THE RECTOR'S DAUGHTER.
Chapter I.
The rapid shade of an October evening, borrowing deeper gloom from the wildness of the adjacent Tipperary mountains, was falling over the lonely town of Clogheen, within whose classic precincts took place that important meeting between Sergeant Snap and Paddy Carey, which has been recorded immortally in song. Forty years ago, (of which period we are about to write,) when roads were not as good, travellers as adventurous, and markets as abundant as at present, Clogheen was a smart, or, as the Itinerary of that day has it, "a thriving place with a decent church," boasting a comfortable inn and several hucksters' shops, where every variety of merchandise, from brandy and bandle-linen to hand-saws and halfpenny whistles, was procurable.
In a double-countered shop (for the appliances for the inward creature were sold at one side, and those for the outward man at another) in one of the handsomest houses of the town—where a double-story, slated roof, and a sign-board with a red splash in the middle, and the characters, "General Hutchinson," underneath, was the standard of excellence—on the evening in question stood Curly Cahill,[22] spirit retailer, and, according to the signboard just quoted, "dealer in soft goods, butter, leather, iron, eggs, and tobacco," busily engaged in serving a customer.
"Beautyful baffety, Miss," said Curly, a dapper middle-aged worthy, his short black hair combed sleek over his low forehead, with a face half smooth, half smirking, and—for the little fellow pretended to no small degree of sanctimony—his person dressed neatly in black, as closely as possible to resemble the fashion just imported by the new Co'juther from Maynooth.
"Beautyful baffety, Miss Katey, fit for any lady from this to Knocklofty, let alone for servants' wear, an' only tenpence-halfpenny a yard. It's giving it away I am."
"It does not seem a very good colour," said the purchaser in a musical voice.
"Is it the colour! Take your hand ov it, take your hand ov it, astore," cried the dextrous merchant; "a bleachground would look yallow an' that purty hand to the fore. An' here, Padeen, bring a candle—an' turn out them pigs, you sir, an' boult the half-dure, till Miss Tyrrel sees the goods.—Now, Miss," he said, when the light was brought and his behests obeyed, slapping his hand in fond emphasis on the bale as he unrolled it wider along the counter, "there's an article!—that I may be happy if I'd wish finer for my windin' sheet; only, to be sure, a body would like that to be linnen, an' go to the grave decent. Yeh! what need you be so very particular for servants?"
"I really do not like the calico, Mr Cahill," hesitated the lady, "and, papa"——
"You don't see it, Miss," interrupted Curly; "push back them darlin' locks o' yours that's sweepin' the counther, an' I'll be bound the goods 'll be at the Glebe afore an hour;" and as he spoke he playfully, but with great respect and tender fingers, lifted aside some of the masses of golden hair that drooped above, and, as he truly insinuated, in some measure overshadowed the good qualities of his merchandise.
"Curly, you are a sad old flatterer," said the young lady, and she impatiently raised her head, and shaking back its weight of ringlets, exposed a fair high forehead and beautifully oval face to view. "I find it always difficult to deal with you; however," she added with a smile, "the better way, perhaps, is to send up the whole piece to the Glebe to-morrow, and I shall then be able to judge of it."
"Ah, then, that I may be soon sellin' you the weddin' sheets, Miss Katey," said the successful shop-keeper, as he rolled up the bale and pushed it to the end of the counter; "and," he added, in a very different tone, modulated to the lowest key of suppleness and deference, "shure that 'ould be to-morrow, if you take my advice, an' were kind en' thrue-hearted to the one you know"——
"Yes, indeed!" half ironically half regretfully murmured the young lady, as she drew down her veil and prepared to depart, but was stayed by a prognostication from Curly, who pledged nothing less than his "hand an' word to her," that she'd break the heart of the anonymous individual alluded to, "afore long, if she didn't take care!"
"'Twas when the men wor goin' to work at broad daylight this mornin', Miss, I hear him in the next room to me, stealin' to bed afther sittin' up the night readin' them books, an' songs, an' things, that you're deludin' the poor fellow's senses with—ach"——
"Oh! that reminds me," said the listener, producing a small volume from the folds of her cloak; "I will just leave this book with my compliments. He is, of course," she carelessly observed, "not now at home?"
"Jest took a short stick in his hand and went out for a solithary walk; by himself, poor fellow, down by the Shuire. 'Tis the only time o' the day he likes for walkin'."
"The time of the night, you mean, Curly," said the girl with a laugh, glad to shake off a certain air of embarrassment she felt, by affected gaiety. "Tell him he should keep better hours; though, upon my word," as she prepared to face the darkening twilight, "I don't set him a very good example myself. Good evening."
"The best of evenin's to you, a cushla," said Mr Cahill, as he bolted the shop-door after her. "The bloody tithe-devourin' parson's daughter," he muttered, as he turned in and prepared to roll up his goods to be forwarded to the Glebe next morning; "an' for all, she's a darlin' herself, an' a blessin' to every one that's about her—but her murdherin' father! Here, Padeen!—Padeen, I say!"
Katey Tyrrel was the spoiled child of an indulgent parent. Her father, the Reverend Edward Tyrrel, was rector of the parish in which our story lies. A man whose disposition, naturally soft and affectionate, had, in the course of years, become sharp and irritable, from the long series of petty vexations he had been subjected to in his efforts to collect the unsatisfactory revenues of his incumbency, from as ingeniously-obstinate a set of parishioners as were to be found in the most litigation-loving island in the world. The district of country, too, in which Mr Tyrrel's lot had fallen, although sufficiently fertile and wealthy, was, of all others, from its situation at the foot of the high and sterile tract of the Kilworth mountains, (then the favourite resort of highwaymen and fugitives from the law,) with the gloomy range of the Gaultees to the north, and on its southern edge the long and lonely Commeragh hills, that divided it from Waterford, the most unfavourable to passing a life of quiet plenty and security. When to this it is added, that from the scanty number of gentry the Government of the day deemed it prudent to entrust with the commission of the peace, in self-defence he was obliged to be a magistrate, an office which not unfrequently compelled him to be complainant, counsel, and convicting justice in his own cause, some idea may be formed of the difficulties and vexations the Vicar of Clogheen had to encounter in the collection of those tithes from which his income was principally derived. Notwithstanding, during the twenty or five-and-twenty years of his incumbency, if his temper did not progress towards improvement, his fortune did. By an ample dowery received with his wife, and exact economy and prudence, he had been enabled, from time to time, to make considerable purchases in land; until at length Mr Tyrrel was accounted, if not the most popular, at least one of the most prosperous clergymen from Dunmanway to the Devil's Bit. He had become a widower early in life, and around his daughter Katey, the sole offspring of his marriage, those sympathies and affections which were denied vent in every other quarter, were concentrated in a lavish and inexhaustible flood. A few short years of a mother's superintendence—some attempts at home-education, (for he would not trust her from his sight,) in the shape of a little petticoated rebel, who would be taught nothing, and a sickly governess who had nothing to teach—a girlhood of romance-reading, riding rough colts with her cousin Lysaght Osborne, and rambling among the peasantry—and we have the result of the clergyman's fondness and folly in the wild, lively blue-eyed maiden of nineteen, now wending her way along the dim and elm-darkened road leading from the town of Clogheen to her father's mansion, nearly a mile away. Even in the early part of an autumn evening few persons were desirous of travelling alone in that neighbourhood; but Katey trod her path in perfect security. She was known to every body, and by the surrounding peasantry (to whom she ever came, with her purse or prescriptions of pots of jam, warm jackets and flannel bed-gowns, a living and lovely Replevin for many of her sire's exactions) she was treated with a fond regard, which can only be estimated by those who know how largely the smallest loan of kindness—of real disinterested kindness—is repaid by that people. Wayward and innocent, however, as she was, Katey, on the evening in question, had not, without a motive, dispensed with the companionship of the staid female domestic who usually attends young ladies in Ireland, when they are necessitated to go out shopping after dinner by themselves. It might be for this reason, that she hastened homeward with more anxiety than usual, although her step was neither as elastic, nor her brow as unclouded, as they were wont to be. But she did not pursue her way uninterrupted.
Chapter II.
Half-way upon the road, where a stile opened into the adjacent fields, a man suddenly appeared, and, coming forward, walked for some paces in silence by her side, as though awaiting some recognition before he ventured to address her. He was of middle stature—his figure was entirely concealed in the thick and ample wrappings of a long, dark riding-coat, (or bang-up, as it was called,) common to that country; his step was firm, and its very sound, quick and decided, so different from the shambling pace of the peasant, told that, whatever he might be, he did not belong to that condition. As Miss Tyrrel showed no symptom of surprise or alarm, it is possible his appearance was not entirely unlooked for. She likewise, however, forbore to speak, and the stranger at length was obliged to commence the conversation—turning back, at the same time, the high collar by which his face was muffled, and exhibiting features so extremely dark that they would have been deemed repulsive, had they not been finely formed, and enlivened by the full light of manhood, which, however, some feeling of deep interest, or passion, seemed at the present to overcloud.
"The hour is come that we have so often talked of," he said, in a low tone. "I have no time to waste, Katey—are you ready?"
"Then you were right in your conjecture," said Miss Tyrrel, with an unembarrassed air; "your retreat is discovered?"
"At least it can no longer shelter me. News arrived to-day that the soul of this ill-starred enterprize—Emmett—has perished by legal murder in Dublin. The gibbet awaits all those of his followers who may be arrested. Certain intelligence has reached me that my assumed name and character are no longer of avail—the local authorities are aware of my real offences. If I do not instantly escape, before the coming midnight I shall be a prisoner."
"I expected this," said Katey, half musingly; "it could not be otherwise; you yourself anticipated it. And yet I have been to Cahill's," she added, looking down, "to—to—leave a book, for I was anxious, and he seems to know nothing of your danger."
"I have only just learned it myself, and have hastened to seek you; the mine at our feet is about to be sprung, and"——
"So ends your life of ignoble disguise and mine of duplicity. We should both be thankful."
"One of us at least—thankful as the wrecked seaman, when the plank he clings to splits and sinks him within sight of shore. But time presses; I have come to test the truth of your character. Once more—are you ready?"
"I am indeed—ready to part this instant. I knew it should be so; it was a pleasure to have known you, but I am resigned—ready. Fly! O lose not a single moment; the moon is rising. Farewell, and fly!"
"Not without you! Girl, you affect to misunderstand me; or have you forgotten those promises of friendship and faith, even to death, that you have made me so often and so lately?"
"Promises—faith?" cried his startled companion; "even admitting those playful assurances of a wild, country girl's friendship, were a compact, could you be cruel enough to insist upon my fulfilling it in this desperate hour?"
"Then all the interest you have expressed hitherto in my fate," pursued the stranger; "the sympathy you have led me to think you felt for one, suffering as I have suffered in the cause of my unhappy country—the hopes excited in this heart when, as I pictured a delighted life passed with you, and love, and freedom, beyond the Atlantic, you listened on, with a consenting smile—all this was but pastime for your vacant hours?"
"It was wrong, I know," replied Katey yieldingly; "yet Heaven knows it was no pastime. I found you in concealment—a fugitive—hunted, you told me, by the laws for your exertions in the cause of a country I have been taught by you to deem misgoverned; I saw you superior to all those around you; you complained of cheerlessness and solitude, of ill health—I brought you books, music, all that I could judge likely to lighten your hours, and dearly am I punished for it."
