Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, No. 727, December 1, 1877

Larry laughed again. 'Sorra a word, captain; an' if "Molly" herself was to go an' ax him, he wouldn't join us,' he said; 'an' bedad, maybe he might inform!' he added merrily – and the men moved away.

'Ha, ha!' Barney said to himself as he crept from his hiding-place, and made his way back to the farm-house; 'that's where Larry goes. An' who's Molly, who's Molly? I'll ask Miss Dora to-morrow who's Molly;' and with this reflection he crept into his bed and fell asleep.

CHAPTER II

'Father, I think I'd like to join the Volunteers,' said Martin Kearney one day, about a month after the above event; 'the country is in a bad way, an' it's time for them that love peace and quietness to spake up.'

'True for you, Martin; an' if I was younger I'd do the same thing,' Owen Kearney said, looking up from the newspaper, in which he was reading an account of the arrest of several of the rebels known in 184- as the Molly Maguires, from their having first met in the house of a woman of that name. 'It's bad for the poor boys that went with the "Mollies."'

'Will you join with me, Larry?' Martin asked.

But he shook his head, as he replied somewhat hastily: 'Not I, faith; the "boys" never did anything to me.'

'An' I'm not going to do anything to them,' answered Martin quietly. 'Only, I think it's right for us to shew that we're honest Roscommon boys, an' have nothing to do with villains who go round the country at night frightening women an' children, an' murdering poor innocent cattle, not to mention shooting their next-door neighbour from behind a hedge, without any reason. I know I'd liever be a sheep-stealer than a Molly Maguire; an' to shew I have no dealings with them, I'll go to-morrow to Boyle an' list in the Volunteers.'

Larry used every argument to prevent his brother going to Boyle as he said, but without any avail; and early the next morning Martin started to do what numbers of the better class of farmers' sons in the vicinity of the small towns had already done.

About twelve o'clock on the night that Martin left his home, Owen Kearney and his wife were startled out of their sleep by the softie rushing into their room screaming wildly that he had a dream.

'An' what was it, Barney?' asked Mrs Kearney kindly. 'Don't be frightened now; but tell me.'

'Arrah, ma'am,' he sobbed, 'I dreamed I saw Martin; an' two men with their faces blackened rode up to him on the plains of Boyle an' shot him. Oh, wirra, wirra, one of them was Larry!'

Poor Mrs Kearney fell to wringing her hands, and sobbing wildly at the extraordinary dream of the poor fool; while her husband rushed to his son's room in the hope of finding Larry; but his bed was empty, as was that of Luke the servant. Full of terrible forebodings, the farmer began to question Barney more particularly as to his dream; but he could only repeat again and again that two men fired at Martin on the plains of Boyle; one of them was Larry, the other was Luke: this he maintained with a persistency which it was almost impossible to doubt. No one thought of returning to bed; and while they were consulting as to what was best to be done, the softie again uttered a wild shriek, and rolled over on the floor, as a bullet entered the kitchen window and lodged in the opposite wall, followed by another, which whizzed past Owen Kearney's head.

'The Lord have mercy upon us!' he exclaimed, crossing himself devoutly. 'Where will it end?' And he held his wife, who was almost insensible from the fright, close in his arms. At that instant a bright light illuminated the whole kitchen; and in a moment the truth flashed across his brain – his steading was in flames. Not daring to open his door to look out, he tried to think what was best to be done; for perhaps the house over his head was blazing too, or would be in a few minutes. Casting a hasty glance round, he lifted his wife in his arms, meaning to carry her to the front of the house and out of sight of the flames; when a violent knocking at the door startled him, and he recognised his niece's voice demanding admittance. Hastily unbarring it, he saw her accompanied by a party of soldiers, who, when they found no lives had been taken, set to work bravely to protect the property which was yet untouched by the fire. But there was little left for them to do. The cattle had been hamstrung, the horses stolen, and a lighted brand placed in every stack of oats and the thatch of every outhouse. The work of devastation had been done only too well.

'They're taken, uncle – them that set the haggard a-fire,' said Dora as soon as she was able to speak. 'I brought the soldiers to the house; and,' she added, 'one of the villains said he had finished off Owen Kearney. Thank God, it is not true!' and she threw herself into his arms.

'Yes; I heard him,' said one of the soldiers; 'and we've sent him to safer lodgings than we took him from. It seems, Mr Kearney, that your niece was returning home from a visit to a neighbour's, when she heard two men whispering in the lane at the end of the meadow. As they were in front, and she didn't like their looks, she kept behind, and heard them say that there were two gone to Boyle to look out for the Volunteer, and that they were going to do for old Kearney and his wife, "string" the cattle and fire the haggard. Like a sensible girl, she turned round quietly and ran as quick as she could towards Castlerea. By good luck she met us half-way; and though we were going on another errand, we turned back at once with her, and netted the rascals who did this pretty piece of business. – I sent six men on towards Boyle, to see if they could learn anything of the villains that followed your son,' added the sergeant.

