CHAPTER V. THE REVIEW IN THE PHOENIX
Winding along the quays, we crossed an old and dilapidated bridge; and after traversing some narrow and ruinous-looking streets, we entered the Park, and at length reached the Fifteen Acres.
The carriages were drawn up in a line; his Grace's led horses were ordered up, and staff-officers galloped right and left to announce the orders for the troops to stand to arms.
As the Duke descended from his carriage he caught my eye, and turning suddenly towards the Duchess, said, “Let me present Mr. Hinton to your Grace.”
While I was making my bows and acknowledgments, his Grace put his hand upon my arm.
“You know Lady Killimore, Hinton? Never mind, it's of no consequence. You see her carriage yonder—they have made some blunder in the road, and the dragoons, it seems, wont let them pass. Just canter down and rescue them.”
“Do, pray, Mr. Hinton,” added the Duchess. “Poor Lady Killimore is so very nervous she'll be terrified to death if they make any fuss. Her carriage can come up quite close; there is plenty of room.”
“Now, do it well,” whispered O'Grady: “there is a pretty girl in the case; it's your first mission; acquit yourself with credit.”
An infernal brass band playing “Rule Britannia” within ten paces of me, the buzz of voices, the crowd, the novelty of the situation, the excitement of the moment, all conspired to addle and confuse me; so that when I put spurs to my horse and struck out into a gallop, I had no very precise idea of what I was to do, and not the slightest upon earth of where I was to do it.
A pretty girl in a carriage beset by dragoons was to be looked for—Lady Kil—somebody's equipage—— “Oh! I have it; there they are,” said I, as a yellow barouche, with four steaming posters, caught my eye in a far part of the field. From the number of dragoons that surrounded the carriage, no less than their violent gestures, I could perceive that an altercation had taken place; pressing my horse to the top of his speed, I flew across the plain, and arrived flushed, heated, and breathless beside the carriage.
A large and strikingly handsome woman in a bonnet and plumes of the most gaudy and showy character, was standing upon the front seat, and carrying on an active, and, as it seemed, acrimonious controversy with the sergeant of the horse police.
“You must go back—can't help it, ma'am—nothing but the members of the household can pass this way.”
“Oh dear! where's Captain O'Grady?—sure it's not possible I could be treated this way. Paul, take that man's name, and mind you have him dismissed in the morning. Where are you, Paul? Ah! he's gone. It is the way with him always; and there you sit, Bob Dwyer, and you are no more good than a stick of sealing-wax!” Here a suppressed titter of laughter from the back of the carriage induced me to turn my eyes in that direction, and I beheld one of the most beautiful girls I ever looked at, holding her handkerchief to her month to conceal her laughter. Her dark eyes flashed, and her features sparkled, while a blush, at being so discovered, if possible, added to her beauty.
“All right,” said I to myself, as taking off my hat I bowed to the very mane of my horse.
“If your Ladyship will kindly permit me,” said I, “his Grace has sent me to show you the way.”
The dragoons fell back as I spoke; the horse police looked awfully frightened; while the lady whose late eloquence manifested little of fear or trepidation, threw herself back in the carriage, and, covering her face with a handkerchief, sobbed violently.
“Ah, the Duchess said she was nervous. Poor Lady Kil——”
“Speak to me, Louisa dear. Who is it? Is it Mr. Wellesley Pole? Is it——”
I did not wait for a further supposition, but in a most insinuating voice, added,
“Mr. Hinton, my lady, extra aide-de-camp on his Excellency's staff. The Duchess feared you would be nervous, and hopes you'll get as close to her as possible.”
“Where's Paul?” said the lady, once more recovering her animation. “If this is a hoax, young gentleman——”
“Madam,” said I, bowing stiffly, “I am really at a loss to understand your meaning.”
“Oh, forgive me, Mr. Hilton.”
“Hinton, my Lady.”
“Yes, Hinton,” said she. “I am a beast to mistrust you, and you so young and so artless; the sweetest blue eyes I ever looked at.”
This was said in a whisper to her young friend, whose mirth now threatened to burst forth.
“And was it really his Royal Highness that sent you?”
“His Grace, my lady, I assure you, despatched me to your aid. He saw your carriage through his glass, and, guessing what had occurred, directed me to ride over and accompany your Ladyship to the viceregal stand.”
Poor Lady Kil——'s nervousness again seized her, and, with a faint cry for the ever-absent Paul, she went off into rather smart hysterics. During this paroxysm I could not help feeling somewhat annoyed at the young lady's conduct, who, instead of evincing the slightest sympathy for her mother, held her head down, and seemed to shake with laughter. By this time, however, the postilions were again under way, and, after ten minutes' sharp trotting, we entered the grand stand, with whips cracking, ribbons fluttering, and I myself caracoling beside the carriage with an air of triumphant success.
A large dusky travelling carriage had meanwhile occupied the place the Duchess designed for her friend. The only thing to do, therefore, was, to place them as conveniently as I could, and hasten back to inform her Grace of the success of my mission. As I approached her carriage I was saluted by a burst of laughter from the staff, in which the Duke himself joined most extravagantly; while O'Grady, with his hands on his sides, threatened to fall from the saddle.
“What the deuce is the matter?” thought I; “I didn't bungle it?”
“Tell her Grace,” said the Duke, with his hand upon his mouth, unable to finish the sentence with laughter.
I saw something was wrong, and that I was in some infernal scrape, still, resolved to go through with it, I drew near, and said,
“I am happy to inform your Grace that Lady Kil——”
“Is here,” said the Duchess, bowing haughtily, as she turned towards a spiteful-looking dowager beside her.
