So fill to the brim, and here’s to him
Who’d drink in punch the Solway;
With debts galore, but fun far more—
Oh, that’s “the man for Galway!”
Charles Lever.
HOW CON CREGAN’S FATHER LEFT HIMSELF A BIT OF LAND.
I was born in a little cabin on the borders of Meath and King’s County; it stood on a small triangular bit of ground, beside a cross-road; and although the place was surveyed every ten years or so, they were never able to say to which county we belonged; there being just the same number of arguments for one side as for the other—a circumstance, many believed, that decided my father in his original choice of the residence; for while, under the “disputed boundary question,” he paid no rates or county cess, he always made a point of voting at both county elections. This may seem to indicate that my parent was of a naturally acute habit; and, indeed, the way he became possessed of the bit of ground will confirm that impression.
There was nobody of the rank of gentry in the parish, not even “squireen”; the richest being a farmer, a snug old fellow, one Harry McCabe, that had two sons, who were always fighting between themselves which was to have the old man’s money. Peter, the elder, doing everything to injure Mat, and Mat never backward in paying off the obligation. At last Mat, tired out in the struggle, resolved he would bear no more. He took leave of his father one night, and next day set off for Dublin, and listed in the “Buffs.” Three weeks after he sailed for India; and the old man, overwhelmed by grief, took to his bed, and never arose from it after. Not that his death was any way sudden, for he lingered on for months long; Peter always teasing him to make his will, and be revenged on “the dirty spalpeen” that disgraced the family, but old Harry as stoutly resisting, and declaring that whatever he owned should be fairly divided between them. These disputes between them were well known in the neighbourhood. Few of the country people passing the house at night but had overheard the old man’s weak, reedy voice, and Peter’s deep hoarse one, in altercation. When, at last—it was on a Sunday night—all was still and quiet in the house; not a word, not a footstep could be heard, no more than if it were uninhabited, the neighbours looked knowingly at each other, and wondered if the old man was worse—if he were dead!
It was a little after midnight that a knock came to the door of our cabin. I heard it first, for I used to sleep in a little snug basket near the fire; but I didn’t speak, for I was frightened. It was repeated still louder, and then came a cry—
“Con Cregan! Con, I say! open the door! I want you.”