, was there, save a comer cup-
board, (or, as it was called, buffet), so incor*^
porated with the walls as to be immoveable,
two arm-chairs on cither side the fire-place,
and an old table with twistted legs, (called,

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THE o'flahertvs*. 205

from its hexapodal basis, a spider table). These
were chalked ** unsold/' On the latter was a
pile of very old books, with a label, ** sold for
waste paper to Sheriff Vance, gi'ocer, Capel-
street.'' O'Brien sighed deeply as he looked
over them. They were, an odd volume of Dug-
dale's Baronage ; Spelman, much torn and de-
faced ; Selden and Bracton complete, but soiled ;
Howard's Popery Laws; a copy of the Penal Sta-
tutes, and a volume of Collins, which was marked
by a strip of paper, and interlined with red ink.
The marked passage ran thus: — ** It is a
rule that an honour, or barony, or a tenure
by barony, does not enforce a conclusion that
the possessor is a baron of parliament." This
conclusion was a point which Lord Arranmore
had been toiling to overturn; for though be
had recovered his barren title, he had not esta-
blished his right to sit in parliament ; the first
Baron Arranmore never having complied with
the writ, by coming in to take his seat. These
had been the studies, and these the pursuits

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2106 THE O'BmiBKS AKD

which bad seduced Terem)^ OBrieo £rom his
industrious aad pxwperous calling, and had
drawn him to sacrifice to pride of family^ (a
natural, as it was a charactaisttc folly), that
independence which is the soie base of the best
and noblest pride. For if wealth has its vices,
poverty has its weaknesses ; and if the rich can
often stoop to be mean, the poor ure carely ena-
bled to be higb-minded.

'< What,"" thought O'Brien, as he stood widi
foldi^ arms, loddng round him on the empty
spaces left by the removal of his father's collec-
tion, ^* what must it have cost him to part with
these objects of his tastes^ his research, and his
pride ! ^Tis so much easier to part with ordi-
mury essentials, than with the superfluities, with
which the passions have connected themselves.^*

It was evident that a sheriff^s sale had taken
place during the morning ; and O'Brien snj^ios-
ing that a newspaper which lay on the table
might contain some account of it, he took it up;
when to his surprise he found that it hkl con-

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THE oVlahbrtys. 207

cealed an open volume of illuminated vellum,
with a small ivory pallet, and a hair pencil
in a glass of water. The colours on the pallet
were still wet; and in the open page of the
volume was accurately and beautifully drawn
the anuquated chimney-piece, with its crown,
arms, and inscription. The drawing was not
finished, but the first outline and tints were laid
in with the band of a master. He examined the
book in astonbhment. It looked like a splen-
did album of modem, modish, literary frippery ;
or, but for its freshness, it might have been ipis-
taken for one of those magnificent missals, from
which the ostentatious piety of passed times
loved to pray.

The room, it was evident, had very recently
been occupied by the elegant artist. There was
part of an old wainscoat burning on the .great
brazen dogs of the spacious hearth ; and the
ponderous leg of an old chair seemed to lie in
store beside them, to replenish the embers which
were now burning dimly. O'Brien looked into

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THE O^BRIEN^ AND

the buffet ; and there stood a brazen candlestick,
with a butt of one of those immense wax tapers
used on church altars. It also contained that
Irish morfeau of patisserie^ called a Bariieen-
braeCf an old-fashioned cruet of water, and a
small flask of that genuine Irish cordial, (the
curofoa of the O'Donnels, and the parfcut amour
of the O'Neils,) Usquebaugh, — or rather more
classically, " Uishge buy."*

From all these evidences, O'Brien drew the
conclusion, that his father was getting a drawing
made of the family relic, which was now no
l<»iger his ; and that both himself and the artist
he employed, would return, under cover of the
evening, to finish a sketch so happily began.
Unwilling again to put the stultified fidelity of
Uobin to the test, (who had evidently been bound
over to secrecy, by some threat or reward, suf-
ficient to preserve it) ; he was determined, more

• " Uishge buy,'' the yellow water ; from the saffron,
which, being infused in it, imparts to that compound its
fine golden colour.

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THE 0*FL AHERTYS. 209

than ever, to wait the return of his unfortunate
parent^ in whose ruin his own was involved, but
whose fate alone touched him; and he again
turned to the table, to the examination of the vo-
lume, whose pure, rich, Roman binding of white
vellum, ornamented with gold, with its silver
clasps studded with Irish amethysts, so curiously
contrasted with the dirty and ill-scented leather
backs of Collins and Selden, and with the po-
verty of all around it. On looking at its frontis-
piece, which was beautifully illuminated with
shamrocks and harps and rainbows, he read the
following title-page : —

llie Annals of the Isles of Arran and MoycuIlen»

or the

Green Book of St Grellan ;

done into Engli&h by

The Abbot Malachi O'Flaherty,

called

Malachi an Leabhair» or, of the Book ;

with Notes and Commentaries by

The Right Hon. T. O'Brien, Baron of Arranmore,

and illuminated by

vGoOQle

210 THE 0*BEIEMS AND

O'Brien had heard so much of this book in
his diildhood, of its superiority over the Psalter
of Cashel, the Annals of Ulster, the Annals of
the Seven Masters, the Leabhair Gabhala, or
Black Book of Hoath, and the Blue Book of
Bally tore; and even over that great national
record (so much prized and praised by all Irish
antiquaries, from OTlaherty to Valancey), the
Annals of Innisfallen, that his curiosity had
long been sharpened by the privation ; and he
was now much pleased to light upon it. When
Sir George Carew and Sir Henry Sydney re-
ceived orders to destroy all the Irish manu-
scripts they could find in the kingdom, this
treasure of the bibliotheca Grellensis had been
secretly conveyed out of the kingdom, and had
been deposited in that great repertoire (beside
thills most valuable) of all the nonsense conse-
crated by antiquity,— the library of the Vatican.

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THE . 0>LAHRBT Y8. 21 1

the court of the Quirinal, than many of the con-
clave; and who, though an exile from infancy,
was now returning to the land of his nativity.

However different in temperament, opposed
in opinion, or various in views the young may
be, firom those who give to their ductile minds
their first impressions, — many of those impres*
sions will remain indelible. They will even survive
respect for those, from whom they were drawn ;
and will cling to the mind with an haUtual
tenacity that sets reason at defiance, and loosens
ccmviction from its strongest holds. The young
0*Brien, an epitome of the regenerated age to
which he belonged, going with its views, and
animated by its spirit, a worshipper of La Fay-
ette, a disdple of Mirabeau, partaking of all
the ^^ glorious faults " which distinguished th^
youth of his times, as well as of their merits,
was yet, with respect to Ireland, full of the
** vulgar errors of the wise.'* On those national
mbjects, which have so long led the Irish
fi(«Q9i the better career of national improvem^t,

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21^ THE O^BBIEKS AND

and retrograded intellect, by directing its re-
searches to the barbarous times, so falsely
called heroic, — he was purely Irish. Know-
ing nothing of modem Ireland, but her suffer-
ings and her wrongs; knowing little of ancient
Ireland, but her fables and her dreams, his
mind had been stored with popular and poetical
fallacies relative to all that concerned her in the
barbarous "days of her glory;'* and uncon-
sciously partaking in his father's prejudices and
sentiments, while he had stood opposed to him
in his political and religious opinions, — ^he was,
upon many points, as visionary and as fanciful as
him, whose illusions he now so keenly deplored.
Deeply read in OTlaherty, and in Keating, in
O^Connor, and all the celebrated genealogists
and senachies, ancient and modem,— and from
his cradle the auditor of his Irish foster-mother,
the famous wierd w6man of the Isles of Arran,
Mor ny Brien, — his memory and imagination
nourished these early associations; and recollec-
tions of family glory were the more fondly che-

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THE o'flahertys. 213

rished, in proportion to the growing misfortunes
and mortifications of his present struggling posi-
tion: for, to the young and the aspiring, the
struggles which arise between poverty and pride
are the most painful contests to which the human
will can be subjected.

Pleased, in a moment so suspenseful and anxi-
ous, to have lighted upon any subject, that could
divert his attention from the melancholy point
to which it was naturally bent, he drew one ot
the old chairs to the table, and began the exa-
mination of the sybil leaves of a record, which,
besides being reputed the " brief abstract'' of
the history of the nation, was deemed the best
chronicle extant of the two rival families of the
O'Briens and the OTIahertys, whose destinies
and stories seemed so mysteriously interwoven.

The first pages were vellum, covered with
silver paper : they contained the armorial bear-
ings of the O'Briens and the O'Flahertys, drawn
with heraldic skill, and painted in the brightest
tints ; and in rapidly turning over the gUt leaves.

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214 THE O^BRIENS A\D

O'Brien perceived that many of the adventures
fecorded of those families were illustrated with
beautiful vignettes, admirably imitating the mo-
nastic portraits and illuminations of anciait
missals, with an art still taught in Italian con*
vents, as an appropriate acquirement for those
whose talents are only cultivated for the service
of the church. The text was in a fine Italian
hand, such as is written by the professional scribes
of Rome ; who are equally expert in copying the
legend of a saint, or in inditing a tender ^* biglkHo
d'amdre.^^ * The notes and commentaries w««
written, in off-pages, in the well-known office
hand of Lord Arranmore. The whole appeared
to be an improved and beautiful copy of the
very ancient ori^nal, which had probably been
restored to its consecrated niche in the great
counters of the Vatican collection.

*Mr. Davt8» an English artist of celebrity, has taken
the higUtito d^amore for the subject of one of the prettiest
compositions that English art has produced in the country
of the Raphaels and Ouidos,

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THE oVlaHEETYS. S16

While looking with a school-boy's eagerness
over the glittering pictures, astonished by some,
delighted by all, O'Brien found the grey light of
a most sombre and rainy evening grow dim;
and the wind, as it shook the windows, burst
open the doors, and entered by every crevice,
cranny, and broken sash in the room, rendered
its desolate vastness so chill, that, trembling
with cold, and desirous to read at his ease, he
stirred up the embers, threw the old leg of the
chair on the fire, lighted the bit of wax taper,
and closed the rattling shutter of the window
next the chimney. Then drawing his chair and
table near the suddenly blazing hearth, and
with his legs stretched upon the dogs, he began
a regular perusal of

® Je annals of St. @tcUatt.

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216 THE OBRIENS AXD

CHAPTER VI.

annab of SbU fflrellan.

Instructed by the antiquary, Time.

Shakspbark.

The light of antiquity and wisdom of past ages.

Letter of J. K. L.

Year of the world 500.— Great pace and
prosperitie of Innisfail, or Irelonde.* Under
God's providence, the Ballyboe of St. Grellan,
aunciently called Croich-Fuhieah, or the " finall
countrie,'' being the last cantred of lande in the
place, darting out into the great western sae,N
flourishes above the worlde; in salubritie far

♦ " To give a regular account of the first inhabitants
of Ireland, I am obliged to begin at the creation of the
world.'' — Dr. Keatinsr^s Historu of Ireland.

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I

THE o'flahertys. 217

above Brittaine. Abcunding in milke and
honey ; also not wanting in fysh, foule, ne red
deir. The people much given to learning and
miisick, great players upon the harpe, of lofty
stature, and mighty comely. They multiply
exceedingly !

A. M. 1525. — Arrivall of one Cesarea, a
niece of one Noah,* who, rigging out a navire,

* "Various are the opinions," says Keating, " concern-
ing the first mortal, who set a foot upon the island. We
are told by sonoe, that three of the daughters of Cain ar-
rived here several hundred years before the deluge ; and the
old poet gives us this account :

•< Fri hingiona chaidhin Chain mar aon ar
Seth mac Adhamh,

Ad chonairch an Banba ar nus ar mabhair
Liom anionthus."

•* The three fair daughters of the cursed Cain,
With Seth, the son of Adam, first beheld
The isle of Banba.''

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218 THE O^BBIBNS AHD

cometb to seek adventures, and falleth on the
coaste of Connemara, together with fifty fay-
males, or gallads, or leadyes, having only three
Htales on boarde ; one of whom was called Fintan,
a great gramog,* or curinkeyf of a fellow.

1595. — Whereas, in this yeare of the worlde,
Noah began to admonishe the people of the
general! deluge to come, for their detestable
sinnes, and more particularly the people of St.
Grellan, in regarde of the arrivaull of Cesarea
and her fifty faymales, ladyes, or gallads ; and
Noah continued admonishions for one hundred
and twenty yeares, (while he builded himself an
ark for him and his) which made the inhabitants
of St. Grellan say it was all Tatlagh-hill talk,
till a poure down of rayne, and the overflowing

^* Ceasarea* daughter of the good Beatha»
Nursed by the careful hand of SabhuilU
Was the first woman, in the list of fame,
That set a foot on Banba's rugged shore.
Before the world was drowned.*'

♦ A buffoon. t The leader of the war-dance.

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THE O'FLAHERTYS. 219

of the great river Suck,* caused an universall
floode, and drowned them all; in which per-
plexitie of minde and imminent daunger, Fintan
transformed himself into a saumon and swoomed
all the time of the deluge in the Suck, which, to
this day, is famous for its saumon fysh, called
by the people, in regard of the bushoppes dues,
" tithe fyshe.'** And the saide Fintan recover-
ing his former shape, after the sayde deluge,
lived longer than Adam, and had greate
Shanads f of the ould times, which he toulde to
his posteritie : so that of him, the common
speech riseth to this blessed houre, " if I had
lived Fintan's yeares, I could tel as much and
more." J

* A river in Con naught. — A modern Irish epic begins—

" Ye sons of Suck," &c. &c.

f Shanads, genealogical gossipry, from " Senachy,*' an
annalist.

1 The learned and revered Keatine: expresses some

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^20 THE o'bEIENS and

1526. Ireland riseth out of the sae like a
beautiful water-lily, or lump of Kerry-stone
diamond,

1800. Arrivall of three shippes in the port
of St. Grellan, and one barque, contayning three
hundreth men, and one small boy or gassoon ;
being the familie and followers of one Japetb,
led on by Bartholanus, a greate sae captaine ;
greate skirmish and fierce battaille betweene the
new comers and the ancient oulde Irish ; the
former claiming a righte to the place, in respect
of theire kin, and Cousine Cesarea, who con-
quered the lande.

The Irish denying the same, a greate bat-
taille ensueth, and the ancient oulde Irish are
driven into the Fassaghs of Connact province.

1801. Greate pace and plcntie in Irelandefor
six months and more.

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THE O'FLAHEtTY^. S2l

1802^ Where God hath his churche, the devil
hath his chapell, for it seemeth that the cquntri^
became uproarious, in regarde of the arrivaulle
of the cursed seed of Shetn, with their captaine,
one Oceanus, who landed at the port of St.
Grellan, and gives his name to the sae there^
aboutSy which has ever since been called Ocean*
Oreate bickerings and skirmishes betweene th^
Giants and ancient oulde Irish, also the Bar-
tholanian settlers: successe various betweene
laweful governors and new usurpers — the giants
are slayne, and throwne into the sae; greate
pace and plentie throughout the yeare. The
ancient Irish multiplie eicceedingly.

1803. More new commers or transplanters.
ArrivauUe of the Belgians in a fleete, well rigged,
led on by Slangey or Slang, prevaileth over the
Bartholantans ; but the Danans, a new colony,
arriving, the Bartholanians forfeit their londe?,
and the Belgians are driven into the Fassaghs
of Connact province, — only Slang, who aceepteth

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222 THE O'BRIKNS AND

a commission in the Irish militia :* his progeny
flourish in the lande to this day. And now the
Danans remayne masters of the sayde londe, 198
yeares, 6 months, and 2 dais.

