St. Patrick's Eve

The whole study of his existence, the whole philosophy of his life, is, how to endure; to struggle on under poverty and sickness; in seasons of famine, in times of national calamity, to hoard up the little pittance for his landlord and the payment for his Priest; and he has nothing more to seek for. Were it our object here, it would not be difficult to pursue this theme further, and examine, if much of the imputed slothfulness and indolence of the people was not in reality due to that very hopelessness. How little energy would be left to life, if you took away its ambitions; how few would enter upon the race, if there were no goal before them! Our present aim, however, is rather with the fortunes of those we have so lately left. To these poor men, now, a new existence opened. Not the sun of spring could more suddenly illumine the landscape where winter so late had thrown its shadows, than did prosperity fall brightly on their hearts, endowing life with pleasures and enjoyments, of which they had not dared to dream before.

In preferring this mountain-tract to some rich lowland farm, they were rather guided by that spirit of attachment to the home of their fathers – so characteristic a trait in the Irish peasant – than by the promptings of self-interest. The mountain was indeed a wild and bleak expanse, scarce affording herbage for a few sheep and goats; the callows at its foot, deeply flooded in winter, and even by the rains of autumn, made tillage precarious and uncertain; yet the fact that these were rent-free, that of its labour and its fruits all was now their own, inspired hope and sweetened toil. They no longer felt the dreary monotony of daily exertion, by which hour was linked to hour, and year to year, in one unbroken succession; – no; they now could look forward, they could lift up their hearts and strain their eyes to a future, where honest industry had laid up its store for the decline of life; they could already fancy the enjoyments of the summer season, when they should look down upon their own crops and herds, or think of the winter nights, and the howling of the storm without, reminding them of the blessings of a home.

How little to the mind teeming with its bright and ambitious aspirings would seem the history of their humble hopes! how insignificant and how narrow might appear the little plans and plots they laid for that new road in life, in which they were now to travel! The great man might scoff at these, the moralist might frown at their worldliness; but there is nothing sordid or mean in the spirit of manly independence; and they who know the Irish people, will never accuse them of receiving worldly benefits with any forgetfulness of their true and only source. And now to our story.

The little cabin upon the mountain was speedily added to, and fashioned into a comfortable-looking farmhouse of the humbler class. Both father and son would willingly have left it as it was; but the landlord’s wish had laid a command upon them, and they felt it would have been a misapplication of his bounty, had they not done as he had desired. So closely, indeed, did they adhere to his injunctions, that a little room was added specially for his use and accommodation, whenever he came on that promised excursion he hinted at. Every detail of this little chamber interested them deeply; and many a night, as they sat over their fire, did they eagerly discuss the habits and tastes of the “quality,” anxious to be wanting in nothing which should make it suitable for one like him.

Sufficient money remained above all this expenditure to purchase some sheep, and even a cow; and already their changed fortunes had excited the interest and curiosity of the little world in which they lived.

There is one blessing, and it is a great one, attendant on humble life. The amelioration of condition requires not that a man should leave the friends and companions he has so long sojourned with, and seek, in a new order, others to supply their place; the spirit of class does not descend to him, or rather, he is far above it; his altered state suggests comparatively few enjoyments or comforts in which his old associates cannot participate; and thus the Connors’ cabin was each Sunday thronged by the country people, who came to see with their own eyes, and hear with their own ears, the wonderful good fortune that befell them.

Had the landlord been an angel of light, the blessings invoked upon him could not have been more frequent or fervent; each measured the munificence of the act by his own short standard of worldly possessions; and individual murmurings for real or fancied wrongs were hushed in the presence of one such deed of benevolence.

