CHAPTER XXXVII.
A TALE OF A TURBOT.
It would have been Owen Fitzgerald's desire to disclaim theinheritance which chance had put in his way in absolute silence, hadsuch a course been possible to him. And, indeed, not being very wellconversant with matters of business, he had thought for a while thatthis might be done--or at any rate something not far different fromthis. To those who had hitherto spoken to him upon the subject, toMr. Prendergast, Mr. Somers, and his cousin, he had disclaimed theinheritance, and that he had thought would have sufficed. That SirThomas should die so quickly after the discovery had not of coursebeen expected by anybody; and much, therefore, had not been thoughtat the moment of these disclaimers;--neither at the moment, norindeed afterwards, when Sir Thomas did die.
Even Mr. Somers was prepared to admit that as the game had beengiven up,--as his branch of the Fitzgeralds, acting under the adviceof their friend and lawyer, admitted that the property must gofrom them--even he, much as he contested within his own breast thepropriety of Mr. Prendergast's decisions, was fain to admit now thatit was Owen's business to walk in upon the property. Any words whichhe may have spoken on the impulse of the moment were empty words.When a man becomes heir to twelve thousand a year, he does not giveit up in a freak of benevolence. And, therefore, when Sir Thomas hadbeen dead some four or five weeks, and when Herbert had gone awayfrom the scene which was no longer one of interest to him, it wasnecessary that something should be done.
During the last two or three days of his life Sir Thomas had executeda new will, in which he admitted that his son was not the heir to hisestates, and so disposed of such moneys as it was in his power toleave as he would have done had Herbert been a younger son. Early inhis life he himself had added something to the property, some two orthree hundred a year, and this, also, he left of course to his ownfamily. Such having been done, there would have been no oppositionmade to Owen had he immediately claimed the inheritance; but as hemade no claim, and took no step whatever,--as he appeared neither byhimself, nor by letter, nor by lawyer, nor by agent,--as no rumourever got about as to what he intended to do, Mr. Somers found itnecessary to write to him. This he did on the day of Herbert'sdeparture, merely asking him, perhaps with scant courtesy, who washis man of business, in order that he, Mr. Somers, as agent to thelate proprietor, might confer with him. With but scant courtesy,--forMr. Somers had made one visit to Hap House since the news had beenknown, with some intention of ingratiating himself with the futureheir; but his tenders had not been graciously received. Mr. Somerswas a proud man, and though his position in life depended on theincome he received from the Castle Richmond estate, he would not makeany further overture. So his letter was somewhat of the shortest, andmerely contained the request above named.
Owen's reply was sharp, immediate, and equally short, and was carriedback by the messenger from Castle Richmond who had brought theletter, to which it was an answer. It was as follows:--
Hap House, Thursday morning, two o'clock.
(There was no other date; and Owen probably was unaware that hisletter being written at two P.M. was not written on Thursdaymorning.)
Dear Sir,
I have got no lawyer, and no man of business; nor do I mean to employ any if I can help it. I intend to make no claim to Mr. Herbert Fitzgerald's property of Castle Richmond; and if it be necessary that I should sign any legal document making over to him any claim that I may have, I am prepared to do so at any moment. As he has got a lawyer, he can get this arranged, and I suppose Mr. Prendergast had better do it.
I am, dear sir, Your faithful servant,
OWEN FITZGERALD of Hap House.
And with those four or five lines he thought it would be practicablefor him to close the whole affair.
This happened on the day of Herbert's departure, and on the daypreceding Lord Desmond's visit to Hap House; so that on the occasionof that visit, Owen looked upon the deed as fully done. He had putit quite beyond his own power to recede now, even had he so wished.And then came the tidings to him,--true tidings as he thought,--thatClara was still within his reach if only he were master of CastleRichmond. That this view of his position did for a moment shake him Iwill not deny; but it was only for a moment: and then it was that hehad looked up at Clara's brother, and bade him go back to his motherand sister, and tell them that Owen of Hap House was Owen of HapHouse still;--that and nothing more. Clara Desmond might be bought ata price which would be too costly even for such a prize as her. Itwas well for him that he so resolved, for at no price could she havebeen bought.
