ST. PATRICK'S DAY IN MY OWN PARLOUR. Carrigbawn, March 18th, 1851. If you were like Asmodeus, my dear Anthony (though I am far from insinuating that you resemble him in any respect), and had the gift of looking into another man's dwelling at your desire, and that it chanced to be your fancy to look into mine on yesterday evening, you would have seen me, about the hour of half-past six o'clock, seated at my fire-side, evidently in a state of expectation. A glance at my table would have showed you that I had dined-not that any vestiges of dinner were to be seen on the table, but it was in the occupation of a force whose presence always announces that the eatables have been driven from the field, or, as Jack Bishop would say, that the flesh has given way to the spirit. In a word, my dear Anthony, certain flasks of blue and amber stood upon the board, with a few long-necked, graceful bottles, whose transparent glass was rivalled by the limpid liquor within them. Some dishes of dried fruits were scattered around, with glasses and doyleys for, it might be, half-a-dozen persons, and in the midst lay a square box, from which issued an aroma that breathed “Havannah” upon the grateful senses. While upon a distant table that stood against the wall might be seen a tongue, a few cold chickens, and some trifles of that sort, modestly awaiting the time when a sufficient interval should elapse from the hour of dinner, to render their nearer approach to the scene of action a matter to be desired. But I was still alone. The pendule on my mantelpiece had chimed seven when the door was softly opened, and the quietest step imaginable-such as a man with his heavy gait can never accomplishstole across the apartment, and placed a small brass kettle on the hob. I scarcely noticed the presence of her who entered till she came up to where I sat, and, placing her hand lightly on my shoulder, she looked gently into my face, and said with an affectionate freedom "Well, now, I do believe you are going to sleep!" "Nay, dear Bridget," said I, "I was only musing." And then I turned up my eyes to that sweet countenance. Now, Anthony, I know very well what you think, and how you turn up your eyes, and what you are going to say, but I must request you to keep your thoughts and your suspicions to yourself, and hear me out at all events. I turned, I repeat it, my eyes to that sweet countenance, and saw it beaming with love for me, a love which I returned with all my heart. Dear Bridget!-thine eye may have lost some of its brightness, but none of its benevolence, and the wrinkles that are gathering on thy old face mar not its placidity; the lily is not purer than thy coif, nor the snow than thy hair, and yet I love thee better than when thy cheek was brighter and thy tresses were black. And now, Mr. Poplar, what have you to say against my loving my old nurse! "I think, Bridget, they ought to be here shortly; I'll just step out and see if they're coming," and so I passed out and stood before the door. How beautiful was the scene around me! The sun had set nearly an hour before, and not the faintest tint of twilight in the west left, as it were, a memory of his brightness; but yet were the heavens filled with a light so pure, so tender, so holy, that one might almost wish that day should never come again to flout its pallid lustre with his bright hot flushes. The moon was at her full, and had already climbed up some degrees in heaven, for she rose at sunset; and as she glittered down in her serene glory on the outstretched earth, her beams, as if endued with a celestial mesmerism, threw all that they smote into a delicious repose. The stars winked far away and feebly in the deep blue impermeable heaven; the mountain tops faded mistily away into the vapor; the stream gleamed in a sil very slumber, and field and forest had a dim, distant, drowsy look, like the landscape that passes over a sleeper's vision, or the pictures that are produced by a camera obscura. Sound there was none to break the spell, save the faintest of breezes that crept over the leaves of the early rose, the gurgling of the streamlet, like the murmurings of a child as he stirs in sleep, and the solemn distant boom of the ocean waves as they broke against the rocks, or rippled fretfully up the sloping sands. Ever restless Ocean! life-pulse of Nature! Thou, like thy great Maker, knowest neither sleep nor slumber. All things rest save Thee, and rest refresheth them, but rest would be to Thee what a pause would be to the heartstagnation and death. And so when the wearied world lies with her giant limbs relaxed in repose, thy heave is still seen and thy throbbing still heard, to tell that she "is not dead, but sleepeth !" Not more naturally does the flame, kindled on the earth, mount up towards heaven, or the vapour on her bosom float skyward, than do the thoughts, which have their origin in the contemplation of terrestrial things, rise by an almost natural necessity to their mighty primal Creator, "who dwelleth in the heavens." So from the moving ocean my thoughts passed to Him whose power first stirred it with life: "The sea is mighty, but a mightier sways His restless billows. Thou, whose hands have scooped His