As I Rode by Granard Moat

by Benedict Kiely

Full at the gates of Stein’s Distillery;

  With Satan’s self you’d stand a tussle

  To enter there and wet your whistle!

  In vain the Priest reproved his doings –

  Even as the ivy holds the ruins –

  He caution’d, counsell’d, watch’d and track’d him,

  But all in vain – at last he whack’d him;

  And with a blackthorn, highly seasoned,

  He urged the argument he’d reason’d.

  But Thady loved intoxication,

  And foil’d all hopes of reformation;

  He still rais’d rows and drank the whiskey,

  And roar’d, just like the Bay of Biscay.

  In every grog-shop he was found,

  In every row he fought a round;

  The treadmill knew his step as well

  As e’er a bellman knew his bell;

  The jail received him forty times

  For midnight rows and drunken crimes;

  He flailed his wife and thump’d her brother,

  And burn’d the bed about his mother,

  Because they hid his fine steel pike

  Deep down in Paudh Molony’s dike!

  The guard was call’d out to arrest him,

  Across the quarry loch they chased him;

  The night was dark, the path was narrow,

  Scarce giving room to one wheelbarrow;

  Thade knew the scanty passage well,

  But headlong his pursuers fell

  Into the stagnant, miry brook

  Like birds in birdlime sudden stuck.

  The neighbours said the devil steel’d him,

  For if the garrison assail’d him

  Inside King John’s strong Castle-wall,

  He would escape unhurt from all!

  All day he drank ‘potheen’ at Hayes’s,

  And pitched the King and Law to blazes!

  He knocked his master on the floor,

  And kiss’d Miss Lizzy at the door!

  But ere his drunken pranks went further,

  The host and he had milla murdher!

  The window panes he broke entire

  The bottles flew about the fire;

  The liquor, on the hearth increasing,

  Caught fire and set the chimney blazing!

  The Reverend sage this deed admonish’d,

  The congregation stood astonish’d –

  He said that Thady was an agent

  Employ’d on earth by hell’s black Regent!

  And if he wouldn’t soon reform,

  His place and pay would be more warm!

  His vital thread would soon be nick’d,

  And into Hades he’d be kick’d!

  Even there he would not be admitted,

  Except the Porter he outwitted!

  For, if he got inside the wall,

  Most likely, he’d out-devil them all!

  The people heard the sad assertion,

  And pray’d aloud for his conversion!

  While Thady in the public-house

  Was emptying kegs and ‘brewing’ rows!

  For him the Priest prognosticated

  A woeful doom and end ill-fated!

  And truth had rarely disappointed

  The sayings of the Lord’s Anointed!

  But many a one in heaven takes dinner,

  Who died a saint and lived a sinner!

  ’Twere better far, and safer surely,

  To live a saint and die one purely!

  All ye who’re ready to condemn

  A fellow-child of clay, like him!

  Try if yourselves need no repentance,

  Before you pass the bitter sentence!

  And ere you judge your brother, first

  Remember that yourselves are dust!

  But if your conscience tells you then

  That your own heart is free from sin –

  Cry, with the Pharisee, ‘Thank God!

  I am not like that wicked clod!’

  But to our story of this queer boy

  Thady the drunken, devil-may-care boy!

  ’Twas Christmas Eve – the gale was high –

  The snow-clouds swept along the sky;

  The flaky drift was whirling down,

  Like flying feathers thro’ the town.

  The tradesman chatted o’er his ‘drop’,

  The Merchant closed his vacant shop

  Where, all day long, the busy crowd

  Bought Christmas fare, with tumult loud.

  The Grocer scored the day’s amounts,

  The Butcher conn’d his fat accounts;

  The Farmer left the noisy mart,

  With heavy purse and lighten’d heart.

  In every pane the Christmas light

  Gave welcome to the holy night;

  In every house the holly green

  Around the wreathed walls was seen;

  The Christmas blocks of oak entire,

  Blaz’d, hiss’d and crackled in the fire;

  And sounds of joy from every dwelling,

  Upon the snowy blast came swelling.

  The flying week, now past and gone,

  Saw Thady earn two pounds one!

  His good employer paid it down,

  And warn’d him to refrain from town;

  And banned the devilment of drinking,

  But Thady scorned his sober thinking;

  He fobb’d the coin, with spirit light,

  To home and master bade good-night,

  And, like a pirate-frigate cruising,

  Steer’d to the crowded City, boozing!

  The sweet-toned bells of Mary’s tower,

  Proclaim’d the Saviour’s natal hour!

  And many an eye with pleasure glisten’d!

  And many an ear with rapture listen’d!

  The gather’d crowd of charm’d people

  Dispersed from gazing at the steeple;

  The homeward tread of parting feet,

  Died on the echoes of the street;

  For Johnny Connell, that dreaded man,

  With his wild-raking Garryowen clan,

  Clear’d the streets and smash’d each lamp,

  And made the watchmen all decamp!