Mr. Somers, when he received that letter, was much inclined to doubtwhether or no it might not be well to take Owen at his word. Afterall, what just right had he to the estate? According to the eternaland unalterable laws of right and wrong ought it not to belong toHerbert Fitzgerald? Mr. Somers allowed his wish on this occasionto be father to many thoughts much at variance from that line ofthinking which was customary to him as a man of business. In hisordinary moods, law with him was law, and a legal claim a legalclaim. Had he been all his life agent to the Hap House propertyinstead of to that of Castle Richmond, a thought so romantic wouldnever have entered his head. He would have scouted a man as nearly amaniac who should suggest to him that his client ought to surrenderan undoubted inheritance of twelve thousand a year on a point offeeling. He would have rejected it as a proposed crime, and talkedmuch of the indefeasible rights of the coming heirs of the new heir.He would have been as firm as a rock, and as trenchant as a sword indefence of his patron's claims. But now, having in his hands thatshort, pithy letter from Owen Fitzgerald, he could not but look atthe matter in a more Christian light. After all was not justice,immutable justice, better than law? And would not the property beenough for both of them? Might not law and justice make a compromise?Let Owen be the baronet, and take a slice of four or five thousand,and add that to Hap House; and then if these things were wellarranged, might not Mr. Somers still be agent to them both?
Meditating all this in his newly tuned romantic frame of mind Mr.Somers sat down and wrote a long letter to Mr. Prendergast, enclosingthe short letter from Owen, and saying all that he, as a man ofbusiness with a new dash of romance, could say on such a subject.This letter, not having slept on the road as Herbert did in Dublin,and having been conveyed with that lightning rapidity for which theBritish Post-office has ever been remarkable--and especially thatportion of it which has reference to the sister island,--was in Mr.Prendergast's pocket when Herbert dined with him. That letter, andanother to which we shall have to refer more specially. But so muchat variance were Mr. Prendergast's ideas from those entertained byMr. Somers, that he would not even speak to Herbert on the subject.Perhaps, also, that other more important letter, which, if we live,we shall read at length, might also have had some effect in keepinghim silent.
But in truth Mr. Somers' mind, and that of Mr. Prendergast, did notwork in harmony on this subject. Judging of the two men together bytheir usual deeds and ascertained character, we may say that therewas much more romance about Mr. Prendergast than there was aboutMr. Somers. But then it was a general romance, and not one withan individual object. Or perhaps we may say, without injury toMr. Somers, that it was a true feeling, and not a false one. Mr.Prendergast, also, was much more anxious for the welfare of HerbertFitzgerald than that of his cousin; but then he could feel on behalfof the man for whom he was interested that it did not behove him totake a present of an estate from the hands of the true owner.
For more than a week Mr. Somers waited, but got no reply to hisletter, and heard nothing from Mr. Prendergast; and during this timehe was really puzzled as to what he should do. As regarded himself,he did not know at what moment his income might end, or how longhe and his family might be allowed to inhabit the house which henow held: and then he could take no steps as to the tenants; couldneither receive money nor pay it away, and was altogether at hiswits' ends. Lady Fitzgerald looked to him for counsel in everything,and he did not know ho
w to counsel her. Arrangements were to be madefor an auction in the house as soon as she should be able to move;but would it not be a thousand pities to sell all the furniture ifthere was a prospect of the family returning? And so he waited forMr. Prendergast's letter with an uneasy heart and vexation of spirit.
