The Ned M'Keown Stories Part 6

"Very right, Shane--very right: only for it, we never could do.--What the d.i.c.kens is keeping this girl with the eggs?--why she might be at Mr.

Morrow's, here, since. By the way, Mr. Morrow," he continued, laughing, "you must come over to our church: you're a good neighbor, and a worthy fellow, and it's a thousand pities you should be sent down."

"Why, Docthor," said Andy, "do you really believe I'll go downwards?"

"Ah, Mr. Morrow, don't ask me that question--out of the pale, you know--out of the pale."

"Then you think, sir, there's no chance for me, at all?" said Andy, smiling.

"Not the laste, Andy, you must go this way," said Father Ned, striking the floor with the b.u.t.t end of his whip, and winking--"to the lower raigons; and, upon my knowledge, to tell you the truth, I'm sorry for it, for you're a worthy fellow."

"Ah, Docthor," said Ned, "it's a great thing entirely to be born of the true church--one's always sure, then."

"Ay, ay; you may say that, Ned," returned the priest, "come or go what will, a man's always safe at the long run, except he dies without his clargy.--Shane, hand me the jug, if you please.--Where did you get this stuff, Nancy?--faith, it's excellent."

"You forget, Father Ned, that that's a secret.----But here's Biddy with the eggs, and now you'll have your rasher in no time."

When the two clergymen had discussed the rashers and eggs, and while the happy group were making themselves intimately acquainted with a fresh jug of punch, as it circulated round the table--

"Now, sir," said Father Ned to the stranger, "we'll hear your story with the greatest satisfaction possible; but I think you might charge your tumbler before you set to it."

When the stranger had complied with this last hint, "Well, gentlemen,"

said he, "as I am rather fatigued, will you excuse me for the position I am about to occupy, which is simply to stretch myself along the hob here, with my head upon the straw ha.s.soch? and if you have no objection to that, I will relate the story."

To this, of course, a general a.s.sent was given. When he was stretched completely at his ease--

"Well, upon my veracity," observed Father Peter, "the gentleman's supernaturally long."

"Yes, Pether," replied Father Ned, "but observe his position--_Polysyllaba cuncta supina_, as Psorody says.--Arrah, salvation to me but you're a dull man, afther all!--but we're interrupting the gentleman. Sir, go on, if you please, with your story."

"Give me a few minutes," said he, "until I recollect the particulars."

He accordingly continued quiescent for two or three minutes more, apparently arranging the materials of his intended narration, and then commenced to gratify the eager expectations of his auditory, by emitting those nasal enunciations which are the usual accompaniments of sleep!

"Why, bad luck to the morsel of 'im but's asleep," said Ned; "Lord pardon me for swearin' in your Reverence's presence."

"That's certainly the language of a sleeping man," replied Father Ned, "but there might have been a little more respect than all that snoring comes to. Your health, boys."

The stranger had now wound up his nasal organ to a high pitch, after which he commenced again with somewhat of a lower and finer tone.

"He's beginning a new paragraph," observed Father Peter with a smile at the joke.

"Not at all," said Father Ned, "he's turning the tune; don't you perceive that he's snoring 'G.o.d save the King,' in the key of _ba.s.s relievo?_"

"I'm no judge of instrumental music, as you are," said the curate, "but I think it's liker the 'Dead March of Saul,' than 'G.o.d save the King;'

however, if you be right, the gentleman certainly snores in a truly loyal strain."

"That," said little M'Roarkin, "is liker the Swine's melody, or the Bedfords.h.i.+re hornpipe--he--he--he!"

"The poor gintleman's tired," observed Nancy, "afther a hard day's thravelling."

"I dare say he is," said Father Ned, in the sincere hospitality of his country; "at all events, take care of him, Nancy, he's a stranger, and get the best supper you can for him--he appears to be a truly respectable and well-bred man."

"I think," said M'Kinley, with a comical grin, "you might know that by his high-flown manner of sleeping--he snores very politely, and like a gentleman, all out."

"Well done, Alick," said the priest, laughing; "go home, boys, it's near bed-time; Paddy, ma bouchal, are the horses ready?"

"They'll be at the door in a jiffy, your Reverence," said Paddy going out.