  At half-past one the town was silent,

  Except a row rais’d in the Island,

  Where Thady – foe to sober thinking –

  With comrade boys sat gaily drinking!

  A table with a pack of cards

  Stood in the midst of four blackguards,

  Who, with the bumper-draught elated,

  Dash’d down their trumps, and swore, and cheated!

  Four pints, the fruit of their last game,

  White-foaming, to the table came;

  They drank, and dealt the cards about,

  And Thady brought ‘fifteen wheel out’!

  Again the deal was Jack Fitzsimon’s,

  He turned them up, and trumps were diamonds;

  The ace was laid by Billy Mara,

  And beat with five by Tom O’Hara;

  The queen was quickly laid by Thady,

  Jack threw the king and douced the lady!

  Bill jink’d the game and cried out, ‘Waiter!

  Bring in the round, before ’tis later!’

  The draughts came foaming from the barrel;

  The sport soon ended in a quarrel; –

  Jack flung a pint at Tom O’Hara,

  And Thady levell’d Billy Mara;

  The cards flew round in every quarter,

  The earthen floor grew drunk with porter;

  The landlord ran to call the Watch,

  With oaths half Irish and half Scotch.

  The Watch came to the scene of battle,

  Proclaiming peace, with sounding wattle;

  The combatants were soon arrested,

  But Thady got off unmolested.

  The night was stormy, cold and late,

  No human form was in the street;

  The virgin snow lay on the highways,


  And chok’d up alleys, lanes, and byways.

  The North still pout’d its frigid store,

  The clouds look’d black and threaten’d more;

  The sky was starless, moonless, all

  Above the silent world’s white pall.

  The driving sleet-shower hiss’d aloud –

  The distant forest roar’d and bow’d;

  But Thady felt no hail nor sleet,

  As home he reel’d thro’ Castle-street.

  The whistling squall was beating on

  The batter’d towers of old King John,

  Which guarded once, in warlike state,

  The hostile pass of Thomond-gate.

  The blinding showers, like silvery balls,

  Rustled against the ancient walls,

  As if determined to subdue

  What William’s guns had failed to do!

  Old Munchin’s trees, from roots to heads,

  Were rocking in their churchyard beds;

  The hoary tombs were wrapt in snow,

  The angry Shannon roar’d below.

  Thade reel’d along, in slow rotation,

  The greatest man in Erin’s nation;

  Now darting forward, like a pike,

  With upraised fist in act to strike;

  Now wheeling backward, with the wind,

  And half to stand or fall inclined;

  Now sidelong, ’mid the pelting showers,

  He stumbled near the tall round towers:

  With nodding head and zig-zag feet,

  He gained the centre of the street;

  And, giddy as a summer-midge,

  Went staggering towards old Thomond Bridge,

  Whose fourteen arches braved so clever,

  Six hundred years, the rapid river;

  And seem’d, in sooth, a noble picture

  Of ancient Irish architecture.

  But here the startled Muse must linger,

  With tearful eye and pointed finger

  To that dark river once the bed

  Of Limerick’s brave defenders dead –

  There half the glorious hope she cherished,

  In one sad hour, deluded, perish’d;

  The fatal draw-bridge open’d wide,

  And gave the warriors to the tide;

  The flood received each foremost man,

  The rear still madly pressing on;

  ’Til all the glory of the brave

  Was buried in the whirling wave;

  And heroes’ frames – a bloodless slaughter –

  Chok’d up the deep and struggling water.

  Now Thady ne’er indulged a thought

  How Limerick’s heroes fell or fought;

  This night he was in no position

  For scripture, history, or tradition.

  His thoughts were on the Bishop’s Lady –

  The first tall arch he’d cross’d already;

  He paused upon the haunted ground,

  The barrier of her midnight round.

  Along the Bridge-way, dark and narrow,

  He peer’d – while terror drove its arrow,

  Cold as the keen blast of October,

  Thro’ all his frame and made him sober.

  Awhile he stood in doubt suspended,

  Still to push forward he intended;

  When, lo! just as his fears released him,

  Up came the angry ghost and seized him!

  Ah, Thady! you are done! – Alas!

  The Priest’s prediction comes to pass –

  If you escape this demon’s clutch,

  The devil himself is not your match!

  He saw her face grim, large and pale,

  Her red eyes sparkled through her veil;

  Her scarlet cloak – half immaterial –

  Flew wildly round her person aerial.

  With oaths, he tried to grasp her form,

  ’Twere easier far to catch a storm;

  Before his eyes she held him there,

  His hands felt nothing more than air;

  Her grasp press’d on him cold as steel;

  He saw her form but could not feel;

  He tried not, tho’ his brain was dizzy,

  To kiss her, as he kissed Miss Lizzy,

  But pray’d to heaven for help sincere –

  The first time e’er he said a prayer.

  ’Twas vain – the Spirit, in her fury,

  To do her work was in a hurry;

  And, rising, with a whirlwind strength,

  Hurl’d him o’er the battlement.