"But think"——
"Think!" cried the girl, passionately interrupting him, for the chord had jarred, "I never thought—till now—when all my giddy, imprudent conduct crowds on my mind as if to crush me. A few months back, and we were ignorant of each other's existence."
"Would that it had continued so," he said, in a voice of sadness; "a few months more, and my memory will be to you as the nameless gravestone, telling alone that it hides the dead. Cruel, but beloved, farewell!" and he turned to depart.
"Yet stay," said Katey, hurriedly. "Why not let me tell my father of this business—I mean of your story—that I know it all, and entreat of him, as I have often urged you to let me do, to interest himself with Government and procure your pardon, which he can readily obtain? I will go this instant."
"And give me up to justice—for such, I assure you, will be the result of an appeal to your father."
"You wrong him, believe me. He is perhaps stern and vindictive in his feelings towards those whom he considers instrumental in keeping alive a spirit of animosity and disturbance among the people; but you know not," she said with a smile, "how all-powerful is my influence with him. Yes, even at the risk of his displeasure—for he little dreams I am acquainted with you, I will tell him your sad story—there is nothing in it a brave or noble man should be afraid of. I will go to him this moment," and she moved on.
"Impossible!-you are mad. The very fact of your having known and befriended me in this clandestine way, will incense your friends. I shall be arrested, and you will accuse yourself for life as my destroyer. No, dear girl," he continued, in a softer yet not less eager tone, as he placed his arm round her, "why not yield to the impulses of your own high, disinterested spirit, and fly with me, as I have so often implored you? Be mine first in the sight of man and heaven, and then plead for me afterwards with your father?"
"I dare not—it would break his heart—my own is breaking fast already," and she trembled from head to foot in her attempts to subdue the sobbing of her bosom.
"And this is the energy, the firm-mindedness, you have so often boasted of! You have it in your power this instant to raise me to happiness, wealth, and safety; and, forgetful it was the charm you threw across my path which has kept me near you until the bloodhounds have run me to bay, you doom me to despair and death. I see you have made your decision—hear mine. Life since I knew you has no value in my eyes if unshared by you. Exile from you would be worse than death. Here, then, I still await the pursuers. Never will I leave, with life, the mountains that surround you."
"Oh—no—no! Heaven forbid your blood should be shed on my account! Fly, I implore you, before it is too late."
"Never! I will sell my life dearly, but my grave at least shall be where you can sometimes visit it and remember"——
"Unkind, dark, inhuman man! was it all my fault? My poor father, what will he say? give me at least a day or two to think"——
"It is now of no use, the night has half past, my doom is fixed."
"No! again no! you will drive me mad! Oh fly, fly, but this once, and I will, at least I promise—I must see him—my father—before—fly now and return, and I will do all you desire—only, only, save your life at once."
The man replied not for some minutes, he then resumed—"I have here that copy of the Gospels you gave me—will you swear on that gift that when we next meet you will be prepared to share life, be it happiness or horror, with me?"
"Yes, I do—I will—any thing; but fly and save yourself."
"Swear then," he said, as with one arm around her he prepared with the other to place the sacred Book upon her lips, when at that very moment an aspersion of cold water was dashed with such ample profusion in the impassioned faces of the pair as to cause them to spring asunder with a start that had very nearly as much the character of discomfort as alarm.
"Hell and"——half-exclaimed the man, as he tore open his coat and grasped one of several pistols it now appeared he was armed with.
"Dhieu, a's Marudha, a's Phaidhrig, a's"[23]——said a voice, following up the lustration with a blessing, cut short, however, by the Stranger's clutching the throat of the pious intruder, and dragging forward from beneath the trees which had hitherto overshadowed their way a little Bundle of some dark coloured cloth, surmounted by a straw bonnet, so battered in its outlines that to fix it there it must have been flattened down with no ordinary emphasis, and from beneath which guttural shrieks now arose, whose extent of volume was out of all proportion to the diminutive object from which they proceeded.
"Hold! let go, for goodness sake!" cried Miss Tyrrel, "it is only poor Sally-the-tin, the Holy-Water woman."
"A—a—a! my windpipe!" cried the Bundle, as soon as that interesting organ had been extricated. "A—a—Miss Katey, take the bushblunder out ov his hand 'fore he blows my brains out," and the shrieks were renewed with more vociferation than before.
"She will raise the country. I must stop her, were I to kill her," said the stranger furiously.
"No, no, dear friend, she is a deaf harmless thing—hush! I hear steps. Oh, in mercy fly!"
"Not without your promise," he said doggedly.
"I am ready, I promise—next time we meet; now farewell and away," said Katey, while she waved one hand to the departing fugitive as he dashed through the thicket, and placed the other on the roaring mouth of the creature at her side, whose terrors seemed under considerable self-control, for they at once subsided.
"Mother o' Grace, pray for us now an' at the hour ov our death, amen!" mumbled the Bundle, as it righted itself, and assumed the appearance of a withered and ancient little Woman, who, in flinging back her dark blue cloak to adjust herself, exhibited a small scarecrow frame, round which was hung, until its shape became orbicular, every variety of feminine attire, from the petticoats, under, upper, and quilted, through the higher gradations of gown, apron, spencer, jacket, pelerine, handkerchief, and shawl. A broad leathern strap was buckled round her waist, from which on one side hung a rosary or string of large beads, to the other was fastened a canteen or tin can without a cover, containing a large supply of holy water, procured from the neighbouring chapels on Sundays. She bore in her hand literally nothing but (as they would say in Ireland) her fist, which was of immense size, and of whose convenience for the purposes of aspergation Katey and her friend had just been afforded such convincing proof.
Footsteps now approached rapidly, and Miss Tyrrel, holding Sally-the-tin by the arm, turned towards home. She was shortly encountered by a lively-voiced gentlemanly young man, who saluted her in an affectionate tone with "Katey, pet, what on earth has kept you out so late. Hallo! Sally, I bar that!" he exclaimed, adroitly slipping aside, and escaping the showery blessing which, despite the lesson just bestowed on her, this incorrigible lady of the Tin had (as was her wont with all she met) discharged at him. "But did I not hear some one," he continued, "screeching violently as I came up?"
"Yes, Lysaght," said Miss Tyrrel, "this stupid, deaf, old creature here, who is a torment to all who meet her, with her benedictions and holy water, suddenly threw some of the contents of her tin (as she always does when saluting a person) on a Stranger, a man she happened to be passing close to, which so irritated him that he has given her a proper fright."
"I could chide you soundly, dear Katey, for such late scampers as these; but you take my hints——well, don't be cross, and have it all your own way if you like," said the young man, interrupting himself, dejectedly.
"I am very cross to-night, Lysaght, so don't talk. But here we are, and I am glad of it," and Katey knocked impatiently and loudly at the door of their home. "Now don't go away sulky, there's a good boy," she cried after her cousin, who turned towards the stables; "and, Lysaght, I have done the rosettes for Lightfoot's headstall, which you asked me to make, though I said I wouldn't—you shall have them in the morning. And now to give this silly old woman her supper and a night's lodging," and followed by Sally-the-tin still groaning heavily, she entered the house.
Chapter III.
Sleepless and miserable to Katey Tyrrel was the night that followed her interview with the Stranger. The fearful and critical position in which she was placed caused her, for the first time in her life, to go through a rigid course of self-examination, the result of which but added to her alarm and anxiety. For some months past the person she had just parted from had been a sojourner in lodgings at Cahill's under circumstances of great privacy—rarely venturing out during the day, and in the evening only with secresy and caution. As that remote country, ill-supplied at the period with police, (and even those of the most "ancient and quiet" description,) and wholly inaccessible to bailiffs and all other functionaries attendant on county sheriffs, was deemed peculiarly favourable as quarters for that class of magnanimous men whose expenditure happens to exceed their incomes, to the detriment of their tailors and their own personal inconvenience, it was soon whispered, and as quickly believed, that the resident at Cahill's was one of that generous brotherhood, or in other words, was "a gentleman on his keeping."[24] In her visits to the shop, which, from her idle though innocent life, were frequent, Katey had several times encountered him as he sauntered in and out. An intimacy sprang up. There was a frankness and a half-military air in his deportment that interested her. He had evidently seen much of the world and society, his conversation was lively and varied, his knowledge and accomplishments, to the secluded country girl, seemed extensive, and round all circled a halo of mystery, not the least of those attractions for Katey, whose passion for riding to the Kilfane hounds had just been succeeded by a stronger one for Mrs Radcliffe and romances. Time flew on. Their daily interviews improved to evening rambles, the interchange of notes, supplies of books and flowers upon one side, an avowal of love and tale of lofty but luckless patriotism on the other. To the object of his passion alone did the stranger confide his story. Fascinated by the principles of freedom with which France had lately inoculated mankind, and maddened by the miseries of ill-government under which his own green Island groaned, he had engaged, full of hope and high aspirations, in that enterprise for the recovery of her national independence, which terminated in the martyrdom of as noble and pure-spirited a being as sleeps buried and unhonoured in "the cross ways of fame"—Robert Emmett. The Stranger had been dispatched, he said, to the south to forward the movement of his party in that quarter, when their central Power in the capital prematurely exploded, carrying dismay and destruction to every remoter organ of the confederacy. His name—the name of Fergus Hewitt, citizen of the new Western Republic, and major of brigade—was one of the first upon the list of the proscribed; a reward was offered for his head; and it was while lurking a hunted man, amid the fastnesses of Tipperary, that he wooed and ventured to win the heart and hand of the heiress of Clogheen.
Such was the tale along whose vicissitudes the fair girl to whom it was imparted now glanced with a bewildered mind. The interview just terminated will have given the reader some idea of the unsettled state of her feelings; but it was in the solitude of her chamber, when she found herself called on to part for ever, or for ever to be united with this interesting stranger, that she seemed to discover, not without consternation, how necessary to her happiness he had become. The waste vacancy of her time and thoughts before she had met him—broken only by dull and distant visits to duller and more distant aunts, vapid rides through rude and solitary scenes, and incessant feud and amnesty between her cousin Lysaght and herself—was this once more to be her portion? or would she fly with Him who had relieved her from them all, and relinquish her father and her home? How, she continued to ask herself, would that beloved parent, so stern to all else, so blindly indulgent to her, endure her loss? Would he proscribe her for ever? She felt not—assuredly not. No, her father would once more receive her into his grace and affection; but Lysaght, who had been reared with her, who loved her so well, so all the more deeply, she knew, that he had never told her so—what would he feel? How would he look the first morning after her flight, when he came in to breakfast and found the room solitary, the urn cold, her little spanniel, Lapwing, moaning about the hearth, and Katey away over the mountains in the dead of night with a nameless and lawless man? Yes, poor Lysaght, she felt, would then be to be pitied: her father might once more be hers; but her cousin—even her little quarrels with him had something pleasant to her recollection, and on this portion of the picture, much as she desired to banish it from her mind, she again and again returned to dwell; nor did she succeed in overlaying it by painting her reconciliation with Lysaght on her return, and her reparation in the shape of a large present of real and personal estate which her father should be induced to make to him, and thereby enable Lysaght to settle in life. And then his wife—which of all her surrounding country friends would she choose for him? The sketch was still unfinished, when the bell announced the morning's repast; and Katey, sleepless, agitated, and undecided, descended to breakfast.