But still he attended the relief committees, and worked at thesoup-kitchens attached to the estate, as though he were still theagent to Castle Richmond; and still debated warmly with FatherBarney on one side, and Mr. Townsend on the other, on that vexatiousquestion of out-door relief. And now the famine was in full swing;and, strange to say, men had ceased to be uncomfortable aboutit;--such men, that is, as Mr. Somers and Mr. Townsend. The cuttingoff of maimed limbs, and wrenching out from their sockets of smashedbones, is by no means shocking to the skilled practitioner. And dyingpaupers, with "the drag" in their face--that certain sign of comingdeath of which I have spoken--no longer struck men to the heart. Likethe skilled surgeon, they worked hard enough at what good they coulddo, and worked the better in that they could treat the cases withoutexpress compassion for the individuals that met their eyes. Inadministering relief one may rob five unseen sufferers of what wouldkeep them in life if one is moved to bestow all that is comfortableon one sufferer that is seen. Was it wise to spend money inalleviating the last hours of those whose doom was already spoken,which money, if duly used, might save the lives of others not yetso far gone in misery? And so in one sense those who were the bestin the county, who worked the hardest for the poor and spent theirtime most completely among them, became the hardest of heart, andmost obdurate in their denials. It was strange to see devoted womenneglecting the wants of the dying, so that they might husband theirstrength and time and means for the wants of those who might still bekept among the living.
At this time there came over to the parish of Drumbarrow a youngEnglish clergyman who might be said to be in many respects the veryopposite to Mr. Townsend. Two men could hardly be found in thesame profession more opposite in their ideas, lives, purposes, andpursuits;--with this similarity, however, that each was a sincere,and on the whole an honest man. The Rev. Mr. Carter was much thejunior, being at that time under thirty. He had now visited Irelandwith the sole object of working among the poor, and distributingaccording to his own judgment certain funds which had been collectedfor this purpose in England.
And indeed there did often exist in England at this time amisapprehension as to Irish wants, which led to some misuses of thefunds which England so liberally sent. It came at that time to bethe duty of a certain public officer to inquire into a charge madeagainst a seemingly respectable man in the far west of Ireland,purporting that he had appropriated to his own use a sum of twelvepounds sent to him for the relief of the poor of his parish. It hadbeen sent by three English maiden ladies to the relieving officerof the parish of Kilcoutymorrow, and had come to his hands, he thenfilling that position. He, so the charge said,--and unfortunatelysaid so with only too much truth,--had put the twelve pounds intohis own private pocket. The officer's duty in the matter took him tothe chairman of the Relief Committee, a stanch old Roman Catholicgentleman nearly eighty years of age, with a hoary head and whitebeard, and a Milesian name that had come down to him throughcenturies of Catholic ancestors;--a man urbane in his manner, of theold school, an Irishman such as one does meet still here and therethrough the country, but now not often--one who above all things wastrue to the old religion.
Then the officer of the government told his story to the old Irishgentleman--with many words, for there were all manner of smallcollateral proofs, to all of which the old Irish gentleman listenedwith a courtesy and patience which were admirable. And when theofficer of the government had done, the old Irish gentleman thusreplied:--
"My neighbour Hobbs,"--such was the culprit's name--"has undoubtedlydone this thing. He has certainly spent upon his own uses thegenerous offering made to our poor parish by those noble-mindedladies, the three Miss Walkers. But he has acted with perfect honestyin the matter."
"What!" said the government officer, "robbing the poor, and at such atime as this!"
"No robbery at all, dear sir," said the good old Irish gentleman,with the blandest of all possible smiles; "the excellent MissWalkers sent their money for the Protestant poor of the parish ofKilcoutymorrow, and Mr. Hobbs is the only Protestant within it." Andfrom the twinkle in the old man's eye, it was clear to see that histriumph consisted in this,--that not only he had but one Protestantin the parish, but that that Protestant should have learned so littlefrom his religion.
But this is an episode. And nowadays no episodes are allowed.
And now Mr. Carter had come over to see that if possible certainEnglish funds were distributed according to the wishes of thegenerous English hearts by whom they had been sent. For as someEnglish, such as the three Miss Walkers, feared on the one hand thatthe Babylonish woman so rampant in Ireland might swallow up theirmoney for Babylonish purposes; so, on the other hand, did othersdread that the too stanch Protestantism of the church militant inthat country might expend the funds collected for undoubted bodilywants in administering to the supposed wants of the soul. No suchfaults did, in truth, at that time prevail. The indomitable force ofthe famine had absolutely knocked down all that; but there had beenthings done in Ireland, before the famine came upon them, which gavereasonable suspicion for such fears.