This is no exaggerated picture. Such was peasant-gratitude once; and such, O landlords of Ireland! it might still have been, if you had not deserted the people. The meanest of your favours, the poorest show of your good-feeling, were acts of grace for which nothing was deemed requital. Your presence in the poor man’s cabin – your kind word to him upon the highway – your aid in sickness – your counsel in trouble, were ties which bound him more closely to your interest, and made him more surely yours, than all the parchments of your attorney, or all the papers of your agent. He knew you then as something more than the recipient of his earnings. That was a time, when neither the hireling patriot nor the calumnious press could sow discord between you. If it be otherwise now, ask yourselves, are you all blameless? Did you ever hope that affection could be transmitted through your agent, like the proceeds of your property? Did you expect that the attachments of a people were to reach you by the post? Or was it not natural, that, in their desertion by you, they should seek succour elsewhere? that in their difficulties and their trials they should turn to any who might feel or feign compassion for them?

Nor is it wonderful that, amid the benefits thus bestowed, they should imbibe principles and opinions fatally in contrast with interests like yours.

There were few on whom good fortune could have fallen, without exciting more envious and jealous feelings on the part of others, than on the Connors. The rugged independent character of the father – the gay light-hearted nature of the son, had given them few enemies and many friends. The whole neighbourhood flocked about them to offer their good wishes and congratulations on their bettered condition, and with an honesty of purpose and a sincerity that might have shamed a more elevated sphere. The Joyces alone shewed no participation in this sentiment, or rather, that small fraction of them more immediately linked with Phil Joyce. At first, they affected to sneer at the stories of the Connors’ good fortune; and when denial became absurd, they half-hinted that it was a new custom in Ireland for men “to fight for money.” These mocking speeches were not slow to reach the ears of the old man and his son; and many thought that the next fair-day would bring with it a heavy retribution for the calamities of the last. In this, however, they were mistaken. Neither Owen nor his father appeared that day; the mustering of their faction was strong and powerful, but they, whose wrongs were the cause of the gathering, never came forward to head them.

This was an indignity not to be passed over in silence; and the murmurs, at first low and subdued, grew louder and louder, until denunciations heavy and deep fell upon the two who “wouldn’t come out and right themselves like men.” The faction, discomfited and angered, soon broke up; and returning homeward in their several directions, they left the field to the enemy without even a blow. On the succeeding day, when the observances of religion had taken place of the riotous and disorderly proceedings of the fair, it was not customary for the younger men to remain. The frequenters of the place were mostly women; the few of the other sex were either old and feeble men, or such objects of compassion as traded on the pious feelings of the votaries so opportunely evoked. It was with great difficulty the worthy Priest of the parish had succeeded in dividing the secular from the holy customs of the time, and thus allowing the pilgrims, as all were called on that day, an uninterrupted period for their devotions. He was firm and resolute, however, in his purpose, and spared no pains to effect it: menacing this one – persuading that; suiting the measure of his arguments to the comprehension of each, he either cajoled or coerced, as the circumstance might warrant. His first care was to remove all the temptations to dissipation and excess; and for this purpose, he banished every show and exhibition, and every tent where gambling and drinking went forward; – his next, a more difficult task, was the exclusion of all those doubtful characters, who, in every walk of life, are suggestive of even more vice than they embody in themselves. These, however, abandoned the place, of their own accord, so soon as they discovered how few were the inducements to remain; until at length, by a tacit understanding, it seemed arranged, that the day of penance and mortification should suffer neither molestation nor interruption from those indisposed to partake of its benefits. So rigid was the Priest in exacting compliance in this matter, that he compelled the tents to be struck by daybreak, except by those few, trusted and privileged individuals, whose ministerings to human wants were permitted during the day of sanctity.