In the course of a few minutes, he returned, exclaiming, "Why, thin, is it thinkin' to venthur out sich a night as it's comin' on yer Reverences would be? and it plas.h.i.+n' as if it came out of methers! Sure the life would be dhrownded out of both of ye, and yees might colch a faver into the bargain."

"Sit down, gintlemen," said Ned; "sit down, Father Ned, you and Father Pether--we'll have another tumbler; and, as it's my turn to tell a story, I'll give yez something, amuse yez,--the best I can, and, you all know, who can do more?"

"Very right, Ned; but let us see"--replied father Ned, putting his head out of the door to ascertain what the night did; "come, pether, it's good to be on the safe side of any house in such a storm; we must only content ourselves until it gets fair. Now, Ned, go on with your story, and let it be as pleasant as possible."

"Never fear, your Reverence," replied Ned--"here goes--and healths a-piece to begin with."

THE THREE TASKS.

"Every person in the parish knows the purty knoll that rises above the Routing Burn, some few miles from the renowned town of Knockimdowny, which, as all the world must allow, wants only houses and inhabitants to be as big a place as the great town of Dublin itself. At the foot of this little hill, just under the shelter of a dacent pebble of a rock, something above the bulk of half a dozen churches, one would be apt to see--if they knew how to look sharp, otherwise they mightn't be able to make it out from the gray rock above it, except by the smoke that ris from the chimbley--Nancy Magennis's little cabin, snug and cosey with its corrag* or ould man of branches, standing on the windy side of the door, to keep away the blast. Upon my word, it was a dacent little residence in its own way, and so was Nancy herself, for that matther; for, though a poor widdy, she was very _punctwell_ in paying for Jack's schooling, as I often heard ould Terry M'Phaudeen say, who told me the story. Jack, indeed, grew up a fine slip; and for hurling, foot-ball playing, and lepping, hadn't his likes in the five quarters of the parish. It's he that knew how to handle a spade and a raping-hook, and what was betther nor all that, he was kind and tindher to his poor ould mother, and would let her want for nothing. Before he'd go to his day's work in the morning, he'd be sure to bring home from the clear-spring well that ran out of the other side of the rock, a pitcher of water to serve her for the day; nor would he forget to bring in a good creel of turf from the snug little peat-sack that stood thatched with rushes before the door, and leave it in the corner, beside the fire; so that she had nothing to do but put over her hand, without rising off of her sate, and put down a sod when she wanted it.

*The _Corrag_ is a roll of branches tied together when green and used for the purposes mentioned the story. It is six feet high, and much thicker than a sack, and is changed to either side of the door according to the direction from which the wind blows.

"Nancy, on her part, kept Jack very clane and comfortable; his linen, though coorse, was always a good color, his working clothes tidily mended at all times; and when he'd have occasion to put on his good coat to work in for the first time, Nancy would sew on the fore-part of each sleeve a stout patch of ould cloth, to keep them from being worn by the spade; so that when she'd rip these off them every Sat.u.r.day night, they would look as new and fresh as if he hadn't been working in them at all, at all.

"Then when Jack came home in the winter nights, it would do your heart good to see Nancy sitting at her wheel, singing, '_Stachan Varagah_,'

or '_Peggy Na Laveen_,' beside a purty clear fire, with a small pot of _murphys_ boiling on it for their supper, or laid up in a wooden dish, comfortably covered with a clane praskeen on the well-swept hearth-stone; whilst the quiet, dancing blaze might be seen blinking in the nice earthen plates and dishes that stood over against the side-wall of the house. Just before the fire you might see Jack's stool waiting for him to come home; and on the other side, the brown cat was.h.i.+ng her face with her paws, or sitting beside the dog that lay asleep, quite happy and continted, purring her song, and now and then looking over at Nancy, with her eyes half-shut, as much as to say, 'Catch a happier pair nor we are, Nancy, if you can.'

"Sitting quietly on the roost above the door, were d.i.c.ky the c.o.c.k, and half-a-dozen hens, that kept this honest pair in eggs and _egg-milk_ for the best part of the year, besides enabling Nancy to sell two or three clutches of March-birds every season, to help to buy wool for Jack's big-coat, and her own gray-beard gown and striped red and blue petticoat.