'Where's Larry, uncle?' asked Dora, after she had tried ineffectually to console her aunt. 'Why isn't he here?'

'You're all I have now, alanna,' Kearney said, pressing her to his breast. 'Martin is gone, and Larry is gone. Well, well, God is good.'

'Miss Dora, Miss Dora!' cried Barney Athleague faintly, 'come here a minute.'

In the general confusion, every one had forgotten the poor softie, who lay on the floor quite insensible.

'What is it, Barney? Are ye hurt?' inquired Dora, bending over him.

'Not much; only my back is bad, and I can't lift my legs. Tell your uncle Owen Kearney that Martin isn't dead. He's lyin' on the settle in a shebeen with his hand on his side, calling "Dora, Dora!" I see him – sure I see him; and Larry an' Luke is took; the sogers is bringing them to Roscommon. Oh, wirra, wirra!'

'Shure the poor creature is frightened to death's door,' said Owen Kearney, trying to induce Barney to get up and drink a little water; but the mug fell out of the farmer's hands in dismay and horror, for he found the poor softie was bathed in blood. 'He's shot, he's shot!' he exclaimed; and one of the soldiers drew near and examined the wound.

'There's a bullet in his back,' the man said; 'and he'll never eat another bit of this world's bread. And may God forget the man that forgot he was an omadthaun.'

Poor Barney never spoke again. Nothing could have saved his life. But his dream was literally true. At the very moment he awoke screaming, Martin Kearney was fired at by his brother Larry and his father's servant; at the hour he mentioned were the murderers taken; and Martin himself was taken into a shebeen, as he said, and laid upon a settle in the kitchen, where he called untiringly for his cousin Dora.

Such was the softie's dream; and such sad stories as that above related are a part and parcel of every Irish rebellion. Martin Kearney did not die; and Larry pleaded guilty, declaring that he was forced to attempt his brother's life both by solemn oath of obedience and by lot; at the same time confessing all he knew of the strength and doings of the Mollies, assuring his judges that he joined them in ignorance, and now thought of them only with horror and regret. Therefore, in consideration of his youth, repentance, and valuable information he gave with regard to the rebels, his life was spared, and he was instead sentenced to twenty-one years' penal servitude; while his companion, Luke Murphy, was hanged. It would have been almost a kindness to Larry to have been permitted to share the same fate. Before two years he died of a broken heart.

Owen Kearney's house was not burned; but after his son's transportation, nothing could induce him to live in it. He therefore sold his furniture and such of his stock as the cruelty and violence of the Mollies spared, and went to end his days amongst his wife's relations in the County Galway. Dora and Martin were married, and after some time emigrated, and spent the remainder of their days in comfort and happiness, clouded only by the memory of how much pleasanter it would have been if they could have settled down in the old farm-house dear to them both, to be a comfort to their father and mother in their old age, and at last to sleep beside them in Glenmadda churchyard.

The stock of one of the wealthiest gentlemen in the County Roscommon now graze where Owen Kearney's house once stood. Not a trace of his family remains in the Green Isle. Their tragical history is almost forgotten; but amongst the gossips and old women the softie's dream is still remembered.

GLIMPSE OF THE INDIAN FAMINE

On this dismal subject so much has lately appeared in the newspapers that we almost shrink from troubling our readers with it. Everybody knows the cause of the famine – a long and unhappy drought in Southern India which parched up the land; nothing would grow; the people, millions in number, had saved nothing; their means of livelihood were gone; and with a weakness which we can scarcely understand, they sat down to die – of starvation. In times when India was subject to Mongol rulers, the population, on the occurrence of such a catastrophe, would simply have been left to die outright. Famine, like war, was deemed a legitimate means for reducing a redundancy in the number of inhabitants, and was accepted as a thing quite natural and reasonable. Matters are now considerably changed. India is part of the great British empire, and British rule is no doubt a fine thing to be boasted of. It gives the English an immense lift in the way of national prestige. Along with prestige, however, come responsibilities that are occasionally found to be rather serious. The bulk of the people of India are living from hand to mouth. If their crops fail, it is all over with them. Then is heard the distant wail of famine from fellow-subjects, which it is impossible to neglect. Noble subscriptions follow, although subscriptions of one sort or other come upon us annually in regular succession from January to December. But when was the Englishman's purse shut while the cry of distress was loudly pealing around him?