Here was a mess! So, bowing and backing, I dropped through the crowd to where my companions still stood convulsed with merriment.
“What, in the devil's name, is it?” said I to O'Grady “Whom have I been escorting this half-hour?”
“You've immortalised yourself,” said O'Grady, with a roar of laughter. “Your bill at twelve months for five hundred pounds is as good this moment as bank paper.”
“What is it?” said I, losing all patience. “Who is she?”
“Mrs. Paul Rooney, my boy, the gem of attorneys' wives, the glory of Stephen's-green, with a villa at Bray, a box at the theatre, champagne suppers every night in the week, dinners promiscuously, and lunch à discrétion: there's glory for you. You may laugh at a latitat, sneer at the King's Bench, and snap your fingers at any process-server from here to Kilmainham!”
“May the devil fly away with her!” said I, wiping my forehead with passion and excitement.
“The Heavens forbid!” said O'Grady, piously. “Our exchequer may be guilty of many an extravagance, but it could not permit such a flight as that. It is evident, Hinton, that you did not see the pretty girl beside her in the carriage.”
“Yes, yes, I saw her,” said I, biting my lip with impatience, “and she seemed evidently enjoying the infernal blunder I was committing. And Mrs. Paul—oh, confound her! I can never endure the sight of her again!”
“My dear young friend,” replied O'Grady, with an affected seriousness, “I see that already the prejudices of your very silly countrymen have worked their effect upon you. Had not Lord Dudley de Vere given you such a picture of the Rooney family, you would probably be much more lenient in your judgment: besides, after all, the error was yours, not hers. You told her that the Duke had sent you; you told her the Duchess wished her carriage beside her own.”
“You take a singular mode,” said I, pettishly, “to bring a man back to a good temper, by showing him that he has no one to blame for his misfortunes but himself. Confound them! look how they are all laughing about us. Indeed, from the little I've seen, it is the only thing they appear to do in this country.”
At a signal from the Duke, O'Grady put spurs to his horse and cantered down the line, leaving me to such reflections as I could form, beneath the gaze of some forty persons, who could not turn to look without laughing at me.
“This is pleasant,” thought I; “this is really a happy début: that I, whose unimpeachable accuracy of manner and address should have won for me, at the Prince's levee, the approbation of the first gentleman of Europe, should here, among these semi-civilised savages, become an object of ridicule and laughter. My father told me they were very different; and my mother———” I had not patience to think of the frightful effects my absurd situation might produce upon her nerves. “Lady Julia, too—ah! there's the rub—my beautiful cousin, who, in the slightest solecism of London manners, could find matter for sarcasm and raillery. What would she think of me now? And this it is they persuaded me to prefer to active service! What wound to a man's flesh could equal one to his feelings? I would rather be condoled with than scoffed at any day; and see! by Jove, they're laughing still. I would wager a fifty that I furnish the dinner conversation for every table in the capital this day.”
The vine twig shows not more ingenuity, as it traverses some rocky crag in search of the cool stream, at once its luxury and its life, than does our injured self-love, in seeking for consolation from the inevitable casualties of fate, and the irresistible strokes of fortune! Thus I found comfort in the thought that the ridicule attached to me rather proceeded from the low standard of manners and habits about me than from anything positively absurd in my position; and, in my warped and biassed imagination, I actually preferred the insolent insipidity of Lord Dudley de Vere to the hearty raciness and laughter-loving spirit of Phil O'Grady.
My reflections were now cut short by the order for the staff to mount, and, following the current of my present feelings, I drew near to Lord Dudley, in whose emptiness and inanity I felt a degree of security from sarcasm, that I could by no means be so confident of in O'Grady's company.
Amid the thunder of cannon, the deafening roll of drums, the tramp of cavalry, and the measured footfall of the infantry columns, these thoughts rapidly gave way to others, and I soon forgot myself in the scene around me. The sight, indeed, was an inspiriting one; for, although but the mockery of glorious war, to my unpractised eye the deception was delightful: the bracing air, the bright sky, the scenery itself, lent their aid, and, in the brilliant panorama before me, I soon regained my light-heartedness, and felt happy as before.
