light Jerry more than an opportunity to show his dexterity in taking a "rise," as he called it, out of the serious Englishman, and he lost no time in carrying his plan into execution. "Your honour didn't hear," he continued, raising his voice, so that those behind could distinctly hear him, "ef what happened to the two English gintlemen that came down this way last week?"—“ No,” said O Neill, taking up his subordinate part, "but I suppose you mean to tell me."—" O thin, it won't take long to tell," resumed Jerry. "It was takin' a bit of a walk they wor, outside the town of Wexford, and some one axed them, would they go and look at a private still; an' fools they wor, to be sure, to go; but whin they did, and they got thim down below where the still was, they brought a tub of whiskey behind, and steeped the skirts of the gintlemen's coats in it, while they were lookin' on; an' thin, what did they do but set fire to them, an', be me sowl, a purty pair they made of them. Before the coats was off, their backs was as brown an' as crisp as the outside of a piece of roast pork. "Monstrous savages!" muttered the Englishman to himself, half in wrath and half in fear; while Jerry fidgeted in his seat in ecstasy to perceive that his story had not failed of the intended effect. "And what was the consequence?" said O'Neill, smiling at the tale the man had invented in a moment. "Faith, sir, the Englishmen couldn't percaive the joke, but thought it was in earnest they wor; so they wint and complained to a justice, an' Jem Sullivan's still was tuk (taken), an' they wor goin' to take himself, only he escaped. The wickedest divil in all the country the same Jem Sullivan is; an' he swears if he ketches an Englishman comin' into this country agin, he'll surely take revinge on him." Here the coach stopped to change horses; and Jerry, as he drank his glass of whiskey inside the window of the public-house where they stopped, almost shook himself to pieces with laughter when he saw the Englishman quietly unstrap his portmanteau, which was on the top of the coach, and taking therefrom a small pair of pistols, deposit them in the pockets of his great-coat. "Why, Jerry," said O'Neill, as he entered the room where the coachman 66 was, your story will frighten that poor man out of his wits; I should not be surprised if he were to turn about and go home, without transacting his business. You had better tell him it was all a humbug." "Is it me, sir?" said Jerry. "O no faith; an' if I did, it's himself that would'nt b'lieve me, but think I wanted to decaive him into some harm. If he does go back sure, the devil set his fut after him! some one that is'nt so great a fool 'ill come after him an get his custom. Christ Jasus, sir! only think of him travellin' wid pistols, on the top of a coach in the open daylight." Perhaps," rejoined O'Neill, "you are not the first who has amused himself with taking a rise' out of the man, and if he takes all jokes as much in earnest as he takes yours, it is no wonder that he should feel alarmed." "I would'nt be an Englishman for the world, sir," said Jerry, as he laid down his glass; "dvil a word they spake, but it's as exact as if they wor readin' it out of a book, an' as sarious as if they were afore the priest. I'd die in a month, sir, if I was'nt to have a bit of fun sometimes." "Ay," said O'Neill," we have the advantage of them in mirth, but they have the advantage of us in steadiness-And now the horses are out, Jerry, we had better mount again. I see they've got a troublesome leader there, that will give you something else to do for the next stage than invent comical lies;—but was that all a lie, from beginning to end, that you told about the private still?" "Half and half, sir," said Jerry," like sailor's grog. There was a private still found, sure enough, an' a bit of a row; an' Jem Sullivan gave the informer a tip of his shillelagh over the head, that bothered him a little, so Jem was obleeged to cut an' run." "Did he hurt the man seriously?” asked O'Neill. "By my sowl," said Jerry, "you may take your oath, sir, he made him feel that 'twasn't ticklin' him wid a feather he was-but he was only kilt, as many a better man was before :he'll be well enough come Donnybrook fair." They now mounted the box again, while the Englishman sharply expressed his anger at the delay, and the unnecessary time they had wasted in changing horses. "Never mind, sir," said the coachman, "there's a leader will bring us in, in good time, whether we will or no, barrin' she upsets the coach, the wicked divil, bad luck to her!" "No danger of that, I hope,” said the Englishman, with an alarmed look. "Plaze God," rejoined Jerry, drily; "but we can't tell always what's before us, sir, as the blind man said when he walked over his mother." They now drove rapidly and silently along for some time, Jerry's attention being sufficiently engaged by his troublesome horse, in the management of which he showed no small professional skill. As they reached the corner of a private road leading off to the right, on