boundless gulfs, and built his shore, thy breath, That moved in the beginning o'er his face, Moves o'er it evermore. The obedient waves To its strong motion roll, and rise and fall. Still, from that realm of rain, thy cloud goes up, My contemplation was broken by a heavy, measured pace near me, and a figure emerged from a path in the shrubbery, and stood in the moonlight. Ere he stood by my side, the light threw out his form, and revealed every feature as clear as in day, and I welcomed one of my oldest and kindest friends, the priest of the parish. Let me describe him to you, Anthony, for he belongs to a class that is passing rapidly away. Father Dionysius O'Kelly, as he loves to hear himself called, or Father Denis, as every one persists in calling him, is a fine specimen of the good old priest which was common enough fifty years ago. A man that was often an honoured guest of the lord of the soil, and the rector of the parish, who eschewed political rancour and polemical bitterness, who loved his own flock, and sheared them duly at Easter and Christmas with a shepherd's care, and loved his neighbour's flock too, though he thought they were wandering out of the way, and might be all the better if penned up in his own fold, and clipped by his own shears; one who cared not to read deeply of modern theology, but was often tinctured with Latin, and even French classics, and had generally a knowledge of Irish literature. All this had Father Denis in common with his class, and now for the individualities that made up the man. Physically he was a favourable specimen of an extensive human area, cultivated upon a judicious system of animal husbandry. Above the middle height, massive and rotund, he stood about five feet ten, and weighed well nigh fifteen stone. He invariably dressed in black broad-cloth; the knees of his smalls were closed with silver buckles, while his legs were lost in long jack boots, which shone not with the lustre of modern blacking, but had a rich, unctuous look withal, that showed the leather was nourished with a more congenial lacker. The countenance of the good priest was pleasing to look upon, weather-beaten and florid, plump and oleaginous; and the facial landscape, though very well diversified with the elevations of all the prominent organs, had not anything approaching to an angle upon it; all was round and swelling, from the top of the frontal bone to the chin, which latter repeated itself again and again in the waves of fat that encircled his neck, and were supported by a white cravat, or rather series of cravats within each other, forming what was long ago familiarly denominated a "pudding." But the eye of Father Denis was his crowning charm; it was grey, large, and in general somewhat languid, and swam in an atmosphere of moisture that proved the priest could, always within proper limits, enjoy the good things of life, both liquid and solid, as well as his neighbours; but once set the eye of Father Denis in motion, and it was something worth looking at, rolling restlessly about from one object to another, sparkling with intelligence, or twinkling with fun, as by turns it sought food for information or humour. Our greetings were scarcely exchanged when the distant sound of wheels was heard. Have you ever listened to this sound in a still night in the country, Anthony? The continuous roll and ringing tone which the wheels make upon the hard dry road, with the measured beat of the horse's feet as he slings along, have something quite musical in them; and I never hear them without involuntarily attaching to them some pleasant chanting melody. And now the noise has suddenly ceased; the clear, sharp clank of iron tells that the latch of the gate has been raised; the wheels come on ringing and singing again, and in a few minutes more a dog-cart, with its freight, drew up at the spot where we were standing, Uncle Saul descended leisurely from the front, and threw the reins to "Shawneen," who was in attendance. My godfather jumped down from beside him somewhat more briskly, and Jack Bishop, who sat behind, vaulted lightly over the back of the vehicle, and, executing an aerial gambol, descended to terra firma. Everybody shook hands with everybody else, as Dickens says, added to which Jonathan Freke slapped the priest upon the back by way of emphasis, for they were old friends, and so we proceeded, without loss of time, to the parlour, Jack bringing up the rere, trolling the appropriate melody of "Patrick's Day in the Morning." I have always observed, my dear Anthony, in social meetings, if there be in company intelligent and good humoured men, willing alike to listen and to communicate, that conversation, no matter how trifling and desultory it be at first, is sure, ere long, to cast off its commonplaces, to concentrate and intensify itself upon some worthier subject, and become pleasant and interesting always, and often instructive. Accordingly, after a few colloquial skirmishes, which usually continue during the time that is occupied in selecting each his particular refection and compounding the same, taking up the position at the fire or the table, which is most agreeable to the individual, and, in a word, "making