H. M
LETTER IX.
TO J. D. ESQ., M. P.
I have already given two lessons to my pupil, in an art in which, with all due deference to the judgment of her quondam tutor, she was never destined to excel.
Not, however, that she is deficient in talent—very far from it; but it is too progressive, too tame a pursuit for the vivacity of her genius. It is not sufficiently connected with those lively and vehement emotions of the soul she is so calculated to feel and to awaken. She was created for a musician—there she is borne away by the magic of the art in which she excels, and the natural enthusiasm of her impassioned character: she can sigh, she can weep, she can smile over her harp. The sensibility of her soul trembles in her song, and the expression of her rapt countenance harmonizes with her voice. But at her drawing-desk, her features lose their animated character—the smile of rapture ceases to play, and the glance of inspiration to beam. And with the transient extinction of those feelings from which each touching charm is derived, fades that all pervading interest, that energy of admiration which she usually excites.
Notwithstanding, however, the pencil is never out of her hand; her harp lies silent, and her drawing-book is scarcely ever closed. Yet she limits my attendance to the first hour after breakfast, and then I generally lose sight of her the whole day, until we all meet en-famille in the evening. Her improvement is rapid—her father delighted, and she quite fascinated by the novelty of her avocation; the priest congratulates me, and I alone am dissatisfied.
But from the natural impatience and volatility of her character, (both very obvious,) this, thank Heaven! will soon be over. Besides, even in the hour of tuition, from which I promised myself so much, I do not enjoy her society—the priest always devotes that time to reading out to her; and this too at her own request:—not that I think her innocent and unsuspicious nature cherishes the least reserve at her being left tete-a-tete with her less venerable preceptor; but that her ever active mind requires incessant exercise; and in fact, while I am hanging over her in uncontrolled emotion, she is drawing, as if her livelihood depended on the exertions of her pencil, or commenting on the subjects of the priest’s perusal, with as much ease as judgment; while she minds me no more than if I were a well organized piece of mechanism, by whose motions her pencil was to be guided.
What if, with all her mind, all her genius, this creature had no heart!—And what were it to me, though she had?———
The Prince fancies his domestic government to be purely patriarchal, and that he is at once the “Law and the Prophet” to his family; never suspecting that he is all the time governed by a girl of nineteen, whose soul, notwithstanding the playful softness of her manner, contains a latent ambition, which sometimes breathing in the grandeur of her sentiment, and sometimes sparkling in the haughtiness of her eye, seems to say, “I was born for empire!”
It is evident that the tone of her mind is naturally stronger than her father’s, though to a common observe, he would appeal a man of nervous and masculine understanding; but the difference between them is this—his energies are the energies of the passions—hers of the mind!
Like most other Princes, mine is governed much by favoritism; and it is evident I already rank high on the list of partiality.
I perceive, however, that much of his predilection in my favour, arises from the coincidence of my present curiosity and taste with his favourite pursuits and national prejudices. Newly awakened, (perhaps by mere force of novelty,) to a lively interest for every thing that concerns a country I once thought so little worthy of consideration; in short, convinced by the analogy of existing habits, with recorded customs, of the truth of those circumstances so generally ranked in the apocryphal tales of the history of this vilified country; I have determined to resort to the witness of time, the light of truth, and the corroboration of living testimony, in the study of a country which I am beginning to think would afford to the mind of philosophy a rich subject of analysis, and to the powers of poetic fancy a splendid series of romantic detail.
“Sir William Temple,” says Dr. Johnson, “complains that Ireland is less known than any other country, as to its ancient state, because the natives have little leisure, and less encouragement for enquiry; and that a stranger, not knowing its language, has no ability.”
This impediment, however, shall not stand in the way of one stranger, who is willing to offer up his national prejudices at the Altar of Truth, and expiate the crime of an unfounded but habitual antipathy, by an impartial examination, and an unbiassed inquiry. In short, I have actually began to study the language; and though I recollect to have read the opinion of Temple, “that the Celtic dialect used by the native Irish is the purest and most original language that now remains yet I never suspected that a language spoken par routine, and chiefly by the lower classes of society, could be acquired upon principle, until the other day, when I observed in the Prince’s truly national library some philological works, which were shown me by Father John, who has offered to be my preceptor in this wreck of ancient dialect, and who assures me he will render me master of it in a short time—provided I study con amore.
“And I will assist you,” said Glorvina.
“We will all assist him,” said the Prince.
“Then I shall study con amore indeed!” returned I.
Behold me then, buried amidst the monuments of past ages!—deep in the study of the language, history, and antiquities of this ancient nation—talking of the invasion of Henry II, as a recent circumstance—of the Phoenician migration hither from Spain, as though my grandfather had been delegated by Firbalgs to receive the Milesians on their landing—and of those transactions passed through
“The dark posterns of time long elapsed,”
as though their existence was but freshly registered in the annate of recollection.
In short, infected by my antiquarian conversation with the Prince, and having fallen in with some of those monkish histories which, on the strength of Druidical tradition, trace a series of wise and learned Irish monarchs before the flood, I am beginning to have as much faith in antediluvian records as Dr. Parsons himself, who accuses Adam of authorship, or Thomas Bangius, who almost gives fac similies of the hand-writing of Noah’s progenitors.
Seriously, however, I enter on my new studies with avidity, and read from the morning’s first dawn till the usual hour of breakfast, which is become to me as much the banquet of the heart, as the Roman supper was to the Agustan wits “the feast of reason and the flow of soul,”—for it is the only meal at which Glorvina presides.
Two hours each day does the kind priest devote to my philological pursuits, while Glorvina, who is frequently present on these occasions makes me repeat some short poem or song after her, that I may catch the pronunciation, (which is almost unattainable,) then translates them into English, which I word for word write down. Here then is a specimen of Irish poetry, which is almost always the effusion of some blind itinerent bard, or some rustic minstrel, into whose breast the genius of his country has breathed inspiration, as he patiently drove the plough, or laboriously worked in the bog. *