CHAPTER VI. THE SHAM BATTLE
I have mentioned in my last chapter how very rapidly I forgot my troubles in the excitement of the scene around me. Indeed, they must have been much more important, much deeper woes, to have occupied any place in a head so addled and confused as mine was. The manoeuvres of the day included a sham battle; and scarcely had his Excellency passed down the line, when preparations for the engagement began. The heavy artillery was seen to limber up, and move slowly across the field, accompanied by a strong detachment of cavalry; columns of infantry were marched hither and thither with the most pressing and eager haste; orderly dragoons and staff-officers galloped to and fro like madmen; red-faced plethoric little colonels bawled out the word of command till one feared they might burst a bloodvessel; and already two companies of light infantry might be seen stealing cautiously along the skirts of the wood, with the apparently insidious design of attacking a brigade of guns. As for me, I was at one moment employed carrying despatches to Sir Charles Asgill, at another conveying intelligence to Lord Harrington; these, be it known, being the rival commanders, whose powers of strategy were now to be tested before the assembled and discriminating citizens of Dublin. Not to speak of the eminent personal hazard of a service which required me constantly to ride between the lines of contending armies, the fatigue alone had nigh killed me. Scarcely did I appear, breathless, at head-quarters on my return from one mission, when I was despatched on another. Tired and panting, I more than once bungled my directions, and communicated to Sir Charles the secret intentions of his Lordship, while with a laudable impartiality I disarranged the former's plans by a total misconception of the orders. Fatigue, noise, chagrin, and incessant worry had so completely turned my head, that I became perfectly incapable of the commonest exercises of reason. Some of the artillery I ordered into a hollow, where I was told to station a party of riflemen. Three squadrons of cavalry I desired to charge up a hill, which the 71st Highlanders were to have scrambled up if they were able. Light dragoons I posted in situations so beset with brushwood and firs, that all movement became impossible; and, in a word, when the signal-gun announced the commencement of the action, my mistakes had introduced such a new feature into tactics, that neither party knew what his adversary was at, nor, indeed, had any accurate notion of which were his own troops. The Duke, who had watched with the most eager satisfaction the whole of my proceedings, sat laughing upon his horse till the very tears coursed down his cheeks; and, as all the staff were more or less participators in the secret, I found myself once more the centre of a grinning audience, perfectly convulsed at my exploits. Meanwhile, the guns thundered, the cavalry charged, the infantry poured in a rattling roar of small arms; while the luckless commanders, unable to discover any semblance of a plan, and still worse, not knowing where one half of their forces were concealed, dared not adventure upon a movement, and preferred trusting to the smoke of the battle as a cover for their blunders. The fusilade, therefore, was hotly sustained; all the heavy pieces were brought to the front; and while the spectators were anxiously looking for the manoeuvres of a fight, the ammunition was waxing low, and the day wearing apace. Dissatisfaction at length began to show itself on every side; and the Duke assuming, as well as he was able, somewhat of a disappointed look, the unhappy generals made a final effort to retrieve their mishaps, and aides-de-camp were despatched through all the highways and byways, to bring up whoever they could find as quickly as possible. Now then began such a scene as few even of the oldest campaigners ever witnessed the equal of. From every dell and hollow, from every brake and thicket, burst forth some party or other, who up to this moment believed themselves lying in ambush. Horse, foot, and dragoons, artillery, sappers, light infantry, and grenadiers, rushed forward wherever chance or their bewildered officers led them. Here might be seen one half of a regiment blazing away at a stray company of their own people, running like devils for shelter; here some squadrons of horse, who, indignant at their fruitless charges and unmeaning movements, now doggedly dismounted, were standing right before a brigade of twelve-pounders, thundering mercilessly amongst them. Never was witnessed such a scene of riot, confusion, and disorder. Colonels lost their regiments, regiments their colonels. The Fusiliers captured the band of the Royal Irish, and made them play through the heat of the engagement. Those who at first expressed enmui and fatigue at the sameness and monotony of the scene, were now gratified to the utmost by its life, bustle, and animation. Elderly citizens in drab shorts and buff waistcoats explained to their listening wives and urchins the plans and intentions of the rival heroes, pronouncing the whole thing the while the very best field-day that ever was seen in the Phoenix.
In the midst of all this confusion, a new element of discord suddenly displayed itself. That loyal corps, the Cork militia, who were ordered up to attack close to where the Duke and his staff were standing, deemed that no better moment could be chosen to exhibit their attachment to church and state than when marching on to glory, struck up, with all the discord of their band, the redoubted air of “Protestant Boys.” A cheer burst from the ranks as the loyal strains filled the air; but scarcely had the loud burst subsided, when the Louth militia advanced with a quick step, their fifes playing “Vinegar-hill.”
For a moment or two the rivalry created a perfect roar of laughter; but this very soon gave way, as the two regiments, instead of drawing up at a reasonable distance for the interchange of an amicable blank cartridge, rushed down upon each other with the fury of madmen. So sudden, so impetuous was the encounter, all effort to prevent it was impracticable. Muskets were clubbed or bayonets fixed, and in a moment really serious battle was engaged; the musicians on each side encouraging their party, as they racked their brains for party-tunes of the most bitter and taunting character; while cries of “Down with King William I.” “To hell with the Pope?” rose alternately from either side.
How far this spirit might have extended, it is difficult to say, when the Duke gave orders for some squadrons of cavalry to charge down upon them, and separate the contending forces. This order was fortunately in time; for scarcely was it issued, when a west country yeomanry corps came galloping up to the assistance of the brave Louth.
“Here we are, boys!” cried Mike Westropp, their colonel—“here we are! lave the way! lave the way for us! and we'll ride down the murthering Orange villains, every man of them!”
The Louth fell back, and the yeomen came forward at a charge; Westropp standing high in his stirrups, and flourishing his sabre above his head. It was just then that a heavy brigade of artillery, unconscious of the hot work going forward, was ordered to open their fire upon the Louth militia. One of the guns, by some accident, contained an undue proportion of wadding, and to this casual circumstance may, in a great degree, be attributed the happy issue of what threatened to be a serious disturbance; for, as Westropp advanced, cheering and encouraging his men, he received this wadding slap in his face. Down he tumbled at once, rolling over and over with the shock; while, believing that he had got his death-wound, he bellowed out,
“Oh! blessed Virgin! there's threason in the camp! hit in the face by a four-pounder, by Jove! Oh! Duke darling! Oh! your Grace! Oh! holy Joseph, look at this! Oh! bad luck to the arthillery, for spoiling a fair fight! Peter”—this was the major of the regiment—“Peter Darcy, gallop into town and lodge informations against the brigade of guns. I'll be dead before you come back.”