the man of the deep cravat, laying his hand upon Jerry's shoulder, but without speaking a word, the horses were drawn up, and the man descended from the coach. He nodded his head to the coachman, indicating by the gesture the direction in which he was about to proceed, and was replied to by a " God speed you" from Jerry; and then the man, who had till now appeared a heavy, stupid, sleepy person, seemed suddenly to acquire a wonderful activity. A five-barred, gate was placed across the little road into which he turned; laying one hand upon the upper rail of this, he vaulted over it without the least apparent difficulty, and proceeded rapidly towards the acclivity of a mountain path which lay before him. "Do you know who that man is?" said O'Neill. "I thought till now he was some lazy Wexford shopkeeper, who had been up in Dublin making purchases; but he seems to have recovered his activity very suddenly." Jerry evaded a direct reply, and said he supposed he was some of the "mountain people."—"I rather think," said O'Neill," that it was his ob ject to keep himself concealed as we came along, for he contrived to keep his face so buried in his cravat, that I did not see the whole of it during our journey, and I doubt whether I should know him again, were I to meet him with his face uncovered." "Maybe he's in some trouble," said Jerry, significantly. with the intention of despatching them from Wexford or Waterford, where I am going, to one of our partners who is at Bristol. My pocket-book I put in my portmanteau, which was strapped upon the coach almost under my own arm, but overhearing a conversation between you and the coachman, from which I inferred there was personal danger to be apprehended by an Englishman travelling in this part of the country, I opened my portmanteau at the last stage, and took out my pistols, and I think my pocket-book also. I know I intended to do so, but being a little alarmed at the time, I cannot positively recollect whether I did or not. But it is gone-I have it not-it is not in the portmanteau. Good God!" he exclaimed again, violently striking his pale forehead, "what ought I to do? The property is not my own, sir, but that of my employers," he continued, "of which it was my duty to have taken better care-I can never repay it, and-I have a wife and children. I and they are utterly ruined!" They travelled along without further remark, until they reached the inn where the coach halted for breakfast, and the travellers found a board set out with those substantial comforts which a morning's drive makes so agreeable. Not that an Irish breakfast can boast of the variety of a Scotch one, or the niceness of arrangement of an English one; but there was a cold round of beef, of formidable dimensions, and there would be mustard, when it was made. Eggs there were innumerable, and abundance of milk, and the promise of tea when the kettle boiled. "It's just bilin,' sir," said the waiter, the plain English of which phrase is, that there are some grounds It seemed as if the man's brain would have for the expectation that it will boil within the burst from the intensity of his emotion, but the next quarter of an hour. The Englishman mention of his children saved him; the tears awaited the advent of the boiling water in sul- spouted from his eyes, and he became calm. len silence, making all the while deliberate as- O'Neill now bitterly repented him of even the saults upon the symmetry of the beef, while slight share which he had had in the fiction the rest of the company talked, laughed, swore, which had alarmed this poor Englishman, and and took revenge upon the eggs. Tea was thrown him off his guard. His heart smote however provided, and breakfast, like all other him as he recollected, that, if instead of jointhings, came to an end. Purses were now puting in and enjoying the joke played off upon in requisition, and the Englishman, after paying his coin, and placing his hand upon his sidepocket as if to ascertain that something he expected to find there was all safe, grew suddenly pale, and ran out of the room with more alacrity than he had hitherto displayed. He soon returned in a state of agitation which it was impossible to behold without being deeply affected. The alarm and distress which make an Irishman stamp, and rave, and exhaust himself in physical exertion, do not perhaps awaken sympathy so much, because they are not really so dangerous to the individual, as the deep and silent struggles of a calmer temperament. The face of the Englishman, when he returned to the parlour of the inn, was colourless as the visage of a dead man, a cold perspiration trickled from his forehead, and a slight tremor shook his frame from head to foot. He stated, however, distinctly and intelligibly, that he had been robbed of his pocket-book, containing a large sum of money. "Robbed!" said O'Neill, "how do you mean ?" "My pocket-book has been taken from me," said the man," and," added he, in a faltering voice, which showed how distressful was the struggle between his alarm and