Arrived at manhood, the future chieftain is duly installed in office according to the prevailing customs of the sept, and henceforth we find him performing all the duties appertaining to his high position, including his attendance at the triennial assembly of Tara, à propos to which we have an elaborate and highly interesting account of that historical gathering of all the estates of the kingdoms into which the island was then divided. A romantic adventure, ending in a love scene, of course, brings him among the Hooded people, the last remnant of those who, rejecting the teachings of St. Patrick and his disciples, continued to practise the Druidical rites in seclusion; and, as a consequence, we find a detailed description of the objects and forms of that extinct species of idolatry. The invasion itself, the first descent of the Northmen on the coast, successfully repulsed by O'Hea's forces, naturally leads to a disquisition on the gloomy superstition and uncouth manners of those terrible barbarians. Thus we find grouped together, gracefully and artistically, the leading historical features of the period, the old superstitions and the beneficent fruits of the new faith, the faults and follies, virtues and graces of the christianized Celts, contrasted with the physical prowess and ferocious temperament of the hordes who were so soon to deluge with blood, not only Erin, but the adjacent isles and the greater part of the coasts of Europe. Strange to say, the Invasion is the only Irish historical novel ever written, and, as Augustin Thierry was induced to write his celebrated history of the Norman Conquest of England by reading Scott's Ivanhoe, may we not hope that some present or future writer may be inspired by the Invasion to give us a detailed and intelligible account of the Danish wars in Ireland?
The Duke of Monmouth is also a historical novel, but more modern in its character and incidents. It is intended to describe the condition of the people of the rural districts in the west of England about the close of the seventeenth century; and the principal events upon which the story depends are the invasion of England by the ill-starred Duke of Monmouth, the illegitimate son of Charles II., during the reign of the latter's successor, the fatal battle of Sedgemoor, and the execution of the adventurer and his principal followers. The style is faultless, the prominent actors mostly taken from real life, though few are truthfully drawn. Still, we cannot but regret for the sake of poetical justice that Griffin chose this subject for a novel, from the fact that the truth of history compelled him to let the notorious Kirke, who figures so largely in his pages, go unwhipped of justice. The portrait of this infamous soldier, whose vices were proverbial, is thus briefly sketched:
"He beheld before him a man somewhat over the middle size, and rather spare than otherwise; his features not ill-looking, but marked by that expression of malign placidity which is no less characteristic of the genuine tyrant than all the ogre-like contortions and grimaces vulgarly associated with the idea of habitual cruelty. There was something like a smile upon his lips; but it was a smile that spoke not of benevolence of the heart, and held out no light of promise to the hope of the supplicant. His very courtesy, all easy as it was, seemed the refined dissimulation of a callous nature. There was a kind of sternness in his very courtliness of manner, a severity even in the smoothness and gentleness of his demeanor and discourse, that was more withering than the open violence of the unmasked and ruffian oppressor. At times, too, it was said he could be all the savage; but it was only when the security of his position afforded a free scope to license. His hair was already tinged with gray, though in so slight a degree as to be scarcely perceptible. His complexion had much of the sallowness, but little of the languor, usually acquired by long residence in tropical countries; and, as he stood glancing rapidly over the paper which he held in his hand, it might be judged from the keenness and concentration of his look that his mind, in like manner, had lost nothing of its activity beneath the enervating influence of an African sun."