A perfect burst of laughter broke from the opposing ranks, and while his friends crowded round the discomfited leader, the rival bands united in a roar of merriment that for a moment caused a suspension of hostilities. For a moment, I say; for scarcely had the gallant Westropp been conveyed to the rear, when once more the bands struck up their irritating strains, and preparations for a still more deadly encounter were made on every side. The matter now assumed so serious an aspect, that the Duke was obliged himself to interfere, and order both parties off the ground; the Cork deploying towards the lodge, while the brave Louth marched off with banners flying and drums beating in the direction of Knockmaroon.
These movements were conducted with a serio-comic solemnity of the most ludicrous kind; and although the respect for viceregal authority was great, and the military devotion of each party strong, yet neither one nor the other was sufficient to prevent the more violent on both sides from occasionally turning, as they went, to give expression to some taunting allusion or some galling sarcasm, well calculated, did the opportunity permit, to renew the conflict.
A hearty burst of laughter from the Duke indicated pretty clearly how he regarded the matter; and, however the grave and significant looks of others might seem to imply that there was more in the circumstance than mere food for mirth, he shook his sides merrily; and, as his bright eye glistened with satisfaction, and his cheek glowed, he could not help whispering his regret that his station compelled him to check the very best joke he ever witnessed in his life.
“This is hot work, Sir Charles,” said he, wiping his forehead as he spoke; “and, as it is now past three o'clock, and we have a privy council at four, I fear I must leave you.”
“The troops will move past in marching order,” replied Sir Charles, pompously: “will your Grace receive the salute at this point?”
“Wherever you like, Sir Charles; wherever you like. Would to Heaven that some good Samaritan could afford me a little brandy-and-water from his canteen. I say, Hinton, they seem at luncheon yonder in that carriage: do you think your diplomacy could negotiate a glass of sherry for me?”
“If you'll permit me, my Lord, I'll try,” said I, as, disengaging myself from the crowd, I set off in the direction he pointed.
As I drew near the carriage—from which the horses had been taken—drawn up beside a clump of beech-trees for the sake of shelter—I was not long in perceiving that it was the same equipage I had so gallantly rescued in the morning from the sabres of the horse police. Had I entertained any fears for the effects of the nervous shock upon the tender sensibilities of Mrs. Paul Rooney, the scene before me must completely have dispelled my uneasiness. Never did a merrier peal of laughter ring from female lungs than hers as I rode forward. Seated in the back of the carriage, the front cushion of which served as a kind of table, sat the lady in question. One hand, resting upon her knee, held a formidable carving-fork, on the summit of which vibrated the short leg of a chicken; in the other she grasped a silver vessel, which, were I to predicate from the froth, I fear I should pronounce to be porter. A luncheon on the most liberal scale, displayed, in all the confusion and disorder inseparable from such a situation, a veal-pie, cold lamb, tongue, chickens, and sandwiches; drinking vessels of every shape and material; a smelling bottle full of mustard, and a newspaper paragraph full of salt. Abundant as were the viands, the guests were not wanting: crowds of infantry officers, flushed with victory or undismayed by defeat, hob-nobbed from the rumble to the box; the steps, the springs, the very splinter-bar had its occupant; and, truly, a merrier party, or a more convivial, it were difficult to conceive.
So environed was Mrs. Rooney by her friends, that I was enabled to observe them some time, myself unseen.
“Captain Mitchell, another wing? Well, the least taste in life of the breast? Bob Dwyer, will ye never have done drawing that cork?”
Now this I must aver was an unjust reproach, inasmuch as to my own certain knowledge he had accomplished three feats of that nature in about as many minutes; and, had the aforesaid Bob been reared from his infancy in drawing corks, instead of declarations, his practice could not have been more expert. Pop, pop, they went; ghig, glug, glug, flowed the bubbling liquor, as sherry, shrub, cold punch, and bottled porter succeeded each other in rapid order. Simpering ensigns, with elevated eyebrows, insinuated nonsense, soft, vapid, and unmeaning as their own brains, as they helped themselves to ham or dived into the pasty; while a young dragoon, who seemed to devote his attention to Mrs. Rodney's companion, amused himself by constant endeavours to stroke down a growing moustache, whose downy whiteness resembled nothing that I know of save the ill-omened fur one sees on an antiquated apple-pie.
As I looked on every side to catch a glance at him whom I should suppose to Mr. Rooney, I was myself detected by the watchful eye of Bob Dwyer, who, at that moment having his mouth full of three hard eggs, was nearly asphyxiated in his endeavours to telegraph my approach to Mrs. Paul.
“The edge-du-cong, by the mortial!” said he, sputtering out the words, as his bloodshot eyes nearly bolted out of his head.
Had I been a Bengal tiger, my advent might have caused less alarm. The officers not knowing if the Duke himself were coming, wiped their lips, resumed their caps and chakos, and sprang to the ground in dismay and confusion: as Mrs. Rooney herself, with an adroitness an Indian juggler might have envied, plunged the fork, drumstick and all, into the recesses of her muff; while with a back hand she decanted the XX upon a bald major of infantry, who was brushing the crumbs from his facings. One individual alone seemed to relish and enjoy the discomfiture of the others: this was the young lady whom I before remarked, and whose whole air and appearance seemed strangely at variance with everything around her. She gave free current to her mirth; while Mrs. Paul, now suddenly restored to a sense of her nervous constitution, fell back in her carriage, and appeared bent upon a scene.
“You caught us enjoying ourselves, Mr. Stilton?”
“Hinton, if you'll allow me, madam.”
“Ay, to be sure—Mr. Hinton. Taking a little snack, which I am sure you'd be the better for after the fatigues of the day.”
“Eh, au au! a devilish good luncheon,” chimed in a pale sub, the first who ventured to pluck up his courage.