And thus the whole picture was suddenly changed. The wild and riotous uproar of the fair, the tumult of voices and music, dancing, drinking, and fighting, were gone; and the low monotonous sound of the pilgrims’ prayers was heard, as they moved along upon their knees to some holy well or shrine, to offer up a prayer, or return a thanksgiving for blessings bestowed. The scene was a strange and picturesque one; the long lines of kneeling figures, where the rich scarlet cloak of the women predominated, crossed and recrossed each other as they wended their way to the destined altar; their muttered words blending with the louder and more boisterous appeals of the mendicants, – who, stationed at every convenient angle or turning, besieged each devotee with unremitting entreaty, – deep and heartfelt devotion in every face, every lineament and feature impressed with religious zeal and piety; but still, as group met group going and returning, they interchanged their greetings between their prayers, and mingled the worldly salutations with aspirations heavenward, and their “Paters,” and “Aves,” and “Credos,” were blended with inquiries for the “childer,” or questions about the “crops.”

“Isn’t that Owen Connor, avick, that’s going there, towards the Yallow-well?” said an old crone as she ceased to count her beads.

“You’re right enough, Biddy; ‘tis himself, and no other; it’s a turn he took to devotion since he grew rich.”

“Ayeh! ayeh! the Lord be good to us! how fond we all be of life, when we’ve the bit of bacon to the fore!” And with that she resumed her pious avocations with redoubled energy, to make up for lost time.

The old ladies were as sharp-sighted as such functionaries usually are in any sphere of society. It was Owen Connor himself, performing his first pilgrimage. The commands of his landlord had expressly forbidden him to engage in any disturbance at the fair; the only mode of complying with which, he rightly judged, was by absenting himself altogether. How this conduct was construed by others, we have briefly hinted at. As for himself, poor fellow, if a day of mortification could have availed him any thing, he needn’t have appeared among the pilgrims; – a period of such sorrow and suffering he had never undergone before. But in justice it must be confessed, it was devotion of a very questionable character that brought him there that morning. Since the fair-day, Mary Joyce had never deigned to notice him; and though he had been several times at mass, she either affected not to be aware of his presence, or designedly looked in another direction. The few words of greeting she once gave him on every Sunday morning – the smile she bestowed – dwelt the whole week in his heart, and made him long for the return of the time, when, even for a second or two, she would be near, and speak to him. He was not slow in supposing how the circumstances under which he rescued the landlord’s son might be used against him by his enemies; and he well knew that she was not surrounded by any others than such. It was, then, with a heavy heart poor Owen witnessed how fatally his improved fortune had dashed hopes far dearer than all worldly advantage. Not only did the new comforts about him become distasteful, but he even accused them to himself as the source of all his present calamity; and half suspected that it was a judgment on him for receiving a reward in such a cause. To see her – to speak to her if possible – was now his wish, morn and night; to tell her that he cared more for one look, one glance, than for all the favours fortune did or could bestow: this, and to undeceive her as to any knowledge of young Leslie’s rudeness to herself, was the sole aim of his thoughts. Stationing himself therefore in an angle of the ruined church, which formed one of the resting-places for prayer, he waited for hours for Mary’s coming; and at last, with a heart half sickened with deferred hope, he saw her pale but beautiful features, shaded by the large blue hood of her cloak, as with downcast eyes she followed in the train.

“Give me your place, acushla; God will reward you for it; I’m late at the station,” said he, to an old ill-favoured hag that followed next to Mary; and at the same time, to aid his request, slipped half-a-crown into her hand.

The wrinkled face brightened into a kind of wicked intelligence as she muttered in Irish: “‘Tis a gould guinea the same place is worth; but I’ll give it to you for the sake of yer people;” and at the same time pocketing the coin in a canvass pouch, among relics and holy clay, she moved off, to admit him in the line.

Owen’s heart beat almost to bursting, as he found himself so close to Mary; and all his former impatience to justify himself, and to speak to her, fled in the happiness he now enjoyed. No devotee ever regarded the relic of a Saint with more trembling ecstacy than did he the folds of that heavy mantle that fell at his knees; he touched it as men would do a sacred thing. The live-long day he followed her, visiting in turn each shrine and holy spot; and ever, as he was ready to speak to her, some fear that, by a word, he might dispel the dream of bliss he revelled in, stopped him, and he was silent.

