Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon Volume I Part 22

Scarcely was the long Latin grace concluded, when Webber, leaning forward, enjoined his friends, in a very audible whisper, that if they intended to dine no time was to be lost.

"We have but little ceremony here, gentlemen, and all we ask is a fair start," said he, as he drew over the soup, and proceeded to help himself.

The advice was not thrown away; for each man, with an alacrity a campaign usually teaches, made himself master of some neighboring dish, a very quick interchange of good things speedily following the appropriation. It was in vain that the senior lecturer looked aghast, that the professor of astronomy frowned. The whole table, indeed, were thunderstruck, even to the poor vice-provost himself, who, albeit given to the comforts of the table, could not lift a morsel to his mouth, but muttered between his teeth, "May the devil admire me, but they're dragoons!" The first shock of surprise over, the porters proceeded to inform them that except Fellows of the University or Fellow-commoners, none were admitted to the table. Webber however a.s.sured them that it was a mistake, there being nothing in the statute to exclude the 14th Light Dragoons, as he was prepared to prove.

Meanwhile dinner proceeded, Power and his party performing with great self-satisfaction upon the sirloins and saddles about them, regretting only, from time to time, that there was a most unaccountable absence of wine, and suggesting the propriety of napkins whenever they should dine there again. Whatever chagrin these unexpected guests caused among their entertainers of the upper table, in the lower part of the hall the laughter was loud and unceasing; and long before the hour concluded, the Fellows took their departure, leaving to Master Frank Webber the task of doing the honors alone and una.s.sisted. When summoned before the board for the offence on the following morning, Webber excused himself by throwing the blame upon his friends, with whom, he said, nothing short of a personal quarrel--a thing for a reading man not to be thought of--could have prevented intruding in the manner related. Nothing less than _his_ tact could have saved him on this occasion, and at last he carried the day; while by an act of the board the 14th Light Dragoons were p.r.o.nounced the most insolent corps in the service.

An adventure of his, however, got wind about this time, and served to enlighten many persons as to his real character, who had hitherto been most lenient in their expressions about him. Our worthy tutor, with a zeal for our welfare far more praiseworthy than successful, was in the habit of summoning to his chambers, on certain mornings of the week, his various pupils, whom he lectured in the books for the approaching examinations.

Now, as these seances were held at six o'clock in winter as well as summer, in a cold fireless chamber,--the lecturer lying snug amidst his blankets, while we stood s.h.i.+vering around the walls,--the ardor of learning must indeed have proved strong that prompted a regular attendance. As to Frank, he would have as soon thought of attending chapel as of presenting himself on such an occasion. Not so with me. I had not yet grown hackneyed enough to fly in the face of authority, and I frequently left the whist-table, or broke off in a song, to hurry over to the doctor's chambers and spout Homer and Hesiod. I suffered on in patience, till at last the bore became so insupportable that I told my sorrows to my friend, who listened to me out, and promised me succor.

It so chanced that upon some evening in each week Dr. Mooney was in the habit of visiting some friends who resided a short distance from town, and spending the night at their house. He, of course, did not lecture the following morning,--a paper placard, announcing no lecture, being affixed to the door on such occasions. Frank waited patiently till he perceived the doctor affixing this announcement upon his door one evening; and no sooner had he left the college than he withdrew the paper and departed.

On the next morning he rose early, and concealing himself on the staircase, waited the arrival of the venerable damsel who acted as servant to the doctor. No sooner had she opened the door and groped her way into the sitting-room than Frank crept forward, and stealing gently into the bedroom, sprang into the bed and wrapped himself up in the blankets. The great bell boomed forth at six o'clock, and soon after the sounds of the feet were heard upon the stairs. One by one they came along, and gradually the room was filled with cold and s.h.i.+vering wretches, more than half asleep, and trying to arouse themselves into an approach to attention.

"Who's there?" said Frank, mimicking the doctor's voice, as he yawned three or four times in succession and turned in the bed.