There was nothing in that meal calculated to allay her anxiety. She found her father and cousin (the latter having just come in from his matutinal tour through the farm, and laden, of course, with the news of the neighbourhood) busily engaged with cold beef and conjectures upon the sudden flight of the gentleman resident at Curly Cahill's, which had taken place during the night, half-an-hour previous to a domiciliary visit from three peace-officers who came from Clonmel, and departed as they came, in profound silence regarding the object of their expedition, upon discovering the stranger had left. As Mr Tyrrel had not been consulted by the authorities on this occasion, the reverend magistrate testified no very poignant regret at the disappointment of the officers; but as his curiosity was commensurately excited, he hazarded several ingenious solutions of the Problem that had been paying eighteen-pence a-week for "dry-lodgings" at Cahill's, the last four months. Lysaght was loud in his decision that the fellow was "some coiner or poaching blackguard;" while his uncle rather inclined to the arson and agrarian-outrage line. Poor Katey sat behind the coffee-stand stifling her feelings in the manner she best might, until she heard her father propose "sheep-stealing" as an emendation of the probable offence of her banished friend, when she could support it no longer. Little accustomed at any time to hide her emotions, the high-spirited girl burst into tears, upbraided her respectable parent and thick-headed cousin for their hardheartedness and want of charity, ventured at first to disbelieve every sentence they had uttered, proceeded to confess that she had had the pleasure of the stranger's acquaintance, and ended by proudly introducing him (in an imaginary way) to her astonished friends as Major Fergus Hewitt of the Second Republican Brigade of Artillery, and Commissioner to Mononia from the Provisional Government.
Had a petard from the Major's own brigade been projected into the centre of the little breakfast table, it could not have played the mischief more effectually than did this stunning explosion. Lysaght Osborne, after remaining speechless for some minutes, having helped himself to a cup of scalding water from the urn, was compelled to retreat upon the pump outside. His uncle, who had received so large a portion of the shell, necessarily, too, exhibited much suffering, which his daughter at length attempted in vain to alleviate. But the spoiled and petted Katey had for once overcounted. There are in certain minds bursts of passion, which, like the tempests of tropical islands, are all the more violent and unsparing from the halcyon seasons that precede them. Such was the storm of wrath that now for the first time descended from Tyrrel's lips upon his daughter's head. He raved and stamped at her like a maniac, terrified her into an acknowledgment that she had listened even to amatory communications from the unhappy Hewitt, commanded her from his presence, then recalled her to be reprimanded for retiring so hastily, and again expelling her, pursued her with all but palpable fire and sword to her own territory, where, locking her in her bed-chamber, he deposited the key in his pocket, and set out on foot to finish the work of disaster by annihilating the "dealer in soft goods," who had, he felt assured, been a proximate agent in nearly ridding him of his child. His first intention was to hold no terms whatever in his approaches upon Curly's fortalice, or, in other words, "to make an open show of him;" but a mile's walk of a muddy day has a sedative effect, and by the time he arrived at Cahill's Mr Tyrrel had seen the impolicy of giving any publicity to what he considered the folly of his daughter. His interview, therefore, with Curly took place in private, and for any satisfaction that resulted from it he might as well have placed himself in communication with the intelligent milestone, "Clonmel XII.," which he had passed as he entered the town. Cahill, on his part, received the first discharge of the clergyman's indignation with a look of stolid surprise, to which one Liston, a player, could alone have done justice. For some time he seemed at a loss to comprehend whether the remarks had reference to his last year's arrear of tithes, or the projected invasion from Boulogne; and when at length their real purport did overtake him, the shock was overwhelming. Well it was for the Fugitive that he was at the moment out of reach of his estimable host's indignation. To be "skivered," to "have every bone in his body smashed to smithers," or "to be torn asunder as one would tear a lark," was the mildest of the horrible fates he had escaped for attempting to inveigle the affections of "the darlin' young lady." As to Cahill himself having ever perceived the remotest approach to any intimacy between the parties, he "declared to his heart" he never saw them together in his life; if he had, his instant duty would have propelled him to inform the rector of it "in a shake;" so that as Mr Tyrrel saw his interview was likely to be a fruitless one, he cut it short and departed, while Curly was concluding a declaration, that "if he could go on his hands an' knees to Clo'mel for his rav'rence, he'd be proud to do it."
During the rest of the day, the discomfited parent had full occupation in his own self-upbraidings. In his boundless indulgence, he had permitted his daughter to be perfectly mistress of her time and actions; and the conviction now pressed upon him, that he had done so to a very culpable and unfortunate degree. In order to remedy one false step, however, he now took another in a contrary direction; and Katey, so long the sole object of his tenderness and love, was henceforth to experience a share of that hardness in his character, which the rest of the world had so largely felt. Although he did not persist in keeping her locked up in one apartment, he forbade her for the present to appear in his presence, and strictly commanded that she should not, on any account, stir from the house.
This was the step to the opposite extreme, and it had the effect that might be expected. His daughter's sensibilities revolted at such severity—her prepossessions in favour of the hapless person on whose account she was subjected to it, became more confirmed; she was determined she would not be thwarted, that, at least, she would attempt to learn some intelligence of Hewitt's fate, and, if possible, see him once more before they parted for ever. While, however, she awaited an opportunity of communicating with a faithful messenger, who had sometimes conveyed notes from him when accident prevented their meeting, she was attacked with illness, a smart febrile indisposition—the result, no doubt, of the mental disquietude she had undergone—and several weeks elapsed before she was again able to reach the little conservatory, which, opening on the lower apartments of the mansion, constituted the utmost limits of that domestic boundary beyond which she was not permitted to proceed.
Chapter IV.
It was late in a dreary night of November. The wind blew a perfect hurricane, rushing up the thick avenue which led to the Glebe house of Clogheen, driving before it in its fury vast clouds of withered leaves it had collected on its way, and showering them in impotent wrath against the doors and windows of the house, which shook and clattered as if each had its own separate assailant. Midnight—black midnight had passed, and the faint light of a rising moon was beginning to mingle with the disturbed and dismal air. It was no night for mortals to forsake quiet and comfortable beds, and, least of all, delicate female invalids; yet Katey Tyrrel, shadowy and wan as a ghost, was standing at this hour watching the roaring tempest from the windows of the conservatory, that looked upon the front lawn of the dwelling. She had not, however, been long stationed there, when the darkness of the spot in which she stood (for there was no candle) was made still murkier by the shadow of a man who appeared outside. Katey softly undid the Venetian door, and Hewitt stood before her.
"Dear, dear girl! how am I to thank you?" he murmured as he pressed with impassioned eagerness the hand she extended to him.
"Speak low—low—low!" whispered the confused and trembling maiden. "Oh, what a night—what an hour to meet in!"
"Any where—every where—no where—no matter—with you it is paradise to me!" ejaculated her lover with a random delight. "How did you manage the dogs though?"
"Oh—I—locked Buffer in the stables, ever so far off—and Bang—indeed he is so savage I was obliged to take him a field away, to the potatoe-house;" and Katey felt her cheek blush, until she feared it would light the gloom.
"High-souled, devoted being! how am I rewarded for all I have gone through! You are indeed worthy to share the existence of one like me, whose hopes have been ruined in the holiest cause that——but there is not a single minute to lose—I have horses ready beyond the avenue gate—oh, come, my Katey—'fly from a world'—etcetera. You know the song."
"Fly!—dear friend—you rave—do you not know how ill I have been? Can you not see what a wretched thin fright I have become."
"Nonsense, my love, you look—(for dark as it is I can see that)—a thousand times more interesting with that pale sweet face. My own life, this is no time to trifle—who could suppose you were so undecided, you so lofty-spirited, so heroine-like.—Oh, Katey"——
"Believe me, Hewitt, I have not strength even to mount, much less to sit a horse at present."
"Then, why this meeting, my love?"
"Why—why—I scarce can tell; surely it is a pleasure to meet for once, even in this way, after all we have suffered."
"Decidedly"—said her lover with an abstracted air. "I'll tell you what," he added eagerly, as if struck by some sudden thought, "there is fearful danger of our being separated if we do not act quickly, and for ever. Suppose—suppose, my beloved one—you now here, in this blest spot, give me a legal claim to your hand, we may not again have such an opportunity?"
"What—how do you mean?" asked Katey bewilderingly.
"Why, you see the truth is this—I did dread your health might have interfered with active flight—might not have been such as seconded our wishes—and I came prepared—the fact is, I have brought a Reverend Friend with me—you understand?—he is now not far away—indeed, he is just outside."
"Hewitt!—are you mad!" exclaimed the overwhelmed girl, shrinking away. "I cannot—indeed, I cannot, think of such a thing."
"Folly—stuff! I see, my beloved one, I must act for you in this matter"——
To go to the window—give a gentle tap—summon a low corpulent little man before it—to seize him by the neck and drag him softly into the room, as though the unwieldy individual were unable to accomplish the feat himself—was but the work of an instant; the next, Hewitt had caught the half-swooning Katey's hand and led her forward.
"'D-d-dom-dominus adimp-p-p-lea bened-d-dic (hic!) benedictionem suam in v-v-v-obis! (hic!)" stutteringly whispered the new-comer, while the powerful smell of whisky-punch, which began to pervade the apartment, bore far less testimony to his piety than to his potations.
"Douce your lingo!" muttered Hewitt. "Keep it till 'tis called for.——Now, my own dear Katey," he said in his most persuasive tone, "let this moment make you mine—mine indissolubly. Come, Father Larr,[25] there is not an instant to spare—do your office;" and supporting Katey, and half-forcibly, half-entreatingly, bringing her forward, he stood with her before the priest—if indeed it is right to profane that name by conferring it on the drunken and dissolute creature, who, long since expelled from the altar, was forced to depend for a livelihood on his services in such desperate hours of need as the present.
"Oh, Hewitt, give me a moment—my father—Lysaght—I did not look for this"—murmured the agitated bride.
"Then such is your faith after all?" whispered Hewitt; "but as you please—even here—at this moment I give you up for ever, since you desire it."
"No—it is God's will—there is no use in struggling against my fate—I am ready," she answered, endeavouring to rouse her stupified faculties.
"Go on, then," whispered her lover to the priest, "be quick!"
"Co—co—conjungo vos," began Father Larr as he joined their hands, "in nom—nom—(hic!)—nomine P—p—patris (hic!) et F—f—f—fil—(hic!)"—
The rest of his articulation was effectually stopped by his receiving, full in the face, the contents of what he felt to be a basin of cold water, conferred, it appeared to him, by the hands of the timid bride; while, at the same time, a voice that split the very room like thunder saluted the group with a blessing from the Virgin and St Patrick, and Sally-the-tin stood beside them, who, however, no sooner recognised Hewitt, with whose grasp she had before now been familiar, than she set up a shriek in which entreaty, benediction, curse, complaint, and consternation, were so vociferously blended that it would have alarmed Erebus. The next instant the whole house above and around them was heard in commotion; bells rung, and were instantly answered by the noise of heavy bodies jumping out of bed; windows raising; servant-women squalling; and grooms rushing madly down-stairs. Miss Tyrrel sank fainting on the spot; and Hewitt had but time to treat Sally-the-tin to a parting kick, which conveyed her in a state of collapse to a small bower of pelargoniums at the further end of the green-house, drag his reverend friend through the window, and disappear, when the whole effective force of the household burst into the apartment.
Chapter V.