Warres and uproares with the Belgians of the
mountaynes, being frequent, in the neck of all
mischief and hurli-burlies, in the yeare of the
worlde 2828, there appeareth on the coast of St.
Grellan, 120 shippes, being the fleet of them
boulde invaders, the Kirca-Scuits, or Scote, or
Scots, or Scytoe, or Scythians, from Scythia, or
Milesians from Milesius (as Trogus and Marianus
Scotus, do write), whose sons, Heber and Here-
mon-f- did conquer the londe entirely, dividing of
it betweene them, — Heber to South, and Hcre-
mon to North ; but ambition, the mother of mis-
chief, did not suffer them to remayne in pac^, so

♦ For an account oflheFionne. Erin, or Irish militia.

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THE O'FLAHERTYS. 223

they put on armes, and to battaille they goe,
Heber he being slaine by his own brother, and
Heremon remayning cock of the roost.

1100. B. C. — Gathulus the Ardruith, or Arch^
druid, planteth the true religion ; the great idol
of Croich Fuineah, or St. Grellan, thrown into
the sae, to the entire moane of the ancient oulde
Irish. And Gathulus presideth metropolitically
under the sovereign pontiff.* And now, He-
remon, his conscience being sore pinched for his
brother's murther, he giveth great stretche of
londe to the druids ; and the greate wood of
St Grellan, called Bally ny doire; and thereste
of the londe is parcelled out among the chief
captains. And Con Maol, of the Dalcascan
race, founder of the O'Briens, son of Heber,

• The Gauls had a sovereign pontiff, or head of the
Druids. The druidical, or Celtic religion, was the same as
that of the old natriarchs. Thpv wnrshin»ed onp Simri^me

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224 THE o'bRIKNS and

son of Milesius, settletli along the coaste of
Munster, to the Isle of Arran ;» and the Hy
Fflaherties, or OTflaherties, take to the moun-
tains of Connamara, or the bays of the great
sae, and found their kingdom of lar Connaught,
or the Hy Tart^gh, whereof Moy CuUen is the
principal sate ; and the Hy Taafs (now Mac
Taafs) being ever a pithfuU sept, stop in the
Fassagh,-|* between hill and coast.

And now, as hath ever been in these king-
domes, greate change and alteration, by usurp-
ing and compounding among themselves, and
by dividing of countrees, and skirmishes through
other, and taking of preys of cattle, and forfeit-
ing and reprizing.

And now the druids rule the londe, and pro-
phecy the greate power of theire order, and
write their mysteries in a boke in the old Ogham,
and depositeth it in the greate college of Mur

* For the rest of the pedigrree of the O'Briens, ud to

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THE oVlahertys^ SS6

Ollivan at Feamat;* and the people, sett oil
by one Einge Cormac CQuinn^ a great scholar
and heretic, demanded i»ght of the sacred boke,
at which the chief druid did fume and chafe,
saying it was an impious abomination ; and the
sayd King Cormack O'Quinn, still conferring and
confuting with the sayd druid, payeth dearly for
the same !

Two hundred yeares before Christe, great
uproares — druids taking the londe for their god
Baal, and the people of Munster rising up
against theni. The wolves came down from the
mountaines and devoured all the inhabitants of
St Grdlan, the rest being carried off with the
plague. The druids declareth it a judgement
for their pestiferous sinnes. And now the race
of the O'Briens, the Dalcascan kings of Munster,
of the race of whom cometh Brian Borrilk, or
Borreimh, king of all Ireland, flourish above
the world, and begin the great Momonian war,
which is waged to thi» blessed day : so that the

• O'Connor calls this college **the celebrated mother of
all our philosophical schools.*'
L 3

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S96 THS 0*BIII£N8 AK9

reakn, as it were, submitted to the 0*firiens
intirely, and who but them^ according to the
Mulaneries.*

A. D. 390. — Christian religion beganncv^
roote in Irelande, as written in the Lyfe oi
Finn Lug,t saint and bushopp ; but not as some
wilful men dreameth, by James the Apoatel^
neither by Patricius, Phaidrig, or Patrick,} but

* See that great monument of Irish antiquities^ the
Codex Momonensis, or Munster Book, whereof I have an
authentic copy. No regular chronology being observed in
this work, which alone containeth the succession of the
Kings of Munster, of the Dalcascan race, I take leave to
supply the defect in my genealogical account of the
O'Briens, from the time of Logan More Moghnuagad, in
the 2d century, to 1541, when Murrogh O'Brien surren^
dered the title of King of Munster to Henry the Eighths-
Note by Lord Arknmore.

t This King is called, by a modem Irish historian, the
greatest legislator of all our kings, as he was indisputably
the greatest philosopher of our nation. It appears that be
paid the penalty of his philosophy ; for Mr. O'Oonnoif
informs us, that by openly opposing the corruptions of the
druids, and attacking the temporal power of their priests,
they attacked him with a treasonable conspiracy, which
cost that great monarch no less than his life.

Mr. Walker, and most of the Irish antiquarians, call
this king ^^ the Irish Lycurgus.**

X Almost every province in Ireland claims the establitb-

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THE o'fLAHERTTS. AS?

by the said Finn Lug, who builded him a cell
in the isle of the Black Lake of 0'Fflaherty'$
M6untaiii, which afterwards became a great
Dominican friary, and is to this day, and will
ever more. This friary became mother of the
Abbey of St. Grellan, and of others in France,
Germanic, Suavia, and Italic.

The chief druid ordereth Finn Lug, sainte
and bushoppe, to be burnt; but he. Lug,
warned of same in a dreame, as by a miracle^
escapeth, and travels to Rome, where he is
made bushoppe, and has the Ballyboe erected
into a see by Pope Celestinus. He hastens back
to Ireland with Saint Patrick, apostle and pa-
tron. St. Patrick converts Queen O'Brien, of
Munster, and Finn Lug, the Queen O'Connor
of Connaught, the kings following. Now the
diief druids beganne to quake, no longer backed
by kings or noljles, and falleth to railling; and
Saint Finn Lug holdeth great converse with

ment of Christianity by its own patron and favourite saint.
St. Kiaran is said, by Mr. O'Connor, to be the founder of
Irish Christianity.

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2^8 THE O'BRIENS AXD

Duhbliach-Mac Logain, ardfileah or chief druid
to the supreme king. He is converted^ and
composeth a hymn in honour of the christian
religion. Druids, called magicians by Saint
Patrick, are persecuted : they fly to the islands
of Arran, and are protected by the clan Tieg
O'Briens. Saint Patrick burns the bokes* in
the college of Mur Ollivan, to the number of
one hundred and eighty, as we are toulde by
the learned Duald Mac Firbess : and now the
whole island being converted, so that there were
as many saintes as soules, they multiphe ex-
ceedingly ; and the cell or monasterie of Finn

* It appears from the Life of St. Patrick, written by the
Mouk of Furaes, that the apostle of Ireland brought with
him that destroying zeal which has distinguished the saints
of all ages. He destroyed King Leoguire*s gold and silver
devils ; asserting that the good king was a worshipper of
images, and he threw the poor man's two beautiful daugh-
ters, for the good of their souls, into a deep sleep, from -
which they never awakened. He had also the power of

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THE O^FLAHERTYS. 229

Lug, in the isle of the Black Lake, alone con-
tayning three thousand monkes, being of the
first of the three orders established by Saint
Patrick, called the most holy order, which was
composed of three hundred and fifty regular
bushoppes, all of them saintes^ who drank
nothing but water, and fed on nothing but
herbes.

200.— The O'Briens now lord it manfully ;
and Eagan More, King of Munster, the great
Momonican hero, makes war upon Con Caed-
cathath, his cousin, who styles himself King of
Ireland, and great murthur among the heroes
of the O'Brien race, for divers usurpations in
Munster and Connaught.*

(Here O'Brien, in disgust at the sanguinary
absurdities, and confused and barbarous detmls
of the wars of his ancestors, was about to throw

• For an account of this war, see O'Flaherty's Ogygia :

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230 THE o'briens and

aside the volume, when a beautiful vignette of
the head of St. Grellan, the founder of his
native town, induced him again to look into the
text.)

664. — The smntes multiplie exceedingly, and
the lande being overrun with them, many are
sent into foreign countrees on the mission of the
Propaganda ; and Saint Grellan, a young novice,
being ordered to Germanie by the abbot, is loth
to lave the place. His heart being hardened,
he refuseth to quit, and calleth the abbot, who
wasoulde and deaf, a Bod-hairCy* and is ex-
communicated by bell, boke, and candle-light,
for breaking the first rule of the churche — obe-
dience- — and is sent out of the island in a bot-
tomless boat, and sees a greate star in the lake,
and finds it was a toothe dropped by Saint Par-
trick two hundred yeares before; and takes it
for an omen, and by light of same, walks the
worlde long and lone, bare foot and bare headed,
through bog and brake, fern and fassagh, and
ford and plash ; and reaching Croick Fuineah,
* A deaf or stupid person.

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THE 0*FLAHEBTY8. S31

(now St. Grellan), wake and weary, lyeth him
down to die, sore suffering in sowl and sole. A
deep sleep cometh on him, within reach of tid«
and floode, but the water retireth back on every
side to the measure of four caracutes of lande^
and left that place dry ever after, that is now tb«
bawn or deer-close of the court of the abbey;
and io memory of this marvellous miracle. Saint
Grellan builded him a cell, of which that rock
was the foundation, and stands to this day, nigh
to the ould druid's cormach, by name of Cartg-
ny-Grellan-an-Sanctha — the holy rock of Saint
Grellan. Out of this cell grew the great abbey,
or monasierium Crovense, now the greatest in
the lande, of which St. Grellan was founder
and first abbot, and builded a new city round it
for the continual resort of Frinch, Allimandes,
Saxons, or English, Ficts, and Italians, and
other barbarous nations, repairing there to be
instructed in a strict course of lyfe ; and was
buried here ; so that it may be called the store^*
house of learning and holiness for the christian

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2SS THS O'BRIENS AKD

worlde, and generall sanctuarie of saintes aiid

. 988. — ^And now the people of Connaught,
headed by their kings and chiefs, and led on
by the great O'Fflaherty, king of lar Connaugfat,
invaded the territories of the O'Briens, from
West Munster to the isles of Arran ; and by
way of bravados, cut down the famous tree of
Maghadoire, under which the kmgs of the
O'Brien race were crowned. And it fell out,
that Brien Borrfl, now king of all Munster,
stcnnached by this bouldnesse, saileth with a
powerful army up the Shanon, and overrunning
the western partes of Connaught, spoyled and
laid waste the same, slaying O'Fflaherty, and
Murtoch son of Conor, king of Connaught, and
other princes, without distinction ; and returned
home with the spoyle. The great Abbey of
MoycuUen, founded by O'Fflaherty, chief of
that name, and Prince of Moycullen, for the
order of St. Bridget, whereof his daughter,
Bevoine OTflaherty-ni-Brian was first Abbess ;

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'81

THE O'FLAHERTVS. 233

and this name of Bevoine became of great note
and sanctity in the family ever after, till the
mbhap of Abbess Bevoine the Second, in the
sixteenth century.

[O^Brien paused here in the perusal of the
manuscript The name of Bevoine O'Flaherty
was familiar to his memory. Either it had
found a place in some of the wild tales of his
foster mother, Mor-ny-Brien, in the isles of
Arran, or be had lisped the name in his infancy.
The sound, as he now audibly repeated it, came
upon his ear as the echo of sounds known, and
half forgotten — at once sweet and sad, the
general chanicter of old and broken recollections.
He took up the manuscript and continued.]

1120 — And now great descents and other
trespasses by the OTflaherties on the Clan Teig
O^Briens of the isles of Arran, whom they bate
back to the mountains. The Mac Taafs and
the O'Flaherties fall to odds for a prey of
cattle. Greate cosherings and cuttings on the
people. Danish pirates spoil the lande, and

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884 THE o'bribns akd

put all to the sword, the rest carried off by the
plague.

1260— Murrogh O'Brien, chief of the Clan
Teigs, prince, or lord of the isles, and near
a-kin to the great king of Thumond, falls to
odds with St. Grellan — greate cutting and
coshering; the Abbot excommunicates him, he
refusing his Easter oblation; he, Murrogh,
layeth stone and faggot to the Abbey wall^
deaves the Abbot's scull with a hatchet, and
earryeth off greate spoyl to the isles. The
QTflaherties taking advantage of same, come
down upon the town, and plunder the people
¥rith fire and sword, who cry woe ! and ohone !
(anglice, alack!) and the Mac Taafs wuteth
for a pounce at the pass of Glen Murrogh, take
a prey of cattle from the OTflaherties ; greal
skirmishes through other.

1150— And now Murrogh of the isles, being
stricken in years, became sore troubled of con-
science, in respect of cleaving of the Abbot\i
scull with his hatchet, pays an eric for. the

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THE o'flahkrtys. 235

Abbot's head of 3000 cows, and maketh over
ip gift and oblation every earicute of lande be
had won or held in the Bally-boe of St. Grellan
to the Abbey, giving in lieu of the Abbot's
head his best lands along the coast, also 500
barings, and 5,000 oysters from every busft
or barque, boat or picear, breaking bulk on
his head land on the coast of St. Grellan,
called Knock-oiy-huing, which are the best
gifts in the bisboprick to this day, together
with three holy crosses, brought from Rome,
two embroidered vestments, for the Abbot, arid
a golden chalice. And so he took the cowl,
and retired to a cell in the Abbey of Moy-
cuUen, in the habit of the order; where his
tomb may still be seen to this blessed hour.
He was callendered a saint by the Pope.

1161 — Strange shippes neare the harbour ctf
St. Grellan, thought to be English. The
OTflaherties goe to armes, and gather on the
coaste; the strange shippes make off. The
divill sett his foote after them.

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S(36 THE 0*B]IIBN8 AN1>

1162 — King Henry Fitzempress of England,

having caste in his mynde to conquer ould

Ireland, seeing it commodious so to do, and

being invited by the Irish princes fighting

througli other, gets a grant of the island from

Pope Adrian, (bad cess to him, Amen !) and

entering by force of armes, breakes the bounds

pf Ireland, according to ould prophecy,

*' At the creek of Bagganbun
Irelaod will be lost and won ;**

The invaders having no hope of the harbour
of St Grellan, as I have shewn.

1176.— Munster submitteth (to the greate
moan of the lande). Rorie O'Connor, king of
Connaught, calleth -a gathering at the chiefs of
the prowence, layeth before them the dangerous
estate of the lande: — ^for council and discretion
are wont to stay hasty motion, and stop the
course of rash device ! So to armes they goe,
horse and foote, kern, and gallow glass, stockah
and horse-boy, chief and tributary ; the king at
their head, the O'Fflaherties bearing the banner

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THE o'flahektys, 23T

of the province ; which put the M*Dennotts in
dudging, and the O'Briens of the Isles dis-
puting the king^s right, claymed of ancient pri-
vilege by the OTflaherties of lar Connaught :
and so they cross the Shannon, and preyed the
country to the walls of Dublin, where lyeth
encamped Earl Strdngbow, with his Norman
gallants, who were fine in their apparel, nor
could endure service in maresh and border, like
the Irish, nor brooked open and remote places,
prefering a warme chamber and furre gownes
to woodes and bogges ; standing upon the pan-
tofles of their reputation, calling the Irish bar-
barians, polling, pilling, extorting, and what
not.

And now the Irish chiefs, out of old grudges,
fall to odds through others — the O'Briens against
the O'Fflaherties — and are surprised by the
Strongbonians,* who shew them small mercy ;

• Speaking of this event, Harding, the admirable his-
torian of Gal way, observes, " These unhappy dissensions
were at all times the cause of their (the Irish) ruin,"

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THB O'BRIENS AND

many arc slayne, and many cross the Shannon,
back with King Rone, who maketh his peace
with the English king, sweareth alle^nce, and
hotdeth the kingdom of Connaught ex sab eo ;*
and so it was as ever more in the londe.

