After leaving Quinlan's, as detailed in a former chapter, O'Mahony and myself agreed to separate for a few days. No reward had then been offered for him, and my presence only impeded his movements. We crossed the river Suir, and remained most of the day in Coolnamuck wood. Toward evening I was conducted far into the county Waterford, where I was to remain until I heard what progress he was able to make. My host was the chief of one of the fierce factions of county Waterford, and bore many a mark of desperate fray. I do not remember having met any man, before or since, who felt so acutely the fate of the country. He procured the best fare he could, and prepared my bed with his own hands. After I retired to rest, he continued pacing the room for several hours, sometimes sighing deeply, sometimes muttering curses between his clenched teeth, and sometimes suggesting plans which he thought might be even then available and efficient to redeem the past. These plans were all of a character more or less desperate; but some were exceedingly ingenious. A truer type of a Celt could not easily be found; his very caution was stamped with vehemence.
Next day but one I proceeded to meet O'Mahony, to learn his success in his nocturnal interviews. I was unable to meet him; but encountered a faithful follower of Thomas Francis Meagher, who was the bearer of a message to the effect that if he could be prevailed upon to attempt escaping, means could be procured for him. I expressed at once my entire concurrence, and desired the messenger should return to say that on condition the same means would be made available for those who were not yet arrested, we would all gladly accept of them. I ventured into a house, where, in early life, I spent many a happy day. Those of the family whom I had known and loved, had passed out of the world. They were a brother and sister, the former educated for the Church, and the latter highly gifted and educated far above her condition. I never knew a woman, in any rank of life, of nobler character or a more heroic nature. She had the richest store of womanly tenderness and kindly affections. She took the veil at the Dungarvan Convent in very early youth, where she died two years afterwards. I asked for some food, and while it was being prepared I wrote the following lines on a blank leaf of a book belonging to my dead friend:—
Bliss to thy spirit, gentlest maid,
Fond, faithful and beloved; how oft,
Within the circle of this glowing glade,
Our mingling souls had soared aloft;
And wooed the knowledge of our destiny—
What is it? I a fugitive, and thou on high.
Yet hopeless of the land I'd save,
Nay, spurned by those for whom I'd die,
Unknown where your fond welcome gave,
There's still a throb of ecstasy.
Even though the latest I may feel on earth.
In lingering o'er the scene where thou hadst birth.
Where wrapt by evening's crimson flush,
We hoped, and felt, and breathed together,
Beside the broad Suir's silent gush,
Or resting on yon mountain heather;
And dared to look beyond the narrow span,
That circumscribed the hope of man.
How sweet, if from the blessed spheres,
Thou didst bestow one look of love,
To cheer the hearts and dry the tears
Of those whose only hope's above;
And win, beloved one, from the throne of light,
One saving ray for our long slavery's night.
Or if this may not be, and yet
Her old doom clings unto the land;
If on her brow the brand be set,
And she must bear the chastening hand
For longer years, O grant, sweet saint, to me,
To die as if my arm had made her free.
GLENN, August 3, 1848.
I left Glenn next morning, with still some hope remaining, and sought out my friend to learn his success and prospects. He came, according to appointment, to a farmer's house in the direction of Rathgormack, bringing with him James Stephens, who was destined to be thenceforth the companion of my wanderings, privations and dangers. He detailed to us, nearly as I have repeated it, the affair at Ballingarry. When he reached the village of Urlingford, he found some difficulty in escaping from the very men he hoped to lead back to the conflict. After vainly making every effort first to urge them on, and secondly to satisfy them of his own identity, he travelled a distance of thirty miles, and took shelter in the house of a private friend, where he hoped he could remain until something definite would be known of his comrades' fate. That his stay was not of long duration, his appearance with us on Thursday, forty miles from the place of his concealment, amply testifies. That distance he travelled on foot on the preceding day, after having slept a night with a drunken man in a brake. He was even more averse than we were to giving up the struggle, and it was agreed on finally that he should be allowed to rest in a place of safety; that the messenger who had come from Mr. Meagher's friend should be despatched with my proposal, and meantime, that I should betake me to the Comeragh mountains in search of Mr. Meagher, while our other comrade should make a final effort to rally the remaining strength of the people. We would then be in a position to determine finally what we should do. Stephens and myself proceeded together as far as my former host's in the mountains, where I left him, and continued my route as far as the Comeraghs, I rested that evening at a place called Sradavalla, and early next day recommenced my search around and over the mountains. After crossing several minor hills, I ascended the summit of the Comeragh, called Cuimshinane, which commands a prospect of nearly the whole counties of Waterford and Kilkenny, with a great part of Tipperary. That prospect was at once grand, beautiful and mournful. The corn crop began to be tinged with coming ripeness; but the potato was blighted, and presented a spectacle as black and dismal as the country's hopes. This widespread ruin was the dread work of an hour. On the morning, when Mr. O'Brien appeared in Carrick, that crop was the most abundant, promising and healthy that had been seen for years. Then it appeared from sea to sea one mass of unvaried rottenness and decay. Notwithstanding this, I spent hours looking down on the landscape, and mourning