"Collisson, O'Malley, Nesbitt," etc., said a number of voices, anxious to have all the merit such a penance could confer.

"Where's Webber?"

"Absent, sir," chorussed the whole party.

"Sorry for it," said the mock doctor. "Webber is a man of first-rate capacity; and were he only to apply, I am not certain to what eminence his abilities might raise him. Come, Collisson, any three angles of a triangle are equal to--are equal to--what are they equal to?" Here he yawned as though he would dislocate his jaw.

"Any three angles of a triangle are equal to two right angles," said Collisson, in the usual sing-song tone of a freshman.

As he proceeded to prove the proposition, his monotonous tone seemed to have lulled the doctor into a doze, for in a few minutes a deep, long-drawn snore announced from the closed curtains that he listened no longer. After a little time, however, a short snort from the sleeper awoke him suddenly, and he called out, "Go on, I'm waiting. Do you think I can arouse at this hour of the morning for nothing but to listen to your bungling? Can no one give me a free translation of the pa.s.sage?"

This digression from mathematics to cla.s.sics did not surprise the hearers, though it somewhat confused them, no one being precisely aware what the line in question might be.

"Try it, Nesbitt,--you, O'Malley. Silent all? Really this is too bad!" An indistinct muttering here from the crowd was followed by an announcement from the doctor that the speaker was an a.s.s, and his head a turnip! "Not one of you capable of translating a chorus from Euripides,--'Ou, ou, papai, papai,' etc.; which, after all, means no more than, 'Oh, whilleleu, murder, why did you die!' etc. What are you laughing at, gentlemen? May I ask, does it become a set of ignorant, ill-informed savages--yes, savages, I repeat the word--to behave in this manner? Webber is the only man I have with common intellect,--the only man among you capable of distinguis.h.i.+ng himself. But as for you, I'll bring you before the board; I'll write to your friends; I'll stop your college indulgences; I'll confine you to the walls; I'll be d.a.m.ned, eh--"

This lapse confused him. He stammered, stuttered, endeavored to recover himself; but by this time we had approached the bed, just at the moment when Master Frank, well knowing what he might expect if detected, had bolted from the blankets and rushed from the room. In an instant we were in pursuit; but he regained his chambers, and double-locked the door before we could overtake him, leaving us to ponder over the insolent tirade we had so patiently submitted to.

That morning the affair got wind all over college. As for us, we were scarcely so much laughed at as the doctor; the world wisely remembering, if such were the nature of our morning's orisons, we might nearly as profitably have remained snug in our quarters.

Such was our life in Old Trinity; and strange enough it is that one should feel tempted to the confession, but I really must acknowledge these were, after all, happy times, and I look back upon them with mingled pleasure and sadness. The n.o.ble lord who so pathetically lamented that the devil was not so strong in him as he used to be forty years before, has an echo in my regrets that the student is not as young in me as when these scenes were enacting of which I write.

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE INVITATION.--THE WAGER.

I was sitting at breakfast with Webber, a few mornings after the mess dinner I have spoken of, when Power came in hastily.

"Ha, the very man!" said he. "I say, O'Malley, here's an invitation for you from Sir George, to dine on Friday. He desired me to say a thousand civil things about his not having made you out, regrets that he was not at home when you called yesterday, and all that. By Jove, I know nothing like the favor you stand in; and as for Miss Dashwood, faith! the fair Lucy blushed, and tore her glove in most approved style, when the old general began his laudation of you."

"Pooh, nonsense," said I; "that silly affair in the west."

"Oh, very probably; there's reason the less for you looking so excessively conscious. But I must tell you, in all fairness, that you have no chance; nothing short of a dragoon will go down."

"Be a.s.sured," said I, somewhat nettled, "my pretensions do not aspire to the fair Miss Dashwood."