one's self comfortable," the conversation insensibly turned upon the subject of the national festival and the saint whose memory we were that night assembled to honour. Father Denis, not only in his clerical character, but also as being a tolerable antiquary and a great Irish scholar, naturally took the lead, and recounted passages of the history and life of the great apostle and missionary of Ireland, with which his mind was well stored both from tradition and reading. Sooth to say, however, some of his accounts of Saint Patrick, in his encounters with the Pagan Irish, bordered so closely on the marvellous, that we were disposed to hold them as rather apocryphal, though we did not care just to tell the priest so. At length he narrated to us a smart brush or two which the saint had with the Irish Magi, and the miracles with which he discomfited them. "Phew!" responded my godfather, in a subdued but lengthened whistle. Now the narrator and his auditory interpreted this sibillation, each in his own fashion. The latter considered the sound as decidedly indicative of dissent and incredulity. And indeed the utterer, when afterwards questioned in private, admitted that it might be justly translated into "what a whopper!" The former looked upon it as a becoming expression of belief and admiration, such as a peasant would give utterance to in the words "Glory be to God, see that now!" And so being gratified and encouraged he raised his glass to his moutha silent oblation to his beloved saint-and, after a moment's pause of an ardent and devotional character, he proceeded. "Gentlemen, I'm now going to give you a treat such as you won't meet every day nor from every one, I can assure you. What do you think of an original hymn composed by St. Patrick himself in the Irish language, and which he sang with his monks when they were approaching the royal palace of Temoria, or Tara, and were surrounded by their Pagan enemies? It was first given to the world by the learned Dr. Petrie, whom I have the high honour of knowing."— "The best hand living at an Irish air on the violin," interposed Jack, "and has the finest collection of Irish music extant. I wish he would publish it.""And," continued the priest," extracted from an Irish manuscript in Trinity College, Dublin, that is at all events 1,200 years old. It is even now but little known, and I believe no metrical English version of it has ever been made except that which I mean just now to recite to you. But first listen to the hymn in the original." Hereupon the priest threw himself back in his chair, and fixing his eyes stea dily upon a little statuette of the "Apollo Belvedere" that stood on a bracket against the opposite wall, thus commenced: A tomriug indiu njurt trén, togairm Trinoit. "In the name of the blessed St. Patrick and all his holy monks, dear Father Donysius, spare us the vernacular," whined Jack Bishop in a tone of most ludicrous supplication. "I never could pick up as much of Irish as would carry me through Connemara. Remember this is no night of penance, though it is in Lent." The priest came to a dead stop, and looked at Jack with an expression of surprise and mortification in silence; but in a moment his eye began to twinkle, and he said with a smile: "You're quite right, Mr. Bishop, the Irish is not the thing at all for such as you are. I deserve the rebuke. Ne date quod sanctum est canibus. Nec projicite margaritas vestras coram porcis. Neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet and turn again, and rend you.'” "Bravo! Father Denis," said Uncle Saul, "that's a hard hit you have given Jack Bishop." "And convicted him of being a great boar on his own showing," added I. "Peccavi, peccavi," cried Jack in a penitential voice, "I submit, good father, to wash away my sin in an extra tumbler." "By no means," replied the priest, "I shall not inflict so disagreeable a penance; I will be content with condemning you to strict silence till I have recited the English version of the hymn." Jack bowed in dumb submission, and the priest thus proceeded : HYMN OF SAINT PATRICK. I. At Temoria, on this day, II. In the blessed Trinity, III. At Temoria on this day, Betwixt me and all ills, I lay Sacred things whose virtues be Of the holiest potency; IV. Christ's birth, his baptism in the wave, His crucifixion and his grave, His rising and ascent on high, V. At Temoria, on this day, VI. The virtue that the hope affords VII. In preaching of the Apostles blest, In good men's deeds of piety. VIII. At Temoria, on this day, The strength of heaven, the sun-beam's light, IX. The lightning's dread rapidity, The speed of wind, the depth of sea, X. At Temoria, on this day, God's strength be pilot of my way; XI. May the eye of God still view me! XII. May the hand of God protect me! May the host of God all guard me XIII. From demon's snares, from sin's temptations, From the mind's bad inclinations, From all who think on ill to me, Far, near, alone, in company! XIV. All these powers I place between me, And evil powers, 'gainst them to screen me, Who their deadly arts employ, My soul and body to destroy; XV. Against false prophets, incantations, Against false laws of heresy, And treacheries of idolatry; |