“Would a sandwich tempt you, with a glass of champagne?” said Mrs. Paul, with the blandest of smiles.
“I can recommend the lamb, sir,” said a voice behind.
“Begad, I'll vouch for the porter,” said the Major. “I only hope it is a good cosmetic.”
“It is a beautiful thing for the hair,” said Mrs. Rooney, half venturing upon a joke.
“No more on that head, ma'am,” said the little Major, bowing pompously.
By this time, thanks to the assiduous attentions of Bob Dwyer, I was presented with a plate, which, had I been an anaconda instead of an aide-decamp, might have satisfied my appetite. A place was made for me in the carriage; and the faithful Bob, converting the skirt of his principal blue into a glass-cloth, polished a wine-glass for my private use.
“Let me introduce my young friend, Mr. Hinton,” said Mrs. Paul, with a graceful wave of her jewelled hand towards her companion. “Miss Louisa Bellew, only daughter of Sir Simon Bellew, of ———” what the place was I could not well hear, but it sounded confoundedly like Killhiman-smotherum—“a beautiful place in the county Mayo. Bob, is it punch you are giving?”
“Most excellent, I assure you, Mrs. Rooney.”
“And how is the Duke, sir? I hope his Grace enjoys good health. He is a darling of a man.”
By-the-by, it is perfectly absurd the sympathy your third or fourth-rate people feel in the health and habits of those above them in station, pleased as they are to learn the most common-place and worthless trifles concerning them, and happy when, by any chance, some accidental similitude would seem to exist even between their misfortunes.
“And the dear Duchess,” resumed Mrs. Rooney, “she's troubled with the nerves like myself. Ah! Mr. Hinton, what an affliction it is to have a sensitive nature; that's what I often say to my sweet young friend here. It's better for her to be the gay, giddy, thoughtless, happy thing she is, than——” Here the lady sighed, wiped her eyes, flourished her cambric, and tried to look like Agnes in the “Bleeding Nun.” “But here they come. You don't know Mr. Rooney? Allow me to introduce him to you.”
As she spoke, O'Grady cantered up to the carriage, accompanied by a short, pursy, round-faced little man, who, with his hat set knowingly on one side, and his top-boots scarce reaching to the middle of the leg, bestrode a sharp, strong-boned hackney, with cropped ears and short tail. He carried in his hand a hunting-whip, and seemed, by his seat in the saddle and the easy finger upon the bridle, no indifferent horseman.
“Mr. Rooney,” said the lady, drawing herself up with a certain austerity of manner, “I wish you to make the acquaintance of Mr. Hinton, the aide-de-camp to his Grace.”
Mr. Rooney lifted his hat straight above his head, and replaced it a little more obliquely than before over his right eye.
“Delighted, upon my honour—faith, quite charmed—hope you got something to eat—there never was such a murthering hot day—Bob Dwyer, open a bottle of port—the Captain is famished.”
“I say, Hinton,” called out O'Grady, “you forgot the Duke, it seems; he told me you'd gone in search of some sherry, or something of the kind; but I can readily conceive how easily a man may forget himself in such a position as yours.”
Here Mrs. Paul dropped her head in deep confusion, Miss Bellew looked saucy, and I, for the first time remembering what brought me there, was perfectly overwhelmed with shame at my carelessness.
“Never mind, boy, don't fret about it, his Grace is the most forgiving man in the world; and when he knows where you were——”
“Ah, Captain!” sighed Mrs. Rooney.
“Master Phil, it's yourself can do it,” murmured Paul, who perfectly appreciated O'Grady's powers of “blarney,” when exercised on the susceptible temperament of his fair spouse.
“I'll take a sandwich,” continued the Captain. “Do you know, Mrs. Rooney, I've been riding about this half-hour to catch my young friend, and introduce him to you; and here I find him comfortably installed, without my aid or assistance. The fact is, these English fellows have a nattering, insinuating way of their own there's no coming up to. Isn't that so, Miss Bellew?”
“Very likely,” said the young lady, who now spoke for the first time; “but it is so very well concealed that I for one could never detect it.”
This speech, uttered with a certain pert and saucy air, nettled mc for the moment; but as no reply occurred to me, I could only look at the speaker a tacit acknowledgment of her sarcasm; while I remembered, for the first time, that, although seated opposite my very attractive neighbour, I had hitherto not addressed to her a single phrase of even common-place attention.
“I suppose you put up in the Castle, sir?” said Mr. Rooney.
“Yes, two doors lower down than Mount O'Grady,” replied the Captain for me. “But come, Hinton, the carriages are moving, we must get back as quick as we can. Good-by, Paul Adieu, Mrs. Rooney, Miss Bellew, good morning.”
It was just at the moment when I had summoned up my courage to address Miss Bellew, that O'Grady called me away: there was nothing for it, however, but to make my adieus; while, extricating myself from the débris of the luncheon, I once more mounted my horse, and joined the viceregal party as they drove from the ground.
“I'm delighted you know the Rooneys,” said O'Grady, as we drove along; “they are by far the best fun going. Paul good, but his wife superb!”
“And the young lady?” said I.
“Oh, a different kind of thing altogether. By-the-by, Hinton, you took my hint, I hope, about your English manner?”
“Eh—why—how—what did you mean?”
“Simply, my boy, that your Coppermine-river kind of courtesy may be a devilish fine thing in Hyde Park or St. James's, but will never do with us poor people here. Put more warmth into it, man. Dash the lemonade with a little maraschino; you'll feel twice as comfortable yourself, and the girls like you all the better. You take the suggestion in good part, I'm sure.”