"_Tant mieux et tant pis, mon cher_. I wish to Heaven mine did; and, by Saint Patrick, if I only played the knight-errant half as gallantly as yourself, I would not relinquish my claims to the Secretary at War himself."

"What the devil brought the old general down to your wild regions?"

inquired Webber.

"To contest the county."

"A bright thought, truly. When a man was looking for a seat, why not try a place where the law is occasionally heard of?"

"I'm sure I can give you no information on that head; nor have I ever heard how Sir George came to learn that such a place as Galway existed."

"I believe I can enlighten you," said Power. "Lady Dashwood--rest her soul!--came west of the Shannon; she had a large property somewhere in Mayo, and owned some hundred acres of swamp, with some thousand starving tenantry thereupon, that people dignified as an estate in Connaught. This first suggested to him the notion of setting up for the county, probably supposing that the people who never paid in rent might like to do so in grat.i.tude. How he was undeceived, O'Malley there can inform us. Indeed, I believe the worthy general, who was confoundedly hard up when he married, expected to have got a great fortune, and little antic.i.p.ated the three chancery suits he succeeded to, nor the fourteen rent-charges to his wife's relatives that made up the bulk of the dower. It was an unlucky hit for him when he fell in with the old 'maid' at Bath; and had she lived, he must have gone to the colonies. But the Lord took her one day, and Major Dashwood was himself again. The Duke of York, the story goes, saw him at Hounslow during a review, was much struck with his air and appearance, made some inquiries, found him to be of excellent family and irreproachable conduct, made him an aide-de-camp, and, in fact, made his fortune. I do not believe that, while doing so kind, he could by possibility have done a more popular thing. Every man in the army rejoiced at his good fortune; so that, after all, though he has had some hard rubs, he has come well through, the only vestige of his unfortunate matrimonial connection being a correspondence kept up by a maiden sister of his late wife's with him. She insists upon claiming the ties of kindred upon about twenty family eras during the year, when she regularly writes a most loving and ill-spelled epistle, containing the latest information from Mayo, with all particulars of the Macan family, of which she is a worthy member. To her constant hints of the acceptable nature of certain small remittances, the poor general is never inattentive; but to the pleasing prospect of a visit in the flesh from Miss Judy Macan, the good man is dead. In fact, nothing short of being broke by general court-martial could complete his sensations of horror at such a stroke of fortune; and I am not certain, if choice were allowed him, that he would not prefer the latter."

"Then he has never yet seen her?" said Webber.

"Never," replied Power; "and he hopes to leave Ireland without that blessing, the prospect of which, however remote and unlikely, has, I know well, more than once terrified him since his arrival."

"I say, Power, and has your worthy general sent me a card for his ball?"

"Not through me, Master Frank."

"Well, now, I call that devilish shabby, do you know. He asks O'Malley there from _my_ chambers, and never notices the other man, the superior in the firm. Eh, O'Malley, what say you?"

"Why, I didn't know you were acquainted."

"And who said we were? It was his fault, though, entirely, that we were not. I am, as I have ever been, the most easy fellow in the world on that score, never give myself airs to military people, endure anything, everything, and you see the result; hard, ain't it?"

"But, Webber, Sir George must really be excused in this matter. He has a daughter, a most attractive, lovely daughter, just at that budding, unsuspecting age when the heart is most susceptible of impressions; and where, let me ask, could she run such a risk as in the chance of a casual meeting with the redoubted lady-killer, Master Frank Webber? If he has not sought you out, then here be his apology."

"A very strong case, certainly," said Frank; "but, still, had he confided his critical position to my honor and secrecy, he might have depended on me; now, having taken the other line--"

"Well, what then?"

"Why, he must abide the consequences. I'll make fierce love to Louisa; isn't that the name?"

"Lucy, so please you."

"Well, be it so,--to Lucy,--talk the little girl into a most deplorable attachment for me."

"But, how, may I ask, and when?"

"I'll begin at the ball, man."