Having pledged ourselves to secrecy and a becoming seriousness, O’Leary began his story as follows:—
CHAPTER XXXIII.
MR. O’LEARY’S FIRST LOVE.
“It was during the vice-royalty of the late Duke of Richmond that the incidents I am about to mention took place. That was a few years since, and I was rather younger, and a little more particular about my dress than at present.” Here the little man cast an eye of stoical satisfaction upon his uncouth habiliments, that nearly made us forget our compact, and laugh outright. “Well, in those wild and headstrong days of youthful ardour, I fell in love—desperately in love—and as always is, I believe, the case with our early experiments in that unfortunate passion, the object of my affection was in every way unsuited to me. She was a tall, dark-haired, dark-eyed maiden, with a romantic imagination, and a kind of a half-crazed poetic fervour, that often made me fear for her intellect. I’m a short, rather fat—I was always given this way”—here he patted a waistcoat that would fit Dame Lambert—“happy-minded little fellow, that liked my supper of oysters at the Pigeon-house, and my other creature-comforts, and hated every thing that excited or put one out of one’s way, just as I would have hated a blister. Then, the devil would have it—for as certainly as marriages are made in heaven, flirtations have something to say to the other place—that I should fall most irretrievably in love with Lady Agnes Moreton. Bless my soul, it absolutely puts me in a perspiration this hot day, just to think over all I went through on her account; for, strange to say, the more I appeared to prosper in her good graces, the more did she exact on my part; the pursuit was like Jacob’s ladder—if it did lead to heaven it was certainly an awfully long journey, and very hard on one’s legs. There was not an amusement she could think of, no matter how unsuited to my tastes or my abilities, that she did not immediately take a violent fancy to; and then there was no escaping, and I was at once obliged to go with the tide, and heaven knows if it would not have carried me to my grave if it were not for the fortunate (I now call it) accident that broke off the affair for ever. One time she took a fancy for yachting, and all the danglers about her—and she always had a cordon of them—young aides-de-camp of her father the general, and idle hussars, in clanking sabertasches and most absurd mustachios—all approved of the taste, and so kept filling her mind with anecdotes of corsairs and smugglers, that at last nothing would satisfy her till I—I who always would rather have waited for low water, and waded the Liffey in all its black mud, than cross over in the ferry-boat, for fear of sickness—I was obliged to put an advertisement in the newspaper for a pleasure-boat, and, before three weeks, saw myself owner of a clinker-built schooner, of forty-eight tons, that by some mockery of fortune was called ‘The Delight.’ I wish you saw me, as you might have done every morning for about a month, as I stood on the Custom-house quay, giving orders for the outfit of the little craft. At first, as she bobbed and pitched with the flood-tide, I used to be a little giddy and rather qualmish, but at last I learned to look on without my head reeling. I began to fancy myself very much of a sailor, a delusion considerably encouraged by a huge P. jacket and a sou’-wester, both of which, though it was in the dog-days, Agnes insisted upon my wearing, saying I looked more like Dirk Hatteraick, who, I understood, was one of her favourite heroes in Walter Scott. In fact, after she suggested this, she and all her friends called me nothing but Dirk.
“Well, at last, after heaven knows how many excuses on my part, and entreaties for delay, a day was appointed for our first excursion. I shall never forget that day—the entire night before it I did not close my eyes; the skipper had told me in his confounded sea-jargon, that if the wind was in one quarter we should have a short tossing sea; and if in another a long rolling swell; and if in a third, a happy union of both—in fact, he made it out that it could not possibly blow right, an opinion I most heartily coincided in, and most devoutly did I pray for a calm, that would not permit of our stirring from our moorings, and thus mar our projected party of pleasure. My prayer was unheard, but my hopes rose on the other hand, for it blew tremendously during the entire night, and although there was a lull towards morning, the sea, even in the river, was considerable.
“I had just come to the conclusion that I was safe for this time, when the steward poked his head into the room and said,
“‘Mr. Brail wishes to know, sir, if he’ll bend the new mainsail to-day, as it’s blowing rather fresh, and he thinks the spars light.’
“‘Why the devil take him, he would not have us go out in a hurricane; surely, Pipes, we could not take out ladies to-day?’
“‘O, bless your heart, yes, sir; it blows a bit to be sure, but she’s a good sea-boat, and we can run for Arklow or the Hook, if it comes fresher.’
“‘Oh, nonsense, there’s no pleasure in that; besides I’m sure they won’t like it—the ladies won’t venture, you’ll see.’
“‘Ay sir, but they’re all on board already: there’s eight ladies in the cabin, and six on deck, and as many hampers of victuals and as much crockery as if we were a-goin’ to Madeira. Captain Grantham, sir, the soldier officer, with the big beard, is a mixing punch in the grog-tub.’