1179. — English first sette foote in Connaught
province. O'Fflaherty plasheth his woodes,
and raiseth a castle of stone in St Grellan, at
which the bards cry ** shame r And Dermod
More O'Brien, prince of the Isle of Arran, re-
ceives this yeare twelve tuns of wine for pro-
tecting the towns of St. Grellan and Galway
from all pirates and privateers. Now this
Dermod More was immediate ancestor of
Twence Baron O'Brien, now of St. Grel-
lan, but formerly of Moyvanie and Cluantes in
Munster, and of Caoluisge in Connaught, with
a Caput Baronicum castle, or battled house,
raised not without king's licence in the liberties
of Dublin, the capital of the realm, now called
O^Brien's House.

* This O'Connor was the last of the Irish monarchs; he
died in the abbey of Cong.

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THE oVlahxbtys. 900

King Henry III. seizes on the provinoe,
bestows it on one Richard de Burgho or Burke,
head of the Clanrickards, who marcheth on St.
Grellan, with English horse and foote, light
iirmes, jacks and sculls, and bows and arrows,
and two-edged swordes, to the marvel and terrc»r
of the people ; but the English find ne dastards,
ne cowards in the Ballyboe, but valiant men,
stout hearts and handes, with horse and foote,
and sling and sparth — the countrie faste with
woodeand bogge, and trenched and plashed.
But of the towne and castle of St. Grellan, the
English make small worke; the castle thej
crumble to the dust ; and the townsmen being
net-fishers, small craftsmen, and retainers of the
abbot and bishop, are put to flight, the church
alone is spared. Then was seen Giolla Dubh*
CFflaherty More, issuing betweene two dark

* Gialla, or Gially was a great name in the O* Flaherty
femily ; but such is the sweetness, copiousness, and great
antiquity of the Irish tongue, that I know of no name in
English to answer truly thereunto. Gialla or Giail ex-
pressing manhood, or the state of man, in contradistinction

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240 THE 0*BRIEK8 XSD

woodes, descending from his mountains; his
horse was fair, and ran as any stagge-— he, tall of
stature, well composed, and active, in counte-
nance fierce ; in his right hande he bore a darte,
whidi he caste from him in token of defiance,
then seized his sparth from one of his captaines,
he flew forth at the head of his chiefs and gallow
glasses, so as to break the English arraie ! The
Irish raise a shout ! — ^but the wary English, clip-
ping them in betweene hill and sae, get them on
the champaign countrey. And now, being man
to man, great strife ensueth — the English charg-
ing with their bows ! — the Irish hurl their slings !
The English, with their accustomed art, gette

to female, as one would say ; for Gialla or Giall> means a
male-hostage, or pledge, man-servant, boy, or lacquey;
baggage-driver in the army, armour-bearer, poet, chariot-
eer, waiter, butler, or lower coachman, postilion,, foot-
man, runner, cup«bearer, groom, ostler, page, train-bearer,
porter, confidant, secretary, plough-boy, sweep, or so-
licitor, according to the word placed after it. Such
Is the copiousness of the Irish tongue.** See the Sanas-
gaoihlgesagsbhearla, or Irish English Dictionary, by
O'Reilly, word Giall or Gialla.— Note by Lord Arranmore

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THE O^FLAHEETYS. 241

the Irish betweene them and the sae, falling on
them with their two-edged swords. The Irish
being in this strait, choose to die like men,
rather than drownlike bastes— no vantage ground
is there now — it booteth not to fly on any side ;
they fight sore — no mercie, but dead blows ; the
Irish fall like leaves, within sight of their fathers'
raths. The OTflaherty More is left in the
midst of his enemies ; flourishing his sparthe or
axe, swashing and lashing, like a lion among
sheep, he backeth bravely towards the mountain.
Some Irish, scattered among the bushes, raise
the shout, and gathering together, come to the
rescue; the English turn on them — ^the Irish
make feint to rune away ; the English following,
are bogged in low moor-ground, and being
environed with marishes, forsake their horses,
and fighting valliantly back to back, doe free
themselves from their bottoms, and make close
retrait. The Irish eagerly pursue, and charge
them with their slings. One De Courcey, with
his company, turn their faces, and fight a cruell

VOL. II. M

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242 THE O'BRIENS ANli

fight — the earth is strewn, the Suck runs blood !
Each claimeth the victory, but who got the best,
there is no boast now made.

The English gett off, under covert of night —
the Irish that remayned, retraite to OTflaher-
ties' rath or fort in the mountaines of Moy-
cuUen, bearing the body of O'Fflaherty More
on* their shoulders; his mantle well rent with
English arrows, the ouldest blood in the nation
gushing from his heart. The monkes of the
abbey come forth to meet them with reed and
rush, and raise the " uUaloo.'' The abbot did
solemnize his exequies with great reverence;
and to this day the people talk of the battailie
of the pass of Glen Murrogh, where O'Fflaherty
fell, defending his country : and no small blame
was given to the Mac Taafs, who kept aloofe,
playing fast and loose, laving their Fassagh with-
out watch or ward, standing on the pounce, to take
a prey of cattle from the O'Briens of the isles,
who were then fighting valliantly the good cause,
in Munster, under O'Brien, Prince of Thumond.

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THE oVlAHERTVS.

A. D. 1240.— The English, masters of all the
champaign country, built towers, castles, and
forts, and churches. The realm at this time
in pace— the chief in his mountains— the priest
in his church^the souldier in his garrison
— and the plowman at his plow. English
and Spanish merchants settle in St. Grellan :
charter of staple and murage granted, gate and
town wall erected, ^nd castle of stone and lyme
builded. The town more English than Irish.
The OTflaherties come down and scour the
place. The O'Briens of the isles make a land*
ing, and carry off greate spoyle. Great plague
this yeare ; also, upon the neck of it, comes over
one Steffano, with the pope's apostolick mandate,
requiring the tenth of all moveables, to man*
ta)me his warres with Frederick, Emperor of
Alemaine or Gernamie. The lords and laity,
as well English as Irish, sayeth, " Nay, we will
give the pope no tenths; neither subject our
locall possessions to the church of Rome.*' But
the clergie, fearing the bulls of excommunica-
M 2

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^44 tUE o'BBIENS Ai^JD

tion, with grudging yielded ; the people send-
ing after their money, bitter Irish curses ; thqr
being all driven to the worst, selling their goods
to merciless merchants to pay their tenths ; their
cowes, hackneys, cadoes, cuppes, copes, altar
cloths, chalices, and aqua vitas. Father Thady
Mac Taaf makes hard for the see of St GreL
lan, but misses the cushion. The Kyng endea-
voures to lay greate taxes on the Irish, to help
him in his warres agdnst the Frinch. Great
polling and pilling of the Irish, which they
could not brooke; so to warre they goe with
the English,— the O'Neils of Ulster, O'Briens
of Munster, O'Connors of Connaught, and
OTflahertys of St. Grellan.

1276.— Great slaughter of the Irish this
yeare, and spilling of the ould blood — over-
throw given to the English at Glendalory —
Miirtoch O'Fflaherty, a notable rebel, tak^i
and executed — Thomas, Earl of Clare, slays
O'Brien Roe— The Irish draw such drau^t,
they shut up the English in Slew-Bany, and

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THE o'FLAHERTYS. %iiS

oblige them to cry quarter — Friar Falburn,
B. of Waterford, Lord Deputy at this tyme.

1280.-* Rose cruell warres betweene the
0*Fflaherties and the O'Briens ; great slaughter
and bloode-shed ; also, between the Mac Der-
motts and O'Connors. The Mac-an-earlies*
overrun the country with fire and sworde. And
now the English lordes and gentilmen begyning
to incline to Irish rule and order, certain sta-
tutes are made for the preservation of English
order, <^ that no English subjects should make
alliance by altarage, or fostering wyth any of
Irish nacion ; nor no Englishman to marry an
Irishwoman, on pain of forfeiture of lands and
tenements, with divers other statutes for bo^efit
oi that English nacbn."

This yeare Monica Mac Taaf granted hi
Frankahnoigne to the cathedral of St Gr^llan,
S void pieces of ground, her jointure lande ^d
orcfa^, and her right to a mill on the river
Suck, she retiring to a nunnery.

* The earl's sona^ the factious sons of the first Earl of
Clanrickard.

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246 THE O'BKIENS AXD

1331.— This yeare, greate rebellion in Con-
naught ; ringleaders cut off every where. Great
skirmishes betweene the OTflaherties and the
O'Briens. Great slaughter of the mere Irish
(by the English of Leinster), in Connaught.
A dearth ensueth, famine killeth where the
sworde spareth.

1336. — On St. Lawrence's day, the Irish of
Connaught discomfitted by the English ;* were
slayne three thousand Irish. Great variance
betweene Fitz-Ralph, Primate, and the four
orders of begging friars. Great storme ! wolves
come downe from the mountaines and devoure
the abbot's deer ; he maketh offering to the
three jewels of Ireland, St. Patrick, St. Bridget,
and St. Colomb ; buildeth a stone fence, by an
English mason of the towne; deer never de-
voured after — praise be to the three jewels ! —

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THE oVlaheetys. 247

iandes. Abbot of Moycullen proveth that the
O'Briens gave fen acres of woode and stony
grounde, in 1210, for ever in fee soccage, not in
capite ; also any black rent thereupcm ; also five
hundred herrings, and five thousand oysters,
from every buss or barque, boat or picar, breaks
ing bulk on his head-land on the coaste of St.
Grellan, called Knock ny Huay. Bushoppe
«howeth a grant of the Pope for the same — they
fall to odds. The OTflaherties back the abbot,
the townsmen goe. with the bushoppe, who is
backed by the Earl of Ulster, and English
droopes from Galway. Bushoppe wins the day,
and gets the oysters to this blessed houre.

1400. — Create oblations come in to the Abbey,
and tributary ofi*ers from the great Irii^ families
of the ould blood. Eel weir built. Holywell
much resorted to.

1490.— Father Paddy Mac Taaf, a purveyor
and a fine birder, brings down eighty curlieus
and fifty rails in one day. Great goss hawk at
the Abbey, called ^* the Prior," dies of a surfeit.

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248 THE o'beiens and

Greate disorder among the monks. St. GrelJan's
rule lost. Monks reformed by the friars of
strict reformance of the Black Isle. Great glut
of oysters this yeare ; the Bushoppe translated to
heaven after supper one night, which reminded
the people of the goss hawk.

The Mac Taafs take English order, and goe

in, doeing homage, and taking grant of their

landes, before the Lorde Walter de Burgo, in the

Castle of Portumna— also one of the O'Brien*

facit fidelitatem et komagium.

1530.— The OTflaherties refuseth all par-
lance with the Lord President, denying English
laws and statutes,* with great abusion of re-
proache for suche as take English rule, and
order, and habite, and tongue, saying in the

* •* So frequent were the breaches of public faith, and the
insecurity of any pardon granted to the Irish, that they
became hopeless, and maddened into resistance : for many,

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THE oVlahektys 249

teeth of the sayd Lord President, " that it be
oone of the destructions of the Irish, their never
being threwe to each other, but selling themselves
ever, and their mother lande, for title, and place,
and power;— as the oulde Earle of Tyrone,
O'Briens, Earles of Inchiquin, Macarthys, Earls
of Desmonde, O'Connor, and others ; but as for
him, he would stick, as his father had done, to
the ould Brehon law, mantle, glibb, and crum-
hal ;" and so he retired to his mountaines, and
raised a fine pile of defence, a tower and rath,
(now called a bawn).

1534. — Lord President, at the head of his
bandes, with the banner of the province, six
score kernes, and their captaines, a score bat-
taille>aKe, and little guidons, and a hosting of
the men of Galway, joyned by the Mac Taafs,
attack the OTflaherties, and take the towne of
St. Grellan. OTflaherty escapes to the moun-
taynes — three of his sones killed — the towne of

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Jt »

250 THE O^BRIENS ANI>

to the English governor; Lord President to
receive fee-farme and cess of the porte ; (oysters
and herrings secured to the bushoppe); no
black rent to be paide to any Irishman; the
President, for eight days, is to cut passes through
the woodes adjacent to his majesty^s subjects,
and to cleare the mountaynes, so to rid the lande
of the wilde Irish ; and the President giveth
regrantes of the Abbey landes to our lord, the
abbot, also confirmeth the domayne of the
bushoppe (both Englishmen); together with
sock, sack, and toll, and judgement of fire, and
water, and iron, and tryal by combat and juris-
diction of the gallows and pitt to one Kenelm
Hunks, an Englishman, and scout^master of the
province; to whom the low landes of the O Ffla-
herties, being 4437 acres, with rents of 612/.
sterling, are also made over for his good services.
1636.— The OTlaherty taken in armes by
a hosting of the lord- president, and a quest being
passed upon him, he was condemned to death,
and the provost and officers led him to death.

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-THK o'fLAHERTYS. SS\

And he, dying stout-hearted, cursed his pos-
terity, who ^ould learne Englishe, sow -corn,
or build houses, to invite the English, He wa^
succeeded, according to the law of tanistry, by
GioUa OTlaherty^ his nephew : a powerful mao
he was, dark of aspect, and strong of arme,
of great valour, and eminent piety ; so that he
re-edified and re-endowed the abbey, now fallen
to decay : sajring he would build for God, and
not for man. He was a zealous and faithful!
childe of the catholick church.

164jO. — Now heresy gaineth footinge in the
londe: provost Hunks professeth it, and saying,
** the king is pope," is excommunicated by the
abbot. One Browne, an Augustinian friar, de-
nyeth the pope's supremacy, and is made arch-
bishoppe of Dublin ; being the first of the clergy
who embraceth the new heresy.

1546. — Dissolution of monasteries proclaimed
by the lord-president ; great hostilities and stir-
rings ; Abbot escapeth to the Isle of Slattery ;
Bushoppe conformeth, and so keepeth his owne.

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S5S THE 0*V&1EKS AND

164T. — New heresy estiMished by procl&ma-
tion ; the fine ould abbey church phindered of
relics and images by English souldiers, and
monks put to the swoarda* The abbey landes
annexed to the see of St. Grellan.

1551. — Mass restored by her most sacred
majesty of blessed memory. Abbot and monks
return to the abbey.

Tlie abbot, an O'Flaherty, made bishoppe of
St. Grellan; an EngUsh garrison received by
the queen's order ; grant of immunity to the
burghers thereoff. GioUa OTlaherty keepeth
quiet in his castle; endoweth the nunnery c^
Mary, John, and Joseph, with foure cantreds
of mountaine lande, placing his daughter Bea-
vdn 0*Fflaherty therein, as abbess, who recdves
a cross for the head of her crosier» from the
Pope, coutayning therein a bit of the true cnM,
which, to this day, is swome upon. She was a
fine and lovely lady, a great ahns-giver from

♦ See Theatre of Catholic and Protestant Religion ; also
"Currey's Civil Wan."

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THE 0'FX«AH£ATYS. 2fS

her childhoode up, fure-eniiiiait in learning and
ho6{ntality> a^nd one who may be calendered for
a saint, when her time cometh.

1560. — ^Abduction of the Abbess of Mary,
John, and Joseph> by Murrogh O'Bri^, chief
<rfthe Isles^ whocaityeth her off, she being on
a jnlgrimage to St Patrick^s Purgatory. And
now greate strife and hurly-burly between the
O'Fflaherties and the O'Briens ; no tidings of
the abbess for a year and more. GioUa OTfla-
herty attacks the Isles, and after much strife
and uproarious continticxi, expels the ClanTe%
O'Briens, man and baste, and carries back his
daughter, the abbess ; that is, her dead bodie,
toMoycullen, where she lies in a faire tomb,
in the new chauntrey of the abbey. And a
great chree was raised over her by the women of
the Bally boe. The story runneth, that she being
much beloved by thesaid Murrogh, her abductor,
and loving him much, from eaiiy youth, was
forced to her veil and vow by her father, who
hated the O'Briens, after the ould grudge.