We have long been persuaded, not less by the impartial assurances of respected friends than by our own internal convictions, that, if we possess any one excellence beyond another—and our talents are varied and extraordinary—it is a tendency to dramatic perfection. And albeit the narrative Arimanes too often mars the beneficent desires of the dramatic Oromasdes; yet at all times we endeavour as much as in us lies to adhere to those venerable observances the Unities, so long and no doubt so justly objects of respect and admiration. In the present tale, although compelled to violate the unity of Time, we have hitherto pretty closely adhered to that of Place, our characters having, for the course of some pages, hovered within and around the precincts of the celebrated village where the scene opened, which (although a hall, or some spacious chamber, might be a little nearer to those rules the classic stage so strictly enforces) we flatter ourselves will be found sufficiently limited for present exigencies. We are now, however, about to take a liberty with the second unity by transporting the reader (may we hope in more senses than one?) to a spot distant from our former scene some six or eight miles, on the high and solitary summit of Kilworth mountain, in that place where the great southern road from Dublin to Cork winds over the acclivity.
The peculiar character of the landscape in question may best be conveyed in the words of a friend whom we once, in an hour of juvenile arrogance and self-exaltation, induced to accompany us thither in order to astonish him with what we conceived to be the boundless impressiveness and glory of the scene. It happened to be rather a breezy day towards the fall of the leaf, and after a pretty sharp and tedious journey, enlivened, however, by our friend's various and interesting converse—for he had been a marvellous traveller, and had crossed the globe from Spitzbergen to Caffraria in one direction, and circled it from Pekin to Peru, viâ Paris, in another—we arrived at our point d'appui. Having allowed him time to recover from what we felt must be his stupendous wonder and delight, we ventured to enquire "what he thought of that?" Whereupon, sinking his arms to the elbows in the pockets of his Petersham, and doubling himself in two, as if seized with a cramp in the stomach, he, after a short altercation with himself, replied in a tone that made our very teeth to chatter—"No, I never—yes—now I think on't—there is—there is one slip of wilderness in Crim Tartary as bad, as to howl at least, but this beats it out in the whinstone."
Over this howling desert, then, we beg to present to our readers Mr Curly Cahill travelling slowly, about dusk, a month or two after the occurrence which took place in the preceding chapter. He was warmly muffled in his great-coat or loody, and mounted on a very high-boned horse, whose hoofs, with many interjections of stumble, made the only noise that broke the dismal stillness around. The summit of the mountain passed, the traveller began to descend the southern side, when, after proceeding a few hundred yards, his steed toed, and tumbled the rider over its head as softly as if it were his favourite mode of alighting. Mr Cahill, having taken a few minutes' time for reflection, on his face and hands, quietly arose, threw the bridle over his arm, and proceeded to walk the very short remnant of the journey. Turning aside to a miserable hovel on the road, he unbolted the half-door, fastened his rein to the latch, and with a Dhieu-a-uth, or "God save you," entered the hut. It was in darkness, save where around a large fire that was flickering half-smothered in its own ashes, sat three men, at a little table, sharing between them a mug of poteen whisky, the only vessel on the table, or probably in the house.
"How long you wor entirely!" said one of the men (who did not move) knocking the ashes out of his pipe, as the traveller entered.
"The baste thravelled badly," replied Curly; "besides, I waited for the fall of the evenin,' as I was loth to be seen comin' the road."
"Well, an' what's on?" asked another. "Be quick—we're not easy here so close to the road, and it'll be pitch-dark with us across the bog."
"Well, then," said Cahill, "the long an' the short of it is this—they're back from Dublin at the Glebe agin. The Capting has sure word from her that she'll be ready to go away with him to-morrow night at twelve. Let ye get three more good boys an' watch, an' soon as ever ye hear them gallop from the gap where they'll mount—make a dash for the house, she'll be shure to leave the windy open, an' then—ye have her murdherin' father—I need say no more."
"I'm agin the blood any how," said one of the men; "he forgiv' my brother Mick two years' 'rear of tithe—an' he giv' Jug Sheedy an' her two childher a cabin an' half an acre o' garden when Buck Rice turned her off the Clo'mel estate"——
"Iss"——said another, "an' the wife, when she was alive, was good to the poor. As far as smashin' the place, an' makin' a fire upon the stairs, an' bringin' away the tithe-books goes, I'm agreeable; but I vote agin blood unless we can't help it."
"Then ye'll not get a rap from me," said their tempter.
"Bloor-an-nagers! what do you mean?" asked a third. "Will you be satisfied if we giv' him a beaten'?"
"No—I won't," answered Cahill.
"Nothin' but blood? Well, I'll tell you what, we'll shplit the difference—we'll cut the ears ov' him—he was always hard on us—but h—— to the one ov us will go further; he never took a spade[26] ov ground over a man's head yet, an' he don't desarve it. I won't say but he hurt many a poor boy by the processes—still that's law—but the villyans that go to eject creathures out of house an' home"——
"Well—I'm satisfied with the ears," muttered Cahill. "It'll be some satisfaction for my hundhred-an'-forty-sevin pounds eighteen-an'-tenpence, including costs, of the last arrear; besides he'll suffer in losin' the daughter. I'll meet you here again afther to-morrow night, this hour, an' we'll settle."
And Mr Cahill, remounting his steed, rode away.
Chapter VI.
He did not journey far. A mile further over the mountain, he pulled up before a lonely public-house, the only abode deserving the name of habitable that then existed for many miles on that desolate range of hills. It was of a very suspicious appearance, and quite as questionable a character; but the Shopkeeper seemed to entertain no scruple on those heads, for he alighted and entered with a pleasant air, and met, from numerous stragglers who were loitering in the kitchen, a cheerful reception.
Curly, having cast a reconnoitring glance through the place, wiped his mouth softly with his right palm, and before he withdrew it managed to whisper from behind it to mine host—
"Is he within jest now?"
"You'll find him in the back room; he has been askin' for you this half hour," was as gently responded.
Curly carelessly, or, as he would say himself, "promiscuously," wandered across the ample kitchen, and, stumbling heavily, slipped, as if by the merest accident, through a door close beside him, and, closing it after him, found himself alone with Major Hewitt, late of the 2d Brigade of Republican Artillery.
That gentleman was standing with his back to a good fire, in a small apartment, lighted by a single candle, which stood on a rude mantelpiece. He exhibited some slight symptoms of impatience at Curly's entrance, and, like the desperado-gentlemen of the hut, enquired peevishly what had delayed him.
"I'm proud to see you, Capting," said Cahill evasively; "the job is near finished at last, I hope?"
"Yes, to-morrow night, I think. We go off after twelve, provided you don't fail in having the horses ready."
"Don't fear me in that. Well, 'twill be great sport intirely—the ould man's tatteration when he finds his colleen gone." And Curly was obliged to bend himself double with laughter. "You'll find Ned Burke at the gap in the avenue-wall with two as good coults as there is in the barony. But, Capting, when it's all right, an' you settled in life, you'll not forget the friend that stood by you an' helped you to the fortun'?"
"For the sake of his own revenge at being cast in a law-suit about ten shillings' worth of potato-tithe? Certainly not, most upright Curly."
"An' where'll you take the brideen—Miss Katey—the darlin'?" said Cahill with a jocose wink.
"Curse you, villain! you'll drive me to give you a token on that head of yours you'll remember until—you see me again, at all events," cried Hewitt passionately. "Thank God, I'm 'most done with you. Have you brought the money?"
"Sorrow a sixpence, jewel. I had the arrears an' costs to pay this mornin', a'n I'm run dhry teetotally; that's the thruth."
"Then all my plan's gone for nothing!" said Hewitt. "In the fiend's name, what brought you here, then?"
"Jest a thrifle o' business up the road," answered Curly, "an' a great wish intirely for you, Capting."
"And she prepared and all!" continued Hewitt abstractedly. "I thought I was done with it for ever.... Go back, I implore you, Cahill, and raise me fifty pounds in any way. I am perfectly penniless."
"I couldn't raise you fifty farthens—I could not, 'pon my word and honour to you, Capting."
"Then I give up the business," replied Hewitt.
"An' the fair-haired girleen, an' her goold, an' what's betther, I know, to you, her goodwill; an' the land, an' the laugh at Lysaght"——and Cahill ran on rising towards his climax.
"I can't stand this; d—n you," cried his hearer. "Since you won't aid me, I must try the old treasury once more."
"An' you're the boy to have your dhrafts honoured, never fear, Capting."
"Will you escort me to the bank?" asked Hewitt with a savage sneer.
"He! he! he!" laughed the worthy Cahill. "My road home lies partly that way; an' if I don't lend you my note-o'-hand, at all events I've no objection to witness the deed, Capting."
"Go out and get your horse, then, and I shall be ready in a few minutes," said Hewitt, with something like a sigh.
Chapter VII.
A post-chaise with two stout horses, and as stout a man to drive them, was standing before the door of Jackson's Inn, in the then little village of Fermoy, at the close of a dry and frosty February day. In the parlour of the inn, two or three gentlemen stood watching or eagerly conversing with a couple of tall and powerful-looking men, who were engaged with a beef-steak, which it seemed—from a watch being placed before them on the table—they had but a limited time to discuss.
"Then you are really determined on it, Mr Skelton?" said one of the standers-by to the elder and busier of the banqueters.
"Quite," answered the person addressed, speaking as rapidly as he fed. "What's to be done?—road stopp'd up—business checked—six months gone—mails cut off—guard killed—alarm increasing"——
"If it continues much longer," interrupted his slower companion, "all communication with the capital will be at an end, unless a blow be struck," he said, looking round him loftily, "that will paralyze the enemy, gentlemen."
"Now for it, Rudd," said Skelton rising; "our time's up—twenty-five minutes past five," and he pocketed the watch by which he counted.
"I'm your man," answered Rudd, as he swallowed his last glass of sherry, and jumped up: "have you the blunderbuss?"
"Ay have I."
"I have the dirk and pistols, then: so bolt at once. Good-by, gentlemen;" and without waiting for the "good-bys" and "successes" that were showered on them, Messrs Skelton and Rudd hurried into the attendant post-chaise, and, giving some earnest directions in a whisper to the driver, dashed rapidly over the bridge which crossed the Blackwater, and took the road leading north, over Kilworth mountain, to Dublin.
Half an hour's travelling brought them to the foot of the hill, where the road began to ascend, and from this spot the driver was instructed to proceed at a slow pace. The night had thoroughly set in, both dark and foggy, and an hour elapsed tediously in winding up and attaining the vast level of the Wild. As they had no lamps, though desirous now to advance at a brisker rate, they were compelled to keep in a slow and cautious trot, the hearts of the travellers, intrepid as they seemed to be a short time ago, thumping violently every step they proceeded.
After various short pauses to avoid deep ruts, and several descents by the driver to free his horses' hoofs from the loose stones that lay plentifully along the wretched road—during one of which he seemed to hold colloquy with some benighted traveller—the carriage had nearly crossed the long summit of the desolate hills, when its occupants perceived it to stop with a sudden and forcible impulse, that betokened instant danger. Dropping the glasses at once, they called loudly to the driver to enquire the cause.
"There's a gentleman here," replied the man in a timid sullen voice, "houldin' the horses heads, that says I must stop here a spell."[27]
"How many of 'em?" asked Skelton in a low tone.
"Two," was the answer, just as softly; "one a-horseback, t'other a-foot."
"Here we are, then!" said Rudd to his companion in a feverish whisper.
"Yes; I wish 'twas over," was the reply, which was scarcely breathed when a man appeared at the right-hand carriage-window, and, presenting a pistol, said in a strong loud voice—
"I'm sorry, gentlemen, but I must have your money."
