I had longed for such an event with an intensity of feeling not to be described; nay, I had often enjoyed anticipated exultation from indulging in a vague dream of its bare possibility, which absorbed all the gloom and horror of my situation. Yet when I stepped securely on what, to me, was hallowed ground, an adequate appreciation of the circumstance was far from realised in my feelings. New sights and sounds began to share my thoughts and engross my comprehension. In a moment the past vanished, with all its disquietude and alarm; and I entered on the new scene with a taste akin to the appetite of a convalescent. If I felt any deep emotion, it was only when my mind recurred to the fate of my comrades, or the feelings of joy with which my family would learn the tidings of my safety. We left our baggage at the Custom house—mine consisted of a pair of boots stowed away in a rather capacious valise—handed the keys, in due form, to the commissionaire of police, and directed them to be sent after us to our hotel. A commissionaire, so they call themselves, appeared in the morning with the keys, which he handed us bowing, adding that all was right.
There was a fete at Boulogne. Nothing was to be seen but glittering bayonets, and nothing to be heard but the harsh monotonous sound of the drum. Flags floated in the breeze, and cheers echoed from the distant hills, and everything proclaimed the festivity of liberty. It was a grand sight, and yet a sad one for me. I could not help contrasting with the scene before me the fate of my own unfortunate country. At ten o'clock we were on our way to Paris.
Such was the anxiety with which I gazed on the glad face of that sunny land during the entire of the journey that I could at this moment recognise every object that attracted my attention. But the scope of this narrative, now drawing rapidly to a close, does not embrace a description of France or Paris. Many pens have plied the task, and were mine more adequate than any, it were unfit to interweave so bright a theme with the gloomy details of this mournful history.
There remains to be told but one incident. On our arrival at the Paris terminus, we got into an English omnibus which brought us to an English hotel—the Hotel de Louvre in the Rue St. Thomas. There we dined together, some dozen or so of the passengers. After dinner my friend and I had champagne. While discussing its merits the conversation turned on Ireland. Opinions, of course, varied. Mine, it need scarcely be added, to an Englishman's ear sounded bloodily, and I urged them with the vehemence of baffled hope. An old English gentleman of that quiet school which affects liberality and moderation, but entertains deepest animosity, deprecated the violence of my language and sentiments, and expressed his painful astonishment at hearing such opinions from the mouth of a clergyman; "They would not be unbecoming," added he, with great bitterness of tone, "in that sanguinary brigand, Doheny." Involuntarily and simultaneously my friend and myself burst into an immoderate fit of laughter, The gentleman could not at all comprehend our mirth. He had, he thought, delivered himself of very sound and very gentlemanly philosophy, and he was really shocked to find it had made an impression so different from what he had expected. He had travelled much, he said, and met men of many lands, of whom Irishmen were ever the most polite and best bred gentlemen; a fact which rendered our laughing in his face rather inexplicable. The conversation was again resumed and again waxed warm. I expressed my opinion of English paupers in Ireland, and said they ought to be transported in a convict ship back to Liverpool, in the same fashion as Irish paupers of a different class are transmitted to Dublin by the Liverpool guardians. To this he replied by saying that there would be no peace in Ireland until the Mitchels and Dohenys were hanged, a fate which the latter was hastening to with irresistible impetus. At this self-satisfied prophecy we laughed louder than before, whereupon he waxed wrathful, and repeating his experience of the world in general, and of Irishmen in particular, demanded an explanation of the laugh. I said, "That is a straightforward question, and demands a direct answer. It shall be given, although you have refused to answer, as all Englishmen of your class invariably do, to several direct questions which I have put to you. I laughed because I am that same sanguinary Doheny": and pulling off my wig, I added, "Me voila at your service." The sudden appearance of him who answered the incantations of the weird sisters could not produce a greater panic. Chairs tumbled in every direction, and their occupiers fled the room, leaving myself and my friend ample space to enjoy the joke and the champagne in undisturbed quiet.
I have nothing further to relate in connection with myself. Paris appeared to me clothed with a grandeur, a glory, and a beauty, infinitely surpassing every description of them I had ever read or heard. Standing in any commanding spot surrounded by the monuments of her splendour and magnificence, upon each of which the genius of the land shed its immortal lustre, one feels coerced to the conviction that the high command and abiding destiny of France must be equally imperishable. But these considerations belong not to my story, and I renounce the idea of commemorating the sensations of gratified pride which that gorgeous capital awakened in my bosom. Her architecture and her art, her memorials of glory, and the triumphs of her progress, require to be scanned by the eye and portrayed by the ability of artistic genius. I must content myself with preserving a delighted recollection of the French metropolis which no scene or circumstance, possible in life can ever efface. The companion of all my hazards in Ireland, whom I again joined in Paris, more than shared my enthusiasm. He spent all his days wandering among the galleries of the Louvre or the statues of Versailles, forgetting in the sublime presence of their unmatched chefs d'ouvres all the shame and perils of the past. I hope he may be induced to give the result of his long examinations and fond reveries to the public.
FOOTNOTES:
[12] "Alice and Uua."
[13] This may be a harsh and unjust opinion; if so, no one could regret it more than myself. In any case I wish to disclaim the idea of making a charge against the body of the Roman Catholic clergy, to some of whose members it applies. I yet fully believe that the great majority of the priesthood would willingly die with the rest of their countrymen in struggling for the liberty of their common home. Even of those who acted against us with such deadly success, I am sure some were influenced by pure and honourable motives: there were others, however, whose conduct the noblest motives would fail to justify, or even extenuate.
[14] I hope my friend "Desmond" (a true poet and genuine Irishman, whom God long preserve) will allow me to borrow his "graceful spirit people" to elevate to poetical dignity the otherwise unattractive and straggling waters of Lough Lua. It is near the lone and lovely passes of Ceimeneagh, which his genius has invested with graceful immortality, and his
"Children of the earth and sea."