There is much satisfaction in knowing that more than half a million sterling has been gathered for the assuagement of the Indian famine. Although vast numbers perished of hunger, vast numbers were saved by a well-conducted system of dispensing food suitable to the simple wants of the people. The natives of Southern India live chiefly on rice, and a little serves them. The distribution of rice was accordingly a ready and easy method of succouring the poor famishing families. Along with boiled rice there was usually given a cup of water, rendered palatable by some sharp condiment, such as pepper or chillies. This desire for hot-tasting condiments seems to be an inherent necessity in warm climates, for which Nature has made the most beneficent provision. With these few preliminary remarks, we proceed to offer some extracts from the letters of a young medical gentleman connected with the army at Madras, descriptive of the plans adopted to feed the assembled crowds who flocked to large camps or barrack-yards in a state of pitiable suffering. The letters were no way designed for publication, a circumstance which gives them additional value.

'Madras, July 25, 1877.– There is not much news this week. One day I drove out to one of the Relief Camps beyond Palaveram to see it. A most curious and interesting sight it was. We went at half-past five, which was feeding-time; and there we saw nine thousand five hundred starving wretches all seated on their hunkers [crouched down in a sitting attitude on their heels], awaiting their food. What a motley crew and queer mixture of old men with more than a foot in the grave; strong men and young women and unweaned babes all mixed indiscriminately, but all seated in long rows of about a hundred each, in perfect order, and kept so by not more than a dozen native police with two half-caste inspectors. The majority of the people were Pariahs. Few caste people care to come to the camps, and prefer to die rather than have their food cooked for them by non-caste persons. However, there were some – about two hundred in all – Hindus and Mohammedans, and they were set apart from the Pariahs.

'The food, rice, is cooked in enormous chatties, and then spread out on matting to cool; after which it is put into gigantic tubs, which are carried slung on bamboos by a couple of coolies to the people, and a large tin measureful given to each. A measureful of pepper water (a mixture of chillies and water) is also given to each, and as much drinking-water as they like.

'So much for the food; now for the camp itself. It is situated on a large plain, and the inclosure is about a mile round. It is in the form of a square, three sides consisting of chuppers [a kind of wood and matting tents], roofed in, and protected from the wind on one side, being open on the other. Each of the three chuppers or houses of accommodation is built of the very simplest material: the floor is hardened mud, perfectly smooth and comfortable, as you know the people make it; while the roof consists of leaves matted together, supported on bamboos, and the side of matting. Each chupper is about a quarter of a mile long, and has accommodation for no end of people, the evils of overcrowding being avoided by the almost free exposure to the air. To windward is the Hospital, a good building, rain-proof, and covered in on all sides. Still further away are cholera and small-pox hospitals. The people at the camps receive two meals a day of rice and pepper water; and once a week on Sundays they get mutton. At this camp alone not less than fifty bags of rice were cooked and consumed daily, sometimes much more. The camp is open to all comers, and each is provided with a cloth and residence. The people appear all to be contented and happy, and await their turn for food calmly and patiently. The feeding is proceeded with rapidly now; but when first the famine came, it was not so; and owing to the paucity of servants, the feeding used to last from five P.M. till five the next morning. Rather trying for starving people to wait that time; hard too on the servants. Now, thanks to good administration, the feeding is all finished in about three hours. I was struck on the whole with the aspect of the people; they all with few exceptions looked well and in good condition. However, the Inspector said, had I seen them when they first came, it was different, and that if they were to return to their own villages, they would be dead in a few days. In fact, all the villages round are empty. Rice has now reached the appalling price of three and a half measures for the rupee, and of course one has to pay all one's servants extra. The poor cannot live, and they say the famine is getting worse! Only one man did I see who was lying among the others. Poor fellow! he had just managed to crawl into camp, and he was dying. I ordered him to be removed to the Hospital, a living skeleton.

'The Hospital was truly a sad sight, the saddest I ever saw. There in one ward, lying on the floor, were a dozen beings, literally living skeletons, with sunken eyes, and ghastly hollow cheeks, and livid lips, with their bones almost protruding through the flesh; too ill to move, and barely able to turn their glassy, stony stare upon you. Yes, dying all from starvation, and being hourly brought nearer death by wasting diarrhœa or dysentery.

'One woman I shall never forget. She had her back to me, and her shoulder-blade stood out so fearfully that I gazed upon it in momentary expectation of its coming through the skin. So awful was it, that I felt almost tempted to take my nail and scrape it, in order to see the white of the bone. Perhaps the saddest sight of all was the lying-in ward, where a lean mother was to be seen unable from weakness to nurse the bag of bones she had given birth to; barely a child surely, with its huge head and sunken eyes and its projecting wee ribs. Poor infant, it couldn't live long.'