"Or your lives," added a man on horseback, blocking up the opposite side of the chaise.
"This is very hard, sir," answered Rudd hesitatingly—"very—hard—indeed; however, I suppose it must be so: perhaps you'll be good enough to come round to the other door of the chaise—my friend here is, I fear, seriously ill—
"Certainly," said the robber, who was now heard walking round to the door already occupied by his mounted companion.
"Are you steady?" whispered Rudd.
"As steel!" answered Skelton.
"Then slip the muzzle of the blunderbuss across me, and the moment the door is well opened, when I raise my arm with the purse, shoot him dead on the spot."
The click of a trigger was the sole reply:—the highwayman had come round to the door. He had his grasp on the handle, when he was suddenly struck in the eyes with some icy liquid, that caused him to swerve violently aside, dragging open the door at the same moment. There was a terrific volley from the carriage, and Curly Cahill, receiving the greater portion of the contents of the blunderbuss intended for his friend, dropped heavily from his horse.
Rudd and Skelton instantly sprang out. They found Hewitt (for our readers, no doubt, have anticipated it was he) engaged with their stalwart driver, who had already grappled with him, having, before he could recover from his shock, as well as surprise, by a well-directed blow knocked the pistol from his hand, and closed with him. The man would have been no match for Hewitt; but before the latter could draw another pistol, he was struck down by Rudd, and, with the powerful assistance of Skelton, handcuffed, and secured in the chaise.
The travellers, who had come determined and prepared for this expedition,[28] now struck a light, and proceeded to raise Cahill, who continued to groan heavily where he had fallen. He seemed to bleed inwardly, having been wounded chiefly in the chest and stomach, and was lifted into the carriage beside his captured companion, and where he almost instantly expired, having squandered his last breath in a feeble laugh, and the expression of his conviction, that "the Capting was cashiered at last."
The travellers now hurried rapidly onwards, conveying with them Sally-the-tin, whom, having been benighted on her return from some country-fair, the driver (an old acquaintance) had overtaken and given a lift to on the bar beside himself, and whose elemental piety, for once not ill-timed, was the means of saving Hewitt's exit. Leaving Cahill's body at the very roadside-hut where he had so lately planned his villanous revenge, they continued their course to Clogheen; and being informed that the nearest magistrate was the rector of the parish, about nine o'clock at night they entered Mr Tyrrel's parlour, where, though still suffering under her father's suspicions, Katey was presiding at the tea-table to Lysaght and his uncle, and begged to introduce to the Reverend Justice's notice, the person who accompanied them—the dreaded and notorious freebooter, Roderick O'Hanlon, who had been so many months the terror of all who travelled Kilworth mountains—and who, on a previous occasion, had been ushered, in an imaginary way, to his acquaintance as Major Fergus Hewitt, commissioner to Mononia from the Provisional Government.
Hewitt (or O'Hanlon) was tried at the ensuing Tipperary Assizes, and, notwithstanding the extreme severity of the law at that period, there were so many palliating circumstances pleaded in his favour at the trial—particularly a popular, and we believe a not altogether unfounded eulogium, (since grown into an apothegm in that country,) that "He robbed the rich to give to the poor," and so many persons of distinction, who had known him at one time as a performer on the Dublin stage, came forward to interest themselves in his behalf—that he escaped with transportation for life. He ultimately conducted himself with such propriety at Sydney, that he obtained a free pardon—and lived to amass some property, and settle in that colony. Previous to his quitting Ireland, he conveyed to Miss Tyrrel, by the hands of her father, a few lines explanatory of portions of his conduct and career, and which concluded with the assurance, that, next to one nameless and bitter regret, he most deeply lamented the injury he had, were it only in her estimation, inflicted on the cause of brave and unfortunate men, by passing himself as an adherent of Robert Emmett's, and the affair of 1803—with neither of which, he declared, had he had any connexion.
Katey Tyrrel recovered so rapidly from the shock and illness that succeeded the appearance of Hewitt as a prisoner in her father's parlour, that it is more than probable her wounded pride and convicted folly annihilated at once that affection for a highwayman which she would have had no scruple of bestowing on a Major of the Republican Brigade. Her father, grateful that, before it was too late, he was afforded an opportunity of atoning for past severity, no less than former indulgence, restored her speedily to favour. Katey profited largely by the lesson her giddiness and obstinacy had received. She became a steady and domestic character, and in due time saved herself the trouble of looking out a wife for Lysaght Osborne among her neighbours, by marrying him herself. They continued to reside with her father, who survived to such an extreme old age as to see all feuds between himself and his parishioners extinguished by the Composition Act.
Sally-the-tin, as often as her vagrant disposition admitted of it, had always a corner in Katey Osborne's kitchen; and it would be an injustice to woman's heart not to say, that this protection was afforded her not a whit the less warmly and permanently, for having been instrumental (however unconsciously) in saving the life of Hewitt.
A GLANCE AT THE PENINSULA.[29]
In England, where politics are so generally and largely discussed, where in fact they form the only subject upon which most men appear disposed or competent to converse, it is not uncommon to meet with persons well informed concerning the social and political state of the principal European countries. But we have frequently observed, that even amongst those who display the most varied knowledge of this kind, there are very few who either possess or pretend to any thing like a thorough appreciation of the affairs of the Peninsula. Yet there are obvious reasons why Englishmen ought to be more conversant with Spanish affairs than with those of any other European state—our nearest neighbours, perhaps, excepted. Here is a country about which we have been fighting or diplomatizing, almost without intermission, since the commencement of the present century; a country to which, by its intestine broils and frequent political changes, the attention of the English public has been continually directed, while that of the monied and commercial classes has been specially attracted to it by the frequent fluctuations and consequent speculation in what are facetiously termed Spanish Securities, and by the oft-revived but hitherto fallacious expectation of a commercial treaty. When these sources of interest are considered, it does seem singular that so few persons should have thought it worth while to investigate the real state of Spain in all its various relations; and that of those who have gone thither with that view, none should have produced a book fully elucidating Spanish affairs to the numerous classes in England which are more or less interested in them. The probable cause of this is, that no country has been so difficult to follow and comprehend through all its countless changes; an indispensable key to which is a thorough knowledge of the national character. On the other hand, that knowledge is doubly difficult to obtain at a period when, as now, the people and the institutions of Spain are in a state of transition.
It is a truism which, at first sight, looks like a paradox, that contemporary history is the most difficult to write. Time, which, in its more extended lapse, destroys and obliterates—previously, by successive operations, purifies and enlightens; classes men and events; elevates the important and the true; and gives praise and obloquy to whom they are severally due. And in the Peninsula, more than in any other country, is this kind of classification requisite. Amidst the various parties and factions, the strange contradictions of the national character, the interminable web of intrigue and political manœuvre, how arduous the task to unravel the truth, to throw a clear light upon the state and prospects of Spain, and explain the hidden and complicated machinery by which many of the recent events in that country have been brought about!
We have now lying before us a book in which this task has been attempted, and, we are disposed to think, by no means without success. It is the work of a man who has evidently passed a considerable time in the Peninsula; and, after becoming well acquainted with the language and habits of the people, has studied the peculiarities of their manners, feelings, and institutions, with a keen and observant eye. The result of his observations he has committed to paper pretty much as they were made; so at least we infer from the style of his book, which, without being on any regular plan, touches upon every subject connected with Spain, nearly, as it would appear, in the order in which they chanced to come uppermost in the writer's mood of the moment. The frequent change which this occasions, from grave subjects to gay, and vice versâ, serves, perhaps as well as any more regularly preconceived plan could have done, to carry the general reader pleasantly through two rather copious volumes; in which, whatever nay be their deficiencies, there is certainly no lack of variety; while the style in which they are written has about it a characteristic vigour and originality, and at times a considerable degree of humour. We are not informed how long the author has lived in Spain; but we suspect that his residence there has been of considerable duration, and that he has become in some degree Españolisado. We infer this from an occasional foreign idiom; from his intimate knowledge of the habits of various classes, which only a long residence in the country could have brought in his way; and from a familiarity with Spanish proverbial language, which now and then breaks out in an amusing and Sancho-like passage. In short, the whole book is characteristic both of the man who has written it, and of the people whom it describes.
Commencing with the fall of Espartero, the first twenty chapters of the first volume are chiefly political in their nature;—containing explanations of the various circumstances attending the above event; details of the state of parties, of the intrigues against Olózaga, and his final overthrow by the Camarilla of the day; the history of Camarillas generally, and sketches of several of the most prominent actors upon the Spanish political stage. The figurative signification of the word camarilla, which, in its literal sense, means a little chamber, is almost too well known, even out of Spain, for an explanation of it to be necessary. Since the fourteenth century, the days of Alonzo the Eleventh, and the beautiful Leonor de Gusman, it has been the wont of Spanish monarchs, with rare exceptions, to rule, and often to be ruled, by cabals or coteries composed of an indeterminate number of courtiers. We find men of all ranks and classes of society taking in turn their share of this back-stairs influence; priests and soldiers, jesuits, nobles, and lawyers, and not unfrequently women, composed the courtier-conclaves that governed the rulers of Spain, sent their own foes to the scaffold or dungeon, and raised their own friends to the highest dignities of the state. In conformity with this time-honoured tradition of the Spanish monarchy, no sooner was Espartero expelled from Spain than Christina hastened to send creatures of her own to Maddrid, to watch over her interests pending her own arrival, and to intrigue against those who should appear disposed to thwart her designs and line of policy; to form, in short, a Camarilla. This was soon done. "It was composed of Narvaez, the Marchioness of Santa Cruz, and Valverde, the Duke of Ossuna, Juan Donoso Cortes, and a member of the Senate named Calvet—all faithful adherents of Christina, Moderados in their politics, and strongly tinged with absolutist principles, although most hostile to the claims of Don Carlos." These half-dozen intriguing spirits soon carved out for themselves abundant and mischievous employment. The then minister, Lopez, the same whose famous amnesty project caused the downfall of Espartero, alike averse to encounter their opposition or to truckle to them in his government, resigned his office although possessing a strong majority in the Cortes; and Olózaga took his place, having been himself designated by Lopez as the most fitting man. The new premier trusted to his energies and talents to make head against the Camarilla; but he had underrated the ingenuity and cunning of the latter; and, still more, the hatred borne to him by Queen Christina. This hatred he had excited to a deadly extent, when ambassador at Paris in the time of Espartero, by demanding the expulsion of Ferdinand's widow from the French capital, on the ground of her plottings and attempts to revolutionize Spain. As will be remembered, no attention was paid to these demands by Louis Philippe, who was far better affected to Christina than to Espartero; and the cunning dowager remained snug at the Hôtel de Courcelles, hatching plots against the existing government of Spain—plots in the carrying out of which she was largely aided by French gold and French counsels. But she neither forgot nor forgave Olózaga's interference; and no sooner did he assume the reins of government, than her adherents opened their batteries upon him with unusual vigour. So effectual was their fire, that Olózaga, who took office on the twenty-first of November, was dismissed from it on the twenty-ninth;—one week's tenure. The absurd history of the violence employed by him to obtain the Queen's signature to a decree for the dissolution of the Cortes is well known, as are also the efforts that were made to crush him, even after his expulsion from the ministry had been obtained by this pitiful pretext—a pretext at once disgraceful to the artful and unprincipled framers, and injurious in the highest degree to Queen Isabel, one of whose first acts, after her majority had been declared, was thus made to be the attestation of a gross and shameless falsehood. In the long and stormy debate that ensued in the Cortes, Olózaga amply confirmed all parties of the absurdity of the charge brought against him, and utterly confounded his enemies. What they could not accomplish by public means, the latter now attempted to bring about by underhand ones—namely, Olózaga's destruction in a literal as well as a political sense; and after one or two narrow escapes from assassination, the ex-premier was advised by his friends to withdraw from Spain. "Portugal presented the readiest asylum; and following very nearly the course of the Tagus, the exile, escorted by twenty well-armed contrabandists, came by way of Talavera and Coria on the back of a mule, in the disguise of a trader, with copious saddle-bags, and crossing the little river Herjas into the Portuguese province of Beira, was soon in Castello Branco." Olózaga was used to this sort of thing, having already had to fly for his life in the time of Ferdinand. On that occasion he drove out of Madrid in the disguise of a Calesero, in company with his friend Garcia, the then intendant of police, who was also obliged to fly from the vengeance of the Camarilla of the day. They reached Corunna in safety, and embarked for England; the facile versatility with which Olózaga had smoked, joked, and drunk his way, adapting himself to the humours of all he met, and supporting admirably his assumed character, having in no small degree contributed to save them from detection.