It was as the evening drew near, and the Pilgrims were turning towards the lake, beside which, at a small thorn-tree, the last “station” of all was performed, that an old beggar, whose importunity suffered none to escape, blocked up the path, and prevented Mary from proceeding until she had given him something. All her money had been long since bestowed; and she said so, hurriedly, and endeavoured to move forward.

“Let Owen Connor, behyind you, give it, acushla! He’s rich now, and can well afford it,” said the cripple.

She turned around at the words; the action was involuntary, and their eyes met. There are glances which reveal the whole secret of a lifetime; there are looks which dwell in the heart longer and deeper than words. Their eyes met for merely a few seconds; and while in her face offended pride was depicted, poor Owen’s sorrow-struck and broken aspect spoke of long suffering and grief so powerfully, that, ere she turned away, her heart had half forgiven him.

“You wrong me hardly, Mary,” said he, in a low, broken voice, as the train moved on. “The Lord, he knows my heart this blessed day! Pater noster, qui es in colis?’” added he, louder, as he perceived that his immediate follower had ceased his prayers to listen to him. “He knows that I’d rather live and die the poorest – ‘Beneficat tuum nomen!’” cried he, louder. And then, turning abruptly, said:

“Av it’s plazing to you, sir, don’t be trampin’ on my heels. I can’t mind my devotions, an’ one so near me.

“It’s not so unconvaynient, maybe, when they’re afore you,” muttered the old fellow, with a grin of sly malice. And though Owen overheard the taunt, he felt no inclination to notice it.

“Four long years I’ve loved ye, Mary Joyce; and the sorra more encouragement I ever got nor the smile ye used to give me. And if ye take that from me, now – Are ye listening to me, Mary? do ye hear me, asthore? – Bad scran to ye, ye ould varmint! why won’t ye keep behind? How is a man to save his sowl, an’ you making him blasphame every minit?”

“I was only listenin’ to that elegant prayer ye were saying,” said the old fellow, drily.

“‘Tis betther you’d mind your own, then,” said Owen, fiercely; “or, by the blessed day, I’ll teach ye a new penance ye never heerd of afore!”

The man dropped back, frightened at the sudden determination these words were uttered in; and Owen resumed his place.

“I may never see ye again, Mary. ‘Tis the last time you’ll hear me spake to you. I’ll lave the ould man. God look to him! I’ll lave him now, and go be a sodger. Here we are now, coming to this holy well; and I’ll swear an oath before the Queen of Heaven, that before this time to-morrow – ”

“How is one to mind their prayers at all, Owen Connor, if ye be talking to yourself, so loud?” said Mary, in a whisper, but one which lost not a syllable, as it fell on Owen’s heart.

“My own sweet darling, the light of my eyes, ye are!” cried he, as with clasped hands he muttered blessings upon her head; and with such vehemence of gesture, and such unfeigned signs of rapture, as to evoke remarks from some beggars near, highly laudatory of his zeal.

“Look at the fine young man there, prayin’ wid all his might. Ayeh, the Saints give ye the benefit of your Pilgrimage!”

“Musha! but ye’r a credit to the station; ye put yer sowl in it, anyhow!” said an old Jezebel, whose hard features seemed to defy emotion.

Owen looked up; and directly in front of him, with his back against a tree, and his arms crossed on his breast, stood Phil Joyce: his brow was dark with passion, and his eyes glared like those of a maniac. A cold thrill ran through Owen’s heart, lest the anger thus displayed should fall on Mary; for he well knew with what tyranny the poor girl was treated. He therefore took the moment of the pilgrims’ approach to the holy tree, to move from his place, and, by a slightly circuitous path, came up to where Joyce was standing.

“I’ve a word for you, Phil Joyce,” said he, in a low voice, where every trace of emotion was carefully subdued. “Can I spake it to you here?”

Owen’s wan and sickly aspect, if it did not shock, it at least astonished Joyce, for he looked at him for some seconds without speaking; then said, half rudely:

“Ay, here will do as well as any where, since ye didn’t like to say it yesterday.”