"To make a long story short--No two could be more comfortable, considering every thing. But, indeed, Jack was always obsarved to have a dacent ginteel turn with him; for he'd scorn to see a bad gown on his mother, or a broken Sunday coat on himself; and instead of drinking his little earning in a shebeen-house, and then eating his praties dry, he'd take care to have something to kitchen* them; so that he was not only snug and dacent of a Sunday, regarding wearables, but so well-fed and rosy, that a point of a rush would take a drop of blood out of his cheek.** Then he was the comeliest and best-looking young man in the parish, could tell lots of droll stories, and sing scores of merry songs that would make you split your sides with downright laughing; and when a wake or a dance would happen to be in the neighborhood, maybe there wouldn't be many a sly look from the purty girls for pleasant Jack Magennis!

* The straits to which the poor Irish are put for what is termed kitchen--that is some liquid that enables them to dilute and swallow the dry potato--are grievous to think of.

An Irishman in his miserable cabin will often feel glad to have salt and water in which to dip it, but that alluded to in the text is absolute comfort. Egg milk is made as follows:--A measure of water is put down suited to the number of the family; the poor woman then takes the proper number of eggs, which she beats up, and, when the water is boiling, pours it in, stirring it well for a couple of minutes. It is then made, and handed round in wooden noggins, every one salting for themselves. In color it resembles milk, which accounts for its name.

Our readers must have heard of the old and well known luxury of "potatoes and point," which, humorous as it is, scarcely falls short of the truth. An Irish family, of the cabin cla.s.s, hangs up in the chimney a herring, or "small taste" of bacon, and as the national imagination is said to be strong, each individual points the potato he is going to eat at it, upon the principle, I suppose, of _crede et habes_. It is generally said that the act communicates the flavor of the herring or bacon, as the case may be, to the potato; and this is called "potatoes and point."

** This proverb, which is always used as above, but without being confined in its application, to only one s.e.x, is a general one in Ireland. In delicacy and beauty I think it inimitable.

"In this way lived Jack and his mother, as happy and continted as two lords; except now and thin, that Jack would feel a little consarn for not being able to lay past anything for the _sorefoot_,* or that might enable him to think of marrying--for he was beginning to look about him for a wife; and why not, to be sure? But he was prudent for all that, and didn't wish to bring a wife and small family into poverty and hards.h.i.+p without means to support them, as too many do.

* Accidents--future calamity--or old age.

"It was one fine, frosty, moonlight night--the sky was without a cloud, and the stars all blinking that it would delight anybody's heart to look at them, when Jack was cra.s.sing a bog that lay a few fields beyant his own cabin. He was just crooning the '_Humors of Glynn_' to himself and thinking that it was a very hard case that he couldn't save anything at all, at all, to help him to the wife, when, on coming down a bank in the middle of the bog, he saw a dark-looking man leaning against a clamp of turf, and a black dog, with a pipe of tobacky in his mouth, sitting at his ase beside him, and he smoking as sober as a judge. Jack, however, had a stout heart, bekase his conscience was clear, and, barring being a little daunted, he wasn't very much afeard. 'Who is this coming down towards us?' said the black-favored man, as he saw Jack approaching them. 'It's Jack Magennis,' says the dog, making answer, and taking the pipe out of his mouth with his right paw; and after puffing away the smoke, and rubbing the end of it against his left leg, exactly as a Christian (this day's Friday, the Lord stand betune us and harm) would do against his sleeve, giving it at the same time to his comrade--'It's Jack Magennis,' says the dog, 'honest Widow Magennis's dacent son.' 'The very man,' says the other, back to him, 'that I'd wish to sarve out of a thousand. Arrah, Jack Magennis, how is every tether-length of you?' says the old fellow, putting the _furrawn_* on him--'and how is every bone in your body, Jack, my darling? I'll hould a thousand guineas,' says he, pointing to a great big bag that lay beside him, 'and that's only the tenth part of what's in this bag, Jack, that you're just going to be in luck to-night above all the nights in the year.'

* That frank, cordial manner of address which brings strangers suddenly to intimacy.