The account our author gives of Queen Isabel is any thing but a favourable one; although we have much reason to fear that it is substantially correct. Wilful and pettish, at times obstinate, deficient in intelligence as well as temper, and above all, dissimulada, a dissembler. Ugly words these; but if it be true that children inherit their parents' virtues and vices, what better could be expected from the offspring of a Ferdinand and a Christina? Indeed it will be fortunate for herself and her people, if, at a later period of this child-queen's life, there are not a few more failings to be added to the above list—already sufficiently long. At present, artfulness and insincerity seem her chief faults—no trifling ones, certainly; and to these may be added a want of heart, very unusual in a girl of such tender age, and which is perhaps the worst symptom in her character. It has been frequently and strongly exemplified in her conduct to those nearest her person. Previously to the anti-Christina revolution of 1840, the Marquesa de Santa Cruz was her governess, and to her the young Queen appeared much attached. But when the Marchioness left Spain in the suite of the Queen-mother, Isabel never made an enquiry after her, receiving Madame Mina with just the same degree of apparent affection that she had shown to her preceding governess. Whilst Espartero was Regent, she professed unbounded attachment to him, insisted having the portrait of her "caro amigo" hung in her room, and seemed proud of showing it to all her visitors. The wheel went round; Narvaez was at Madrid, and the Duke of Victoria a refugee on board the Malabar. The Señora de Mina was dismissed, and her royal pupil took leave of her with the same absence of feeling that she had shown when separated from the Marchioness of Santa Cruz:—
"'Since you are leaving me,' she said, 'I must make you a present.' And away she ran to take down the portrait of her very 'dear friend' Espartero, which precious relic she handed over to her outgoing Aya, saying 'Keep this portrait, señora; it will be better in your possession than mine!'"
Taken to a bull-fight, her youthful majesty of Spain was delighted beyond measure, enjoying the sufferings of maddened bulls and gored horses with as much zest as could have been shown by her illustrious and respectable father. Unfortunately, auto-da-fés are out of date, or they might serve to vary her pastimes. As it is, she is obliged to fill up her leisure by the consumption of confectionery, of which she has a constant and abundant supply on hand. "This pastry-cook museum, which extends over every apartment of the palace, contains some most interesting specimens—the tortas, or tarts, of Moron, the most celebrated in Spain; the panes pintados, or painted buns, of Salamanca; the Paschal ojalores, or Carnival and Easter dainties; the hard turrones of Alicant, composed of almonds, nut-kernels, filberts, and roasted chestnuts, intermixed with honey and sugar; dulces of cocoa-nut frosted with sugar; roasted almonds; avellanas, a peculiarly nice sort of filbert, whole and in powder; alfajor, or spiced bread; the delicious cheese called jijona; pomegranate jelly; blando de huévos, or sweetened yolks of eggs," &c. &c. &c. When in a good humour, she makes presents of these delicacies to the persons about her; and the degree of favour in which her courtiers stand, is to be estimated by the amount of cakes and sugar-sticks bestowed upon them. No place is secure from the invasion of these sweets; even in the council-chamber, while dispatching business with the ministers, she is surrounded by them, "and the confection of decrees, and discussion of dainties, proceed pari passu."
The abundance of the comfits and the badness of the counsellors by which the poor child is environed, menace grievous injury both to mind and body, heart and stomach. A puppet in the hands of factions, living from her earliest childhood in an atmosphere of intrigue and falsehood,—the usual atmosphere of Spanish courts and camarillas, how was she to escape the contagion? Her education seems also to have been grievously neglected. When Arguelles was her governor, she was indocile and refractory; under the care of Olózaga she only remained three months. Her female instructors, with the exception of the Countess of Mina, have been women of equivocal reputation, seeking to advance themselves and their friends, and teaching their pupil few lessons but those of dissimulation. To aggravate the evil, during the three years of Christina's exile, that princess was allowed to be in constant correspondence with her daughter, and of course lost no opportunity of inspiring her with a dislike of her own political enemies, the Progresistas. These latter, however, being in power, and about the person of the young Queen, she was obliged at least to appear friendly with them, and was thus "taught to be false and artful by the force of circumstances, and trained by events to deceit."
The chapter headed "Narvaez" is extremely interesting, giving graphic sketches of one of the most remarkable of living Spaniards. In Narvaez we find the faults and the virtues of the soldier of fortune; prompt decision, great energy and determination, on the one hand—cruelty, impolicy, and violence, on the other. His character has made him popular with a portion of the army, and over the officers, in particular, he exercises great influence. His severities, however, especially his shooting eight men the autumn before last, for demanding what had been solemnly promised them, permission to quit the service, have lost him many adherents, and made him numerous enemies in the ranks. But his deadly foes, and those from whom he has the most to fear, are the Ex-National Guards of Madrid. Their hatred of him is unlimited, and savage beyond conception, founded upon various causes, any one of which is, with Spaniards, sufficient to account for it. Their confidence betrayed, their arms taken from them, themselves recklessly sabred and bayoneted when assembled for the most peaceable purposes—these and many other injuries will never be forgotten or forgiven by the Madrileños. We in England are now so accustomed to hear of bloodshedding and outrage in the Peninsula, that we have began to consider it almost as a matter of course, and scarcely accord a moment's attention to the horrors of to-day, which are no worse than those of yesterday, and may probably be surpassed by those of to-morrow. Yet, if we except a portion of the period of Espartero's rule, there are no three months in the history of Spain for the last ten years, which would not, if transplanted into the annals of any other country, form an era of bloodshed. Since the advent of Narvaez to power, although the vigour of his government has prevented civil war and checked insurrection, that has only been accomplished by a system of despotic cruelty worthy of the days of Ferdinand the Well-beloved. Countless instances may be adduced in support of this assertion. Executions, like that of Zurbano and his family, have been defended by the argument, that the sufferers were rebels against the established government of the country, and as such deserved the fate they met. Rather a flimsy argument, it appears to us, in a country in which revolution flourishes as an evergreen plant. How is it to be decided which is the rightful governor, and which the usurper? who shall say whether those in power are there by right as well as might; or whether they are merely successful rebels, banditti on a large scale, who have seized upon place and power with as much justice, and by the same violent means, as highwaymen of inferior grade possess themselves of the purses of travellers? But even if we concede this point, and admit that whoever holds the reins, though but from yesterday, and with a bloodstained hand, is justified in slaughtering by wholesale all who show a disposition to drag him down again, it will still be impossible to palliate the treacherous and tyrannical proceedings of Narvaez. The inhabitants of Madrid, lured out of their houses by the bait of some joyous festival, the streets hung with banners and strewed with flowers, the fountains playing wine and milk—on all sides rejoicings and festivity; the insouciant light-hearted Castilians forgetting for a while the misfortunes of their country, and giving themselves up to the unrestrained enjoyment of the moment. But there are those amongst them who will soon trouble their pleasures; agents of their rulers, tutored to excite them to some apparently rebellious demonstration. A shout or two, interpreted as indicative of disaffection, and caught up by an excitable mob; and immediately battalions appear upon the plaza, dragoons gallop out of the side streets, bayonets are lowered and sabres bared, and amidst the clatter of the charge, the screams of women and the oaths of men, the festal garlands are trodden under foot, and blood reddens the pavement. "On many a fiesta, or day of saints," says our author, "which Spain regards as of special holiness, plots and snares were thickly strewn around the people's footsteps; murder lurked beneath the wreath of festivity, and the day which began in prayer, concluded with mourning."
During the three days' rejoicings on occasion of the Queen's majority, scenes of this sort occurred. "They invited us to a ball," said the people in the true Madrileño spirit—"they invited us to a ball, and we had to assist at a funeral." The object sought to be obtained by such barbarous means, was the intimidation of the populace, and the deterring of revolutionists and progresistas. The suppression of the national guard produced another alboroto, or disturbance. A crowd assembled, and moved through the streets, giving vivas for the constitutional Queen, and mueras for the ministers and the traitors. Narvaez asked no better chance than this. Out turned the palace guard, composed of strong bodies of infantry and cavalry, and, without a moment's delay, charged the mob, which, although principally composed of national guardsmen, was unarmed, save with a few bayonets and knives. In all the adjacent streets, people were running for their lives; and the congregations, which were then just leaving mass—for this occurred on a Sabbath morning—recoiled for safety into the churches.
As a politician, Narvaez is unquestionably an obstinate and unscrupulous dunce, who feels his incompetency to rule by any means but the sword, and has substituted a tyrannical dictatorship supported by bayonets, for the legal and constitutional government of Spain. In a military point of view he is more respectable, although even as a general his exploits have been few and little heard of. In his brief campaign against the Esparterists, he had no opportunity of showing more than activity and daring; since at the very moment when he was on the point of measuring strength and generalship with Seoane and Zurbano at Torrejon de Ardos, the troops under those two leaders came over to him. During the War of Succession, he gave proof of some skill as an organizer of armies of reserve, and even fought a gallant and successful battle with Gomez at Majaceite in Andalusia, in which, if one might believe the lying Spanish bulletins, he nearly swept the Carlists from the face of the earth. There is no doubt he mauled them a little; but neither that nor the various other decisive overthrows recorded by gazettes, prevented Gomez from returning to the Basque provinces with a considerable force at his back, and an immense amount of booty.
It will be contrary to all precedent in modern Spanish history, if Narvaez's career terminates otherwise than by a violent death, met, in all probability, at the hands of the populace, or at those of some disgusted adherents of his own. The deaths of Carlos de España, slain by his own escort on his way to the French frontier; of Moreno—the butcher of Torrijos, Lopez Pinto, Florez Calderon, and fifty other martyrs—himself murdered in the wood of Vera by the bandit followers of the savage priest Echeverria; these, and fifty similar instances, are events but of yesterday. It is still fresh in the memory of the Madrileños how they pursued the stern Quesada to his place of refuge—Quesada who, alone and by his single energy, had cleared the streets of an excited populace, and stopped a revolution for one whole day; how they dragged him forth, piecemeal it may almost be said, and with his severed fingers stirred the bowl in which they toasted the downfall of tyrants. Between Quesada and Narvaez there is more than one point of resemblance. Their deaths, also, may be alike.