“Oh, of course,” said I, somewhat stung that I should get a lesson in manner where I had meant to be a model for imitation; “if they like that kind of thing, I must only conform.”
CHAPTER VII. THE ROONEYS.
I cannot proceed further in this my veracious history without dwelling a little longer upon the characters of the two interesting individuals I have already presented to my readers as Mr. and Mrs. Rooney.
Paul Rooney, attorney-at-law, 42, Stephen's-green, north, was about as well known in his native city of Dublin as Nelson's Pillar. His reputation, unlimited by the adventitious circumstances of class, spread over the whole surface of society; and, from the chancellor down to the carman, his claims were confessed.
It is possible that, in many other cities of the world, Mr. Rooney might have been regarded as a common-place, every-day personage, well to do in the world, and of a free-and-easy character, which, if it left little for reproach, left still less for remark: but in Ireland, whether it was the climate or the people, the potteen or the potatoes, I cannot say, but certainly he “came out,” as the painters call it, in a breadth of colour quite surprising.
The changeful character of the skies has, they tell us, a remarkable influence in fashioning the ever-varying features of Irish temperament; and, certainly, the inconstant climate of Dublin had much merit if it produced in Mr. Rooney the versatile nature he rejoiced in.
About ten o'clock, on every morning during term, might be seen a shrewd, cunning-looking, sly little fellow, who, with pursed-up lips and slightly elevated nose, wended his way towards the Four Courts, followed by a ragged urchin with a well-filled bag of purple stuff. His black coat, drab shorts, and gaiters, had a plain and business-like cut; and the short, square tie of his white cravat had a quaint resemblance to a flourish on a deed; the self-satisfied look, the assured step, the easy roll of the head—all bespoke one with whom the world was thriving; and it did not need the additional evidence of a certain habit he had of jingling his silver in his breeches-pocket as he went, to assure you that Rooney was a warm fellow, and had no want of cash.
Were you to trace his steps for the three or four hours that ensued, you would see him bustling through the crowded hall of the Four Courts—now, whispering some important point to a leading barrister, while he held another by the gown lest he should escape him; now, he might be remarked seated in a niche between the pillars, explaining some knotty difficulty to a western client, whose flushed cheek and flashing eye too plainly indicated his impatience of legal strategy, and how much more pleased he would feel to redress his wrongs in his own fashion; now brow-beating, now cajoling, now encouraging, now condoling, he edged his way through the bewigged and dusty throng, not stopping to reply to the hundred salutations he met with, save by a knowing wink, which was the only civility he did not put down at three-and-fourpence. If his knowledge of law was little, his knowledge of human nature—at least of such of it as Ireland exhibits—was great; and no case of any importance could come before a jury, where Paul's advice and opinion were not deemed of considerable importance. No man better knew all the wiles and twists, all the dark nooks and recesses of Irish character. No man more quickly could ferret out a hoarded secret; no one so soon detect an attempted imposition. His was the secret police of law: he read a witness as he would a deed, and detected a flaw in him to the full as easily.
As he sat near the leading counsel in a cause, he seemed a kind of middle term between the lawyer and the jury. Marking by some slight but significant gesture every point of the former, to the latter he impressed upon their minds every favourable feature of his client's cause; and twelve deaf men might have followed the pleadings in a cause through the agency of Paul's gesticulations. The consequence of these varied gifts was, business flowed in upon him from every side, and few members of the bar were in the receipt of one-half his income.
Scarcely, however, did the courts rise, when Paul, shaking from his shoulders the learned dust of the Exchequer, would dive into a small apartment which, in an obscure house in Mass-lane, he dignified by the name of his study. Short and few as were his moments of seclusion, they sufficed to effect in his entire man a complete and total change. The shrewd little attorney, that went in with a nisi prius grin, came out a round, pleasant-looking fellow, with a green coat of jockey cut, a buff waistcoat, white cords, and tops; his hat set jauntily on one side, his spotted neckcloth knotted in bang-up mode,—in fact, his figure the beau idéal of a west-country squire taking a canter among his covers before the opening of the hunting.
His grey eyes, expanded to twice their former size, looked the very soul of merriment; his nether lip, slightly dropped, quivered with the last joke it uttered. Even his voice partook of the change, and was now a rich, full, mellow Clare accent, which, with the recitative of his country, seemed to Italianise his English. While such was Paul, his accessoires—as the French would call them—were in admirable keeping: a dark chesnut cob, a perfect model of strength and symmetry, would be led up and down by a groom, also mounted upon a strong hackney, whose flat rib and short pastern showed his old Irish breeding; the well-fitting saddle, the well-balanced stirrup, the plain but powerful snaffle, all looked like the appendages of one whose jockeyism was no assumed feature; and, indeed, you had only to see Mr. Rooney in his seat, to confess that he was to the full as much at home there as in the Court of Chancery.
