“' King James he pitched his tents between
Their lines for to retire,' &c., &c.
“And so they departed, very much to the satisfaction of Eliza and Boots, who were both obliged to sit up until his departure, although fatigued with a long day's hard and incessant labor. I also retired to my pillow, where I lay for a considerable time reflecting on the occurrences of the night, and the ease with which an ingenious hypocrite may turn the forms, but not the spirit of religion, to the worst and most iniquitous purpose.”
And thus far our friend, Mr. Easel, whom we leave to follow up his examinations into the state of the Castle Cumber property, and its management, hoping that discoveries and disclosures may at some future day be of service to the tenantry on that fine estate, as well as to the country at large. In the meantime, we beg our readers to accompany us to the scene of many an act of gross corruption, where jobs, and jobbing, and selfishness in their worst shapes, aided by knavery, fraud, bigotry, party rancor, personal hate, and revenge long cherished—where active loyalty and high political Protestantism, assuming the name of religion, and all the other passions and prejudices that have been suffered to scourge the country so long—have often been in full operation, without check, restraint, or any wholesome responsibility, that might, or could, or ought to have protected the property of the people from rapine, and their persons from oppression. The scene we allude to is the Grand Jury Room of Castle Cumber.
CHAPTER XXI.—Darby's Piety Rewarded
—A Protestant Charger, with his Precious Burthen—A Disaffected Hack supporting a Pillar of the Church—A Political and Religious Discussion in a Friendly Way
The Assizes had now arrived, and the Grand Panel of the county met once more to transact their fiscal and criminal business. We omit the grand entry of the Judges, escorted, as they were, by a large military guard, and the posse comitatus of the county, not omitting to mention a goodly and imposing array of the gentry and squirearchy of the immediate and surrounding districts, many of Whom were pranked out in all the grandeur of their Orange robes. As, however, we are only yet upon our way there, we beg you to direct your attention to two gentlemen dressed in black, and mounted each in a peculiar and characteristic manner. One of them is a large, bloated, but rather handsome, and decidedly aristocratic looking man, with a vermilion face, mounted upon a splendid charger, whose blood and action must have been trained to that kind of subdued but elegant bearing that would seem to indicate, upon the part of the animal, a consciousness that he too owed a duty to the Church and Constitution, and had a just right to come within the category of a staunch and loyal Protestant horse, as being entrusted with the life, virtues, and dignity of no less a person than the Rev. Phineas Lucre—all of which are now on his back assembled, as they always are, in that reverend gentleman's precious person. Here we account at once for the animal's cautious sobriety of step, and pride and dignity of action, together with his devoted attachment to the Church and Constitution by which he lived, and owing to which he wore a coat quite as sleek, but by no means so black as his master's. The gentleman by whom he appears to be accompanied, much—if we can judge by their motions—against his will, seems to be quite as strongly contrasted to him, as the rough undressed hack upon which he is mounted is to the sanctified and aristocratic nag that is honored by bearing the Rev. Phineas Lucre. The hack in question is, nevertheless, a stout and desperate looking varmint, with a red vindictive eye, moving, ill-tempered ears, and a tail that seems to be the seat of intellect, if a person is to take its quick and furious whisking as being given in reply to Mr. Lucre's observations, or by way of corroboration of the truth uttered by the huge and able-bodied individual who is astride of him. That individual is no other than the Rev. Father M'Cabe, who is dressed in a coat and waistcoat of coarse black broadcloth, somewhat worse for the wear, a pair of black breeches, deprived of their original gloss, and a pair of boots well greased with honest hog's lard—the fact being, that the wonderful discovery of Day and Martin had not then come to light. Mr. M'Cabe has clearly an unsettled and dissatisfied seat, and does not sit his horse with the ease and dignity of his companion. In fact, he feels that matters are not proceeding as he could wish, neither does the hack at all appear to bear cordiality or affection to the state which keeps him on such short commons. They are, by no means, either of them in a state of peace or patience with the powers that be, and when the priest, at the conclusion of every sentence, gives the garran an angry dash of the spurs, as much as to say, was not that observation right, no man could mistake the venomous spirit in which the tail is whisked, and the head shaken, in reply.
It is scarcely necessary to say that either Mr. Lucre or Mr. M'Cabe were at all upon terms of intimacy. Mr. M'Cabe considered Mr. Lucre as a wealthy epicure, fat and heretical; whilst Mr. Lucre looked upon Father McCabe as vulgar and idolatrous. It was impossible, in fact, that with such an opinion of each other, they could for a moment agree in anything, or meet as men qualified by the virtues of their station to discharge on any one duty in common. On the day in question, Mr. Lucre was riding towards Castle Cumber, with the pious intention of getting Darby O'Drive's appointment to the under jailorship confirmed. This was one motive, but there was another still stronger, which was, to have an interview with the leading men of the Grand Jury, for the purpose of getting a new road run past his Glebe House, in the first place, and, in the next, to secure a good job for himself, as a magistrate. At all events he was proceeding towards Castle Cumber, apparently engaged in the contemplation of some important subject, but whether it was the new road to his glebe, or the old one to heaven, is beyond our penetration to determine. Be this as it may, such was his abstraction, that he noticed not the Rev. Father M'Cabe, who had ridden for some time along with him, until that gentleman thought proper to break the ice of ceremony, and address him.
“Sir, your most obedient,” said the priest; “excuse my freedom—I am the Rev. Mr. M'Cabe, Catholic Curate of Castle Cumber; but as I reside in the parish it is very possible you don't know me.”