The sketches of Spanish political men, the various party leaders and conspicuous senators of the day, are done with much spirit and cleverness, and give an excellent idea of the fickle inconsistency, the showy talent but want of steadiness of purpose, that characterize most of the notable Peninsular politicians. One is much accustomed to receive information upon such subjects with doubt and mistrust, it being so often tinctured with the violent party spirit which, in Spain, distorts men's views and opinions; and the book before us being published anonymously, we are prevented from judging, by circumstances of position or others, to which side or men, if to any, the author is likely to incline. But we think we discern in him the wish to be impartial, and are therefore disposed to place unusual confidence in his statements; the more so as he represents no character as entirely bad, but, while laying on the lash for their faults, does not forget to give them credit for their good qualities. According to his account, Lopez is the most brilliantly eloquent, and, at the same time, one of the most incorrupt members of the Spanish Chambers; one of the very few Spaniards who have held office without advantage to themselves.
"It is a most creditable distinction in Spain, where office is sought almost exclusively for its emoluments, that Lopez has been at three different times a minister of the crown, and retired thrice from that government, of which he was always the most influential member, without any permanent office, or title, or decoration; without even a cross or a riband to display upon his breast, in a country where those favours are most extensively distributed. Even from the premiership of the provisional government, by which high titles and orders were lavishly disseminated amongst the leading instruments of a successful national movement, and from the side of a Queen whose majority had been just proclaimed, he withdrew into private life in a strictly private capacity, without a charge upon the pension list for himself or any of his connexions—without an inscription in the court list or a real of the public money. Five hundred different lucrative and permanent offices were at his disposal, but he preferred a practising lawyer's independence."
This would be rare praise in any country; in Spain it must be almost without parallel. In striking contrast stands the character of Don Luis Gonzalez Bravo, or Brabo, as he affects to write himself, who succeeded Olózaga in the premiership, for which post he united some of the most singular disqualifications ever possessed by a prime minister.
Spain, while imitating the fashions of England and France in dress and suchlike petty particulars, has also thought proper to copy certain political peculiarities of those two countries. Thus, while La Jeune France vapours in long-bearded and belligerent splendour, under the special patronage of a Joinville, and Young England peeps out, gentlemanly and dignified, from beneath the ægis of a less high-born, but, in other respects, equally distinguished character, La Joven España, emulous of their bright example, ranges itself under the patronage of the disreputable editor of a scurrilous journal. It is difficult for us in England to imagine the state of things existing in a country where such a person can head any party or section, however insignificant, in the legislative assembly, and still more difficult to conceive any amount of satirical and vituperative talent placing within his grasp the portfolio of prime minister.
Bravo's first introduction to public notice, was as member of the "Trueno," or Thunder Club—a society that amused itself, of evenings, by molesting peaceable citizens as they returned home to their families, thrashing the serenos or watchmen, and suchlike intellectual and dignified diversion. He got seriously wounded by a pistol-shot on one of these occasions, and we next find him editing the Guirigay or "Slang," a paper remarkable for its personal and unscrupulous tone. For some time its attacks were directed against Christina, to whose expulsion from Spain it is said to have contributed, so great is the influence of newspaper violence in the Peninsula. During the Queen-Dowager's three years' exile, however, Bravo wrote himself round from a violent exaltado progresista, or Radical, into a very decided moderado, or Conservative, in which latter character he entered office. Taxed with his renegade conduct, his defence was a most impudent one, highly characteristic of the man. "No es ridiculo," said he, "estar para siempre el mismo?" Is it not ridiculous to be always the same?
But though he managed to get on while in opposition—and even, by a certain amount of impassioned energy and satirical verve, to place himself at the head of a party of young members, who, although not exceeding fifty in number, turned the scale in many parliamentary contests—his incapacity became glaringly apparent as soon as he took office.
"The prime minister, when he should have been writing sage decrees, was scribbling scurrilous paragraphs; from his portfolio peeped forth old numbers of 'The Slang' and his official robes could not hide his harlequin's jacket. 'Vistan me, dijo Sancho, como quisieren qui de cualquier manera que vaya vestido sere Sancho Panza.' Let them dress me up as they will, quoth Sancho, however I am dressed I shall still be Sancho Panza."
Bravo, however, did as well as another to be the tool of Narvaez, and moreover he was found pliant, which doubtless prevented his being kicked out of office as soon as he got into it. Of course he lost no time in taking care of himself and his friends. His father, who had been dismissed from a government employment for malversation, received the appointment of under-secretary to the Treasury; his wife's brother, a hanger-on at one of the theatres, was made state-groom to the Queen; while a number of other equivocal characters were appointed to the diplomatic corps, and half the political chiefs and public employés in Spain were dismissed to make room for the new premier's friends, including a considerable number of newspaper scribblers. The power of the newspaper press in Spain is enormous, and nearly all the leading politicians in Madrid either are, or have been, editors or proprietors of some one of the principal journals.
The manners and peculiarities of the lower orders in Spain offer a fertile theme, differing as they do in toto from those of the corresponding classes in any other country. They have furnished our author with materials for some amusing chapters. The description of a roadside venta, or inn, and its frequenters, is capital, and reminds us of some of Lewis's admirable pencillings of Spanish life and interiors. The amalgamation of grades of society, which in most countries would be kept carefully distinct, but in the Peninsula hobnob together in perfect good fellowship, the mixture of muleteers and alcaldes, priests and banditti, smugglers and custom-house officers, all sitting in the same smoky room, dipping in the same dish, exchanging the latest intelligence, local and political, forms a strange but a characteristic and perfectly true picture. Apropos of smugglers, here is a small statement worthy the notice of that sensible party in Spain which opposes the introduction of foreign manufactures upon payment of a reasonable duty.
"Spain is, of all European countries, the most helplessly exposed to contrabandist operations. With an ill-paid and sometimes ragged army, and with revenue officers directly exposed to temptation by inadequate salaries, she has 500 miles of Portuguese frontier and nearly 300 of Pyrenean; and with a fleet crumbled into ruins, and no longer of the slightest efficacy, she has 400 miles of Cantabrian and 700 of Mediterranean coast. Four hundred thousand smugglers are constantly engaged in demolishing her absurd fiscal laws, and some 1,600,000 pounds weight of cotton goods alone, are every year illicitly imported."
But things in Spain are now rapidly approaching that happy state when it will become quite unnecessary for the gentlemen contrabandistas to expose their valuable health to the Pyrenean fogs, or their lives in contests with aduaneros. The system is becoming each day more beautifully simple; and, strange as it may seem, the direct road for the importation of contraband goods is through the custom-house. "Bribery is here reduced to the old electioneering simplicity; and the tariff of custom-house corruption is arranged with more uniform regularity, and far more perfectly understood, than the tariff of customs' duties—the difference being, that the customs' revenues may not be paid, but the customs' officers must." The due amount of fee being insinuated into the "itching palm" of the revenue officers, your goods pass with all imaginable facility. By the magic of a four, eight, or sixteen dollar bit, as the case may be, a mist settles over the vision of the complaisant official, and either prevents his seeing at all, or else transforms in the most remarkable manner the objects that pass before him. Bales of manufactured goods assume the appearance of sacks of potatoes and onions—nay, those useful products of the soil are sometimes even supposed to be contained in wooden cases and casks, carefully hooped and nailed; "and huge canvass bales are likewise cleared, and reported to be indubitably filled with the said potatoes, the softness of the packages to the touch arising probably from the fact of their being boiled!"
At times, however, by a rare chance, an incorruptible custom-house is discovered; and for that, or some other reason, it is deemed advisable to resort to the old, and certainly more sporting plan, of running the cargoes, which is accomplished in a most systematic and comfortable manner. The smugglers are usually in sufficient number to deter the carabineros from meddling; and if, by chance, the latter should interfere, they almost invariably receive a sound thrashing. There are a large number of small Portuguese craft constantly employed in running contraband goods; and the quantity of merchandise introduced from Gibraltar is enormous. The latter town, which, by the census of 1835, had 15,000 inhabitants, contains only 3000 cigar manufacturers. As our author says, what a frightful deal they must smoke in Gibraltar!
It is all nonsense talking in mincing terms about English smuggling in Spain. However much our Government might discountenance it, nothing could be done to prevent it, not even if English guarda costas were stationed round the whole eleven hundred miles of Spanish coast. The smuggled goods would then go through Portugal, as many of them do now; or any diminution in the amount of English merchandise imported, would be made up by a corresponding increase in the quantity of French. Why, even the Germans, the respectable, plodding Germans, supply their quota of indifferent calicoes and dull cutlery to the Spanish consumer. The French, who are fond of charging England with being the nation "egoiste par excellence," who consults only her own interests, and is equally ready to poison antipodean barbarians with opium, or to violate the principles of fair dealing that ought to exist between friendly countries, by introducing contraband goods in every possible manner—the French, we say, albeit so Pecksniffian in their condolences with Spain, and other nations, which they affect to consider victims to the practices of greedy and treacherous England, are themselves most reckless and determined in their smuggling transactions with their southern neighbours; and the sole circumstance which "rises their dander" is to find English goods obtaining the preference in the Peninsula, as every where else. The constant aim of the French is to irritate Spaniards against England; and the ground upon which they have hitherto gone is, that of representing us, in all our actions, as thinking only of our own advantage. The activity and skill of French political agents were long exerted to bring about a reaction against the friendly feelings which, only a very short time back, were entertained in the Peninsula towards England; and these exertions were at last successful, although we may now hope that Spaniards are again opening their eyes to the deceit that has been practised on them. The friendly offices of France are probably by this time beginning to be appreciated at their just value; and doubts must be arising in the minds of the rational portion of the Spanish people, whether the "perfides insulaires" did not mean and act as honestly by them as the more smooth-tongued and insinuating allies who have reimposed upon them a Christina and a Narvaez.
"Exaggeration in all things," says the English resident, "is the leading vice of Spain. There is not a city in the Peninsula that is not 'muy noble, muy leal, y muy heroica;' not a corporate body that is not 'most excellent,' or 'most illustrious;' not a military corps that is not renowned, and matchless for its valour; not a ragamuffin in Castile that does not esteem himself noble, nor a brigand in Andalusia but calls himself a soldier; not a man but is a Don, nor a woman but is a Doña; not a dunce of a doctor but is profoundly learned, nor a scribbling poetaster but is a European celebrity. Where all are first-rate, how shall there be improvement? Where there is no humility, how shall there be acquisition of knowledge? Pangloss might here have found his perfect world."
It is, we fear, this Bobadil vein, this unbounded self-approval and vain-gloriousness, entailing an unwillingness to acknowledge obligations, and an impatience of feeling that they have received any, which renders a large proportion of Spaniards less amicably disposed towards England than we might expect them to be, when we look at the recent history of the two countries, and recall all the friendly offices Spain has received at the hands of England. We have ourselves noticed amongst Spaniards—even amongst men of good average intelligence and education—a fretful sort of feeling whenever the support for which their country has been indebted to Great Britain was alluded to. Some of them go so far as to endeavour to persuade the world, and more especially themselves, that the parts played by English and Spaniards in the Peninsular War were the converse of what is usually supposed—that it was Spanish valour, skill, and generalship that swept Napoleon's armies before them, and drove his best commanders across the Pyrenees. The English were there, certainly; they were very useful, but they played second fiddle to their allies on most occasions. In short, to hear many of the present generation of Spaniards talk, one might suppose that it was their ill-disciplined, badly-officered troops which won the numerous hard-fought fields of the War of Independence.