habitual firmness," it contained a thousand pounds in Bank of England post-bills. Good God!" he continued," what had I best do?" "Tell me what are the circumstances," said O'Neill, partaking of the agitation which a natural sympathy excites on such occasions; "I am astonished at what you say, and do not understand you." "I had large accounts to collect in Dublin," said the man," my business was not finished yesterday evening until it was too late for the Dost. and I put the bills in my pocket-book. the man, he had given him some rational information about the country in which he was travelling, his portmanteau would in all probability not have been opened, and all this loss and misery would not have occurred. Anxious, however, to do every thing possible, to repair a misfortune in which he could not help accusing himself of having had some share, he carefully inquired into the circumstances of the disappearance of the pocket-book, respecting which the poor man who had lost it still gave the same account, and still persisted in his belief that it was stolen. "Are you quite certain you brought it from Dublin?" said O'Neill. "Quite certain," replied the man; " and that it was the first thing I saw in my portmanteau when I opened it at the last stage." "Could it then have been taken from your portmanteau while you were at breakfast?" "No," he replied; "I am every thing but quite certain, that I took it out of my portmanteau and put it into my pocket. If I had not been under that impression, I would have brought my portmanteau with me into the room. As it was, the coach was drawn up before the windows, opposite to which I sat at breakfast, and I would have seen if any one had opened the portmanteau then." "How then could the pocket-book have gone?-Who could have stolen it from you?" "I know not," said the man; "but I know it is gone," he continued, relapsing into his former miserable tone-"There was a man sat by me on the coach, who left us suddenly." "Ay, so there was," said O'Neill, "I should have thought of that; and there was something suspicious about him too." "Coach ready, gintlemin," said Jerry, putting his head half in at the door. "We cannot go on, Jerry," said O'Neill,"nor you neither. You must get some one to drive the coach the rest of the way, and remain with us. This gentleman has lost his pocket-book, with a large sum of money in it, and we shall perhaps require your assistance to investigate the matter." Jerry at first hesitated about giving up the care of his coach to another; but on the assurance of O'Neill, whose father was a man of some consequence in the country, that he would bear him harmless, another man was got to assume the reins, and Jerry was summoned to the parlour. He was closely interrogated by O'Neill respecting the man who had departed from the coach on the road, but either could or would give no information about him; but he always evaded a direct ay or no answer to the questions put to him. as we "Have you got any county magistrates in this kingdom," said the Englishman, have in England? We ought to take the regular course, if there are such persons." "Yes," said O'Neill;-" Mr. Roberts, a particular friend of my father's, and with whom I am acquainted, is a magistrate of the county, and lives within a mile of this; and if you approve of it, we will go before him." But it was evident this regular method of proceeding did not meet with the approbation of Jerry."'Pon my sowl, gintlemin," said he, "not in the laste doubtin' but you know best; but the divil a use I see in your goin' afore a magistrate about a pocket-book that's lost, an' that himself can know no more about than one of the horses in the stable without-beggin' his honour's worship's pardon, for comparin' him to a brute baste.". "The gintlemin," were, however, of a dif ferent opinion; and to the magistrate they went, taking Jerry along with them. They were received with much politeness by Mr. Roberts, who sympathized in the distress of the poor man who had lost the money, with much more warmth of feeling than an English magistrate would have probably expressed, whatever he might have felt. O'Neill told him the story of the man who had come down with them from Dublin, and of his having left them just about the time that it appeared most probable the pocket-book had been lost. "What does your coachman say about him?" said the magistrate. "These kind of people generally know something of one another." O'Neill said they had already interrogated him unsuccessfully. "I am a more practised hand at this kind of examination than you, my young friend," said the magistrate, "We will have your coachman in, if you please, and see what he has to say." Jerry was ushered in, making his best bow, yet with an uneasy air, as if he would have been much better pleased to have been left out in the inquiry. "Your name, my good friend," said the magistrate. "Jerry Kavanagh, your honour." "Who was that friend of yours, that you drove down to Fox's-gate this morning?” "How should I know, your honour," said Jerry, more than I know any other strange Passenger ?" 