There was no mistaking this taunt; the sneer on Owen’s want of courage was too plain to be misconstrued; and although for a moment he looked as if disposed to resent it, he merely shook his head mournfully, and replied: “It is not about that I came to speak; it’s about your sister, Mary Joyce.”

Phil turned upon him a stare of amazement, as quickly followed by a laugh, whose insulting mockery made Owen’s cheek crimson with shame.

“True enough, Phil Joyce; I know your meanin’ well,” said he, with an immense effort to subdue his passion. “I’m a poor cottier, wid a bit of mountain-land – sorra more – and has no right to look up to one like her. But listen to me, Phil!” and here he grasped his arm, and spoke with a thick guttural accent: “Listen to me! Av the girl wasn’t what she is, but only your sister, I’d scorn her as I do yourself;” and with that, he pushed him from him with a force that made him stagger. Before he had well recovered, Owen was again at his side, and continued: – “And now, one word more, and all’s ended between us. For you, and your likings or mis-likings, I never cared a rush: but ‘tis Mary herself refused me, so there’s no more about it; only don’t be wreaking your temper on her, for she has no fault in it.”

“Av a sister of mine ever bestowed a thought on the likes o’ ye, I’d give her the outside of the door this night,” said Joyce, whose courage now rose from seeing several of his faction attracted to the spot, by observing that he and Connor were conversing. “‘Tis a disgrace – divil a less than a disgrace to spake of it!”

“Well, we won’t do so any more, plaze God!” said Owen, with a smile of very fearful meaning. “It will be another little matter we’ll have to settle when we meet, next. There’s a score there, not paid off yet:” and at the word he lifted his hat, and disclosed the deep mark of the scarce-closed gash on his forehead: “and so, good bye to ye.”

A rude nod from Phil Joyce was all the reply, and Owen turned homewards.

If prosperity could suggest the frame of mind to enjoy it, the rich would always be happy; but such is not the dispensation of Providence. Acquisition is but a stage on the road of ambition; it lightens the way, but brings the goal no nearer. Owen never returned to his mountain-home with a sadder heart. He passed without regarding them, the little fields, now green with the coming spring; he bestowed no look nor thought upon the herds that already speckled the mountain-side; disappointment had embittered his spirit; and even love itself now gave way to faction-hate, the old and cherished animosity of party.

If the war of rival factions did not originally spring from the personal quarrels of men of rank and station, who stimulated their followers and adherents to acts of aggression and reprisal, it assuredly was perpetuated, if not with their concurrence, at least permission; and many were not ashamed to avow, that in these savage encounters the “bad blood” of the country was “let out,” at less cost and trouble than by any other means. When legal proceedings were recurred to, the landlord, in his capacity of magistrate, maintained the cause of his tenants; and, however disposed to lean heavily on them himself, in the true spirit of tyranny he opposed pressure from any other hand than his own. The people were grateful for this advocacy – far more, indeed, than they often proved for less questionable kindness. They regarded the law with so much dread – they awaited its decisions with such uncertainty – that he who would conduct them through its mazes was indeed a friend. But, was the administration of justice, some forty or fifty years back in Ireland, such as to excite or justify other sentiments? Was it not this tampering with right and wrong, this recurrence to patronage, that made legal redress seem an act of meanness and cowardice among the people? No cause was decided upon its own merits. The influence of the great man – the interest he was disposed to take in the case – the momentary condition of county politics – with the general character of the individuals at issue, usually determined the matter; and it could scarcely be expected that a triumph thus obtained should have exercised any peaceful sway among the people.