Another subject of difference, and a far more serious one than these petty ranklings of offended pride and ill-borne obligation, is the slave-trade, and the right of search. Persuade Spaniards, or Frenchmen, or any nation in the world, if you can, that Great Britain added twenty millions to her debt, impoverished her own colonial proprietors, and still goes to a heavy annual expense for the suppression of the slave traffic, with any other view than a very decided one to her own benefit. To Spain, thanks to the wretched administration of her internal resources, the revenue derived from her few remaining colonies is a great object; and in our hostility to the slave-trade, she beholds a direct attack on that source of income. Again, in the present depressed state of Spanish commerce, a large portion of the commercial capital of the country is invested in the slave-trade; and a constant bitter feeling towards the English is consequently kept up amongst the class whose money is thus employed. If they bring one cargo out of three to the Havannah, they have, it is said, a profit on the transaction; but at the same time it is not likely to put the slave-dealing Dons in particularly good humour to hear of the other two having been walked off by British cruisers. On the contrary, they curse the meddling Ingleses, who having, they say, cut off their own tail by emancipating their negroes, now, like the fox in the fable, wish to persuade, or, if necessary, to compel all their neighbours to follow their example.
The English resident is enthusiastic on the subject of slave emancipation, and gives us a lively account of some arguments he maintained on the subject with sundry Gaditano slave-dealers, the result of which was, of course, that each party remained precisely of the same opinion as before. The abstract philanthropy of English legislation on that question cannot be doubted; and it is to be hoped that the course adopted may eventually prove beneficial to humanity, although it seems very doubtful whether such has as yet been the case. Meanwhile, there is small credit given to us for disinterestedness by foreigners, who, in our resolute opposition to the slave-traffic, are determined to see nothing but a wish to harass their commerce, injure their colonies, and insure our dominion of the seas.
Under the favouring auspices of that poor creature, Leopold O'Donnel, who distinguished himself during the War of Succession by the skill with which he managed to get beaten by the Carlists on nearly every possible occasion, and who now occupies the important post of Governor of Cuba—under his auspices the slave-trade is flourishing with renewed vigour. Slaves, we are told, can now be legally imported into Cuba upon payment of the governor's fee of twenty-five dollars per head, and "la traite has seldom, of late years, been more successful than under the rule of this governor." One of the most striking chapters of the book before us is the one on colonial slavery, in which some curious details are given concerning the recent conspiracy of Matanzas. This outbreak, like all others that occur in the Spanish West Indies, was most falsely laid at the door of the English by the whole Spanish press. "It was directed," said they, "by a committee of five members. Placido was president, two of the other four were mulattoes, and two Englishmen. This latter circumstance is worthy of note." "As being an utter falsehood," observes our author.
Placido, the mulatto leader of the insurrection, seems to have been a remarkable man, of commanding appearance, great energy of character, and superior intelligence. One of the means he adopted to rouse the coloured population of Cuba against their oppressors, was the writing of revolutionary songs and verses. During the whole of 1843 he was busy laying the foundations of his scheme, and, although his designs were known to thousands, no one was found to betray them. The plot was finally discovered by the conversation of some of the conspirators being overheard. An obscure warning of it, given by a young negress to her master, with whom she was in love, also led to enquiry. The project was for nothing less than the total extermination of the white race, and the formation of a republic after the example of Hayti The leading posts and commands were assigned to the mulattoes, as well during the revolt as in the organized government that was subsequently to be formed. The Thursday in Passion Week was the day fixed for the outbreak; the signal to be given by the simultaneous burning of the sugar-canes; the watchword, "La Muerte y la Destruccion." The domestic servants were in the plot, and were to aid in various ways. "The cooks were to poison their masters, and the caleseros, with their coach-horses, to form a corps of cavalry."
The alarm was not given till the morning of the day on which the conspiracy was to have broken out. Then the arrests began. Five hundred of the conspirators were thrown into the prison of Matanzas, which town was the headquarters of the conspiracy, and gave its name to it. But the negroes finding themselves discovered, and expecting no mercy, resolved at least to glut their vengeance as far as the time would allow them. Overseers were flung into their sugar-boilers, two entire families at Matanzas were poisoned, and other excesses took place. The reprisals exercised were most horrible; two hundred prisoners were immediately butchered, and numerous straggling parties shot down like dogs; some wretched victims were flogged to death to induce them to betray their accomplices. Further outbreaks were the result of these severities. The planters who fell into the hands of the negroes were mercilessly massacred; numerous plantations were burned. The insurrectionary movements were, however, isolated and without organization; the Spaniards succeeded in repressing them, and then, furious and alarmed at the imminence of the peril they had so narrowly escaped, inflicted the most terrible punishment on the unsuccessful mutineers. Eight hundred prisoners had been secured in the Matanzas Jail; of these two hundred were shot without trial, the remainder, for the most part, strangled in their dungeons. The meaning of the Spanish word Matanzas is "a place of slaughter," and such, indeed, the town became. Placido, the chief of the conspiracy, made a tremendous resistance before he was taken. "He fired three pistols, killing or wounding a man at each discharge, and then hacked and hewed away with his sword, speedily making for himself a ring of more than its span, and clearing a space around him as rapidly as an Utreran bull when he rushes into the circus. But a soldier's musket soon brought him to the ground, and bleeding and faint he was flung into the Matanzas carcel."
As the prisoners refused to a man to make disclosures, torture was resorted to. The lash was applied till they confessed or fainted. Most of them yielded, the plot was acknowledged to be of ancient date, and to have Placido at its head.
Placido bore, with the resolution of a stoic, the rude and unsparing stripes with which his broad shoulders and back were speedily covered. Not a groan nor a sigh escaped him; but he fainted away at last from loss of blood, and with such little apparent change, that the executioners continued to flog for some time after he was senseless. He was loosed from the triangles, and tied to a neighbouring stake, after the mummery of a five minutes' court-martial. He was still senseless when bound to the stake—lifeless, for all that his verdugos knew to the contrary. Ere he received the fusillade, he recovered from his fainting fit sufficiently to exclaim, in an audible tone. "Los dias de la esclavitud son contados!" "The days of slavery are numbered."
A horrible account, but doubtless a correct one. Our author seems to have been in the south of Spain at the time of the Matanzas insurrection, and consequently in the right place to get at the true particulars of the affair.
In the chapters on the Spanish Army, &c., although amusing enough, we do not consider the English resident to have been so successful as in most other parts of his work. We would caution him against believing, or at any rate expecting others to believe, the marvels recorded by Spanish gazettes of Spanish armies and generals—marvels which usually get repeated and magnified to most preposterous dimensions by the embustero retailers of such intelligence. We would also warn him against indulging in such enthusiasm as he displays in speaking of General Léon—a very fine fellow undoubtedly, a good soldier and dashing officer, but yet a little overrated in these lines. "In his unexaggerated feats of war, he eclipsed the Homeric heroes, and rivalled the incredible exploits of Charlemagne and his peers. His tremendous lance spread terror and dismay among the enemies of his queen and country, and the glorious inequalities of Crécy and Azincour were revived in the deeds of Léon, witnessed by living men." Revived and considerably eclipsed, we should say, judging from the list of exploits that follows. If our friend the English resident be in any degree acquainted with military matters, he must be aware that the dispersal of an army of eleven thousand infantry, and one thousand horse, by a hundred and fifty hussars, a feat which he attributes to Léon, is an absurdity; and that if such a thing, or any thing like it, did occur, it must have been when the hundred and fifty dragoons were closely backed by some much more numerous force.
The Spanish army, as it existed at the close of the Carlist war, was perhaps in a higher state of discipline and practical usefulness than it had been at any previous period of the present century. Rendered hardy and martial by six years' unremitting warfare; officered, too, for the most part, by men who had something besides title or family interest to recommend them, it only required greater regularity of pay and supplies to prove highly efficient. Gradually reduced by Espartero to about fifty thousand men, its numbers were doubled by a decree of Narvaez, who felt that so small a force was insufficient to support him in his tyrannical rule. At the same time an unprecedented system of conciliation, or of adulation it should rather be said, was adopted by the dictator towards his legions. Espartero had done all in his power, and that the disordered state of Spanish finances allowed him to do, for the comfort and well-being of his army; but he had not thought fit to sacrifice to it all or any other classes of the state. It had not been necessary for him to do so; his government was not based upon fear, nor dependent on bayonets. With Narvaez it was very different. His sole tenure of power was in the fidelity of the army, and this he sought to ensure by every possible means. "The priest may starve and the exclaustrado perish; the last rotten planks of the navy may go to pieces; public monuments may totter for want of conservation or repairs; the civil employé may be pinched, and the very palace pine for its arrears; but money must be found to clothe and feed the army, and maintain it like a prancing charger." The extent to which this courting and propitiation of the soldiery is carried, is almost incredible, and often ridiculous. Allowances of cigars, extra rations of wine upon holidays, boxes and stalls at the theatre provided gratis for the officers upon the Queen's birth-day—these and similar indulgences are the sops thrown by Narvaez to his capricious cohorts. But, with all his pains, he obtains no feeling of security. He is well aware that no man in Spain has so many enemies, not mere ill-wishers, but deadly foes thirsting for his blood; he knows that the National Guards of Madrid have sworn his destruction; and he cannot even tell how soon he may be turned upon or betrayed by the very army which he takes such trouble to conciliate. They may sell Narvaez, as they sold Espartero, to the highest bidder.
In a recent number of this Magazine, we took occasion to animadvert on the conceit and presumption of certain tourists who imagine themselves qualified by a flying visit to write their opinions concerning a country and people, thus doing grievous injustice to those they write about, and sadly misleading any credulous portion of the public which may be beguiled into reading and placing confidence in their lucubrations. It has been seen that no such reproach can be addressed to the author of the book we are now noticing, who has moreover performed his labour, which was no light one, in a conscientious and creditable manner, without prejudice, favour, or affection. We scarcely think he does full justice to Espartero, whom we must still persist in considering the most estimable and respectable of the Spanish public men of the day. He may not possess the glowing and fascinating eloquence of an Olózaga, nor the fierce energy of a Narvaez; but neither has he the versatile insincerity of the former, nor the unscrupulous and brutal recklessness of the latter. He has not, like Olózaga, according to the uncontradicted testimony of Roca de Togores in the Cortes, "broken faith with all parties;" nor did he ever, like Narvaez, cause his dragoons to charge inoffensive crowds, assembled by invitation of their rulers to celebrate saint-days or national festivals.
Our author's general remarks on the state of Spain, of its people and prospects, are acute and sensible; and they also coincide in great measure with as much as has been said on those subjects by one or two recent and intelligent travellers in the Peninsula. In short, setting aside a slight occasional tendency to high colouring, more calculated, however, to amuse than mislead, the principal fault we have to find with the book is its title. After the deluges of Mysteries and Revelations that has been poured upon the shoulders of the reading public during the last two or three years, commencing with the rhapsodies of Sue and company, and continued through countless varieties by writers of every degree on both sides the Channel, we really cannot think that such a title as "Revelations" of any thing will tend to prepossess the public in favour of the work it designates. One frequently sees books of very small merit, or of none at all, ushered into the world under some highly enticing name, conveying the idea that the author has expended at his bantling's christening the whole of his diminutive modicum of talent. Here, however, is an example of the opposite mode of proceeding; a title that we must decidedly condemn, given to a book of much interest and utility—a book which, from its liveliness, and the amount of anecdote and light matter it contains, will be read by many who would shrink from the perusal of a mere dry statistical work.