66 "Answer me my questions first," said the magistrate," and I will answer you any questions with great pleasure afterwards; but one is enough to ask questions at a time, Jerry." "It's true for your honour," said Jerry, look ing a little disconcerted. As this is a serious business, I must put you on your oath," said the magistrate; and the oath, truly to answer to such questions as should be asked him, was duly administered to Jerry Kavanagh. "Now tell me ay or no," continued the magistrate, "whether you know who the man was who left you this morning at Fox's-gate?" "I do not," said Jerry. "Nor where he was going, when he left you?" "No." "And you know nothing about this gentleman's pocket-book?" "By the vartue of my oath," said Jerry, kissing the book, which he still held in his hand, no more than the child unborn." 66 "I am very much afraid, sir," said the magistrate, addressing the Englishman, "that we can make nothing of this business at present; but I shall institute every inquiry that I possibly can to recover your property, if it has been stolen or lost, which indeed I must say I think more probable; and, in the mean time, you will take the precaution of writing to the person from whom you purchased your post-bills, to ascertain, if possible, the numbers, and have them stopped. And now, Kavanagh," he continued, addressing the coachman, "as I have you here, I want your assistance in another matter. You know Sullivan, whose private still was discovered the other day in Wexford, and who got off, after committing a serious as sault?" "O yes, to be sure, your honour, I know," said Jerry" that is, I mane to say, your ho I've heerd of him often and often." "Well, but his person-you know his person, do you not?" nour, "I cannot say that I do," replied Jerry. "You may know him then," said the magis trate, "by a tremendous scar on his lower left jaw. I have had information within a day or two that he was in Dublin, and about to come down this way again. If you should fall in with him in your travels, let me know, and give a hint to Byrne, the constable-He's on the look-out for him at the inn that you just now came from." "It's myself that will, your honour," said Jerry, but muttered to himself, as he left the room." The divil recave the same Tim Ryan's sowl. If ever I tip him a hint, it's wid the but-end of a black-thorn stick I'll do it." Mr. Roberts pressed O'Neill to stay with him, but he was now too much interested in the affairs of the unhappy Englishman to leave him, while there was any chance of doing any thing for him. He was not quite satisfied, either, about the strange man, of whom Jerry had denied all knowledge; and he therefore declined the magistrate's invitation, and sought out Jerry, that he might have a private expla nation of his doubts. "Jerry," he said, "I tell you plainly, I am not satisfied that you have told the truth about the stranger who quitted us so quietly and jumped over the gate. I thought by your manner in the morning, that you knew something about him which you did not choose to tell; and though I saw you take your oath, and declare that you did not know him, I watched you closely, and perceived a reluctance in your manner that you must explain to me." "Why, then," said Jerry, "if it was any thing that concarned you, Masther Ned, sure I'd be long sorry not to tell you every thing, as if it was my own child I was talking to; but sure it can't signify to you, here or there, who the poor man was, that you never saw before, and won't, maybe, ever see again." "I tell you it does signify to me, Jerry, and if you know any thing of him, you must tell me." "Well, then, I'll tell you," said Jerry, "it was Sullivan, the very man we wor tellin' the story about, an' that Mr. Roberts, a while ago, was biddin' me look after, as if I was goin' to make a spy of myself." "Good heavens and how could you deny so solemnly that you knew any thing about him?" "Deny!-D'ye think, sir, I was goin' to turn informer 2" 66 But, my God! your oath-the oath that you took before the magistrate?-Is it nothing to perjure yourself?" "I committed no parjury, Masther Edward," said Jerry. "We can be cute enough for the magistrate sometimes in that way, an' it wasn't for nothing I spent three months in Wexford jail, when I helped my cousin to carry off Biddy Reilly-bad luck to them both, that left me in the lurch-I larned there how to bamboozle the magistrate about an oath, when I didn't want to tell what he wanted to know; and so to-day I took no oath, till I was axed about the pocket-book, and that I swore about true enough." "What do you mean, sir?" said O'Neill, angrily. "Did I not see you take the oath at the commencement?" "Don't be angry, Masther Edward," said Jerry; "I didn't kiss the book at all at all the first time-1 only kissed the cuff of my coat, when they thought I kissed the book." "Jerry, you are a scoundrel!" said O'Neill, " and I shall this instant go to the magistrate, and have you punished for this villany." The man