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*64 THE O'BRIENS AND

And willingly went she with the said Murrogh
to his Isles, where they were married by a Fran*
ciscan ; for he, Murrogh, was of the ould des.
tBcent, tall and dark-eyed and very comely, as
the Dalgaiscan or Milesian race ever were, and
a goodly gentleman, and of the sword, and heir
to many subtracts of gentry ; and had been sent
more than once to bridle in the insolence of the
OTflaherties, in ruffling times. He was, in his
youth £md prime, when first he beheld the most
fair and lovely Beavoin, in the church of Mary,
John, and Joseph, on an Easter day. And
was called Murrogh na Spaniagh, from haying
been a sword and buckler man of the King of
Spain, and fought valiantly against the Moors
in Pagan lande. And the story went, that the
Lady Beavoin was slain in his armes by ber ow0
father, who sought and found her within the
walls of Dan -ZEngus, the rathe or fort of the
O'Briens of Arran and what not. — Be that as it
may, the O'Briens of Arran never flourished
after, as will be seen in history ; the O^Ffla-

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THK O'FLiVHERTYS. 255

faerties holding possession of their islands of
Arran^ until the Queen, on pretext, backed by
pike and gunne, did claim said isles, and get
them : which sheweth what doeth ever come of
meddling with Goddess own.

And here it seemeth notable to mention the
ould Irish prophecy in regard of the O'Briens
and the O'Fflaherties, that love and religion
would ever be fatal to them ; till the cross, first
planted in the land by St. Grellan, should rise
triumphant by Godde's grace, and by the strong
arme of the O'Briens. For it is well known
that Heaven did openly manifest its favour to.
the great Aongus O'Brien at the battle of Ive-
leathian, — a sword falling from a cloud at his
feet when he was sore pressed ; with which he
won the victory, and killed with the same sword
the usurper of his crowne and kingdom, Mog
Muagad ; and hence the crest of the O'Briens,
a naked arm issuing from a cloud, brandishing a
sword, all proper* Motto—" Vigtieur de dessus.^
And further goeth the prophecy of him shall re*

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256 THS O^BRIBNS AND

store his church and sept^ an Irish distich, wbkb
done into fur Engliahe, thus inditeth :—

** Midst ^Dgus forloFBe
Shall th* O'Brien be borne -y
And bear in his face
The mole of hb race/'

Here O'Brien laid down the MS. which he had
read with rapidity. He smiled to think how
readily the accidents of his own birth and person
might, in darker times, have been turned to the
account of party, by the influence of superstition
or craft, as in the instance of O'Donnel Baldearg.
For the rest, the impressions made were very
different from those which similar records, tra-
ditionally learned in cliildhood from the story-
tellers of the isles of Arran, and confirmed by
Keating and OTflaherty, had awakened. In the
tMes of national vanity and poetical hyp^bo)e»
he had then seen only a race of oaints and heroes,
perfect as the types of the martyrology, and ideal
as the chiefs of Ossian^s poedo ^trains. He now

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THE o'flaheetys. 267

saw them as they were, a barbarous people,*
checked in their natural progress towards
civilization by a foreign government, to tlie
full as barbarous as themselves ; their boasted
learning, a tissue of monkish legends; their
government, the rudest form of the worst of
human institutions — feudality; their heroes,
bcdd, brave, fierce, and false, as men, acting
under the worst political combinations, and the
most vehement of human passions : constantly
opposed in domestic quarrels, to the destruction
of their common interests, and always op-
pressed, because always divided. Still he saw
them valiant, proud, and spirited ; highly en-
dowed, full of that creative imagination which
constitutes genius, and animated by those strong
passions which anticipate time, and lead to social
advancement, by prompt decision and uncalcu-
lated innovation.

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2B8 THE 0'bRI£193 AK0

touched and even affected him ; rudely and
simply as^ it was told. What a world of feeling !
— what struggles of passion and piety t— of pre-»
judice and predilection { — ^what incidents and
adventures, in the church of St. Bridget, in the
wild fastnesses of MoycuUen, on the turbulent
Atlantic, and the rocky isles of Arran ! The
destiny also of the two families, thus aigrafted
«i the history of a country, and inteiwoven with
its wrongs ! For the false combinations of a
barbarous le^slature nourished the provincial
^md municipal feuds, and cherished by persecu-*
tion the institutions which so often quenched
" those best of passions,'* love and patriotism.

It was curious to observe the same system
still re-producing the same effects. His devout
grandmother, Onor-ny-Flaherty, the origin of
his own present adverse state, the victim of love
and of a devotion equally ill-regulated, Rory
Oge, the clan Tieg O'Brien of his day, — and
again the mysterious rumours of the abduction
of his aunt, the Abbess of St. Bridget, by the
accomplished but profligate Count O'Flal^erty ;

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9tIE O^LAHEBtY^. fiSQ

which he had so often heard alluded to in his
boyhood, but which his father, rather evasively,
than positively, denied. His granduncle, too,
the Abbate O'Brien ! the awful object of hi»
boyish recollections ! his father himself, writh-
ing under some ^^ compunctious visitings of
conscience,'* connected with the religion he had
abandoned, and to which he afterwards relapsed ;
^-the perver^on of his talents under the pressure
of national prejudices, nurtured by nation^
wrongs — ^his misfortune, his ruin, his long ancl .
mysterious absence — the inheritance of misery
he had purchased for his son — a pauper no-
bility — the perpetual struggle between pride
and indigence ! — ^all these convictions crowded
on his mind, and sunk him into the deepest
despondency. He threw himself back in the
old and creeking chair, and covering his eyes
with his hands, yielded to impressions of
wretchedness, which come with such fearful
fbrce when the spirits are previously prepared
by malady or their own depression, to exaggerate
circumstances in themselves baleful and dis-

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960 THE o'beibks and

astrous. He sighed deeply and often, ^-and
once be thought he heard his righ re-echoed*-^
and so distinctly, that he started on his feet
and listened ; but all was uloit, save the pat*
tering of the rain against the windows, or the
beating of the wind against the old gables.

He again, therefore, took his seat, and was about
to resume the old chronicle, when at that mo*
ment, either the rattling of wind in <xie of the
apartments, which opened intQ the sittipg-room^
. produced a singular noise, or scwebody moved
within. 0*Brien arose, and advanced to a door
esu&ctly opposite the place where he sat; but
it was fastened, fielieving that the move^
ment (if any other than that by which the
increaang storm shook the old edifice, and more
than once brought the old woman'^s warning to
his memory) was occasioned by Robin^ who
kept his sad vigils below by the bier of his
grandmother, he again stirred up the fire,
trimmed his wax-light, and re-assumed the
•nnids. In turning over the leavers, he per-
odved that two pages enveloped with silver

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THE O'PLAHEBTTS, S61

paper, bad stuck together. He opened them
with some difficulty, and discovered a superb
vignette, the chef d^ceuvre of the book. It eic-
hibited a faithful view of the Gothic archway
of the Convent of Mary John and Joseph at
St. Grellan, as he had last seen it in his boy-
hood. Within its deep shadow stood a woman
in a religious habit, her head turned back, as if
taking a last view of that altar (faintly sketched
in the remote perspective) to whiph she had
vainly vowed the sacrifice of all human pasmoas.
Without the arch, and leading her by the hand,
with an apparaitly gentle violence, stood a
young man in the Irish habit, as it was worn
in Connaught in Elizabeth's time, in spite c^
laws and statutes forbidding truis and mantle,
glib and codun. O'Brien was struck by the
bold outline of this figure, sketched as it was
upon the sunny fore-ground, ^< a colpo di pen^
neUoj^ after the manner of Salvator Rosa^s
strong, but careless figures. All but the head
was a mere sketch; but that was a finished

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96i THE O^BBIEKS AND

miniature. It was full of beauty, both in ex*
pression and colouring ; and it seemed the high
wrought copy of some original model, tinged
with the idealism of the painter's fervid fancy.
It was too much in nature, not to be a portrait,
for there was even a dark mole upon the cheek,
— ^but it was too beautiful, not to have received
some of that ** purple light,*^ with which geniu*
knows how to embellish truth and nature, i^s
he held the picture nearer to the light, he
thought he had somewhere seen such a face.
The mole, too, the O'Brien mole, like the crosis
of the O'Donnels ;* such a mole as he himself
had on his left cheek ! He paused, and looked
again ; and blushing deeply, though alone, he
at last recognized his own flattered resemblance.
Amazement^ the most profound, — amazement
even to an emotion that quickened his breathing,
and accelerated the pulses of his Jbeart, took pos«
Session of every sense. Who was this charming;

• A mark said to be common to the members of this
family.

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THE oVlahe&tys^ 263

artist, whose exquisite skill and delicate flattery
had substituted his head for that of his celebrated
ancestor, Murrogh-na-Spaniagh, one whose va-
lour and heroism were on record, and who had
died the victim of both, in the war of the Earl
of Tyrone ?

In assigning this introduction of his own
resemblance to paternal vanity, he was still at a
loss as to the ingenious painter who had taken so
perfect a likeness, for which the ori^nal had ne-
ver sat. Conjecture was vain ; this little incident
bdonged to the mass of mysteries, in which his
father had shrouded all his actions. Still such
is the unconscious influence of self-love, that
O'Brien took up the manuscript with a new
and deeper interest ; biit in replacing the vig-
nette, he again unconsciously examined it with
increasing accuracy. Details came out in the
scenery, with which he was well acquainted.
Every thing was clear, but that which he
most wished to behold ; for the face of the
erring abbess was shrouded in her veil. His

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S^ THE O'eRIEKS and

excited ima^nation, however, lent to this vio
tim of bigotry a charm, beyond that of mere
mortal beauty, a charm whidi high wrought
enthusiasm and deep seated passion ever give
to the countenance and figure they animate and
inspire.

Under the influence of particular impressions,
accidentally given to a mind the most ima^na-
tive, O'Brien had formed an ideal model of female
influence, arising out of a position which placed
the object beyond the reach of mane's pursuit,
and therefore the more irresistibly attractive.
Such a character, formed to lead, to overrule
all within its sphere, he suspected, he believed
did exist, hiding beneath the religious scapular
and vestal's veil, energies and talents that are
rarely found in women divested of strong pas-
sions and vehement affections. He believed this
highly endowed and enlightened being, with
powers misdirected and overwrought, was but
an accident in a system, an agent in a cause,
which blasted and perverted all that fell within

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THE O FLAHEBTYS. »0»7

Us sphere. He imagined for a moment such a
woman drawn off, and induced to abandon the
great object for which she had been reared, and
to which she had been devoted. He imagined
in the invisible Abbess on whose veil he now
gazed, such a woman — and the man ! — He
sighed ! What were a thousand Lady Knock-
loftys to such a being ?

He again took up the manuscript and read ;
but read for a minute with distracted attention,
until gradually falling in with the subject, it be-
came again deep and concentrated.

♦ ♦*♦♦»

{Annals resumed.)

1660. — ^And now, Murrogh O'Brien gets a dis-
pensation from the Pope, making his marriage
lawful with the Abbess of Moycullen ; and his
$on, Murrogh-an^Urlicaen^ (Murrogh of the
curly bead), their issue legitimate. And of this
issue of Prince Murrogh, of the isles, and Beavoin
OT0aherty, comes the family of the present

VOL. II. N

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^66 THE o'bbiens and

Terence O'Brien, late of St. Grellan, Esq., and
claimant of the title of Arranmore.

1670. — Mass again put down. Litany or-
dered to be read in English, in the cathedral of
St. Grellan. Popish images and relics to be
removed. Every catholic not going to church,
to be fined. The cathedral walls painted white.
Scripture text^ wrote on the same " in place"
(saycth the ordinance) ** of idolatrous images:"
great and sore persecution of the pore catholics,
townsmen, and burghers, English and Irish.
Abbot flies to Arran isles. Monks driven into
boggs and fassaghs by English souldiers. A
large bible sent down to be placed in the midst
of the choir of the cathedral church of St.
Grellan, to be read by the people, on penalty :
(none reading English in that tyme, save the
genteels, and few of them.) Castellated house
built for the new prelatical bishoppe, called a
palace, the ould castel, or mess, in the close,
being much decayed. And now the Queen
being insensed of the outrages of the O Fflaher*

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THE o'flaheetys. 867

ties on the 0*Brien*8 isles, a commisi^oD is issued
^bowing that the sayd isles do belong neither to
O'Brien nor to OTflaherties, but to her majesty
in right of her crown ; so, by her letters patent,
she bestoweth same isles upon an English cap-
tayne and his heirs, so that he would mantayne
there twenty English soldiers. The county and
towne of Galway and Bishop of St. Grellan
memorial the Queen in behalf of sayd O'Brien,
Lord of the isles since the Milesians, but in
vain ; and the Mac Tiegs still claim these as
their patrimony, and will evermore, to the ind of
lime and after.

1590.— And now the O'Fflaherty being ac-
cused of decJaring against the Queen's supre-
macy, saying "she was no pope;" and not
obeying the proclamation, and refusing to come
in, at the rathmore of Mulloghmaston ;* and

• The English published a proclamation, inviting all
the well affected Irish to an interview at the rathmore, at
Mulloghmaston, engaging, at the same time, for their se-
curity, and that no evil was intended. In consequence of

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968 THE O^BBIENS AND

also accused of saving and succouring the creV
of a Spanish bark, wrecked on bis head lands;
and he holding off with delays and delusions to
answer these charges, the Lord President or-
dered the warre to be prosecuted gainst him,
and a hosting to ride forth into his mountains :
and so his territory was plundered, his tower
taken, and he hunted into the woodes. And
now the people of Connaught are sore driven
by their English Lord President, Sir Ri-
chard Bingham : the sheriffs, and other officers
following his example, enter county and town,
barony and Ballyboe, and burgh and bishop-
rick of St. Grellan, with large bodies of armed
men, pillaging, polling, violating, and murther-
ing, where they list, and other barbarities as
^' were sufficient to drive the best and quietest

this engagement, the well-affected came to the rathmore
aforesaid, and soon after they were assembled, they found
themselves surrounded by three or four lines of English
and Irish horse and foot, completely accoutred, by whom
they were ungenerously attacked and cut to pieces, and not
^ single roan esp^ped^-^See Curry's Civil Wars,

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THE O^FLAHEETYS. 269

State into a sudden confusion.**** So that by
famine, sword, and plague, the people are
brought to such wretchedness as any stony heart
would rue the same ; out of every corner of the
woodes and glynnes they came creeping forth
upon their hands— their legs no longer bear
them, — they like anatomies of death — they eat
dead carrion, sparing not to scrape dead car-
cases out of the graves. If they found a plot of
shamrocks or cresses, they flocked unto it as to
a feast ; and the oulde chief OTflaherty flying
into the woodes, was there in a cabin slaine, his
head cut off and sent to the Lord Deputy,
having only a friar and horse-boy with him.

And now the OTflaherty, (his son,) is forced
to come in. Though at the head of a powerful
body of kernes and gallo w-glasses, he submitteth,
and surrendering all his possessions, received them
back by letters patent, that same yeare, reciting
that, ** although the queen and her predecessors

• The Lord Deputy Mountjoy's own words*

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S70 THE O'B&IENS AND

were the true possessors of the premises, yet that
RorieOTflaherty andhis ancestors possessed them
unjustly against the crown ;'' and he being truly
sensible of same, the queen accordingly granted
to SirRoderic, chief of his name, by the service
of a knight*s fee, all his manors, lordships, and
domaines, with a proviso of forfeiture, in case of
confederacy against the crowne. He rendereth
the queen a greate service ; is made colonel in
her army ; is knighted, and builds a noble castel
of tenure, adjoining his old tower, with flankers
and donjons.

1603. — King James, of the ould stock, (Mi-
lesian born), his access to the crowne ; long life
to him ! Great rejoicings ; fires on every rock
and rack in theBallyboe; light on the top of
(TFflaherty's tower — seen six leagues off at sea.
Irishry received into protection, which breeds
much comfort and security in the hearts of men.
Sir Roderic OTftaherty elected a free man, he
bearing scott and lott ; sits in Parliament ; dis-
putes precedence with Colonel Teaguc O'Brien,

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THE o'flahertys. 271

which is adjudged to the former; they fight
near Isod's Chapel,* in Isod's Park ; both are
wounded.

