Complete Novels of Maria Edgeworth

by Maria Edgeworth

  “Ah! sir,” said an Irish gentleman, who found me in admiration upon the staircase, “this is all very good, very fine, but it is too good and too fine to last; come here again in two years, and I am afraid you will see all this going to rack and ruin. This is too often the case with us in Ireland: we can project, but we can’t calculate; we must have every thing upon too large a scale. We mistake a grand beginning for a good beginning. We begin like princes, and we end like beggars.”

  I rested only a few days in a capital in which, I took it for granted, there could be nothing worth seeing by a person who was just come from London. In driving through the streets, I was, however, surprised to see buildings, which my prejudices could scarcely believe to be Irish. I also saw some things, which recalled to my mind the observations I had heard at my hotel. I was struck with instances of grand beginnings and lamentable want of finish, with mixture of the magnificent and the paltry; of admirable and execrable taste. Though my understanding was wholly uncultivated, these things struck my eye. Of all the faculties of my mind, my taste had been most exercised, because its exercise had given me least trouble.

  Impatient to see my own castle, I left Dublin. I was again astonished by the beauty of the prospects, and the excellence of the roads. I had in my ignorance believed that I was never to see a tree in Ireland, and that the roads were almost impassable. With the promptitude of credulity, I now went from one extreme to the other: I concluded that we should travel with the same celerity as upon the Bath road; and I expected, that a journey for which four days had been allotted might be performed in two. Like all those who have nothing to do any where, I was always in a prodigious hurry to get from place to place; and I ever had a noble ambition to go over as much ground as possible in a given space of time. I travelled in a light barouche, and with my own horses. My own man (an Englishman), and my cook (a Frenchman), followed in a hackney chaise; I cared not how, so that they kept up with me; the rest was their affair. At night, my gentleman complained bitterly of the Irish post carriages, and besought me to let him follow at an easier rate the next day; but to this I could by no means consent: for how could I exist without my own man and my French cook? In the morning, just as I was ready to set off, and had thrown myself back in my carriage, my Englishman and Frenchman came to the door, both in so great a rage, that the one was inarticulate and the other unintelligible. At length the object of their indignation spoke for itself. From the inn yard came a hackney chaise, in a most deplorable crazy state; the body mounted up to a prodigious height, on unbending springs, nodding forwards, one door swinging open, three blinds up, because they could not be let down, the perch tied in two places, the iron of the wheels half off, half loose, wooden pegs for linch-pins, and ropes for harness. The horses were worthy of the harness; wretched little dog-tired creatures, that looked as if they had been driven to the last gasp, and as if they had never been rubbed down in their lives; their bones starting through their skin; one lame, the other blind; one with a raw back, the other with a galled breast; one with his neck poking down over his collar, and the other with his head dragged forward by a bit of a broken bridle, held at arm’s length by a man dressed like a mad beggar, in half a hat and half a wig, both awry in opposite directions; a long tattered great-coat, tied round his waist by a hay-rope; the jagged rents in the skirts of his coat showing his bare legs marbled of many colours; while something like stockings hung loose about his ankles. The noises he made by way of threatening or encouraging his steeds, I pretend not to describe.

  In an indignant voice I called to the landlord, “I hope these are not the horses — I hope this is not the chaise, intended for my servants.”

  The innkeeper, and the pauper who was preparing to officiate as postilion, both in the same instant exclaimed, “Sorrow better chaise in the county!”

  “Sorrow” said I; “what do you mean by sorrow?”

  “That there’s no better, plase your honour, can be seen. We have two more, to be sure; but one has no top, and the other no bottom. Any way there’s no better can be seen than this same.” 77

  “And these horses!” cried I; “why, this horse is so lame he can hardly stand.”

  “Oh, plase your honour, tho’ he can’t stand, he’ll go fast enough. He has a great deal of the rogue in him, plase your honour. He’s always that way at first setting out.”

  “And that wretched animal with the galled breast!”