betrayed no symptom of anger at this rebuke, but his eye grew moist, and his voice softened to a tone almost of tenderness, as he answered the young gentleman. and voice, and gesture, which, even when exerted in the wrong, it is difficult to resist. The purpose of O'Neill was changed, and he contented himself with a strong reprobation of the man's pernicious notion, that he incurred any disgrace by telling the truth, when legally called upon to do so. "It's true for you, sir," said Jerry, when O'Neill had finished his harangue; "an' in the regard of the quality, there's no denyin' what you say. But sure, sir, the poor people must stand by one another, or they could'nt live at all. Every one hates an informer, an' would'nt go either to his wake or his berrin." Jerry's mind was made up upon this point, and O'Neill's arguments were of no avail. He now turned his attention once more to the recovery of the Englishman's money, and stated to Kavanagh the probability that Sullivan had contrived, by some means to steal it, and the necessity that therefore existed, for having him taken up. "The divil a bit of it he stole, no more than I did," said Jerry, emphatically; "an' I'll make bould to say, no more than yourself did. I know him well, an' he's not the man for such a turn. I'll tell you what, sir, if the Englishman has lost the money at all,-an' though they say the English mostly tell truth,-I wouldn't like to swear he has lost; you may be sure it wasn't stole, but dropped some way, or shook out of his little walise." "I am inclined to think so myself," said O'Neill; "but tell me where is this Sullivan to be found. I promise you not to give him into the hands of the officers of justice; but I shall leave no means untried to get this man's pocket-book and its contents back for him, if it be possible; and as Sullivan was beside him when he opened his portmanteau, there is a chance that it may have fallen into his hands." Jerry protested once more, that if it had, Sullivan would have given it out of his hands forthwith to the right owner; but to satisfy O'Neill, he accurately described to him the situa tion of Sullivan's present dwelling, which the young gentleman the more easily understood, as his grousing expeditions had made him familiar with all the mountain district of the neighbourhood. The day was spent in fruitless inquiries-no tidings of the lost property could be obtained. O'Neill, whose conscience still reproached him as being in some sort accessory to the misfortune, and whose goodness of heart made him participate deeply in the extreme distress of the poor Englishman, still remained with him, and after he went to rest in the inn where they had stopped in the morning, the impression grew upon him stronger and stronger, that some good would result from seeing Sullivan, who had been the only companion of the Eng "Masther Edward," he said, "my mother nursed your father afore I was born, an' it isn't you that 'id bring your father's foster-brother to disgrace, and break the heart of his ould mother. More than that, I've tould you what I needn't have tould you, unless I liked; an'lishman upon his part of the coach. though I'm no gintleman, I know what honor manes too well to think that you'd take advantage of what I said myself, against myself. I did nothing but what I couldn't help doin', unless I turned informer; and that I'll never do, while my name's Jerry Kavanagh." There is an earnestness about the lower Irish-a -a throwing of their heart into the matter, and an emphatic expression of language, Even a few hours' sleep did not banish this impression from his mind; and shortly after dawn, he dressed himself, and actually set forth alone, to seek this man in his dwelling amongst the mountains. The spot described "The quality," are words used by the lower orders of the Irish, to denote the gentry, or upper orders. to him was only about eight miles distant from the inn, and it was still early when he began to ascend from the bottom of a deep glen towards a cleft about half-way up the mountain's side, where the habitation he sought had been described to be. The morning was remarkably fresh and clear, and the small thatched cabins, very thinly scattered upon the mountain's side, seemed almost so near, that a strong arm might have cast a stone to them; yet their extreme minuteness of size, and the smoothness of their outlines, showed, that they must still be at a great distance from the eye. Round lumps of granite held up their storm-beaten fronts above the heath and fern which encompassed their base; and here and there were little patches of herbage, that were nibbled at by little wild solitary mountain-sheep, which, as they heard the approaching step of O'Neill, scampered higher up the ascent, and at safe distance looked down with curious eye upon the stranger. And now O'Neill entered the cleft, which seemed to have been made in times long past, by some huge mountain torrent, that had worked for itself a deep and rocky channel, at the bottom of which there still flowed a little