Chapter Seventy Nine.
Saint Patrick’s Performance.
Notwithstanding the serious air with which Mozey told his very improbable story, Tom did not appear to give implicit credence to it. He evidently suspected that the rogue had been cheating him; and, after several exclamations of wonder, but without betraying incredulity, he sat in silence, apparently cogitating some scheme for repaying him. It was not long before an opportunity offered, his companion unintentionally furnishing him with a cue.
“I’s hab heer, Massa Tum, dat dar am no snake in de country wha you come from. Dat ’ere de troof?”
“Yis. Nayther snake nor toad in owld Oireland,—nayther could live for a single hour, if ye plants them thare. The green island wudn’t contain thim bekase they’re condimned to die the moment they sit fut on the sod.”
“But what condemn dem?”
“Saint Pathrick, to be shure. Trath, thare’s a story about that. May be yez wud loike to be afther hearin’ it, Mozey?”
“Like um berry much, Massy Tum.”
“Will, thin, I’ll till it to yer. It isn’t such a wondherful story as yours; but it had a betther indin’, as yer’ll see when ye’ve heerd it. Instid av the snakes killin’ all the people exciptin’ wan, the riptiles got killed thimsilves, all but wan,—that was the father of ivry sirpint in the world. He’s livin’ yit, an’ must now be about five thousand years uv age. So the praste sez.
“A long toime ago, owld Oireland was very badly infisted wid thim craythers. They wur so thick all over the swate island, that yez cudn’t sit your fut down widout triddin’ on wan av their tails; an’ to kape out av their way the people had to build a great scaffoldin’ that extinded all over the counthry, and slape on the threes, just as we’ve been doin’ over the gyapo.
“Whiniver they wanted anythin’ to ate, such as purtaties, an’ the loike, they were compilled to git it up from the ground wid long forks; and whin they wur in need to dhrink, they had to dip it up in buckets, as if they were drawin’ it out av a well.
“Av coorse this was moighty inconvanient, an’ cudn’t last long no how. The worst ov it was, that the snakes, instid ov gettin’ thinned off, were ivery year growin’ thicker, by razin ov their large families ov young wuns. Will, it got so bad at last that ther’ wusn’t a spot av groun’ bigger than the bunch ov your hand that warn’t occupoyed by a snake, an’ in some places they were two deep. The people up on the platform that I towld yez about, they cursed an’ swore, an’ raged, an’ raved, an’ at last prayed to be delivered from the inimy.”
Here Tom paused to note the effect of his speech on his sable listener.
“But dey war delibbered,—wur dey?”
“Trath, wur they. If they hadn’t, is it at all loikely that yer wud see me here? Will, the people prayed. Not as your countrymen prays, to a stick or a stone, or beloike to the sarpints themselves, that could do them no benefit; but to a lady, that was able to protect them. We, in owld Oireland, call her the Virgin Mary. She was the mother av Him that came down from the siventh heaven to save us poor sinners. But what’s the use of my tryin’ to explain all that to an ignorant haythen, loike you?”
“No use, Massa Tum, no use,” rejoined the African, in a tone of resignation.
“Never moind, Mozey. The lady heerd their prayer, and that was an ind to it.”
“She killed da snakes!”
“Arrah now; did yez think the Virgin Mary—a raal lady as she was—ud be afther doin’ such dhirty work as slaughter a whole island full of venomous sarpents? Not a bit av that same. It’s true they were desthroyed; but not by her own swate hands. She sinds a man to do the work for her. She sint Sant Pathrick.”
“O, I’s heerd ye ’peak ob dat man, many’s de time, Massa Tum. ’Twur him dat kill de serpents, wur it?”
“Trath was it.”
“But how’d he do it? It muss hab take um a berry long time to destroy um all.”
“There ye are intirely asthray, nager. It only occupied him wan day, an’ not all the day nayther, for he had done the work a thrifle ov a hour or so afther dinner-time.”
“Gollys! how’d he do all dat?”
“Will! ye see, he invited all the snakes to a grand banquit. He had such a charmin’ way wid him that they wun an’ all agreed to come. The place was on the top of a high mountain,—called the Hill of Howth,—far hoigher than any in the Andays we saw when crossin’ thare. The faste he had provided for them was a colliction of toads, includin’ every wun ov thim that inhabited the island. The toads he had invited too; an’ the stupid craythers, not suspictin’ anythin’, come willingly to the place.
“Now yez must undherstand, nager, that the snakes are moighty fond of toads, and frogs too; but Saint Pathrick had no ill-will against the frogs, an’ they wur exchused from comin’. As it was, the toads wur axed at an earlier hour than the snakes, an’ got first to the top of the hill; an’ while they were waitin’ there to see what was to be done, the sarpints came glidin’ up, and bein’ tould that their dinner was spread before them, they fell to, an’ swallowed up every toad upon the hill, which was every wun there was in all Oireland.”
The narrator made a long pause, either to draw breath after such a declamation, or to give time for his companion to indulge his astonishment.
“Gora!” exclaimed the latter, impatient for further explanation. “How ’bout de snakes demselves? Surely dey didn’t swallow one anodder?”
“Trath! an’ that’s jest what they did do,—every mother’s son of thim.”
“But dat ’ere doan’ ’tan’ to reezun, unless dey hab a fight one wif de odder? Splain yourself, Massa Tum.”
“Will, yez have guessed it exactly widout my sayin’ a word. They did have a foight, that went all roun’ through the whole crowd, like a shindy in Donnybrook fair. Yez would loike to hear how it begun. Will, I’ll tell ye. There was two kinds av the riptile. Wan they called ‘Ribbon snakes,’ an’ the tother ‘Orange snakes,’ by razon av their colour, both in politics and religion. They had a king over both that lived moighty foine at their expinse. But he couldn’t manage to keep thim continted with payin’ him taxes, unless by sittin’ the wan agaynst the tother. An’ this he did to the full av his satisfacshin. Now the bad blood that was betwane thim showed itself at that great gatherin’ worse than iver it had done afore. Thare wasn’t toads enough to give them all a full male; and by way of dissart they thought they’d turn to an’ ate wun another. Av course that was just what Sant Pathrick wanted; for he wasn’t plazed at their having two sorts of religion. So the ould praste hugged thim on in the quarrel, till it come to blows, an’ inded in both kinds killin’ an’ atin’ wun another till there was nothing lift av ayther exceptin’ the tails.”
“Golly! what becomed of de tails?”
“O, thim? The people jumped down from the scaffolds and gathered thim up into a hape, and thin made a great bonfire av thim, and aftherwardt spred the ashes over the groun’; and that’s what makes ould Oireland the greenest gim av the oshin.”
“But, Massa Tum, you hab say dat one ob de snakes ’scape from the genr’l congregation?”
“Trath did I say it. Wun did escape, an’ ’s livin’ to make mischief in ould Oireland to this very day.”
“Which one was he?”
“Their king.”
“De king. How you call um, Massa Tipprary?”
“The Divvel.”