  “He’s all the better for it, when once he warms; it’s he that will go with the speed of light, plase your honour. Sure, is not he Knockecroghery? and didn’t I give fifteen guineas for him, barring the luck penny, at the fair of Knockecroghery, and he rising four year old at the same time?”

  I could not avoid smiling at this speech: but my gentleman, maintaining his angry gravity, declared, in a sullen tone, that he would be cursed if he went with such horses; and the Frenchman, with abundance of gesticulation, made a prodigious chattering, which no mortal understood.

  “Then I’ll tell you what you’ll do,” said Paddy; “you’ll take four, as becomes gentlemen of your quality, and you’ll see how we’ll powder along.”

  And straight he put the knuckle of his fore-finger in his mouth, and whistled shrill and strong; and, in a moment, a whistle somewhere out in the fields answered him.

  I protested against these proceedings, but in vain; before the first pair of horses were fastened to the chaise, up came a little boy with the others fresh from the plough. They were quick enough in putting these to; yet how they managed it with their tackle, I know not. “Now we’re fixed handsomely,” said Paddy.

  “But this chaise will break down the first mile.”

  “Is it this chaise, plase your honour? I’ll engage it will go the world’s end. The universe wouldn’t break it down now; sure it was mended but last night.”

  Then seizing his whip and reins in one hand, he clawed up his stockings with the other: so with one easy step he got into his place, and seated himself, coachman-like, upon a well-worn bar of wood, that served as a coach-box. “Throw me the loan of a trusty Bartly, for a cushion,” said he. A frieze coat was thrown up over the horses’ heads — Paddy caught it. “Where are you, Hosey?” cried he. “Sure I’m only rowling a wisp of straw on my leg,” replied Hosey. “Throw me up,” added this paragon of postilions, turning to one of the crowd of idle bystanders. “Arrah, push me up, can’t ye?”

  A man took hold of his knee, and threw him upon the horse: he was in his seat in a trice; then clinging by the mane of his horse, he scrambled for the bridle, which was under the other horse’s feet — reached it, and, well satisfied with himself, looked round at Paddy, who looked back to the chaise-door at my angry servants, “secure in the last event of things.” In vain the Englishman in monotonous anger, and the Frenchman in every note of the gamut, abused Paddy: necessity and wit were on Paddy’s side; he parried all that was said against his chaise, his horses, himself, and his country, with invincible comic dexterity, till at last, both his adversaries, dumb-foundered, clambered into the vehicle, where they were instantly shut up in straw and darkness. Paddy, in a triumphant tone, called to my postilions, bidding them “get on, and not be stopping the way any longer.”

  Without uttering a syllable, they drove on; but they could not, nor could I, refrain from looking back to see how those fellows would manage. We saw the fore-horses make towards the right, then to the left, and every way but straight forwards; whilst Paddy bawled to Hosey—”Keep the middle of the road, can’t ye? I don’t want ye to draw a pound at-all-at-all.”

  At last, by dint of whipping, the four horses were compelled to set off in a lame gallop; but they stopped short at a hill near the end of the town, whilst a shouting troop of ragged boys followed, and pushed them fairly to the top. Half an hour afterwards, as we were putting on our drag-chain to go down another steep hill, — to my utter astonishment, Paddy, with his horses in full gallop, came rattling and chehupping past us. My people called to warn him that he had no drag:
but still he cried “Never fear!” and shaking the long reins, and stamping with his foot, on he went thundering down the hill. My Englishmen were aghast.

  “The turn yonder below, at the bottom of the hill, is as sharp and ugly as ever I see,” said my postilion, after a moment’s stupified silence. “He will break their necks, as sure as my name is John.”

  Quite the contrary: when we had dragged and undragged, and came up to Paddy, we found him safe on his legs, mending some of his tackle very quietly.

  “If that had broken as you were going down the steep hill,” said I, “it would have been all over with you, Paddy.”

  “That’s true, plase your honour: but it never happened me going down hill — nor never will, by the blessing of God, if I’ve any luck.”