From this to the hour of a late dinner, the Phoenix Park became his resort. There, surrounded by a gay and laughing crowd, Paul cantered along, amusing his hearers with the last mot from the King's Bench, or some stray bit of humour or fun from a case on circuit. His conversation, however, principally ran on other topics: the Curragh Meeting, the Loughrea Steeple-chase, the Meath Cup, or Lord Boyne's Handicap; with these he was thoroughly familiar. He knew the odds of every race, could apportion the weights, describe the ground, and, better than all, make rather a good guess at the winner. In addition to these gifts, he was the best judge of a horse in Ireland; always well mounted, and never without at least two hackneys in his stable, able to trot their fifteen Irish miles within the hour. Such qualities as these might be supposed popular ones in a country proverbially given to sporting; but Mr. Rooney had other and very superior powers of attraction,—he was the Amphitryou of Dublin. It was no figurative expression to say that he kept open house. Déjeuners, dinners, routs, and balls followed each other in endless succession. His cook was French, his claret was Sneyd's; he imported his own sherry and Madeira, both of which he nursed with a care and affection truly parental. His venison and black-cock came from Scotland; every Holyhead packet had its consignment of Welsh mutton; and, in a word, whatever wealth could purchase, and a taste, nurtured as his had been by the counsel of many who frequented his table, could procure, such he possessed in abundance, his greatest ambition being to outshine in splendour, and surpass in magnificence, all the other dinner-givers of the day, filling his house with the great and titled of the land, who ministered to his vanity with singular good-nature, while they sipped his claret, and sat over his Burgundy. His was indeed a pleasant house. The bons vivants liked it for its excellent fare, the perfection of its wines, the certainty of finding the first rarity of the season before its existence was heard of at other tables; the lounger liked it for its ease and informality; the humorist, for the amusing features of its host and hostess; and not a few were attracted by the gracefulness and surpassing loveliness of one who, by some strange fatality of fortune, seemed to have been dropped down into the midst of this singular ménage.
Of Mr. Rooney, I have only further to say that, hospitable as a prince, he was never so happy as at the head of his table; for, although his natural sharpness could not but convince him of the footing which he occupied among his high and distinguished guests, yet he knew well there are few such levellers of rank as riches, and he had read in his youth that even the lofty Jove himself was accessible by the odour of a hecatomb.
Mrs. Rooney—or, as she wrote herself upon her card, Mrs. Paul Rooney (there seemed something distinctive in the prenom.)—was a being of a very different order. Perfectly unconscious of the ridicule that attaches to vulgar profusion, she believed herself the great source of attraction of her crowded staircase and besieged drawing-room. True it was, she was a large and very handsome woman. Her deep, dark, brown eyes, and brilliant complexion, would have been beautiful, had not her mouth somewhat marred their effect, by that coarse expression which high living and a voluptuous life is sure to impress upon those not born to be great. There is no doubt of it, the mouth is your thorough-bred feature. You will meet eyes as softly beaming, as brightly speaking, among the lofty cliffs of the wild Tyrol, or in the deep valleys of the far west; I have seen, too, a brow as fairly pencilled, a nose no Grecian statue could surpass, a skin whose tint was fair and transparent as the downy rose-leaf, amid the humble peasants of a poor and barren land; but never have I seen the mouth whose clean-cut lip and chiselled arch betokened birth. No; that feature would seem the prerogative of the highly born; fashioned to the expression of high and holy thoughts; moulded to the utterance of ennobling sentiment, or proud desire. Its every lineament tells of birth and blood.
Now, Mrs. Rooney's mouth was a large and handsome one, her teeth white and regular withal, and, when at rest, there was nothing to find fault with; but let her speak—was it her accent?—was it the awful provincialism of her native city?—was it that strange habit of contortion any patois is sure to impress upon the speaker?—I cannot tell, but certainly it lent to features of very considerable attraction a vulgarising character of expression.
It was truly provoking to see so handsome a person mar every effect of her beauty by some extravagant display. Dramatising every trivial incident in life, she rolled her eyes, looked horror-struck or happy, sweet or sarcastic, lofty or languishing, all in one minute. There was an eternal play of feature of one kind or other; there was no rest, no repose. Her arms—and they were round, and fair, and well-fashioned—were also enlisted in the service; and to a distant observer Mrs. Rooney's animated conversation appeared like a priest performing mass.
And that beautiful head, whose fair and classic proportions were balanced so equally upon her white and swelling throat, how tantalising to know it full of low and petty ambitions, of vulgar tastes, of contemptible rivalries, of insignificant triumph. To see her, amid the voluptuous splendour and profusion of her gorgeous house, resplendent with jewellery, glistening in all the blaze of emeralds and rubies; to watch how the poisonous venom of innate vulgarity had so tainted that fair and beautiful form, rendering her an object of ridicule who should have been a thing to worship. It was too bad; and, as she sat at dinner, her plump but taper fingers grasping a champagne glass, she seemed like a Madonna enacting the part of Moll Flagon.
Now, Mrs. Paul's manner had as many discrepancies as her features. She was by nature a good, kind, merry, coarse personage, who loved a joke not the less if it were broad as well as long. Wealth, however, and its attendant evils, suggested the propriety of a very different line; and catching up as she did at every opportunity that presented itself such of the airs and graces as she believed to be the distinctive traits of high life, she figured about in these cast-off attractions, like a waiting-maid in the abandoned finery of her mistress.
As she progressed in fortune, she “tried back” for a family, and discovered that she was an O'Toole by birth, and consequently of Irish blood-royal; a certain O'Toole being king of a nameless tract, in an unknown year, somewhere about the time of Cromwell, who, Mrs. Rooney had heard, came over with the Romans.
“Ah, yes, my dear,” as she would say when, softened by sherry and sorrow, she would lay her hand upon your arm—“ah, yes, if every one had their own, it isn't married to an attorney I'd be, but living in regal splendour in the halls of my ancestors. Well, well!” Here she would throw up her eyes with a mixed expression of grief and confidence in Heaven, that if she hadn't got her own, in this world, Oliver Cromwell, at least, was paying off, in the other, his foul wrongs to the royal house of O'Toole.
