“Is that your last detarmination?” said Darby.
“No doubt of it,” replied the priest; “my last, and I'll stick to it till I see you a different scoundrel from what you are.”
“Ay,” replied Darby; “then, upon my sowl, you're all of a kidney—all jack fellow like—an' divil rasave the dacent creed among you, barrin' the Quakers, and may heaven have a hand in me, but I think I was born to be a Quaker, or, any way, a Methodist. I wish to God I understood praichin'—at aitin' the bacon and fowl I am as good a Methodist as any of them—but, be me sowl, as I don't understand praichin', I'll stick to the Quakers, for when a man praiches there, all he has to do is to say nothing.” Having uttered these sentiments in a kind of soliloquy, Darby, after having given the priest a very significant look, took his departure.
“Well,” said he to himself, “if the Quakers, bad luck to them, won't take me, I know what I'll do—upon my conscience, I'll set up a new religion for myself, and sure I have as good a right to bring out a new religion myself, as many that done so. Who knows but I may have a congregation of my own yet, and troth it may aisily be as respectable as some o' them. But sure I can't be at a loss, for, plaise God, if all fails, I can go to Oxford, where I'm tould there's a manifactory of new religions—the Lord be praised for it!”
* Darby had better success in his speculations than perhaps
he ever expected to have. We need not inform the generality
of our readers that the sect called Darbyites were founded
by him, and have been called after him to the present day,
sometimes Darbyites, and sometimes Drivers.
On returning home, Val was observed to be silent and morose. The dashing speed of his ride to M'Loughlin's was not usual to him, for his motions were generally slow; it was significant, however, of the greedy spirit which stimulated him to the long wished for glut of his revenge. Not so his return. He walked his horse as if he had been a philosopher on horseback; and when Phil (now quite tipsy), who expected to see him return with all the savage triumph of vengeance in his looks, saw that he was dumb, spiritless and absolutely crestfallen, and who also observed the symptoms we spoke of, he began naturally enough to suspect that something had gone wrong. His interrogations, however, were fruitless. Val, on his inquiring the cause of these appearances, told him in a petulant fit of that ill-temper which is pecular to cowards, “to go be hanged;” a compliment which dutiful Phil returned to his worthy father with interest. This was all that passed between them, with the single exception of an observation which fell from Phil's lips as he left the dinner-table, late in the evening.
“I tell you what, M'Clutchy, you're a confounded ill-tempered old scoundrel, an-and what-what's more—o-o-over to your disgrace, a d——d bad, rotten, and unsound Protestant. How do you ex-expect, sir, that a Protestant Establishment can be sup-support-ported in this country by such scandalous con-conduct as this? hip, hip, hurra! Instead of-of being an ex-example to your son, it is your-your son, M'Clutchy, that is an example to you, hip, hip, hur—, and so good night to you, I'm—I'm on for a neat bit of business—that's all. Go to bed, you old dog.”
CHAPTER XXX.—The Mountain Grave-Yard
—Dreams of a Broken Heart—The Christian Pastor at his Duty—Melancholy Meeting between a Mother and her Son—A Death-Bed that the Great might envy—Phil experiences a Specimen of the Pressure from without—Retribution—The Death of Valentine M'Clutchy.