I need not say that the remainder of his speech, being heard on all sides, became one universal shout of laughter, in which, to do him justice, the excellent Shave himself heartily joined. Scarcely were the sounds of mirth lulled into an apparent calm, when the door opened and the host and hostess appeared. Mrs. Blake advanced in all the plenitude of her charms, arrayed in crimson satin, sorely injured in its freshness by a patch of grease upon the front about the same size and shape as the continent of Europe in Arrowsmith’s Atlas. A swan’s-down tippet covered her shoulders; massive bracelets ornamented her wrists; while from her ears descended two Irish diamond ear-rings, rivalling in magnitude and value the glass pendants of a lustre. Her reception of her guests made ample amends, in warmth and cordiality, for any deficiency of elegance; and as she disposed her ample proportions upon the sofa, and looked around upon the company, she appeared the very impersonation of hospitality.
After several openings and shuttings of the drawing-room door, accompanied by the appearance of old Simon the butler, who counted the party at least five times before he was certain that the score was correct, dinner was at length announced. Now came a moment of difficulty, and one which, as testing Mr. Blake’s tact, he would gladly have seen devolve upon some other shoulders; for he well knew that the marshalling a room full of mandarins, blue, green, and yellow, was “cakes and gingerbread” to ushering a Galway party in to dinner.
First, then, was Mr. Miles Bodkin, whose grandfather would have been a lord if Cromwell had not hanged him one fine morning. Then Mrs. Mosey Blake’s first husband was promised the title of Kilmacud if it was ever restored; whereas Mrs. French of Knocktunmor’s mother was then at law for a title. And lastly, Mrs. Joe Burke was fourth cousin to Lord Clanricarde, as is or will be every Burke from this to the day of judgment. Now, luckily for her prospects, the lord was alive; and Mr. Blake, remembering a very sage adage about “dead lions,” etc., solved the difficulty at once by gracefully tucking the lady under his arm and leading the way. The others soon followed, the priest of Portumna and my unworthy self bringing up the rear.
When, many a year afterwards, the hard ground of a mountain bivouac, with its pitiful portion of pickled cork-tree yclept mess-beef, and that pyroligneous aquafortis they call corn-brandy have been my hard fare, I often looked back to that day’s dinner with a most heart-yearning sensation,—a turbot as big as the Waterloo shield, a sirloin that seemed cut from the sides of a rhinoceros, a sauce-boat that contained an oyster-bed. There was a turkey, which singly would have formed the main army of a French dinner, doing mere outpost duty, flanked by a picket of ham and a detached squadron of chickens carefully ambushed in a forest of greens; potatoes, not disguised à la maître d’hôtel and tortured to resemble bad macaroni, but piled like shot in an ordnance-yard, were posted at different quarters; while massive decanters of port and sherry stood proudly up like standard bearers amidst the goodly array. This was none of your austere “great dinners,” where a cold and chilling plateau of artificial nonsense cuts off one-half of the table from intercourse with the other; when whispered sentences constitute the conversation, and all the friendly recognition of wine-drinking, which renews acquaintance and cements an intimacy, is replaced by the ceremonious filling of your glass by a lackey; where smiles go current in lieu of kind speeches, and epigram and smartness form the substitute for the broad jest and merry story. Far from it. Here the company ate, drank, talked, laughed,—did all but sing, and certainly enjoyed themselves heartily. As for me, I was little more than a listener; and such was the crash of plates, the jingle of glasses, and the clatter of voices, that fragments only of what was passing around reached me, giving to the conversation of the party a character occasionally somewhat incongruous. Thus such sentences as the following ran foul of each other every instant:—
“No better land in Galway”—“where could you find such facilities”—“for shooting Mr. Jones on his way home”—“the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth”—“kiss”—“Miss Blake, she’s the girl with a foot and ankle”—“Daly has never had wool on his sheep”—“how could he”—“what does he pay for the mountain”—“four and tenpence a yard”—“not a penny less”—“all the cabbage-stalks and potato-skins”—“with some bog stuff through it”—“that’s the thing to”—“make soup, with a red herring in it instead of salt”—“and when he proposed for my niece, ma’am, says he”—“mix a strong tumbler, and I’ll make a shake-down for you on the floor”—“and may the Lord have mercy on your soul”—“and now, down the middle and up again”—“Captain Magan, my dear, he is the man”—“to shave a pig properly”—“it’s not money I’m looking for, says he, the girl of my heart”—“if she had not a wind-gall and two spavins”—“I’d have given her the rights of the church, of coorse,” said Father Roach, bringing up the rear of this ill-assorted jargon.
Such were the scattered links of conversation I was condemned to listen to, till a general rise on the part of the ladies left us alone to discuss our wine and enter in good earnest upon the more serious duties of the evening.
Scarcely was the door closed when one of the company, seizing the bell-rope, said, “With your leave, Blake, we’ll have the ‘dew’ now.”
“Good claret,—no better,” said another; “but it sits mighty cold on the stomach.”
“There’s nothing like the groceries, after all,—eh, Sir George?” said an old Galway squire to the English general, who acceded to the fact, which he understood in a very different sense.
“Oh, punch, you are my darlin’,” hummed another, as a large, square, half-gallon decanter of whiskey was placed on the table, the various decanters of wine being now ignominiously sent down to the end of the board without any evidence of regret on any face save Sir George Dashwood’s, who mixed his tumbler with a very rebellious conscience.