1617. — Proclamation, for banishing the popish
regular clergy, made in St. Grellan ; great moan
and marvel thereat. Sir Roger OTflaherty
censured in the Star-chamber of Dublin for
speaking slightingly of the King's supremacy ;
retires to his castle in the mountaines.

1623. — Proclamation requiring popish clergie,
regular and secular, to depart the kingdom,
forbidding all converse with them ; great moan

through the Ballyboe ; the Abbott of Moycullen

holds his ground, backed by his sept.

1636. — Convent of Mary, John, and Joseph,

of the cwder of St. Bridget, and other religious

houses, seized to the King's use.

1641, — Great Irish rebellion put down by

the King's forces ; in the heat of which, starts

up one of the clan Tieg O'Briens to claim the

Island of Arran.

• Now chapel Izod,

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27@ THS O'BBIENS AND

1645. — Great rebellion in England; King
murdered*

161^. — Parliament forces overrun the lande ;
great murther of the Irish ; country burnt about
Leinster — two thousand fires at once, seen from
the steeples there; great plague and famine;
meeting of chiefs, lords, burghers, and corpo-
ration of St. Grellan, and lar Connaught, and
Galway — resolve to remain faithful to the King'?
majesty. Sir Murtoch Na Doe O'Fflaherty
raises a corps of two thousand men of his own
people to jmn the royal forces ; but he refusing
to truckle to " the excommunicator,^* and being
a great catholic, got the name of " the Ma-
rauder ;^^ and lending his aid to the LordClan-
rickard in the King's behalf, kept his majesty's
foes at bay, and often cleared the Ballyboe of
the thieving Roundheads, but would join no
foreigners.

• The Pope*s nuncio, Cardinal Rinuncinni, so called.
The catholic loyalists were divided into two bodies ; the
smaller, under the Pope's nuncio, were called the excom-
municators ; the others, adhering to the King, but resisting
foreign influence, were named marauders.

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THE o'flaheetys. 273

Battle of Knock na Clashy— the last ever
fought between loyal Irish and English rebel
The Parliamentarians win the day; old Sir
Murtoch leaves three of his fine young sons
dead in the field; the youngest Bryan, the
Tanistj joins the King's standard in foreign parts.
The town of St. Grellan blockaded by Crom-
well's troops under Coote and Stubbes ; towns-
men resolve to sell tlieir lives dearly ; famine
rages ; two vessels laded with corn getting into
the harbour, are pursued and taken by the Par-
liamentarians. Proposals now sent to the be-
siegers; town surrenders to Colonel Stubbes;
articles being signed, are all violated. Colonel
Stubbe preaches a sermon on God'*s mercy at
the upper four corners. Surrender of the town,
followed by a great famine and plague.

1653. — The military governor (a great saint
and preacher), under pretence of taking up idle
persons, "who knew not the Lord," makes
excursions nightly into the woodes, mountaines,
and country; seizes a thousand persons and
n3

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S74 THE o'bRIEKS and

more, without respect of rank or birth, atid
transports them to the West Indies, where they
are sold for slaves. Contributions raised, to the
entire ruin of the towns-people ; bible explained
in the parish church, which is stripped of all
ornaments ; fifty catholic clergie, caught in the
woodes, are shipped for the West Indies.

1654. — Petition from the English protestants
of the towne to the council of state, that the
mayor and chief magistrates should be English
protestants, and the Irish or papists removed :
ould corporation disfranchised; English soul-
diers made free men ; orders issued, for all the
popish or Irish inhabitants to leave the towne, to
provide accommodation for English protestants.
The St. Grellaners, driven out of the towne in
midst of winter, — herd in ditches and poor cabins
in OTflaherty's mountains. The town now a
great barrack ; houses fit to lodge kings fall to
ruin. OTflaherty 's country portioned out to the
Parliamentary souldiers. Mac Taaf 's fassagh
sould to adventurers. Prelatical church or cathe-

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THE O'FLAHERTYS. 276

dral converted into stables for dragoons ; chalices >
used as drinking-cups ; the lead of the ancient
ould abbey of MoycuUen made into cannon-balls ;
the choir turned into a brewery ; and Abbess
Beavoin's Cross, without the town, turned into a
gallows. Bishop's verger hanged for decorating
the cathedral church with holly and ivy on the
nativity of our Lord. Parson Hunks fined and
imprisoned for celebrating the mass done into
English, on same blessed day ; great meeting-
house erected for " the service of God," de-
frayed by applotments on the papists ; O'Ffla-
hertie's silver tankard, and great salt-cellar, with
a cover, seen on the English governor's table.

1655. — Court of inquiry held to try a young
gentleman, one Donogh O'Brien, of the clan
Tiegs, found hiding in the caves of Knock Na
Huay, under the fort of Dun JEJngus, in the great
Isle of Arran, he being accused of murdering four
protestants in the rebellion of forty-one. Proves
he was not then bom. Is condemned and exe-

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276 THE 0*BEI£N$ AND

cuted same evening by torch -light, all the same,
at Abbess Beavoitf s Cross.

Now the story ranne that he was the O'Brien
Mac Tieg, who was the direct descendant of
Murrogh O'Brien and the Abbess Beavoin OTfla-
herty, and that it was remarkable that he was
hung upon the fine ould cross, erected by O'Ffla-
herty Dhu for the peace of his daughter's soul,
(the Abbess of St. Bridget,) at the four ways;
and upon St. Grellan*s Eve, above all nights in
the yeare ; and what was more remarkable still,
tfcat the said O'Brien was afterwards seen in the
Isle of Arran, and swore many of the ould toU
lowers of the family upon the head of the Ab-
bess's crozier to be true to the ould blood, and
so sailed for Spayne.

1656. — Order issued that the governor of St.
Grellan do forthwith remove thereout all Irish
papists, and that no Irish be permitted to inhabit
therein, (unless disabled to remove through
age or sickness,) so that now no Irish are per«

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THE o'flaheeiys. 277

mitted to live in the town, or within six miles
thereof.

1660. — Restoration of the king's majesty;
great rejoicing — fires on every rock and rath in
the Ballyboe. Many of the new settlers quit
the place — old natives hold up their heads*
King orders the Lords Justices to restore the old
natives to their freedom and estates.* Great con-
tintions of the new settlers and ould inhabitants.
Lords Justices turn a deaf ear to king'*s orders,
who was said to have the two ways with him.
Some of the ancient inhabitants flock to the
town, but are expelled. Bishop and Abbot re-
turn together in a herring-buss — the one to his
abbey in the mountains, the other to his palace

• " The catholics of Ireland, in the great Rebellion,
lost their estates for fighting in defence of the king,*'
(says Swift) " and Charles the Second, to reward them, ex-
cluded them from the act of oblivion, and issued a procla-
mation, 1660, ' That all adventurers, soldiers, and others,
in possession of manors, castles, houses, or land, of any of
the said Irish rebeb, should not be disturbed in their pos-
sessions,* " &c. &c.

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278 THE o'bri£>js akd

in the town ; they fall to odds about oysters and
herrings. An inquisition taken, which finds that
the abbey lands were vested in the crown in the
reign of Henry VIII. The ould Abbot and four
monks maintained in the ruins of the abbey by
voluntary oblations. Old natives give security,
backed by Lord Essex, Lord Lieutenant. Some
permitted to return, but driven out again by the
corporation. Colonel Sir Bryan OTflaherty,
the marauder, a great crony of the king^s, and
kinsman by alliance to the Lady Castlemain, his
most sacred majesty'*s concubine, (being one of
" those specially meriting favour,* and without
further proof to be restored,") repossesses his
estates; and the adventurers, or English settlers,
removed thence, were reprized in forfeitures
upon the estates of the Hunkes, and others
manifesting rebellious intentions against his late

• " ' Who have, for reasons known unto us, in an
especial manner, merited our grace and favour.* Among
these favoured persons were Lord Taaf, Sir Brien OTlaherty,
and a hundred others."— See Irish Statutes, Charles II.

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THE o'^FtAHERTYS. 279

majesty; also on the estates of some of the
O'Bri^is : they being ** Irish popish rebels of the
confederate aimy, over whom his majesty hath
obtcuned victorie by his English and protestant
subjects." Sir Dermot returns to Moycullen, to
the great joy thereoflF. Repairs the ould abbey,
and fits up the place for his own residence.
Clears the pass of Glen Murrogh, so that my
Lord President's coach drives within one mile
of the stone gate of the outward court, on the
occasion of the young Tanist's birth. Great
doings, and the ould hospitality. Silver tankard
and great salt-cellar, with a cover, found in a
bog and restored to the family. Colonel Sir
3ryan OTflaherty, in consideration of his ally-
ance in bloode to the whole towne, he and his
posterity shall hereafter be freemen of the cor-
poration. Great discontent of the townspeople ;
they^ mortgaged most of the corporation landes
for several sums of money, which they handed
over to the Lord Clanricarde for the king's ser-
vice. After restoration, said loyal mortgagers

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280 THE o'beieks and

were found to be forfeiting persons, the premises
vested in the king under act of settlement, who
granted the entire to a fair lady,* widow of one
of the grooms of his chamber, and this was the
entire ruin of the town.

1686.— His most sacred majesty James II.
proclaimed ; all the ould natives and ancient in-
habitants flock back to the town, without let or
hindrance, and are restored to their properties
and freedom. And now returns the O'^Brien,
chief of the clan Tiegs, from Spain, and recovers
lands and fiefs, through the king's justices, and
has good effects in Clare and elsewhere, and
prepares his claims to bring before the Lords
Commissioners of the High Court, established to
that intent. The catholic clergy reclaim their
respective places of worship. Abbey choir re-
paired, and windows sashed.

1690. — Great protestant rebellion, headed by
the Prince of Orange. Protestant inhabitants

* A Mrs. Hamilton.

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THE o'flaheetys. 281

of St. Grellan sent out of the town to the north
suburbs, for better security thereoflF. The friars
of St. Grellan supply stores and other materials
for the fortification of the town. Colonel Sir
Roderick OTflaherty raises a regiment among
his own people for the king's service. Great
preparation in the town.

1691. July 12.— Battle of Aughrim— all
lost. The town of St. Grellan surrenders;
English army bum the suburbs ; the old natives
and inhabitants quit the towne; papists dis-
armed. The prior of St. Francis flies to Spain,
leaving one of the community to preserve the
order in the town. The ladies of Mary, John,
and Joseph, sent upon the Shaughraun^ flying
to and fro, like doves in a dove-cote before a
hawk.

1691. — A large frog found in the fossae of
the old castle of St. Grellan (now the jail), the
first ever seen in the province since the time of
Saint Patrick.

1691. — King William's army plunder and

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ftSi THE o'BRIEXS and

murder the poore Irish at pleasure, in spite of
His Majesty's declaration ;♦ and many protes-
tants and officers of the King's army who had
more bowels and justice than the rest, did abhor
to see what sport they made to hang up poore
Irish people by dozens, without pains to exa-
mine them ; they scarcely thinking them human
kind : so that they now began to turn rappa-
rees,-f- hiding themselves in the bog-grass of the
Mac Taaf 's fassagh, and in glens and crannies
of O'Fflaherty's mountaines. And others of
the better sort of papists, being driven out of
the towne to go upon their keepinge, turn rap-

• The wise and benevolent intentions of King William,
with respect to Ireland, were frustrated at every st^ by a
faction, and by the licentious and disorderly rabble of
foreigners who formed the greater part of the army.— See
Harris*s King William, and Burnefs History of his own
Time.

f ** Those who were then called * rapparees,' and exe-
cuted as such, were, for the most part, poor harmless country
people, that were daily killed in vast numbers, up, and
down the fields, or taken out of their beds and shot imme-
diately/'— Leshe's Answerto King's State of the Protestants,
&c.

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THE o'flahertys. 283

parees> being forced to unquiet means. And
before the woods were destroyed, or the moun-
tains were deared of their heath and under-
wood, nothing was commoner than to find many,
who from too much melancholy, grief, fear of
death, and constant danger, being turned in their
brains, did run starke, or live in tatters, subsist-
ing upon herbs, berries, wild fruit, and the
like.*

[O'Brien paused, — he thought he heard the
lock of the door turn. He listened ; but all
was silent, save the pattering of the rain against
the windows, and the blowing of the wind in
sudden gusts. He felt he was nervous, and
again read on.]

.... subsisting upon herbs, berries, wild fruit,
and the like ; which gave occasion to the report
of there being wild people in Connaught pro-

*■ Of rapparees killed by the army, or militia, one thou«
sand, nine hundred, and twenty-eight ; of rapparees killed
and HANGE0 by the soldiers, without ceremony, one hun-
dred and twenty.— Dean Story.

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S84 THE O'BRIENS AN0

vince, and more particularly in Connemara.
And wild indeed were they, in these troubleous
times, and down to the present ; and when one
of them was taken, which was very difficult to
compass, by reason of their great nimbleness,
exceeding even that of the common game, it
would be with long and extraordinary care and
management that they were brought to their
senses, and sure were they ever to remain
affected, or light.

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THE O^FLAHEBXrS. ?85

CHAPTER VII.

THE BAPPAEEE.

By my troth, I will go with thee to the land's end. I am a kind of
barr, I shall stick.

Otd Flap.

O'Bbien had dropped the annals of St. Grel-
lan. There was a moisture in his eyes that
obscured their vision, and for a moment ren-
dered the perusal impracticable. The last
passage, which he had twice read over, as the
timid recur involuntarily to the objects of their
fears, had deeply affected him, both by a general
inference, and by a particular instance. There
was something in its graphic delineation, which
almost realized the wretched outlawed Irish
gentleman, and the hound-hunted Irish peasant
of Cromwell's time. It had touched a nerve in
his heart, which vibrated painfully to the im-

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286 THE O'BRIENS AND

pression. Twice he had passed his hand across
his humid eyes, and pshaw'd and pished away
his womanish sensibility; and, determined to
read no more on a subject, which, combined with
the heavy storm without, and the dreary deso-
lation within, was unfitting him for the interview
he awaited with his unfortunate father, he was
about to amuse himself with the vignettes, when,
in die next page to the melancholy description
that had so deeply affected him, he found its
illustration, in the full-length drawing of

A rapparee.

Or wild Irishman,

Of the 18th century.

It was evidently a portrait, being marked by all
that truth, which a close copy of nature alone
preserves. It represented a man in rude, vigor-
ous senility. The figure was gaunt, powerful,
and athletic ; but the countenance (the true phy-
siognomy of the western or Spanish race of
Irishmen), was worn, wan, and haggard, and full
of that melancholy ferocity, and timid vigilance

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THE o'flahebtys. 287

of look, which ever characterizes man, when
hunted from civilized society; or when in
his savage, unaccommodated state, ere he has
been admitted to its protection. A dark, deep,
and sunken eye, with the Irish glib, cumhal,
and prohibited coolun, or long, black, matted
lock, hanging down on each side, added to the
wild and wierd air of a figure, still not divested
of manly comeliness. The dress, if a garb so
tattered could be called a dress, was singular.
It was that still worn at the time, by the natives
of the isles of Arran : a frieze jerkin and truis,
a conical cap of seal-skin, and the br6g, or
sandal, fastened by a latchet. From the shoulders
fell a mantle, folded across the breast with a
wooden bodkin ; the whole giving a most per-
fect picture of a wild Irishman^ as he was called,
and exhibited on the stage in his traditional
dress and deplorable humiliation, from the time
of Charles the Second almost to the present day,
— from Teague to Paddy O'Carrol.

