None cared to offer their consolings to one so fully capable of supplying the commodity to himself, and the party broke up in twos or threes, moodily seeking their own quarters, and brooding gloomily over what they had just witnessed.
CHAPTER XXII. LEAVING HOME
I will ask my reader now to turn for a brief space to the “Fisherman's Home,” which is a scene of somewhat unusual bustle. The Barringtons are preparing for a journey, and old Peter's wardrobe has been displayed for inspection along a hedge of sweet-brier in the garden,—an arrangement devised by the genius of Darby, who passes up and down, with an expression of admiration on his face, the sincerity of which could not be questioned. A more reflective mind than his might have been carried away, at the sight to thoughts of the strange passages in the late history of Ireland, so curiously typified in that motley display. There, was the bright green dress-coat of Daly's club, recalling days of political excitement, and all the plottings and cabals of a once famous opposition. There was, in somewhat faded splendor it must be owned, a court suit of the Duke of Portland's day, when Irish gentlemen were as gorgeous as the courtiers of Versailles. Here came a grand colonel's uniform, when Barrington commanded a regiment of Volunteers; and yonder lay a friar's frock and cowl, relics of those “attic nights” with the Monks of the Screw, and recalling memories of Avonmore and Curran, and Day and Parsons; and with them were mixed hunting-coats, and shooting-jackets, and masonic robes, and “friendly brother” emblems, and long-waisted garments, and swallow-tailed affectations of all shades and tints,—reminders of a time when Buck Whalley was the eccentric, and Lord Llandaff the beau of Irish society. I am not certain that Monmouth Street would have endorsed Darby's sentiment as he said, “There was clothes there for a king on his throne!” but it was an honestly uttered speech, and came out of the fulness of an admiring heart, and although in truth he was nothing less than an historian, he was forcibly struck by the thought that Ireland must have been a grand country to live in, in those old days when men went about their ordinary avocations in such splendor as he saw there.
Nor was Peter Barrington himself an unmoved spectator of these old remnants of the past Old garments, like old letters, bring oftentimes very forcible memories of a long ago; and as he turned over the purple-stained flap of a waistcoat, he bethought him of a night at Daly's, when, in returning thanks for his health, his shaking hand had spilled that identical glass of Burgundy; and in the dun-colored tinge of a hunting-coat he remembered the day he had plunged into the Nore at Corrig O'Neal, himself and the huntsman, alone of all the field, to follow the dogs!
“Take them away, Darby, take them away; they only set me a-thinking about the pleasant companions of my early life. It was in that suit there I moved the amendment in '82, when Henry Grattan crossed over and said, 'Barrington will lead us here, as he does in the hunting-field.' Do you see that peach-colored waistcoat? It was Lady Caher embroidered every stitch of it with her own hands, for me.”
“Them 's elegant black satin breeches,” said Darby, whose eyes of covetousness were actually rooted on the object of his desire.
“I never wore them,” said Barrington, with a sigh. “I got them for a duel with Mat Fortescue, but Sir Toby Blake shot him that morning. Poor Mat!”