'August 7.– This morning I was up at five, and after my breakfast of porridge and goat's milk, was driving out to Jeramuchi Famine Relief Camp, eleven and a half miles distant. The camp is much the same as the Palaveram one I already described to you; but it is superior, and more luxurious in some ways. It is not built in the form of a square, and is all the better of that, I think. It is fenced in all round with a trim palisading, as was the other camp, sufficient to prevent the people straying at night. The chuppers are arranged on the pavilion system, right down the centre of the camp. During the day they are entirely open at both sides, therein differing from the Palaveram ones, where one side is always closed. However, at night either side can be closed, as the sides consist of pieces of matting on a wooden framework, which is hinged to the side of the roof; and during the day the sides are all put up, supported on two bamboos each.

'The children at this camp are all collected together and fed first, the grown-up people afterwards. This morning I saw five thousand children, in age from twelve to infants, mustered for breakfast. An old gentleman with great swagger played a tom-tom with a couple of sticks; it was in the shape of a kettle-drum, and they all mustered, standing up in a row. M – and I walked down two streets of these children. They were almost all bright and happy-looking; and on being asked if they had enough to eat, they all replied in the affirmative, save one boy about twelve, who shook his head and smote his belly. Poor creature; his looks confirmed his words; there he was on two legs like walking-sticks, mere bones without an atom of muscle, on which he could hardly stand. On being asked when he came in, he said last night. Where were his father and mother? Oh, father, mother, brother, sister, and he all left village together; walked many, many miles; no food. First sister, then mother, died on the road; then brother; yesterday father; he alone being able to reach the Relief Camp.

'This tale is only a repetition of dozens of the same. He was ordered milk and port wine as extras; and I hope the poor orphan being will recover. We went over the rest of the camp; saw the men and women all sitting patiently in rows in their dreamy eastern way, silently awaiting the summons of the tom-tom after the children's breakfast was over, to call them to theirs. On coming to the Mohammedan women, about thirty in number, they all promptly stood up. One could not but be struck with their appearance, so fair-skinned, clean-looking, and handsome, compared to the Pariahs and others. They all spoke Hindustani of course, and were most polite and respectful. Despite the poorness of their attire and the absence of their jewellery, they had a refined air about them, and a superior look totally foreign to the ordinary Hindu. One young girl I was particularly struck with; she could only have been about fifteen, with most lovely eyes and perfect teeth, and such a figure. Ah! I thought, if this young woman was dressed in European clothes and was a lady, she would make a figure in London. Dressed in a scarlet and golden saree, with bangles and other jewellery, she would to my mind have been the realisation of my idea of an Indian princess.

'The Hospital presented the same sad scene of cases of emaciation as at Palaveram; there were more than one hundred cases of dysentery and diarrhœa. I also saw another case of a milkless mother trying to suckle her newly born handful of bones in the lying-in ward. It is a mercy with such a large community that no cholera prevails. They have about twenty cases of small-pox. Leaving camp, we saw two stretchers coming in with coolies. Every morning the highways and byways are searched for three miles round; and those poor creatures who have died or are found dying, unable to come to camp, are brought in. If dead, they are at once buried about a mile away from camp; if alive, they are sent to Hospital. The famine continues very bad; and there was a great meeting in Madras at the Banqueting-hall, when it was acknowledged government could not now cope with it without extraneous aid. Accordingly a telegram was despatched to England, calling on the Lord Mayors of London, Dublin, Manchester, Liverpool, and the Lord Provosts of Edinburgh and Glasgow, to open subscription lists. I am sure it is a worthy cause… In Mysore alone there have been more deaths the last three months than during the last five years. The Viceroy is said to be coming down immediately from Simla to personally inspect the state of matters.'

In a subsequent letter, October 25th, the writer adds – 'The accounts are still dreadful. Many poor creatures die after reaching the camps, from inability to swallow or receive the nourishment offered to them in the hospitals. The day the Viceroy visited Bangalore, no fewer than ninety dead bodies were found in the streets and the bazaar. The people at home have certainly done much to help their poor brethren in India; but I believe they would do still more were they to be thoroughly aware of the terrible scenes which have come under my notice.'

In conclusion, it is not out of place to say that the frequently occurring famines in that country call for measures of prevention as well as temporary aid. In making roads and railways, the English have done vast service to India; but something equally imposing in the way of irrigation from artificial tanks and from rivers has seemingly become an absolute though costly necessity, for only by such means can a repetition of these dire famines be averted. In this direction evidently lies the duty of legislators, and we hope they will, with considerate foresight, be not slack in its performance. There might also, possibly, be something done by enabling masses of the redundant population to emigrate, under safe conduct, as coolies to countries where their labour is required.