more over the mental and moral blight, which shed its influence on the public heart, than the plague spot whose dark circumference embraced the circle of the island. From heat, fatigue and the effects of weak food, I discharged my stomach more than once, while descending the ranges of the Comeraghs. I again took up my station for the night at the village of Sradavalla. It was deemed prudent I should not sleep in the same house as on the previous night, and about eleven o'clock, accompanied by five or six men of the village, I proceeded to a house farther up the mountain. Here the accommodation was not such as we expected, and we were forced to return. On our arrival, I found my sister-in-law who was escorted by two boatmen from Carrick-on-Suir, and who reached this wild sequestered and almost inaccessible mountain village, after a journey of fifty miles. A sad change had come over our circumstances since last we parted. My hopes were then nearly a conviction, and I went on my way not alone without remonstrance or regret on her part, but with intense encouragement. She had heard of Mr. O'Brien's disaster, and a rumour of his arrest, had witnessed the prostration of the people, had heard I had means of escape proposed for me, and came with what money could be provided. We spent that night together at the house of a woman who had been lately confined. She endeavoured to provide tea and eggs, and we enjoyed our supper with as keen a relish and as high a zest as possible. I learned that Meagher was in the other extremity of the county Tipperary, and she undertook to convey my message to his friend a second time, while his faithful scout would endeavour to discover his retreat, and induce him to join us. She departed on her mission, having to walk ten miles over the mountain roads. I returned to the place where I parted from Stephens, whom I found greatly recovered. We remained that night at the house of his entertainer, where we were joined the following morning by O'Mahony. We spent the three succeeding days in and about the woods at Coolnamuck. Three more anxious days and nights never darkened the destiny of baffled rebels. Every morning arose upon a new hope which was blasted ere night came on by some sad intelligence. The news that reached us was partly true and partly false: of the former character was the account of our beloved chief's arrest, which took place on the evening of Sunday, the 6th of August. In proportion as it nerved our purpose and urged us to desperation, did that fatal information scatter the agencies on which we were to depend. The most desperate hazards would be readily undertaken in that hour of gloom. One more effort we decided on, and the experiment was to be tried the next night. We heard Mr. Meagher also was arrested, and we resolved, in order to satisfy ourselves of the correctness of this and other reports, to put ourselves in direct communication with some person in the town of Clonmel. We accordingly proceeded to the neighbourhood of that town, within a mile of which, at the Waterford side, we established ourselves, and remained two days. Each day we sent in a messenger who brought us correct intelligence of what occurred; and satisfied us not alone that Mr. O'Brien was then in gaol, but that he was allowed to be torn from the midst of a people for whom he had perilled his life, without a hand being raised in his defence. We then returned to the scene of our former meetings, and met, for the last time, beside a little brook near the Waterford slate-quarries. My ambassadress had also returned, and there were present three or four others. The reunion was gloomy. But one question remained for discussion: Was there any hope left? The message I received as to the means of escape was dark and discouraging. Nothing remained but the hazards of some desperate enterprise. What had chiefly animated our hopes for the few days was the knowledge that disaffection and conspiracy existed in the ranks of the British army. But among other intelligence of evil omen that reached us was this, that the conspiracy had been discovered. Whether this were true or not, our means of communication were suspended; and, unable to learn what had occurred, we naturally concluded it was the worst. It is not quite correct to say, we, as far as the proceedings of these days in that neighbourhood were concerned. Neither Stephens nor myself was in communication with more than the one friend, to whose honour and heroism we would commit the liberty of the world. Never yet lived a man of more sanguine hope or intense patriotism. All the vigour of a gigantic intellect, aided by the endurance of great physical strength was tasked to the uttermost in attempting to rouse the broken energies of the country. He generally spent his nights in interviews with the chief men of the surrounding districts, while his duty by day was to communicate the result to us, and secure a place of safety for the ensuing night. Our last conference was of course the longest and most anxious. There was no chance within the range of possibility we did not discuss. Of the intensity of our feelings, some idea may be formed by the fact, that the one woman who was of the party, whose sole stay on this earth I was, as well as the sole stay of her sister and a most helpless little family, never uttered one word of remonstrance against any project, however desperate, which was proposed. We concluded an interview of several hours, by referring the entire question to the sole decision of our friend. After a short silence, during which the agony of his mind was extreme, he solemnly advised and adjured us to provide as best we could for our own safety, while he, who was not so deeply compromised, would maintain his position, and still struggle against our common destiny. If he succeeded, and that we had not left the country, we could return. But to advise us to continue in our then position where an iron circle was closing around us, relying on the slender chances that then presented themselves, involved a responsibility which would be no longer endurable. We then partook of a comfortable dinner which he had provided, and parted with sad hearts.