Notwithstanding the fault referred to, the book is one that merits attention both as being the production of the author's more mature years and as furnishing us an insight into the modes of life, manner of living, and unreasonable preconceptions of politics and religion of the humbler classes of England at the period immediately preceding the downfall of the house of Stuart. The so-called reformation in that country, while it deprived the peasantry of all the attractions and consolations of true religion, as well as of the innocent sports and pastimes so much encouraged by the church, left nothing in their stead to lighten the heavy burden of labor save the sensual attractions of the ale-house, or the more invigorating, if more hazardous, luxury of rebellion. Deprived of the refuge always afforded by the eleemosynary institutions of the monks to the deserving needy and afflicted, the wants of the widow and the orphan were neglected, the poor became poorer and more discontented, and the nobles more haughty and overbearing. The reformers succeeded in unsettling the religious faith of the masses, as the wars of the Commonwealth destroyed their ideas of authority and obedience. Hence followed in rapid rotation the restoration of Charles II., the dethronement of James, the Scotch rebellions of 1715 and 1745, and many if not all the evils which have afflicted the people of Great Britain up to the present time—evils which have become so glaring that a thousand acts of parliament cannot hide them, and distress, ignorance, and its attendant vices, so gross and general as to be beyond the cure of the poor-house and the penitentiary. Considered in the aggregate, England is one of the wealthiest countries in the world. Individually, her people are the poorest in Christendom; for she contains within her boundaries a larger percentage of paupers and those who live by crime of various degrees than any civilized country on the face of the globe.
It was while in this transition state, from "merrie" England in Catholic times to her present anomalous condition, that the Duke of Monmouth, relying on the ignorance and anti-Catholic prejudices of the rustic population, resolved to dispute the possession of the throne with James II., whose only fault, in the eyes of his enemies at that time, was his desire to concede some degree of toleration to his dissenting and Catholic subjects. Monmouth's miserable failure is a matter of history; but in this book we have likewise a glimpse of the feeling of the people who followed his standard, and which afterward led to the elevation of William of Orange, and of the sentiments which actuated the British portion of that prince's army in his subsequent wars in the sister island. The author also gives a very just idea of Monmouth and his subordinate rebels. The duke himself is represented as possessing all those exterior graces which are said to have distinguished the Stuarts, with more than all their vices and instability of character—false to his friends, cringing to his enemies, superstitious without faith, and ambitious without the courage or capacity to command success. Fletcher, his chief counsellor and best officer, is a keen, hard-headed, but passionate Covenanter, a theoretical republican of the Roundhead school engrafted on the antique; Lord Grey and Ferguson are simply respectable adventurers, equally destitute of honesty or brains, and worthy instruments in so desperate an enterprise. In comparison with those men, the devotion of young Fullarton to a hopeless cause becomes less blamable; and even the ultra loyalty of the old cavalier, Captain Kingsly, is respectable.
In addition to what we have before remarked of the design of this work, there is a feature in its composition which by some readers may be considered a grave defect. The interest which surrounds the heroine, Aquila Fullarton, from the very beginning of the tale deepens by degrees until it becomes painfully intense, and the scene between her and Kirke, wherein that monster perpetrates one of the greatest crimes known to humanity, and she in consequence loses her reason, though founded on well-authenticated facts, and described with all the delicacy of diction possible, is almost too horrible to receive mention. The necessarily gloomy pages of the story are occasionally enlivened by the introduction of two Irish characters—brothers—Morty and Shamus Delaney, who, like so many of their countrymen, then and since, have left home to seek their fortunes, and find themselves in Taunton on the eve of the stirring events related in the novel. Morty, being of a practical turn of mind, forthwith enlists in "Kirke's Lambs;" but Shamus, whose tastes are also pugnacious, but whose ambition is to wear epaulettes, takes service on the other side, and raises a company of ragamuffins not unlike that which shamed the redoubtable Falstaff at Coventry. There are many exquisite bits of humor scattered through Griffin's works, which might be quoted as evincing his keen appreciation of the ludicrous; but we prefer to extract the following address of Captain Delaney to his command, for the benefit of our military readers who have neglected studying the articles of war. Shamus loquitur:
"'Well, I see ye're all here, exceptin' those that's absent. Well, then, fall in, fall in, an' much good may it do ye! An' now attind to my ordhers, an' mind 'em well. Every man is to fight, an' nobody is to run; that's plain enough. Secondly, any man that wants arms, is to fight hard for 'em first, an' to fight with 'em at his aise afther. Thirdly, any booty whatsomever that any o' ye may take in the war, such as goold rings, watches, sails, valuable clothing, an' the likes—but above all things, money—ye're to bring it all to me. Do you hear me?'