mountain river of the clearest water. The stream was driven into ten thousand irregularities by the lumps of rough granite scattered in its channel, through which the water toiled its way with ceaseless murmur. Here it dropped down like an infant waterfall, between two tall pieces of rock, with just a crevice to let it pass-there, it wheeled and foamed round a broad flat stone; and in some places the blocks of granite were so placed as to form a little basin, in which the crystal water was collected, and from which it gushed away like a living thing, delighted to escape to play. In some places, the sides of this narrow ravine displayed nothing but the bare rock, and in others, the rock was concealed by old bramble bushes, about whose roots the falling leaves of many winters had made a little soil; and here the bright green blades of grass, and the yellow primrose peeping through it, glinted in the morning sun. After walking about a mile up this cleft, there appeared on one side a sudden break in the line of granite rock; and an opening of smooth sward, growing wider as it receded from the stream, led to the cabin of which O'Neill was in search. It was what is called in Ireland, a "comfortable cabin;" it had a whole roof, of thatch, and a chimney formed by an old cask, with the ends driven out, fastened into the roof by a cement of mud. The walls of the habitation were also of mud, mixed with straw, straight, and well-made, a kind of building, by the by, in which the Irish do much delight, and which gives rise to a par. ticular trade amongst them, called that of a "mud-wall weaver.' The only stone used in the edifice was in two rude piles, broad at the base and narrow at the top, which formed the "door-cheeks;" and directly in front of this, shutting out completely from the dwelling the view of the pretty little slope leading to the stream, was a large pile of peats-Hibernicé, "a clump of turf." It was not until O'Neill had almost reached the door, and began to consider what he was to do and say, that the hopelessness of his expedi tion occurred to his mind, and the extreme improbability that any benefit could arise from it. He even had thoughts of turning about and retracing his steps, but this idea he gave up as soon as formed, and determined that as he had come so far, he would endeavour to see Sullivan, however small the chance that he was to gain any thing by the interview. He found the door, as is usual in Irish cabins, open; this is partly from an old traditional habit of hospitality, and partly, because in default of windows, it is the chief inlet to the light of day. When the rushlight is lighted in the evening, the door is put upon the latch. As O'Neill entered, he saw two young children playing on the floor, while a cradle held another-a stout girl, with a blowzy face, was washing a basket of potatoes in a corner-and a handsome young woman, with a cast of melancholy in her countenance, was sitting opposite the door carding wool. She started up with a frightened air at the appearance of the stranger; and to his inquiries whether Sullivan were at home, she gave an embarrassed and hesitating reply in the negative. O'Neill was about to ask some other questions, when he heard a loud and rough, but kindly voice, from a kind of cock-loft at the end of the house, formed by the space between the thatch and a rude ceiling of boards, which graced a part of the room, and left the loft open at one end. Yes, I am at home, Mary," said the unseen speaker; "sure, I know that young gentleman an' he's not the one to mane any harm." Sullivan's wife, for so the woman was who had spoken to O'Neill, at once changed her anxious and embarrassed air, to one of gladness and welcome, and wiping a stool with her apron, entreated O'Neill to sit down for a minute, "Till Jem would put on him,* and come down to his honour." In very little more than the time mentioned, the man did descend by a short ladder from his bedroom and hidingplace; and but that O'Neill's heart was not very liable to fear, he might have felt some alarm at finding himself alone in this wild place, with a man who now had all the appearance of a stout and reckless outlaw. Had be felt any apprehension, however, he must have been reassured, by the kind and merry tone of the man, who declared how glad he was to see him up the mountains, and by way of laughing off the circumstance of his having been denied, he said, casting a glance around," That though this was rather a mane lookin' place, yet he had as much gentility left, as not to be at home to every body." "You seem to know me," said O'Neill. "I should not have known you, though I believe I saw you once before, and that not long ago." "I know you well, sir," replied Sullivan; "and knew your father before you-an' if others did not know you as well as me, you couldn't have got here so quietly." After some farther colloquy, O'Neill entered upon the business which had brought him to Sullivan's dwelling-reminded him of his journey from Dublin the morning before, and the Dress himself. |