“He wouldn’t be so bould to-day, av his landlord wasn’t to the fore,” was Owen Connor’s oft-repeated reflection, as he ascended the narrow pathway towards his cabin; “‘tis the good backing makes us brave, God help us!” From that hour forward, the gay light-hearted peasant became dark, moody, and depressed; the very circumstances which might be supposed calculated to have suggested a happier frame of mind, only increased and embittered his gloom. His prosperity made daily labour no longer a necessity. Industry, it is true, would have brought more comforts about him, and surrounded him with more appliances of enjoyment; but long habits of endurance had made him easily satisfied on this score, and there were no examples for his imitation which should make him strive for better. So far, then, from the landlord’s benevolence working for good, its operation was directly the reverse; his leniency had indeed taken away the hardship of a difficult and onerous payment, but the relief suggested no desire for an equivalent amelioration of condition. The first pleasurable emotions of gratitude over, they soon recurred to the old customs in every thing, and gradually fell hack into all the observances of their former state, the only difference being, that less exertion on their parts was now called for than before.

Had the landlord been a resident on his property – acquainting himself daily and hourly with the condition of his tenants – holding up examples for their imitation – rewarding the deserving – discountenancing the unworthy – extending the benefits of education among the young – and fostering habits of order and good conduct among all, Owen would have striven among the first for a place of credit and honour, and speedily have distinguished himself above his equals. But alas! no; Mr. Leslie, when not abroad, lived in England. Of his Irish estates he knew nothing, save through the half-yearly accounts of his agent. He was conscious of excellent intentions; he was a kind, even a benevolent man; and in the society of his set, remarkable for more than ordinary sympathies with the poor. To have ventured on any reflection on a landlord before him, would have been deemed a downright absurdity.

He was a living refutation of all such calumnies; yet how was it, that, in the district he owned, the misery of the people was a thing to shudder at? that there were hovels excavated in the bogs, within which human beings lingered on between life and death, their existence like some terrible passage in a dream? that beneath these frail roofs famine and fever dwelt, until suffering, and starvation itself, had ceased to prey upon minds on which no ray of hope ever shone? Simply he did not know of these things; he saw them not; he never heard of them. He was aware that seasons of unusual distress occurred, and that a more than ordinary degree of want was experienced by a failure of the potato-crop; but on these occasions, he read his name, with a subscription of a hundred pounds annexed, and was not that a receipt in full for all the claims of conscience? He ran his eyes over a list in which Royal and Princely titles figured, and he expressed himself grateful for so much sympathy with Ireland! But did he ask himself the question, whether, if he had resided among his people, such necessities for alms-giving had ever arisen? Did he inquire how far his own desertion of his tenantry – his ignorance of their state – his indifference to their condition – had fostered these growing evils? Could he acquit himself of the guilt of deriving all the appliances of his ease and enjoyment, from those whose struggles to supply them were made under the pressure of disease and hunger? Was unconsciousness of all this, an excuse sufficient to stifle remorse? Oh, it is not the monied wealth dispensed by the resident great man; it is not the stream of affluence, flowing in its thousand tiny rills, and fertilising as it goes, we want. It is far more the kindly influence of those virtues which. And their congenial soil in easy circumstances; benevolence, sympathy, succour in sickness, friendly counsel in distress, timely aid in trouble, encouragement to the faint-hearted, caution to the over-eager: these are gifts, which, giving, makes the bestower richer; and these are the benefits which, better than gold, foster the charities of life among a people, and bind up the human family in a holy and indissoluble league. No benevolence from afar, no well wishings from distant lands, compensate for the want of them. To neglect such duties is to fail in the great social compact by which the rich and poor are united, and, what some may deem of more moment still, to resign the rightful influence of property into the hands of dangerous and designing men.

It is in vain to suppose that traditionary deservings will elicit gratitude when the present generation are neglectful. On the contrary, the comparison of the once resident, now absent landlord, excites very different feelings; the murmurings of discontent swell into the louder language of menace; and evils, over which no protective power of human origin could avail, are ascribed to that class, who, forgetful of one great duty, are now accused of causing every calamity. If not present to exercise the duties their position demands, their absence exaggerates every accusation against them; and from the very men, too, who have, by the fact of their desertion, succeeded in obtaining the influence that should be theirs.