Here again O'Brien, as he gazed sadly and

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288 THE O^BRIEKS AND

intently, recognized the resemblance of one,
once dearly loved, and still deeply lamented.
Although apparently worn by time or suffering,
the strongly marked countenance, the gigantic
figure, the form and attitude, recalled his earliest
friend and foster-brother — the Chiron of his
infancy and childhood — the man who, in nature's
own gymnasium, had taught him to climb, to
run, to dive, to swim, to sling, to wrestle, and
to hurl, — the man to whom he was indebted for
that strength, agility, and adroitness, that robust
and unalterable health, which had served him
8o materially in the arduous profession he had
afterwards adopted.

As he now gazed, in wonder and in pity, on
tliis fine representation of a fine and noble animal,
degraded into savagery, he recollected, with
deep and dire emotion, the last moment in which
he had seen the person, who had given the model
of this characteristic picture. It almost maddened
him, even at such a distance of time, to remem-
ber the hour, the scene, the event. He had full

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THE oVlahertys. 289

in his memory the dauntless, bold bearing of a
being so loved, when led from a mock trial to
instant executicHi, '* imanointed, uhanneard^—
bis cool and careless eye, the look of stoical in-
difference he had worn, until he saw pressing
through the multitude his mother, leading by
the hand a youth — a mere child. Then, indeed,
his countenance had changed ! O'Brien saw him
•turn his head, and hastily assist the executioner
in the horrible preliminaries of his ignominious
death : he saw the fatal cap, the rope — ^but he
saw no more ! Even now, at the distance of
eleven years, he sickened, as he had sickened
then ; he felt the same fainting of the heart, as
when he then fell senseless into the arms of the
stem, tearless, and inflexible Mor-ny-Brien.
The recollection suffocated him with emodon,
he flung down the book, and rose to change the
subject of his thoughts. But suddenly he
paused, started back, shuddered. Doubting his
senses, and as one spell-bound, he stood fixed,

VOL. II. o

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t&Q THE o'bBIEKS AK0

gazed intensely, and breathed shortly, but spoke
not — for before him, on the threshold of the door,
stood the object of his melancholy reminiscence,
the awful original of that fearful and affecting
picture, which had curdled his blood even to
look upon. It was indeed ^^ the rapparee,**^ not
as he had seen him in the prime of manhood,
but the same in form, in dress, in attitude, as
the vignette represented him, and in that half-
crouching position, the habitual posture of vigi-
lance and fear.

** Shane !'' exclaimed O'Brien, after a long
pause, tremulously and doubtingly ; '^can it be?
-4-is it ?— Gracious God !"

With a spring, like that of a wild beast
restored to its ravaged young, Shane darted
forward; and with a stifled burst of sound,
which resembled the last whining howl of a
dying wolf, — ^a sound such as those only emit,
who have learned to "cry Irish," fell at his
feet.

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THE 0*FLAH£ETYS. 291

Clasping tlie knees of O^Brien with his huge
arms, he fixed his upturned eyes on his face
with such intensity, such wild tenderness, as
made its object shudder. O^Brien bent down, and
embraced his foster brother and hereditary dans-
man, with all the earnestness of affection. It
was a full minute befcM'e he could speak, or
address him.

" Shane,^' at last he cried, " you Kve then ?
You are the person who has haunted me of
late, who came to my rescue last night ; you,
whom I thought I had seen murdered ! whose
horrible fate first drove me forth a wanderer?''

'^ Ay, Musha ! Shane I am ; poor Shane
a vie I Shane-na-Brien, who was hanged at
Michael's cross, as was the fader afore him,
for th' ould cause, praised be Jasus and his
blessed moder, Amen! And the mark's left
on me to this hour shure, like Moran*8 collar/'*

* See 0*Hftlloian'8 Antiquities of Ireland.
o2

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292 THE o'bkiens and

' He bared his neck, as he spoke, and shewed
a black circle, discolouring its muscular surface
like a collar. O'Brien still bending over him,
his hands clasped in his iron grasp, smiled on
him through his swimming eyes, but strove in
vain to speak; while Shane, gazing on him
with ineffable tenderness (for a visage so stern
and wild), seemed wholly lost in the enjoyment
of the meeting. 'At last, looking fearfully
round, he dropped his deep guttural voice, and
asked in a low mutter, ^^ Have you Irish ?''.-

** Not enough to converse with you," said
Murrogh. " I have almost lost my Irish,
though I still understand it"
* " Ay then,*'' said Shane, still more wildly
and vaguely, looking around him, with what
seemed habitual caution; and then again fixing
his eyes on the face of O'Brien, cowering timidly
towards him, and muttering a phrase of Irish
endearment, as if to disarm his apprehensions.
He sighed deeply, exclaiming, ^< Och ! the great

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THE o'flaheetys. 298

joy ! and do I touch you again, my Votimeen
UrUcaenV^*

** You must rise," said O'Brien : " I cannot
speak to you, while you keep this degrading
and painful attitude. Pray rise, Shane ; you
must, you must indeed !" .

" Huisht ! huisht ! a vie," said Shane, evi-
dently confused and wild,, and with a mind b&
wandering, as his affections were concentrated,
** Huisht ! I wid not throuble you long. I'H
only look on ye a vie for a taste, and just
touch your little crvbeen\ once again, and then
1*11 be off to the mountains the night, and nivir
throuble you more — no, troth and fait, only
pray for ye on the knees of my heart."

" Trouble me ! Oh, Shane, how you mi&.
take me ! indeed I am rejoiced to see you —
amazed, but still rejoiced. But after whait
passed last night, you are not safe here."

** NU^ nily'X said Shane, shaking his head. •

* My darling, my curly head. f Your hand.

X No, no.

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294 THE 0'*BRIENS AND

" Much as I desire to know by what means
that life has been preserved, I dread to endanger
it, by detaining you here a minute. You are
not safe, Shane, here — I must repeat it."

"A^iVm,*'* sighed Shane; ^^ and am Uke the
fox of Mam Turk, hunted from his lair, with
the arch^haid-f at his throath, and the pack at
his traheens, aye indeed."

" What could have brought you here, my
dear Shane ?'*• said O'Brien, gently forcing him
to rise, and drawing forward one of the arm
chairs, to induce him to sit down. But Shane,
leaning against the old chimney-piece, as cha-
racteristic as one of its own supporters, re-
jected the offered seat, while O'Brien resumed
his own,

" And what brought me here d'"* repeated
Shane. " Och ! Musha, what but yourself,
ma vourneen. Shure it's little Shane thinks of
life, in regard o' that ; and have kept watch and

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TH£ 0*FLAHEBTYa« 295

ward upon you, since I first seed you in the
great scrimmage yesterday ; and was in th^
ould daoire,* and you took ^e for an arrachyf
Musha, I'll engage ye did, and th^ ould
chree * lambh laidre aboo.^ '^l

" The sound of your never-forgotten voice,
the family war-cry, and your strange appear-
ance, did indeed sorely amaze, confound, and
agitate me. I knew not what to think of it.^'

^< Ay, Musha,'* said Shane, with a half
yeird laugh, that gave to hb visage an expres-
sion more grim, than even was natural to it —
'^ and wouldn't shew mysel for fear to shame
yez.**

•** And whence came you, my dear Shane, —
from Connaught ?''

<< Ay,* said Shane.

" And how did you find your way ?''

" Och ! I followed the track of thim that
led."

* Oak-tree. f A fetch, or ghott.

X The strong hand for ever.

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THE O^BRIENS AVJ>

" And who were they ?"

Shane rubbed round his shoulders, and
answered, evasively and smilingly^ from an old
Irish song —

" Che shin ? Gudae shin
Nogh wanneen shae gho.'**

" But how did you know I had returned ?''

** Och ! I dramed it," replied ShiMie, " ay,
indeed."

t* When did you arrive in Dublin ?'* demanded
O'Brien, perceiving it was in vain to ask, what
Shane chose not to tell. . .

" Och ! Jasus be praised, yesterday, — and
saw you afar off, a great GendreanairCyf and
knew ye by the knocking of my heart, and the
mole on yo\ir cheek, and the eyes, and your
mother's smile, agrah !"

" Then, you had just arrived by the Phoenix

* «« What is it? What is it to any one, whom it doth
not concern?'*
f OflScer, hero.

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THE oVlahebtys. 297

park, when I passed you under the tree at tKe
head of my corps ?''

**Arrah! Musha, * that's it intirely!*' said
Shane, gradually cheering up: " and never lost
sight of you after (sorrow sight), till this blessed
minute, Jasus be praised, and found you in th^
Cean eorrah.'*f

*^ VTou have learned to speak English
fluently," said O'Brien, " since we last parted
— but surely not in Connaught ?" '

** Nihil; but were it was well taught, shure.''

*' And where was that, Shane?*' asked
O'Brien, almost amused. '

.** Och, in Rome !"

'' In Rome ?" repeated O'Brien, with incre-'
dulous astonishment.

*^ Shure enough, and lamed it of the Irish .
Dominicans of our Lady of Peace."

," And what could have brought you to
Rome, Shane ?".

^^ Mea ddpay mm nuuvima culpa^'* exclaimed

*' ♦ Arra, or arrah : I pledge myself,
f Cean corrah: «' The Chiefs House."

o 3

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^8 THE o'BEIEXS and

Shane^ striking his breast with a terrific force ;
while a slight convulsion passed over his grim
features ; and he muttered with great rapidity
and confusion some penitential prayers. Then
suddenly assuming his wonted manner, he said,
with a smile,

" A great place it is.''

" Then you went to Rome," said O'Brien,
with increasing amazement, "on a pilgrimage
of penance ?"

*' Ay, in troth : and the jubilee, and the
Santa Porta^ and the tlirue cross!'' And he
drew from his bosom a string, to which one of
those reliquaries was suspended, which are
supposed by the faithful to contain a bit of
the cross.

" And how did you get to Rome ?" said
O'Brien.

" Och ! sliure the grace of God and the
blessed Virgin : and overtook in my corricle,*

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THE o'flaheetts. 299

a Gralway merchant bound for Leghorn ; and
begged and prayed my way to the holy city.
And shure,^ (he added, rubbing hb hands
and turning their palms to the fire) — ^'our
own cousin is suparior, father Kelly: and
might have my bit and my sup to this day
at our lady's of pace, only for ould Ireland, and
the great yearning, ay troth.'*

^^ But how did you escape from — fcom St.
Michael's cross ?^'

^< Och !" said Shane, cowering closer to
O'Brien ; << Sure my moder wore the ^rdle
dear, and see, here it is :*' (and stripping back
his ragged jacket, he displayed a small leadiem
belt, wrought over with Irish characters)*
^^ and when they left me in great haste, the
rain falling, and the storm blowing, and I like

nirf that generally beats on this shore ^ and it is astonish-
ing what a sea they will venture to encounter. — See Survey
of Clare.

* Sir John Harrington observes, '^ It is a great practice
in Ireland, to charme girdles and the Hke ; persuading
men that, while they weare them, they cannot be hurt by
any weapone."

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SOO THE O'BRIENS AST)

the branch of a withered tree, Mor-ny-Brien
cut me down^ wid her own two hands and the
help of God : and she reigns in glory with Christ
and his mother this day, she that bore and saved
me, in nomine patris etJiUi — Amen, Shure no
harm could come to me while she lived — the
last of the Binieds /* And she it was cut me
down wid her own' hands ; and in the caves of
Cong, with fire and water, and the sign of the
cross, gave back a pulse to the heart o' me^ and
breath and sight ; and the first word I spoke
was an ave, and the next was a curse on the
inimies of me and miiie^ to the ind of time. May
.the screech of the morning be on them, soon and
often ! — May the evil eye open on them every
day they sae light ! — May they never know pace
nor grace in this world or the next ! — May they
die in a lone land, without kith or kin to close

their eyes ! — May they '*

" Hush, dear Shane,^' interrupted O'Brien,
more shocked and alarmed by the expression of

* Wise women.

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THE O'FLAHEETYS. 301

insanity, that was gradually distorting his hag-
gard features^ than even by his wild impreca^p
tions. " Remember you have triumphed over
your enemies, since you live and are here-
changed, indeed, since we last met in the isles of
Arran, but "

" Och, the sorrow much," said Shane, bright-
ening up ; " only in regard of the glib, and
coolun, and cumhal ;" and he stroked baek his
long, matted locks from his visage, and roughed
the stiff tufts which bristled upon his upper lip ;
" and that's to hide me from th' inemy, since I
corned here. For the heart o' me was in the
place, and would rather be famished at hotae
nor feasted far away ; and be hanged in the midst
of my people, nor have the stranger close poor
Shane^s eyes in a foreign land." »

" But where, and how do you subsist .?"
asked O'Brien, his interest increasing with his
compassion, and his early associations returning
in all their ancient influence.

" Where is it ? and how ? Och, Christ is good.

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302 THE o'beiens and

and his holy mother^ Sdncta Virgo Maria! —
But the paper * is still on the church door at
St, Grellan to this day, the blood-money for the
informer! — But who would inform against a
BrieuP Not the clan Tiegs of Arran, nor the
OTlaherties of Moycullen; and so keeps by
times in the isles, and by times in the mountains,
and sleeps where the fox has his hole, and the
eagle his nest ; and never lays head- under
shingled roof, nor goes near town or townland,
nor where the Sassoni keep crock nor pan;
nor where the traitor leaves the track of his
ircJieens.^'

" But how do you subidst? — I mean, how ck>
you live ? I know there is shelter in the hills
and fastnesses of Connemara for the hunted and
the persecuted ; but I remember when you fared
well with our dear and excellent Abb^ in the
isles, and when your mother's hearth gave hos-
pitality to all who needed it"

* The proclamation of a reward for his apprehensioD.

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THE oVlahertys. 808

<< Ay/' said Shane, his countenance assuming
great tenderness of expression at the recollections
of his insular home, ^^ Ay, and the cabin down
by the cromleck, and the cow in the bawn, and
St Endeas' Cross, and the ating and the
dhrinking, and the puffins, and the sunfish, and
the uishge, and the meed. And now the great-
grandson of Con-na-Brien Ma&>na-Reagh, who
built the first stone house in Arranmore, and
killed six oxen at Holytide for all who came, to
be a poor wild shular man^ without cot or
cabin, only for the christians that throw him his
bit and his rag. But what moan in that ? GxA
is good ; and the poorest has a soul to be saved !
and there's berries on the bramble, and cresses
in the ditch, and wather in the ford ; and is not
that good enough for the wild Irish gfvocah ?"•{•

The bitter smile, and sharp tone with which
this was uttered, went to the soul of Miurogh.

" And has this been your lot, my poor friend T^

♦ Wanderer. t Vagabond, or outlaw.

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304 THE O'BRIENS AND

he asked, with a sigh ; " you, whose mother's
plenteous board — my dear foster-mother — is it
possible that they, who are honest enough not
to betray you, would refuse to relieve your
wants ?" He paused, and then added, " I re-
member when the scuUogs of Connemara were
noted for their hospitality, and their door was
never closed against the stranger."

*5 The scullogs?" said Shane, sighing, and
coming gradually to himself* ; " but it's not •
now as in th' ould time ; and when the poor,
wild shular comes to the bawn, the curs bark,
and the garlaghs cry : and then, a vie, the pride
of the Briens 'bove all—"

His voice faltered, and he dashed the big
tear from his eyes, with that deeply ejaculated
" Gchone ! " of Irish grief, which none but an I rish
bosom can heave. He wept not, however, alone.
O'Brien covered his face with his hands and
wept too, but not fairly and frankly ; for youth,
in its mistaken pride, blushes for the feelings by
which humanity is most honoured. Still the

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THE o'flahertys. 306

emotions he struggled to conceal, were not un-
observed by one to whose lone and unrecipro^
coted feelings such tenderness was balm, — by
one, whose temperament, made up of all the
wanner and more vehement affections, was coun-
teracted, but not wholly hardened by habits',
which necessity alone had rendered savage and
ferocious.