Mr. Townsend among others had been very active in soliciting aidfrom England, and hence had arisen a correspondence between him andMr. Carter; and now Mr. Carter had arrived at Drumbarrow with arespectable sum to his credit at the provincial bank, and an intensedesire to make himself useful in this time of sore need. Mr. Carterwas a tall, thin, austere-looking man; one, seemingly, who hadmacerated himself inwardly and outwardly by hard living. He had ahigh, narrow forehead, a sparse amount of animal development, thinlips, and a piercing, sharp, gray eye. He was a man, too, of fewwords, and would have been altogether harsh in his appearance hadthere not been that in the twinkle of his eye which seemed to saythat, in spite of all that his gait said to the contrary, the cocklesof his heart might yet be reached by some play of wit--if only thewit were to his taste.
Mr. Carter was a man of personal means, so that he not only was notdependent on his profession, but was able--as he also was willing--toaid that profession by his liberality. In one thing only was hepersonally expensive. As to his eating and drinking it was, or mighthave been for any solicitude of his own, little more than breadand water. As for the comforts of home, he had none, for since hisordination his missions had ever been migrating. But he alwaysdressed with care, and consequently with expense, for carefuldressing is ever expensive. He always wore new black gloves, anda very long black coat which never degenerated to rust, blackcloth trousers, a high black silk waistcoat, and a new black hat.Everything about him was black except his neck, and that was alwaysscrupulously white.
Mr. Carter was a good man--one may say a very good man--for he gaveup himself and his money to carry out high views of charity andreligion, in which he was sincere with the sincerity of his wholeheart, and from which he looked for no reward save such as the godlyever seek. But yet there was about him too much of the Pharisee.He was greatly inclined to condemn other men, and to think nonerighteous who differed from him. And now he had come to Ireland witha certain conviction that the clergy of his own church there were mennot to be trusted; that they were mere Irish, and little better intheir habits and doctrines than under-bred dissenters. He had beenelsewhere in the country before he visited Drumbarrow, and had shownthis too plainly; but then Mr. Carter was a very young man, and it isnot perhaps fair to expect zeal and discretion also from those whoare very young.
Mrs. Townsend had heard of him, and was in dismay when she found thathe was to stay with them at Drumbarrow parsonage for three days. IfMr. Carter did not like clerical characters of her stamp, neitherdid she like them of the stamp of Mr. Carter. She had heard of him,of his austerity, of his look, of his habits, and in her heart shebelieved him
to be a Jesuit. Had she possessed full sway herself inthe parish of Drumbarrow, no bodies should have been saved at suchterrible peril to the souls of the whole parish. But this Mr. Cartercame with such recommendation--with such assurances of money givenand to be given, of service done and to be done,--that there was norefusing him. And so the husband, more worldly wise than his wife,had invited the Jesuit to his parsonage.
"You'll find, Aeneas, he'll have mass in his room in the morninginstead of coming to family prayers," said the wife.
"But what on earth shall we give him for dinner?" said the husband,whose soul at the present moment was among the flesh-pots; and indeedMrs. Townsend had also turned over that question in her prudent mind.
"He'll not eat meat in Lent, you may be sure," said Mrs. Townsend,remembering that that was the present period of the year.
"And if he would there is none for him to eat," said Mr. Townsend,calling to mind the way in which the larder had of late been emptied.
Protestant clergymen in Ireland in those days had very frequentlyother reasons for fasting than those prescribed by ecclesiasticalcanons. A well-nurtured lady, the wife of a parish rector in thecounty Cork, showed me her larder one day about that time. Itcontained two large loaves of bread, and a pan full of stuff which Ishould have called paste, but which she called porridge. It was allthat she had for herself, her husband, her children, and her charity.Her servants had left her before she came to that pass. And she was awell-nurtured, handsome, educated woman, born to such comforts as youand I enjoy every day,--oh, my reader! perhaps without much giving ofthanks for them. Poor lady! the struggle was too much for her, andshe died under it.
