David Barry and his seven brothers lived with M’Adam, and were of his own name and race; and whether he enjoyed the sport of the chase, or took the diversion of shooting, or moved among the high and titled of the land, they always accompanied him, and formed a sort of body-guard, to share his sports or assert his quarrels. At that time, on the banks of the Bride, near the ruined tower of Shanacloch, lived a man named Edmund Barry. A thick and briary covert on his farm had been for many years the haunt of a fox celebrated all over the south of Ireland for the extraordinary speed and prowess he evinced in the many attempts made to hunt him down. Many gallant and noble huntsmen sought the honour of bearing home his brush, but in vain; and it was a remarkable fact, that after tiring out both hounds and horses in the arduous pursuit, and though his flight might extend over a considerable part of the province, he invariably returned at night to his favourite covert. A treaty of peace, it would seem, had been tacitly instituted between Edmund Barry and the fox. Barry’s poultry for a series of years, whether they sought the banks of the Bride or the neighbourhood of the barn door, never suffered by the dangerous vicinity: Reynard would mix with Barry’s dogs and spend an hour of social intercourse with them, as familiarly as if he belonged to the same species; and Barry gave his wild crafty friend the same protection and licence that he permitted his own domestic curs. The fame of this strange union of interests was well known; and to this day the memory of Barry’s madra roc survives in the traditions of the country.
One evening as M’Adam and his train returned from a long and unsuccessful chase of Edmund Barry’s fox, their route lay by the ruins of the ancient church of Kildinan; near this sacred spot a whitethorn tree had stood, and its beauty and bloom were the theme of every tongue. The simple devotee who poured his orisons to God beneath its holy shade believed that the hands of guardian spirits pruned its luxuriance and developed its form of beauty—that dews from heaven were sprinkled by angel hands to produce its rich and beautiful blossoms, which, like those of the thorn of Glastonbury, loaded the black winds of December with many a token of holy fragrance, in welcome of the heavenly advent of Him who left his Father’s throne to restore to the sons of Adam the lost inheritance of heaven. M’Adam was charmed with the beauty of the tree, and little regarding the sanctity or the superstitious awe attached to its character, was resolved to transfer it to Lisnegar, that his lawn might possess that rare species of thorn which blooms in beauty when all its sisters of the field are bare and barren.
Next day, when M’Adam signified his intention of removing the whitethorn of Kildinan, his people stood aghast at his impiety, and one and all declared they would suffer a thousand deaths rather than perpetrate so audacious a sacrilege. Now, M’Adam was a man of high blood and haughty bearing, and accustomed at all times to the most rigid enforcement of his commands. When he found his men unhesitatingly refuse to obey him, his anger sent the glow of resentment to flush his cheek; he spurned the earth in a paroxysm of rage, exclaiming, ‘Varlets! of all that have eaten the bread of M’Adam, and reposed under the shadow of his protection, are there none free from the trammels of superstitious folly, to execute his commands?’
‘Here are seven of your own name and race,’ cried David Barry, ‘men sworn to stand and fall together, who obey no commands but yours, and acknowledge no law but your will. The whitethorn of Kildinan shall leave its sacred tenement, if strong hands and brave hearts can effect its removal. If it be profanation to disturb the tree which generations have reverenced, the curse for sacrilege rests not with us: and did M’Adam command us to tear the blessed gold from the shrine of a saint, we would not hesitate to obey—we were but executing the will of our legal chief.’
Such was the flattering unction which the retainers of M’Adam applied to their souls, as they proceeded to desecrate the spot hallowed by the reverence of ages, and around whose holy thorn superstition had drawn a mystic circle, within whose limit human foot may not intrude. Men have not yet forgotten this lesson of the feudal school; the sack of cities, the shrieks of women, the slaughter of thousands, are yet perpetrated without ruth or remorse in obedience to superior command, and the sublime Te Deum swells to consecrate the savage atrocity.
On that evening M’Adam saw the beautiful whitethorn planted in his lawn, and many were the thanks and high the reward of the faithful few who rose superior to the terrors of superstition in the execution of his commands. But his surprise was great when David Barry broke in upon his morning’s repose, to announce that the tree had disappeared during the night, and was again planted where it had stood for ages before, in the ancient cemetery of Kildinan. M’Adam, conjecturing that this object of the people’s veneration had been secretly conveyed by them during the night to its former abode, dispatched his retainers again to fetch it, with strict injunctions to lie in watch around it till morning. The brothers, obedient to the call of their chief, brought the whitethorn back, and having supported its stem, and carefully covered its roots with rich mould, after the most approved method of planting, prepared to watch round it all night, under the bare canopy of heaven. The night was long and dark, and their eyes sleepless; the night-breeze had sunk to repose, and all nature seemed hushed in mysterious awe. A deep and undefinable feeling of dread stole over the hearts of the midnight watchers; and they who could have rejoiced in the din of battle, were appalled by this fearful calm. Obedience to the commands of M’Adam could not steel their bosoms against the goadings of remorse, and the ill-suppressed murmur rose against their sacrilegious chief. As the night advanced, impelled by some strange fear, they extended their circle round the mysterious tree. At length David, the eldest and bravest of the brothers, fell asleep. His short and fitful snatches of repose were disturbed by wild and indistinct dreams; but as his slumbers settled, those vague images passed away, and the following vision was presented to the sleeper’s imagination:—
He dreamt that as he was keeping watch where he lay, by the blessed thorn of Kildinan, there stood before him a venerable man; his radiant features and shining vesture lighted all the space around, and pierced awful and far into the surrounding darkness. His hand held a crosier; his head was crowned with a towering mitre; his white beard descended to the girdle that encircled his rich pontificals; and he looked, in his embroidered ‘sandal shoon’ and gorgeous array, the mitred abbot of some ancient monastery, which the holy rage of the Saxon reformation had levelled in the dust. But the visage of the sainted man was fearfully severe in its expression, and the sleeping mortal fell prostrate before the unearthly eye that sent its piercing regards to search his inmost soul.
‘Wretch,’ said the shining apparition, in a voice of thunder, ‘raise thy head and hear thy doom, and that of thy sacrilegious brothers.’
Barry did raise his head in obedience to the terrific mandate, though his soul sank within him, before his dreadful voice and eye of terror.