" Come, come, Shane," said O^Brien, rising,
and taking his huge hands kindly in his own,
" your trials, your sufferings are now, I trust,
nearly over. Had my father known your situaf-
tion— but till within this last year, he has not
I understand visited Connemara since my mo-
ther's death — now, however, come what may>
while I live, and have hands and strength to
labour, you cannot want. With respect to
your past afflictions, I am sure, a life so mira-
culously saved, will not again be taken (even if
you were recognized) upon the old accusation.
But then, the adventure of last night was one
of no small peril That it was on my behalf

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806 THE o'BEt£KS AND

to o a nd yet, even with all this, I am so
rejoiced to see you, 90 delighted to see you
•five, my dear old friend, that, for the moment,
I can admit no other feelings.''

" Why then, are you, machree," said Shane,
with a burst of sobbing joy, ** are you glad to
see your poor ould Shane, your foster-brother ?
And you too, a lovely fine uasdly* and a great
scholar arid captain!^ Then dropping on his
knees, and taking from his breast a bog-wood
rosary, he repeated, with wild and fanatical
vehemence, and in hedge Latin, ' Ave MariOj
gratke plena : dommua tecum. Benedkta tu in
fnuUeribtu, et benedictusfrudus ventris tui Jesta.
Sanckk Maria^ mater Dei^ ora pro nobis pec^
caioribuSj nunc^ et in hord mortis nostras —
Amenr'

" And now," he said, putting up his rosary,
and starting on his feet, ^^ that^s all I wish or
want ; and won't trouble you more, machree, but

* A gentleman.

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THE oVlaheetts. 807

just go back to th^ ould place, light of foot and
heart. Ay, troth ! and that this blessed night,
or early the morrow, any how.''

^^ Indeed, I think it would be wisest to do so :
and the sooner the better. But, Shane, there is
some one else here as interested, at least, ahnost
as interested for you as I am:'' and he was
about to open the annals, and inquire, who was
the delightful artist who had given them so high
a Talue, when he was struck by the sinking of
Shane'ii head on his bosom, and the dimness of
his eyes, still fixed on himself.

** You are not well," sud Murrogh, anxiously ;
<^ what is the matter? You seem faint and
weak ?"

<^ The heart of Qie is wake," said Shane,
smilingly, << that is all, shure.'*

" Weak, Shane, your heart?"

" Ochy wurrutroot it's only in regard of the
place, and the thick air, not all as one on the
hills of Connemara. And there's no cot nor

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808 THE 0*BRIEN8 AN^D

caban here, only great hoases and castles^ and
the door shut, neider hob, nor hearth^ nor bit,
nor sup."

*' You are faint from hunger, then ?'* said
Murrogh, with a suffocating sensation of intense
sympathy.

*^ Thahy'^ said Shane, whose English seemed
exhausted with his spirits. O'Brien flew to the
buffet. The cake and the usquebaugh were to
hid), at that moment, as the spring in the desart.
He held them forth, and Shane snatched at
them eagerly, and devoured them voraciously.
Cheering up gradually, under their nourishing
excitement, he exclaimed, at intervals, as he ate
and sipped, " Agvs ne barneen brcec. Agii9
Tie uishge bu^.^'f

" It is all I can find," said O'Brien, delighted

• It is ; yes.

f " Barneen brseo/' spotted cake, a cake with currants
in it. " Uishge buy," yellow water. Buy is the box tree,
whose wood is yellow.

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THE oVlahertys. 309

to observe the effects of the small portion of
nourishment produced; and now wholly en-
grossed by the object of his affections, his cares,
and anxiety, to the total exclusion of every
other idea. " Sit down," he continued, " sit
down, dear Shane, and do not hurry yourself;'^
(for he was fearful that the ravenous manner in
which he ate, would be injurious to him). He
threw the last fragment of the old wainscot on
the fire, and drawing his chair closer towards it,
he contemplated with satisfaction the gradual
kindling of Shane's eye, and the deepening
colour of his wan cheek. Shane, having now
drained the flask to its last drop, seated himself
at the hearth, after the old Irish fashion, his
legs drawn up (till his knees were almost on a
level with his chin), and clasped by his gaunt
arms ; exhibiting the attitude of those, who in
castle or caban " sat waking and watching over
a coal" till the dawn should lead them to prey
or poll some "enemy's country," or till the
tale-teller should lull them to sleep after the

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310 THE 0*BBIEKS AND

wolf cbace> by such ^^ rambling stuff" as his
wild fancy suggested.

This last specimen of the Rapparees of the
earlier part of the last century had the true Jrkh
spirits, formed for every excitement, to madden
into riotous gaiety, to sink into gloomy de-
spondency. Intoxicated alike with joy and
usquebaugh, basking in the red blaze of the
fire, he now sat, the image of savage felicity ;
hb eyes glistening, his accait chuckling, and
his haggard features distorted by a play of gaiety,
which rendered their expression still more wild
and fierce.

« As you now sit and look on me, Shane,'^ said
O'Brien, gazing intensely upon him, "you
recall at once the days of my happy child-
hood, ....*•

^* Thahj' said Shane, rubbing his hands and
smiling.

** My foster-mother, and every corner

of the cabin near Dun iEngus.^

^^ Musha thdk,^' said Shane, with a chuck-

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THE 0*FLAHERTY8. Sll

liog laugh^ and smoothing back his long, lank
coolun.

**She was a strange creature/' continued
O^Brien; ^^her mysterious disappearance from
the Isles of Arran was never accounted for.**

Shane nodded his head in token of assent, and
compressed his lips.

**She never settled after,^ said O'Brien;
^' there were some wild tales circulated of her
being met in the mountains of Moycullen, by
wayfaring people ; you, Shane, have doubtless
heard the story about the ruins of the
abbeyr

^<She died a great saint,*^ said Shane, eva«
sively, ^^ pace to her soul, and glory to her me«
mory. Amen.'*

O'Brien observing that the subject agitated
him, changed it ; and added — ^^ Mor ny Brien
was greatly gifted ; her memory was miraculous,
and her voice most melodious."

** Thah r (exclaimed Shane, his stem fea-
tures relaxing from their temporary compression)

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312 THE O'BRIENS AND

*^ darsagh fia vaSagh^ she was called far and
near — ay, troth ^

** Which means the harp of the village^ if I
remember right?'*

^^ Mu^Aoj thah r said Shane, much pleased ;
<^ and hears her voice in the mountains to this
day, when the wind is asleep, keening th' ould
moan !" *

The tears suddenly started to his eyes, and
rolled down his haggard cheeks in big drops.

« With what delight," said O'Brien, "I used
to listen to her stories of the tribe of Dalgais,
and the feats of the heroes of our family — of
Cas, son of Conal of the swift horses, and of
Fionne Mac Cumhal "

" Agus Ossin," said Shtoe, suddenly bright-
ening up, and shaking back his coolun, and
wiping his eyes in his hair.

" Yes," said O'Brien, " I remember the
effect of her Irish Cronan, that began ^ Corloch,

* The Lameotations of Connaught. — See Walker*s His-
tory of Irish Music

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THE oVlAHEKTYS.

haughty, bold, and brave/ and Cucullin's chal-
lenge to him. You remember that, Shane ?'^

** Thah /" said Shane, swinging backwards
and forwards his gigantic frame, and cheering
gradually up. " Agtis an Moira Borb!""

" Yes," said O'Brien, rather in soUloquy than
in dialogue, and wholly borne away by the sub-
ject, which now called up, not only past, but
present associations; — " that tale of Moira Borb,
the Irish enchantress, the Irish Armida, is a
strange coincidence with Tasso. There is some-
thing in it even more than coincidence —

^ Air apparir della beM novella
Nasce un bisbiglio P "

** Anan !'' said Shane, staring.

" And there was a spirited controversial dia-
logue, too, between St. Patrick and Ossian,"
continued O'Brien, " which she used to sing to
a wild strain.^'

^* Ossin agua St. Phaedrig^^^ repeated Shane,
making the sign of the cross.

VOL. 11. P

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814 THE O^BEIENS AXD

" And that sweet old air, of which the burden
was, ' I am asleep, do not awaken me.' ^^

" Ta mi mo hoolah, na dushame^^ interrupted
Shane, now not touched, but rapt.

" And Carolan's receipt, sung by old Do-
nogh ?"

** Ay, Musha,^ chuckled Shane, " a great
ahra* Dofiiogh an abhac;\ a great gramogyi

" There are no impressions like those of early
childhood,^' said O'Brien, " particularly when
received in such scenes, and with such people.***

" Nil," echoed Shane, who was now thinking
in Irish, and so spoke it.

" How well I remember," said O'Brien,
" going round St. ^Engus's Cross on my knees.*'

" JEngus a Naoimhe^^'* § said Shane, blessing
himself instinctively at the name of his patron
saint.

" Does Conlas's rath still stand ?*" said O'Brien.

** Och, Musha, to the fore,'' replied Shane.

♦ A soDg. t Donogh, the dwarf.

:(: Buffoon. $ £ogus of the saints.

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THE o'FLAHEaxrs. 315

** And still blazes, I suppose, on the first of
May, with many a merry bonfire ?'*

'' The Bel tean, * Musha, ay.''

** What has become of that curious, long,
twisted wand, which used to stand in the comer
of your mother's hearth ?"

*« The slahanDraodfieath?''f asked Shane—
** Abbess Beayoin*s crosier ?"

O'Brien started at the mention of a name that
had so recently and so powerfully interested
him.

" Och, thim has it as has a right to have it,*'
said Sliane, mysteriously.

" I suppose you have not one story-teller, one
Sceadluidhe, left in Arran ?*'

♦ Bel's fire.

t The druids* staff. The use of the crosier is said to
be derived from the augur's baton, and this probably
(being of Tuscan origin) came from the East The druids
likewise used the crosier; deriving it, in all likelihood,
from the Phoenicians. Hence it has been thought, by some
antiquarians, that the introduction of this article of fumi-
ture into the Christian church, came directly from the
druids.

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316 THE o'beiens akjd

" Virgo Maria ! Ay, plinty," replied Shane.
" Agus ould Fergus, the clashmanaigh'^ ♦

*^ Indeed ! those Arranites never die ; one
is tempted almost to believe their fables of
longevity."

*^ Shure the bed of Coemhan,*' t said Shane,
emphatically.

" How well I remember,'^ said O'Brien,
stretching out his legs, and folding his arms,
while his countenance exhibited the imaginative
influence of his memory, and all its thick-coming
fancies — ^^ How well I remember your mother
placing me on that rocky bed, to recover me
from my lameness, and the severe manner in
which she was rebuked by the Abbe OTlaherty,
for her attachment to such superstitious cere^
monies."

• The jester.

t The bed of St. Coemhan, much famed for its mira-
culous cures, through the mediation of the saints of in-
firm persons, particularly the lame and blind.— Transac-
tions of Royal Irish Acad. vol. xiv.

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THE oVlAHERTYS. Sl7

" Ay, in troth,'' said Shane, stirring up the
embers with a brand.

" You remember, too, I dare say, Shane, how
I got that lameness ?*'

^^ Agus the puffins," said Shane, laughing,
" and the clifters ! and great sport that night !
And you a daimy cratur, not that high — ^no, in-
deed — avic Machree /"

^^ Good God ! what a scene ! what magni-
ficent desolation ! what a subject for a Salvator !
I see it all now. We stood on the summit of
the cliffs, looking down the almost fathomless
precipice, suddenly illumined by a beautiful
aurora borealisj'*

^* Ay," said Shane, rubbing his huge chopped
hands.

" You let me down by a rope, tied round
my middle. I remember its pressure^ and my
swinging in mid- air, till I reached the strand
below ; I now hear the flutter of the puffins." —
(Shane made a noise, imitating the flight of the
birds.) — " You followed ; I see you now, half

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818 THE 0*BRI£KS AVD

way down. If the rope had broken — it makes
my head reel to think of it I There is a reckless
hardihood in children, the result of ignorance,

that certain it is, I would not now do what

I then did so carelessly— nothing could tempt

^^Naerif nctenT said Shane, shaking his head,
and evidently rather guessing than understand-
ing, the abrupt apostrophies of his quondam
pupil.

** But you were then my guardian angel,"
added O'Brien, smiling kindly, as, borne away
by that vehemence of feeling (the virtue and
the weakness of an ardent and impetuous tern*
perament), he stretched forth his hand to the
rapparee — " And you are still," (he continued,
*' at least you would be, a barrier between me
and harm.''

" Ay and troth," said Shane, with a growling
fondness, " and the heart's blood would flow
for you every dhrop and mUle* welcomes."
* A thousand.

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THE o'flahertys. 819

" Of that I have no doubt ; I can have no
doubt of your devotion, Shane ; but, I fear it.
Your desperate efforts in my behalf last night,
your being now in the very neighbourhood of
the military whom you attacked."

*^ The bodddh SassofU /" * exclaimed Shane,
fiercely, his whole countenance assuming a fero-
cious expression, darkling, glowering and dis-
torted. *' Croisha na Chrishla^f an they wid
tiche an hair of your vourneen urlacaetij or blink
an eye agen ye;" and he seized a carbine,
which, on entering, he had deposited against the
wall ; and which O'Brien now, for the first time,
observed.

Heart-struck at once by his devotedness, and
by the insane vehemence with which it was
manifested, he threw his arm over Shane's
shoulder, and said, in a soothing tone, ^^ But I
trust, my dear Shane, there will be no further
occasion for your gallant and affectionate inter-
ference. My only fears now are for you. Are

♦ The Saxon churls. t Crow of Christ

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820 TUE o'bEIENS AND

you aware of th^ risk you ran in entering the
Castle last night ? I am sure I saw you there. '^

** Are you, a-vic /" said Shane, now affectedly
pre-occiipied in piling up the embers.

" You were followed by a chair so closely

that Have you any knowledge of the person

who was in it ?^'

" Soldier, that is your prisoner,'' interrupted
a voice from the further end of the room.
O'Brien, with the rapidity of lightning, threw
himself before Shane, who, starting on his legs,
levelled his piece over O'Brien's shoulder, with
the look of a wild beast, hunted to his den, and
eager to protect its young. A file of soldiers
now entered, halted by command, and drew up
in line ; while a civil officer, who accompanied
them, stepped forward, accompanied by three
gentlemen ; and O'Brien beheld with consterna-
tion. Captain O* Mealy, Lord Walter, and Lord
Charles.

There was a pause, a silence. Amazement,
and a still deeper interest sat on every counte-

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THE o'rLAHERTYS. 321

nance. But, on the face of O'Brien, as it paled
and reddened, as his eyes dimmed and flashed,
as his compressed lips quivered and refused alJ
utterance, was exhibited an emotion, in which
every passion, save fear alone, had its share;
while the deepest and direst mortification of
wounded pride, at the exposure thus made of
his forlorn and ruinous home, and at the strange
position in which he was discovered, was almost
the least easy of endurance.

He was about to address the intruders, with
all the temper he could afiect, but observing
that when the civil oflicer was advancing to-
wards him, Shane cocked his piece, he snatched
the murderous weapon from his hands; and
speaking to him as well as he could in Irish, he
invoked his discretion, and observed to him,
that resistance could thenv only aggravate his
danger. Shane threw around him a terrible
glance ; then letting fall his eyes, and shaking
down his long locks, he drew his tattered mantle
P 8

vGooQle

382 THE o'beikks and

around bim, and stood the image of sullen, silent,
and ferocious despair.

O'firieD, drawing up, and assuming a look
and tone of haughtiness, but ill-suited to his
wretched ntuation, addressed the civil officer^

** Who is it, Sir, you look for here ?**

** This person," said the officer, " whom we
find with the very carbine he violently took
from a soldier of the Royal Irish brigade, last
night, and with which he fired at this gentleman
who commanded the party/'

" You are certain of his identity ?" said
O'Brien. *^ You can swear to his person ?"

** Yes, I think V can," replied the oflicer,
smiling ; *^ it is not easy to mistake him. I
saw enough of him last night in the fray of
the Strugglers, and at the rescue of yourself,
Mr. O'Brien, out of the hands of the police.
He has been traced this evening to this house,
and seen entering it over an old wall in the
rear, not an hour back."

