To his right lies Bantry Bay, that now is spreading itself out in all its glory to catch the delicate hues of the sky above. They rush to greet it, and, sinking deep down into its watery embrace, lie there all day rocked to and fro by the restless ocean.
From the hills the scent of the heather is wafted towards him, filling him with a subtle keen sense of youth and gladness and the absolute joy of living. His good dog is at his heels; a boy—procured from some neighboring cabin, and warranted not to wear out, however long the journey to be undertaken or how many miles to travel—carries his bag beside him.
Game as yet is not exactly plentiful: neither yesterday nor the day before could it be said that birds flock to his gun; there is, indeed, a settled uncertainty as to whether one may or may not have a good day's sport. And yet perhaps this very uncertainty gives an additional excitement to the game.
Here and there a pack is discovered, so unexpectedly as to be doubly welcome. And sometimes a friendly native will tell him of some quiet corner where "his honor" will surely find some birds, "an be able in the evenin' to show raison for his blazin'." It is a somewhat wild life, but a pleasant one, and perhaps, on the whole, Mr. Rodney finds Ireland an agreeable take-in, and the inhabitants of it by no means as eccentric or as bloodthirsty as he has been led to believe. He has read innumerable works on the Irish peasantry, calculated to raise laughter in the breasts of those who claim the Emerald Isle as their own,—works written by people who have never seen Ireland, or, having seen it, have thought it a pity to destroy the glamour time has thrown over it, and so reduce it to commonplaceness.
He is, for instance, surprised, and indeed somewhat relieved, when he discovers that the drivers of the jaunting-cars that take him on his shooting-expeditions are not all modern Joe Millers, and do not let off witty remarks, like bombshells, every two minutes.
He is perhaps disappointed in that every Irish cloak does not conceal a face beautiful as a houri's. And he learns by degrees that only one in ten says "bedad," and that "och murther?" is an expression almost extinct.
They appear a kindly, gentle, good-humored people,—easily led, no doubt (which is their undoing), but generous to the heart's core; a people who can speak English fluently (though with a rich brogue) and more grammatically than the Sassenachs themselves (of their own class), inasmuch as they respect their aspirates and never put an h in or leave one out in the wrong place.
The typical Irishman, in whom Lever delighted, with his knee-breeches and long-tailed coat, his pig under one arm and his shillalah under the other, is literally nowhere! The caubeen and the dhudheen which we are always hearing about may indeed be seen, but they are very usual objects in all lands, if one just alters the names, and scarcely create astonishment in the eyes of the on-looker.
The dhudheen is an institution, no doubt, but the owner of it, as a rule, is not to be found seated on a five-barred gate, with a shamrock pinned in his hat and a straw in his mouth, singing "Rory O'More" or "Paddy O'Rafferty," as the case may be. On the contrary, poor soul, he is found by Geoffrey either digging up his potatoes or stocking his turf for winter use.
Altogether, things are very disappointing; though perhaps there is comfort in the thought that no one is waiting round a corner, or lying perdu in a ditch, ready to smash the first comer with a blackthorn stick, or reduce him to submission with a pike, irrespective of cause or reason.