  With this mixed confidence in a special providence, and in his own good luck, Paddy went on, much to my amusement. It was his glory to keep before us; and he rattled on till he came to a narrow part of the road, where they were rebuilding a bridge. Here there was a dead stop. Paddy lashed his horses, and called them all manner of names; but the wheel horse, Knockecroghery, was restive, and at last began to kick most furiously. It seemed inevitable that the first kick which should reach the splinter-bar, at which it was aimed, must demolish it instantly. My English gentleman and my Frenchman both put their heads out of the only window which was pervious, and called most manfully to be let out. “Never fear,” said Paddy. To open the door for themselves was beyond their force or skill. One of the hind wheels, which had belonged to another carriage, was too high to suffer the door to be opened, and the blind at the other side prevented their attempts, so they were close prisoners. The men who had been at work on the broken bridge came forward, and rested on their spades to see the battle. As my carriage could not pass, I was also compelled to be a spectator of this contest between man and horse.

  “Never fear,” reiterated Paddy; “I’ll engage I’ll be up wid him. Now for it, Knockecroghery! Oh, the rogue, he thinks he has me at a nonplush, but I’ll show him the differ.”

  After this brag of war, Paddy whipped, Knockecroghery kicked; and Paddy, seemingly unconscious of danger, sat within reach of the kicking horse, twitching up first one of his legs, then the other, and shifting as the animal aimed his hoofs, escaping every time as it were by miracle. With a mixture of temerity and presence of mind, which made us alternately look upon him as a madman and a hero, he gloried in the danger, secure of success, and of the sympathy of the spectators.

  “Ah! didn’t I compass him cleverly then? Oh, the villain, to be browbating me! I’m too cute for him yet. See there, now, he’s come to; and I’ll be his bail he’ll go asy enough wid me. Ogh! he has a fine spirit of his own, but it’s I that can match him: ’twould be a poor case if a man like me cou’dn’t match a horse any way, let alone a mare, which this is, or it never would be so vicious.”

  After this hard-fought battle, and suitable rejoicing for the victory, Paddy walked his subdued adversary on a few yards to allow us to pass him; but, to the dismay of my postilions, a hay-rope was at this instant thrown across the road, before our horses, by the road-makers, who, to explain this proceeding, cried out, “Plase your honour, the road is so dry, we’d expect a trifle to wet it.”

  “What do these fellows mean?” said I.

  “It’s only a tester or a hog they want, your honour, to give ’em to drink your honour’s health,” said Paddy.

  “A hog to drink my health?”

  “Ay, that is a thirteen, plase your honour; all as one as an English shilling.”

  I threw them a shilling: the hay-rope was withdrawn, and at last we went on. We heard no more of Paddy till evening. He came in two hours after us, and expected to be doubly paid for driving my honour’s gentlemen so well.

  I must say that on this journey, though I met with many delays and disasters; though one of my horses was lamed in shoeing by a smith, who came home drunk from a funeral; and though the back pannel of my carriage was broken by the pole of a chaise; and though one day I went without my dinner at a large desolate inn, where nothing was to be had but whiskey; and though one night I lay in a little smoky den, in which the meanest of my servants in England would have thought it impossible to sleep; and though I complained bitterly, and swore it was impracticable for a gentleman to travel in Ireland; yet I never remember to have experienced, on any journey, less ennui.78 I was out of patience twenty times a day, but I certainly felt no ennui; and I am convinced that the benefit some patients receive from a journey is in an inverse proportion to the ease and luxury of their mode of travelling. When they are compelled to exert their faculties, and to use their limbs, they forget their nerves, as I did. Upon this principle I should recommend to wealthy hypochondriacs a journey in Ireland, preferably to any country in the civilized world. I can promise them, that they will not only be moved to anger often enough to make their blood circulate briskly, but they will even, in the acme of their impatience, be thrown into salutary convulsions of laughter, by the comic concomitants of their disasters: besides, if they have hearts, their best feelings cannot fail to be awakened by the warm, generous hospitality they will receive in this country, from the cabin to the castle.