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THE o'flahketys. ^23

O'Brien then turned coldly and haughtily to
the gentlemen, and asked, " And to what cir-
cumstance, my lords, am I indebted for ycur
presence, at an hour somewhat unseasonable,
to say the least of it?"

" Oh !'' said O'Mealy, winking at his com-
panions, " we were sure of finding you at home :
as Lockit says, ^the Captain's always at home,'
and so .... *'

Lord Walter here pushed back his vulgar
associate, and taking off his hat, said, " Mr.
O'Brien, our intrusion is indeed unseasonable,
but it was as utterly unexpected both on my
part, and that of Lord Charles. It requires
explanation and apology. We had not the
slightest idea of your being in this house, when
an idle curiosity tempted us to enter it. Hap-
pening to dine to-day at the mess of the
Prince's Own, with Lord Charles, where Cap-
tain O'Mealy came after dinner, (on a message
from Lady Knocldofty, to join her at the ball
at the Botunda), an account arrived that the

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8€4 TUfi o'bAieks akh

tinfortuuate man now before us^ had been dogged
to an old bouse in' this neighbourhood. The
strange description given of a genuine wild
Irishman, and of the almost super-human feats
he performed yesterday, (of which Lord Charles
was a witness, and, but for you, would have
been a victim), induced us to accompany O'Mealy
and his party, on our way into town. I
have no doubt,'' he added significantly, and
taking O'Brien's reluctant hand, which he
cordially shook, " that a similar curiosity has
likewise led you here. But since we can none
of us be of service, and since we have fully
satisfied our curiosity respecting this Irish
champion, I think. Lord Charles, we had better
proceed, and not keep Lady Knocklofty'^s horses
waiting this tremendous night."

^* I think so too," said l^ord Charles, hesi-
tating, and rather sideling towards O'Brien, to
whom he had taken off his hat, and recognized
him by a surly bend, which O'Brien had as
sullenly returned. " We are destined,'' he con-

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THE oVlaheetys. 326

tinued, " Mr. O'Brien, to meet under singular
circumstances.'^

" I can have no objection,'' said O'Brien, sig-
nificantly, " to meet Lord Charles Fitzcharles
under any circumstances.'*'

" Come," said Lord Walter, taking his
friend's arm, " let us be off, we can be of no
use here, and '*

" Stay, for the love of the Lord," interrupted
O' Mealy, catching Lord Walter's sleeve ; " wait
a minute, and 'pon my honour I'll be with you,
before you can say Jack Robinson. Sure, you
would not lave me to walk to the Rotunda in my
silks, pumps, and white kerseymeres : and I to
lade off the first set to the tune of Money Musk
with Lady Mary O'Blarney? — Pace officer,
where are you ? Soldiers, surround your prisoner.
We'll deposit him, for the night, in the barrack
depot. Serjeant, take charge of this carbine ;
it is hanging evidence. Mr. O'Brien, my dear,
upon my honour and conscience, as a gentleman
and a soldier, it greives me greetly to sae you in

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^6 THE o'bRIEKS and

nuch a situation, it does 'pon my honour ; and
shut up at this * witching time of night/ as th'
immortal says, coshering and colloguing with
that murdering ruffianly Irish giant there, to
whom Magrah's skeleton in the 'natomy room
of your college is but a fairy. I beleive, pace
officer, that is, I am afraid, we cannot well be
off arresting Mr. O'Brien too, till he can give
an account how and why he was found here,
a party concerned in this den of thieves and
robbers : for that's what it is, beyond all doubt,
or I am greatly mistaken. And you'll mind,
Mr. O'Brien, that no later than this evening, as
the castle clock struck a quarter to six, just as
we parted at the gate, you told me you were
going to O'Brien House, to my lord your
father^s : and it was my fullest intention to
tip you the pasteboard, and give you the pro-
voke to a mess-dinner before night. Instead of
which, I find you here, to my intire surprise,
in a murdering, ugly, ould ruin, sated, quite
at home, with your book and your bottle beside

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THK o'flahk*tys. 827

you, and cheek-by-jowl, with your pot cwUpa*
nion there. And you, Mr. O'Brien, that pledged
me your solemn word of honour, that you kntw
neither act nor part of . . . /'

" Hold !" exclaimed O'Brien, in a tone that
made O'Mealy step back some paces. For thus
exposed in all his penury, — pride, rage, and
indignation, gave an almost super-human ex*
pression to his countenance. There was in his
look and voice something stunning, which
startled even the animal courage of O'^Mealy.

" Hold !" he said. " Stop there. Whatever
may be your idle suspicions, founded in ignor-
anee, and expressed in all the insolence of your
temporary authority, give them no further
utterance. You must believe, you dare not
doubt an assertion, to which I have pledged
my honour."

" Be aisy ; be aisy, now, my dear fellow,*'
^d O'Mealy, with a cajoling and humorous
tone. " Now, I just ask you, fair and quiet,
did you not give me your word, or what came

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328 THE O^BBIENS AND

to the same thing, assured me that you knew
nothing of that rebelly thief?*'

*^ Nor did I then, Captain O'Mealy : I was
utterly ignorant of his existence. Not an hour
since. I most unexpectedly found in this "pbor
unfortunate man, an old friend, and faithful
follower of my family. My long absence from
Ireland, and my belief of his death, prevented
me from recognizing him, in the frequent and
strange rencontres we had yesterday. For the
rest, let me suggest to you, and to the civil officer,
under whose authority you doubtless act, that
your prisoner is not quite sane ; that he acts
under the influence of strong mental derange-
ment ; and that his hallucination will, I trust,
not fail to acquit him of the matter with which
he may be charged. And- now. Sir,'* he con-
tinued with an evident eflbrt and struggle of
the mind, " with respect to this old house, which
you have been pleased to name a den of thieves,
it is, and has been for nearly two centuries, a
family mansion ; and though, since I last saw

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THE oVlaheetys. 829

it, it has been dismantled and dilapidated, it
was once the residence of my ancestor the great
Earl of Inchiquin, and is now his lineal de-
scendant's, my father's house.*'

" Well, my dear fellow," said O'Mealy, good
humouredly, ^^ laste said is soonest minded ;
and as to the ould house, if I have hurt your
fine feelings, upon my honour I am heartily
sorry for it ; and I can say no more. But J
suppose, the pace officer here wDl expect you
to find some surety for your appearance for all
that, in regard of your being found cheek*by-
jowl with this Fin Macopl here.''

" Certainly 1 shall. Captain O'Mealy,'' said
the officer. *' And Mr. O'Brien, you had better
accompany me at once ; as it may be difficult
to procure two sureties at this hour, and the
night so bad.''

" There can be no difficulty whatever on the
subject," said Lord Walter ; '* I ofler myself
for one bail."

*« And I," said Lord Charles, « for the

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THE O'BRIENS AXD

other ; if Mr. O'Brien will do me the honour
to accept of me."

*^ I am much flattered," said O'Brien, franklj,
and with much feeling, " and will gratefully
accept of both, if it be really necessary."

" A friend in need's a friend indeed,'' said
O'Mealy. " Did not I tell you, my dear
fellow, you were born under a lucky star.^
'Pon my honour I did. It's worth while
gitting into a scrape, to have lords' and dukes'
sons going bail for one, — it will cut such a dash
in the papers. But we must keep moving ; for
Lady Mary is watching for me. Til ingage, —
«o, sarjeant, do your duty."

The gentlemen drew back, and gathered
Tound O'Brien at the fire-place, intreating him
not to interfere. The soldiers moved forward
upon their prisoner ; who, firm, erect, and
drawn up to his full gigantic height, stood
like a fixture of the old building. He had
imperceptibly, and step by step, drawn back,
(followed by his guard), till he now stood in

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THE o'flahkrtys. 831

front of the paQnel-door which led to the back
stairs, and which was then half closed. Wben^
however, two soldiers, perceiving his immove-
able firmness, seized him by the shoulders
to drag him forcibly away, his countenana*
darkened^ his eyes flashed, and by a sudden
spring he dashed them on one side, sending
th^n reeling for several paces ; and with the
rapidity of thought he darted back and closed
the door upon his retreat. Others of the military
now rushed forward to force an entrance and
pursue the fugitive ; and thus, precipitating
themselves on one spol of the rotten floor, the
fatal and natural consequence ensued— the floor
gave way. The awful, terrible, and dinning crash
which followed was rendered more horrid and
astounding by the shrieks of the unfortunate
men, who sunk with the mass of rubbish into
the yawning chasm, mingling with the report
of their fire-arms, with the din of the still falling
building, and the roar of the storm without.
The shock given by the fall, caused an universal

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332 THE O'BRIENS AND

vibration to the whole building: rafter after
rafter gave way, and beam after beam. A
chimney, which fell through the tiled roof,
spread increa^ng destruction. Gushes of thick,
suffocating dust filled, for a time, the horrible
abyss, and almost stifled tho$e who still re-
mained on a fragment of the floor, which
extended a few feet beyond the great chimney-
piece. These were the two lords, Captain
0!Mealy, O'Brien, and the peace officer.
Amidst the horror and consternation of an
event so fearful, bricks and tiles still falling
—doors, windows, and shutters ratthng in
the storm, both within and without, they still
preserved sufficient presence of mind to recog-
nize their danger, and the possibiUty of escape ;
while the cry of *^ Faer ghim^ faer ghim, AgtsSy
keep to the fire-place,^' issuing from beneath the
window near which they stood, convinced
O^Brien that Shane was safe — a conviction,
that cheered him into hope for the safety of
himself and those around him.

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THE oVlahertys. 33;i

When he could make himself heard,, (for the
light being extinguished, he could not be seen,)
he begged of all to stand quiet, and remain
where they were. The hearth which they
occupied, he said, was supported by holdfasts,
lately erected, and the beams of that end of the
floor were fresh and uninjured. He then made
to the window next the chimney-piece, threw up
the sash, and shouted for assistance. The build-
ing was already surrounded ; men with lanterns
and flambeaux were visible at a little distance ;
and the ghttering of arms also shewed that some
of the soldiers had escaped, and that others had
joined them from the royal barracks on the other
side of the river. A lofty figure, much above
the stature of those around him, forced forward
through the falling bricks and tiles, and fixed a
ladder against the window.

The gentlemen descended in safety, O'Brien
ast; but scarcely had he reached the earth,
when he saw himself in Shane's arms. " Away !
away!" he said, extricating himself from the

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S34 THE o'briens and

embrace. At that moment, the part of the
building they had just left, fell in, with a horrible
crash, and the chimney-piece, the fine monument
of antiquity, was precipitated with it into the
ruins. Still the outward walls held together;
and by the light of the flambeaux, the back
stairs were seen hanging as it were in the air,
like the geometrical staircases of modern times,
without visible suppoi-t

When the cloud of dust, formed by the last
fall, had somewhat subsided, and the house
could be approached without imminent peril,
O'Brien (satisfied that Shane had escaped), busied
himself in giving relief to the sufferers by this
fatal event. He thought of poor Robin, buried,
doubtless, with the corpse of his grandmother,
l)eneath the ruins. He rushed on through dust
and lime, followed by the humane and the
courageous ; and was soon joined by a party of

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THE oVlaheetys. SS5

were wounded ; but all, though nearly suffocated,
escaped with life, and were carried off by their
comrades* Two dead bodies alone were dis-
covered, on which the coping-stone of a wall
had fallen. By the glare of a flambeau, were
discovered the mangled remains of the unfor-
tunate Robin, beside those of the deceased Alice.

While O'Brien was thus penetrating into the
interior of the building, Lord Charles, Lord
Walter, O'Mealy, and the constable, were fully
occupied without, in preserving order and keep-
ing out the crowd, which, in spite of rain and
wind, had assembled from the neighbouring
purlieus of the barracks and of Watling-street.

Every blast of wind still continued to shake
the wreck of the ruined fabric ; and O'Brien,
believing that the walls would soon follow^ was
himself retiring ; rejoicing that amidst the s^^
events of the night, his father had escaped;
when, as he stumbled over heaps of rafters and
limp, the faint shriek of a female voice or^nsrht

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836 THK o'beiens and

looked up, and doubting the evidence of his
senses, beheld a female form standing on the
still suspended stairs, between which and de-
struction there seemed to be but a moment of
time.

The nodding ruin now received a terrible
shock, from a burst of the increasing hurricane.
The crowd fell hurrying back ;— O'Brien plunged
deeper and deeper within the walls, till he stood
beneath the perilous staircase, which rocked like
one of rope.

*^ Spring down at once,*" he said, opening his
arms to receive the trembling person, above
whose head, fragments of the roof were falling,
tile by tile. As he opened his arms, she half
bent forward, as if to leap ; when, from the
other side, the cry of " Faer ghim ! faer ghim r
arrested her attention ; and springing down, with
the light dart land hardihood of a bird, she was
received in the arms of Shane. At that moment
the whole pile fell in, with a tremendous roar ;
and O'Brien, with his arms folded over his head,

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THE o'flaheetys. 887

sometimes beaten down, and again plunging for-
ward, scarcely credited his senses, when he agun

«
found himself beyond the reach of danger, sur*

rounded by the Lords Walter and Charles,
O'Mealy, and a multitude of people.

The gentlemen endeavoured to carry him from
the spot, and to persuade him to accompany
them into town, as nothing farther now remained
to be done : but he was under powerful excite- '
ment, and fearful that Shane, and the object ci
his humane and perilous exertions, were buried
in the ruins. As soon as he had recovered
breath and strength, he made known his fears to
the bystanders. His mind, however, was set at
rest, by one of the crowd, who assured him that
a tall man, carrying a woman in his arms, had
passed him at the Ferry slip, and by this time,
was on the other side. Fortunately, this infor-
mation was given out of the bearing of O^Mealy
and the peace officer; and O'Brien's heart, though
still thrilling and palpitating, was, as far as Shane
was concerned, for the present at rest. He now

VOL. II. Q

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338 THE O'BRIENS AND

accompanied the gentlemen, walking arm in anu
with Lord Walter, towards Lady Knocklofty''s
carriage, which had drawn up at a short dis-
tance, under the shelter of the porte cochere o{
Moira House, while curiosity had detained the
footmen at the scene of recent action.

As neither the dress of the party, nor the
state of their spirits, permitted them to join
the ball at the Rotunda, Lord Walter proposed
to O'Brien to set him down at the College ; but
he declined the offer, on the plea that the con-
dition of his clothes, (covered with the dust and
rubbish of the ruin, and drenched with rain,)
would render a walk safer to himself, as well as
spare the delicate silken hangings of Lady
Knocklofty's vehicle. All that he could be pre-
vailed on to accept, was Lord Walter's great-
coat. While he was drawing it on, Lord Charles,

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THE o'flahektys. 339

stances : will you allow me, then, to cut cere-
mony short, and make you a proposition for a
meeting to-morrow ?'*

"Undoubtedly;" said O'Brien, coming closer
to the carriage-window, " when and where you
please.''

" Well, then," said Lord Charles, " the when,

six o'clock, and the where, at our mess dinner ;

with Lord Walter for your second, and our

friend O'Mealy for mine : and then, with glasses

charged to the brim,

' Lay on, Macduff;
And damned be he who first cries, Hold, enough/

I know this is not your Irish way of settling dif-
ferences. But, hang it, — whatever an Hibernian
may think, I have no great gusto for taking
away the life of a man who has saved miue.^^
" And who," said O'Brien, returning the cor-

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340 THE o'bbiens and the o'flahebtys.

quarrel as it stands," said O'Mealy, " as my
&iend, Sir Lucius, has it. So I shall not say a
word.op the subject, only that I'm glad to be a
party concerned."

Lord Walter now shaking the hands oT both
the young men, expressed his satisfaction at the
termination of an affair, in which both, or neither,
had been in tlie wrong. The carriage then drove
on, to set down the gentlemen at their respective
homes; and O'Brien, as the College clock struck
eleven, entered the gates of Alma Mater,

END OF VOL. II.

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