    W. C.

A BURIED CITY

The history of the destruction of Herculaneum and Pompeii under the ashes of Vesuvius is well known; but long before that period, and contemporary with the age of Stone, a city in the Grecian Archipelago was buried in the same manner, with its inhabitants, their tools, and their domestic utensils. Here they have lain for thousands of years, until M. Christomanos, Professor of Chemistry at the University of Athens, called the attention of the public to them.

There is a small group of islands to the north of Candia where these discoveries have been made, chiefly in Santorini and Therasia, which with one or two others form a circle round a bay. The two already mentioned are in the shape of a horse-shoe, with the concavity turned inwards, rising from the bay in almost inaccessible cliffs. Horizontal strata of deep black lava, layers of reddish scoria, and cinders of violet gray, are unequally distributed over these steep rocks, the whole being covered by pumice-stone of a brilliant whiteness. A few banks of marble and schist crop out to shew the original formation over which the volcanic ashes have poured; and long vertical streams of what has been molten matter can be traced down the cliffs. On the opposite side, facing the open sea, the islands are altogether different, sloping gently down, and covered with pumice-stone, the light fragments of which are soon displaced by the wind, and sometimes carried to great distances by the equinoctial storms. A few villages are scattered about, and the vine clothes the ground with its beautiful greenery.

From time immemorial the pumice of Santorini and Therasia has been dug out for building houses; and when mixed with lime, it affords an excellent cement, acquiring such hardness that it resists shocks of earthquakes and the action of air and water. It has been used for building piers and moles along the Mediterranean; and recently the works at the Isthmus of Suez and the ports of Egypt have given a great impetus to the trade, and thus opened out the underlying soil and remains of human habitations. There are immense quarries where the stone has been worked; the material being transported to the edge of the cliff, and thrown down a glissade about a hundred and fifty feet high, to the side of the ships awaiting it. Contenting themselves with cutting up the highest layers only, the workmen avoided the lower part, which seemed to be mixed with stony masses. These hindered their work, and were not valuable; but upon examination they prove to be walls of ancient houses. This had no interest for the owners of the land, who had long been aware of the fact; but an accidental visit from M. Christomanos awakened the interest of scientific folks at Athens.

At first the idea arose that this was an ancient burial-ground, and that the tombs had been hollowed out of the pumice-stone after the volcanic eruption; but it is now fully ascertained that they were built long before. The largest edifice, which has been cleared of the tufa which fills it, consists of six rooms of unequal size, the largest being about eighteen feet by fifteen; and one wall extends round a court of twenty-four feet in length, with a single entrance. The walls are built in quite a different manner from the fashion now used in the islands; they are formed of a series of irregular blocks of lava, uncut, laid together without any order; no mortar, but the interstices filled with a kind of red ashes. Between the stones, long twisted branches of the olive-tree are laid, still covered with bark, but in a very advanced state of decomposition. The wood has become nearly black, as if burnt, and falls to powder at the slightest touch. The inside of the rooms has never been whitewashed; but probably a rough coating of red earthy matter, similar to that which lies between the stones, has been put on.

At the north side there are two windows; a third and a door are found on the other sides, and several openings into the different rooms. As these were formed by pieces of wood, which have decayed, the situation of the openings is chiefly ascertained by the mass of stones that have fallen in. In every case the roof lies in the interior of the rooms, and has been formed of wood laid upon the walls in such a manner as to be sloping; whilst in the largest apartment a cylindrical block of stone buried in the floor, has evidently supported a beam of wood, from which radiated the other pieces of the roof.

The things which have been discovered in this building are numerous and varied. There are vases of pottery and lava, seeds, straw, the bones of animals, tools of flint and lava, and a human skeleton. It may be remarked that not one article of iron or bronze has been found, not even the trace of a nail in the pieces of wood which have formed the roof; the absence of metals is complete. The pottery is all well proportioned, the commonest kind consisting of yellow jars, very thick, and capable of holding many gallons. They are filled with barley, the seeds of coriander and aniseed, gray peas, and other articles which cannot be made out. The form, material, and size resemble the jars used in Greece for keeping cereals in very early though historic times. In many of the rooms, heaps of barley lie against the walls. There are smaller jars of finer ware and a brighter colour, ornamented with circular bands and vertical stripes. The colouring-matter, of a deep red, has been put on in a moist state without variety of design, being always in circles and straight lines.