I have only one person more to speak of ere I conclude my rather prolix account of the family. Miss Louisa Bellew was the daughter of an Irish baronet, who put the keystone upon his ruin by his honest opposition to the passing of the Union. His large estates, loaded with debt and encumbered by mortgage, had been for half a century a kind of battle-field for legal warfare at every assizes. Through the medium of his difficulties he became acquainted with Mr. Rooney, whose craft and subtlety had rescued him from more than one difficulty, and whose good-natured assistance had done still more important service by loans upon his property.
At Mr. Rooney's suggestion, Miss Bellew was invited to pass her winter with them in Dublin. This proposition which, in the palmier days of the baronet's fortune, would in all probability never have been made, and would certainly never have been accepted, was now entertained with some consideration, and finally acceded to, on prudential motives. Rooney had lent him large sums; he had never been a pressing, on the contrary, he was a lenient creditor; possessing great power over the property, he had used it sparingly, even delicately, and showed himself upon more than one occasion not only a shrewd adviser, but a warm friend. “'Tis true,” thought Sir Simon, “they are vulgar people, of coarse tastes and low habits, and those with whom they associate laugh at, though they live upon them; yet, after all, to refuse this invitation may be taken in ill part; a few months will do the whole thing. Louisa, although young, has tact and cleverness enough to see the difficulties of her position; besides, poor child, the gaiety and life of a city will be a relief to her, after the dreary and monotonous existence she has passed with me.”
This latter reason he plausibly represented to himself as a strong one for complying with what his altered fortunes and ruined prospects seemed to render no longer a matter of choice.
To the Rooneys, indeed, Miss Bellew's visit was a matter of some consequence; it was like the recognition of some petty state by one of the great powers of Europe. It was an acknowledgment of a social existence, an evidence to the world not only that there was such a thing as the kingdom of Rooney, but also that it was worth while to enter into negotiation with it, and even accredit an ambassador to its court.
Little did that fair and lovely girl think, as with tearful eyes she turned again and again to embrace her father, as the hour arrived, when for the first time in her life she was to leave her home, little did she dream of the circumstances under which her visit was to be paid. Less a guest than a hostage, she was about to quit the home of her infancy, where, notwithstanding the inroads of poverty, a certain air of its once greatness still lingered; the broad and swelling lands, that stretched away with wood and coppice, far as the eye could reach—the woodland walks—the ancient house itself, with its discordant pile, accumulated at different times by different masters—all told of power and supremacy in the land of her fathers. The lonely solitude of those walls, peopled alone by the grim-visaged portraits of long-buried ancestors, were now to be exchanged for the noise and bustle, the glitter and the glare of second-rate city life; profusion and extravagance, where she had seen but thrift and forbearance; the gossip, the scandal, the tittle-tattle of society, with its envies, its jealousies, its petty rivalries, and its rancours, were to supply those quiet evenings beside the winter hearth, when reading aloud some old and valued volume she learned to prize the treasures of our earlier writers under the guiding taste of one whose scholarship was of no mean order, and whose cultivated mind was imbued with all the tenderness and simplicity of a refined and gentle nature.
When fortune smiled, when youth and wealth, an ancient name and a high position, all concurred to elevate him, Sir Simon Bellew was courteous almost to humility; but when the cloud of misfortune lowered over his house, when difficulties thickened around him, and every effort to rescue seemed only to plunge him deeper, then the deep-rooted pride of the man shone forth: and he who in happier days was forgiving even to a fault, became now scrupulous about every petty observance, exacting testimonies of respect from all around him, and assuming an almost tyranny of manner totally foreign to his tastes, his feelings, and his nature; like some mighty oak of the forest, riven and scathed by lightning, its branches leafless and its roots laid bare, still standing erect, it stretches its sapless limbs proudly towards heaven, so stood he, reft of nearly all, yet still presenting to the adverse wind of fortune his bold, unshaken front.
Alas and alas! poverty has no heavier evil in its train than its power of perverting the fairest gifts of our nature from their true channel,—making the bright sides of our character dark, gloomy, and repulsive. Thus the high-souled pride that in our better days sustains and keeps us far above the reach of sordid thoughts and unworthy actions, becomes, in the darker hour of our destiny, a misanthropic selfishness, in which we wrap ourselves as in a mantle. The caresses of friendship, the warm affections of domestic love, cannot penetrate through this; even sympathy becomes suspect, and then commences that terrible struggle against the world, whose only termination is a broken heart.
Notwithstanding, then, all Mr. Rooney's address in conveying the invitation in question, it was not without a severe struggle that Sir Simon resolved on its acceptance; and when at last he did accede, it was with so many stipulations, so many express conditions, that, thad they been complied with de facto, as they were acknowledged by promise, Miss Bellew would, in all probability, have spent her winter in the retirement of her own chamber in Stephen's-green, without seeing more of the capital and its inhabitants than a view from her window presented. Paul, it is true, agreed to everything; for, although, to use his own language, the codicil revoked the entire body of the testament, he determined in his own mind to break the will. “Once in Dublin,” thought he, “the fascinations of society, the pleasures of the world, with such a guide as Mrs. Rooney”—and here let me mention, that for his wife's tact and social cleverness Paul had the most heartfelt admiration—“with advantages like these, she will soon forget the humdrum life of Kilmorran Castle, and become reconciled to a splendour and magnificence unsurpassed by even the viceregal court.”
Here, then, let me conclude this account of the Rooneys, while I resume the thread of my own narrative. Although I feel for and am ashamed of the prolixity in which I have indulged, yet, as I speak of real people, well known at the period of which I write, and as they may to a certain extent convey an impression of the tone of one class in the society of that day, I could not bring myself to omit their mention, nor even dismiss them more briefly.