"'Ay, ay, ay!'
"'Very well. Because I'm captain, ye know, an' best judge how it ought to be divided. For it is one o' the maxims of war, that it's the part o' the common sodgers for to fight, an' for the ladin' officers for to have all the call to the booty an' the likes, how 'tis to be shared, an' what's to be done with it. Do ye hear?'
"'Ay, ay!'
"'An' if there's any thing that's very dangerous—certain death, for instance—as a place where one would be blown up, an' the likes, it's the custom o' war for the common sodgers to have it all to themselves, an' for the officer to give 'em ordhers for to face it, but to stay behind himself, bein' more valuable. Do ye hear?'
"'Ay, ay!'
"'An' if there be a scarcity o' food or clothin', or beddin', an' the likes, or a dale to do, sech as diggin' threnches an' the likes o' that, then it's the custom o' war for the officer to have the first o' the victuals an' things that way; but the sodgers is to have the first o' the labor always. Do ye understand?'
"'Ay, ay!'
"'Very well, why. Now, mind the word! Shoulder your picks! Quick, march!'"
Of Griffin's minor works, included under the titles of Tales of the Munster Festivals and Tales of my Neighborhood, the Rivals, Barber of Bantry, and Shuil Dhuv are decidedly the most entertaining. The latter particularly, though irregular in composition, is a story evincing great dramatic power and knowledge of the human heart. The dark-eyed hero, if such he may be called, who gives the title to the tale, stands out before us in all the enormity of his guilt as distinctly as if he had been an actual acquaintance, and we venture to say that there are few who have read the book but have experienced that feeling. In this story, also, Griffin departs from his usual custom of avoiding personal description of his female characters, and gives us an elaborate picture of his heroine, which, whether it be drawn from life or the creation of his own imagination, calls up before us an image of surpassing loveliness.
Griffin's other tales, such as the Half-Sir, Card-Drawing, and Tracey's Ambition, have all much merit, and, though not so prolonged as those we have mentioned, exhibit in a greater or lesser degree the skilful hand and rich imagination of the author. The Christian Physiologist, comprising a series of beautiful tales intended to illustrate the use and abuse of the senses, is worthy a place near the writings of that friend of childhood, Canon Schmidt.
As a poet, Griffin is remarkable for the beauty of his delineations of natural scenery, his elevation of sentiment and purity of conception. His lyrics remind us of Moore, and are scarcely inferior to some of the best of that immortal bard's in feeling and choiceness of metaphor; but being somewhat deficient in rhythm, they have never found much favor in the drawing or concert-room, "A Place in thy Memory, Dearest," "My Mary of the Curling Hair," and one or two others excepted. Many of his poems were from time to time contributed to the London journals, while he was yet a literary drudge in that city; others are to be found interspersed in his novels, and not a few were written to gratify his friends, and were first given to the public when his entire poetical works, as far as it was possible, were collected together in book-form, and now fill a large volume, not the least important of the present edition. We are not aware that he ever attempted an epic or any thing more extended than the beautiful ballad of Matt Hyland, of the merits of which we can only judge by the fragment which has been preserved, the original having been destroyed by the author immediately previous to his joining the order of Christian Brothers; nor do we think his ambition ever soared to higher flights than songs and short descriptive poems. The most meritorious of these, or, at least, the one which has obtained the greatest popularity, is the Sister of Charity, written on the occasion of a dear friend becoming a religious; and, though several gifted pens have been employed on the same subject, we know of none who has embodied so true an appreciation of the self-denial and entire devotion which mark that order—the boast and glory of all womanhood. Several of his best pieces, indeed, are written in the same devotional spirit, particularly the following verses, in illustration of a seal, representing a mariner on a tempestuous ocean who, reclining in his bark, fixes his eye on a distant star, with the motto—