“Arrah! Counsellor,” said the boatman, “don’t be going on praying that side, if you plase; sure it’s the other lad you ought to be praying to.”
“What lad do you mean?” said Colclough with alarm.
“What lad! why, Counsellor, the old people always say, that the devil takes care of his own; and if you don’t vex him by praying the other way, I really think, Counsellor, we have a pretty safe cargo aboard at this present passage.”
The friend I alluded to, whose wit and pencil were always ready, immediately placed Cæsar in a much more classical point of view. Though he made him a downright idolater, yet he put him on a level with a mighty hero, or emperor—writing upon the back of a letter thus:
While meaner souls the tempest kept in awe,
Intrepid Colclough, crossing Ballinlaw,
Cried to the sailors (shivering in their rags)
You carry Cæsar and his saddle-bags!
Little did Julius Cæsar foresee before the birth of Christ that the first man at the Irish bar would, near two thousand years afterward, call to mind his exploits in Gaul on the waves of Ballinlaw, in the roaring of a hurricane. Should I meet him hereafter, I shall certainly tell him the anecdote.