  Splash went poor Thady in the torrent,

  And roll’d along the rapid current,

  Towards Curragour’s mad-roaring Fall

  The billows tost him, like a ball;

  And who dare say, that saw him sinking,

  But ’twas his last full round of drinking?

  Yet, no – against the river’s might

  He made a long and gallant fight;

  That stream in which he learned to swim,

  Shall be no watery grave to him!

  Near, and more near he heard the roar

  Of rock-impeded Curragour,

  Whose torrents, in their headlong sway,

  Raged mad as lions for their prey!

  Above the Fall he spied afloat

  Some object, like an anchor’d boat,

  To this, with furious grasp, he clung,

  And from the tide his limbs upswung.

  Half-frozen in the stern he lay,

  Until the holy light of day

  Brought forth some kind assisting hand

  To row poor Thady to the strand.

  ’Mid gazing crowds, he left the shore

  Well sober’d, and got drunk no more!

  And in the whole wide parish round,

  A better Christian was not found;

  He loved his God and served his neighbour,

  And earn’d his bread by honest labour.

  Thady, with all his faults, stood bravely by my side when I had the honour of encountering for the first time, at a conference of librarians in Galway city, the renowned Robert Herbert, scholar and historian, and then, and until his death, librarian for Limerick city. Robert had written for The Limerick Leader a series of articles on the worthies of Thomond, which were afterwards collected into a book. And one of those worthies was, most certainly, Michael Hogan, the Bard of Thomond, who wrote about poor Thady and about a lot more in his Lays and Legends of Thomond, a formidable volume that first appeared in the Fenian Year of 1867. But the volume that I have just stolen Thady from is a new, select and complete edition published in Limerick city in 1924.

  Which reminds me. A distinguished citizen of Limerick, who was also a friend of Robert Herbert, said to me not so long ago: ‘A Kiely from Bruff can do no wrong.’

  We were standing halfway between the gates of Leinster House and the gate of the National Library.

  The point in the remark was that my grandfather came from Bruff. Down in that green and pleasant land they have long memories.

  And here is a pleasant memory from that Limerick land. This poem by Jerome Flood, a man from west Cork, I take from David Marcus’s book-page in The Irish Press for 17 January 1981:

  JOHNNY IN KILLALOE

  Let me die young or thrive and bloom in Killaloe

  And drowse on the bridge, all day, in summer weather

  With nothing at all on my mind but a choice of drinks:

  ‘What’ll it be today, Johnny, whiskey or Guinness?’

  All the rest of my long days, until death comes.

  In rain or sun, even here in haunted Killaloe,

  I would never remember for long the Danes or the Monks,

  Not even Cromwell the whoreson, Collins or Owen Roe

  Nor other men whose names were cursed or blessed

  From Cork to Derry, Aughrim to Vinegar Hill.

  With a breeze I would skim under sail on Lough Derg,

  Or stroll at my ease through Owney & Arrah
>
  Or lie in some scented meadow above Portroe

  With nothing much on my mind but names for islands

  Dim on the hazy Lough – islands in the Sea of China.

  The girls I’d court would be Clare girls, mostly,

  Farmers’ daughters, soft-eyed, supple and willing

  With nothing averse in the heart to love under hedges,

  Eager to comfort a single man with no harm in him,

  And take a chance, at times, at more than kissing.

  For a change, I would cross the long bridge to Ballina

  And stretch my length by the Graves of the Leinstermen,

  Sharing the skyward joy of the enraptured lark

  And wish it is I were the grass-hidden hopper

  Frittering the sunlit hour away, near my left hand.

  From a choice of mansions in the woods of Leinster

  Or a castle in Ulster with three avenue-gates

  With no regrets in my mind I would turn

  And choose Killaloe for the fine delights of my days

  All the rest of my long days, until death comes.

  And now that I think of it, ’twas another Kerryman, and one of the greatest, who first gave me the words of that wildest of all (almost) Limerick songs: ‘The Limerick Rake’.

  I’m talking now of Sigerson Clifford, not only in himself a composer of poems and ballads, but a great and scholarly authority on the songs sung here and there in Munster for many years. I take the words of ‘The Limerick Rake’ from Sigerson’s Book of Irish Recitations, published by Bentee Books (Dun Laoire: 1960).

  THE LIMERICK RAKE

  I am a young fellow, as wild as a goat,

  In Castletown Conyers I’m also well-known,

  In Newcastle West I spent many a note

  With Nellie and Judy and Mary.

  My father abused me for being such a rake

  And wasting my time in such frolicking ways.

  But I ne’er could forget the kind nature of Kate.

  And we’ll leave the old world as we find it.

  My parents had reared me to shake and to mow,

  To plough and to harrow, to reap and to sow.

  But my heart being too airy to drop it so low

  I set out on a high speculation.

  On paper and parchment they taught me to write,

  In Euclid and grammar they opened my eyes,

  And in multiplication, in truth, I was bright.

  And we’ll leave the old world as we find it.

  If I chance for to go to the town of Rathkeale

  The girls all around me do flock on the Square.