  Late in the evening of the fourth day, we came to an inn on the verge of the county where my estate was situate. It was one of the wildest parts of Ireland. We could find no horses, nor accommodations of any sort, and we had several miles farther to go. For our only comfort, the dirty landlady, who had married the hostler, and wore gold drop ear-rings, reminded us, that, “Sure, if we could but wait an hour, and take a fresh egg, we should have a fine moon.”

  After many fruitless imprecations, my French cook was obliged to mount one of my saddle-horses; my groom was left to follow us the next day; I let my gentleman sit on the barouche box, and proceeded with my own tired horses. The moon, which my landlady had promised me, rose, and I had a full view of the face of the country. As we approached my maritime territories, the cottages were thinly scattered, and the trees had a stunted appearance; they all slanted one way, from the prevalent winds that blew from the ocean. Our road presently stretched along the beach, and I saw nothing to vary the prospect but rocks, and their huge shadows upon the water. The road being sandy, the feet of the horses made no noise, and nothing interrupted the silence of the night but the hissing sound of the carriage-wheels passing through the sand.

  “What o’clock is it now, think you, John?” said one of my postilions to the other.

  “Past twelve, for sartain,” said John; “and this bees a strange Irish place,” continued he, in a drawling voice; “with no possible way o’ getting at it, as I see.” John, after a pause, resumed, “I say, Timothy, to the best of my opinion, this here road is leading on us into the sea.” John replied, “that he did suppose there might be such a thing as a boat farther on, but where, he could not say for sartain.” Dismayed and helpless, they at last stopped to consult whether they had come the right road to the house. In the midst of their consultation there came up an Irish carman, whistling as he walked beside his horse and car.

  “Honest friend, is this the road to Glenthorn Castle?”

  “To Glenthorn, sure enough, your honour.”

  “Whereabouts is the castle?”

  “Forenent you, if you go on to the turn.”

  “Forenent you!” As the postilions pondered upon this word, the carman, leaving his horse, and car, turned back to explain by action what he could not make intelligible by words.

  “See, isn’t here the castle?” cried he, darting before us to the turn of the road, where he stood pointing at what we could not possibly see, as it was hid by a promontory of rock. When we f reached the spot where he was stationed, we came full upon the view of Glenthorn Castle: it seemed to rise from the sea, abrupt and insulated, in all the gloomy grandeur of ancient times, with turrets and battlements, and a huge gateway, the pointed arch of which receded in perspective between the projecting towers.

  “It’s my
lord himself, I’m fond to believe!” said our guide, taking off his hat; “I had best step on and tell ’em at the castle.”

  “No, my good friend, there is no occasion to trouble you farther; you had better go back to your horse and car, which you have left on the road.”

  “Oh! they are used to that, plase your honour; they’ll go on very quite, and I’ll run like a redshank with the news to the castle.”

  He ran on before us with surprising velocity, whilst our tired horses dragged us slowly through the sand. As we approached, the gateway of the castle opened, and a number of men, who appeared to be dwarfs when compared with the height of the building, came out with torches in their hands. By their bustle, and the vehemence with which they bawled to one another, one might have thought that the whole castle was in flames; but they were only letting down a drawbridge. As I was going over this bridge, a casement window opened in the castle; and a voice, which I knew to be old Ellinor’s, exclaimed, “Mind the big hole in the middle of the bridge, God bless yees!”

  I passed over the broken bridge, and through the massive gate, under an arched way, at the farthest end of which a lamp had just been lighted: then I came into a large open area, the court of the castle. The hollow sound of the horses’ feet, and of the carriage rumbling over the drawbridge, was immediately succeeded by the strange and eager voices of the people, who filled the court with a variety of noises, contrasting, in the most striking manner, with the silence in which we had travelled over the sands. The great effect that my arrival instantaneously produced upon the multitude of servants and dependants, who issued from the castle, gave me an idea of my own consequence beyond any thing which I had ever felt in England. These people seemed “born for my use:” the officious precipitation with which they ran to and fro; the style in which they addressed me; some crying, “Long life to the Earl of Glenthorn!” some blessing me for coming to reign over them; all together gave more the idea of vassals than of tenants, and carried my imagination centuries back to feudal times.