Mr. Townsend was, as I have said, the very opposite to Mr. Carter,but he also was a man who could do without the comforts of life, ifthe comforts of life did not come readily in his way. He liked hisglass of whisky punch dearly, and had an idea that it was good forhim. Not caring much about personal debts, he would go in debt forwhisky. But if the whisky and credit were at an end, the loss did notmake him miserable. He was a man with a large appetite, and who tookgreat advantage of a good dinner when it was before him; nay, hewould go a long distance to insure a good dinner; but, nevertheless,he would leave himself without the means of getting a mutton chop,and then not be unhappy. Now Mr. Carter would have been very unhappyhad he been left without his superfine long black coat.
In tendering his invitation to Mr. Carter, Mr. Townsend had explainedthat with him the _res angusta domi_, which was always a prevailingdisease, had been heightened by the circumstances of the time; butthat of such crust and cup as he had, his brother English clergymanwould be made most welcome to partake. In answer to this, Mr. Carterhad explained that in these days good men thought but little ofcrusts and cups, and that as regarded himself, nature had so made himthat he had but few concupiscences of that sort. And then, all thishaving been so far explained and settled, Mr. Carter came.
The first day the two clergymen spent together at Berryhill, andfound plenty to employ them. They were now like enough to be in wantof funds at that Berryhill soup-kitchen, seeing that the great fountof supplies, the house, namely, of Castle Richmond, would soon havestopped running altogether. And Mr. Carter was ready to providefunds to some moderate extent if all his questions were answeredsatisfactorily. "There was to be no making of Protestants," he said,"by giving away of soup purchased with his money." Mr. Townsendthought that this might have been spared him. "I regret to say,"replied he, with some touch of sarcasm, "that we have no time forthat now." "And so better," said Mr. Carter, with a sarcasm of ablunter sort. "So better. Let us not clog our alms with impossibleconditions which will only create falsehood." "Any conditions are outof the question when one has to feed a whole parish," answered Mr.Townsend.
And then Mr. Carter would teach them how to boil their yellow meal,on which subject he had a theory totally opposite to the practiceof the woman employed at the soup-kitchen. "Av we war to hocus itthat, yer riverence," said Mrs. Daly, turning to Mr. Townsend, "thecrathurs couldn't ate a bit of it; it wouldn't bile at all, at all,not like that."
"Try it, woman," said Mr. Carter, when he had uttered his receiptoracularly for the third time.
"'Deed an' I won't," said Mrs. Daly, whose presence there was prettynearly a labour of love, and who was therefore independent. "It'd bea sin an' a shame to spile Christian vittels in them times, an' Iwon't do it." And then there was some hard work that day; and thoughMr. Townsend kept his temper with his visitor, seeing that he hadmuch to get and nothing to give, he did not on this occasion learn toalter his general opinion of his brethren of the English high church.
And then, when they got home, very hungry after their toil, Mr.Townsend made another apology for the poorness of his table. "I amalmost ashamed," said he, "to ask an English gentleman to sit down tosuch a dinner as Mrs. Townsend will put before you."
"And indeed then it isn't much," said Mrs. Townsend; "just a bit offish I found going the road."
"My dear madam, anything will suffice," said Mr. Carter, somewhatpretentiously. And anything would have sufficed. Had they put beforehim a mess of that paste of which I have spoken he would have ate itand said nothing,--ate enough of it at least to sustain him till themorrow.
But things had not come to so bad a pass as this atDrumbarrow parsonage; and, indeed, that day fortune had beenpropitious;--fortune which ever favours the daring. Mrs. Townsend,knowing that she had really nothing in the house, had sent Jerry towaylay the Lent fishmonger, who twice a week was known to make hisway from Kanturk to Mallow with a donkey and panniers; and Jerry hadreturned with a prize.
And now they sat down to dinner, and lo and behold, to the greatsurprise of Mr. Carter, and perhaps also to the surprise of the host,a magnificent turbot smoked upon the board. The fins no doubt hadbeen cut off to render possible the insertion of the animal into thelargest of the Drumbarrow parsonage kitchen-pots,--an injury againstwhich Mr. Townsend immediately exclaimed angrily. "My goodness,they have cut off the fins!" said he, holding up both hands in deepdismay. According to his philosophy, if he did have a turbot, whyshould he not have it with all its perfections about it--fins andall?
"My dear Aeneas!" said Mrs. Townsend, looking at him with that agonyof domestic distress which all wives so well know how to assume.
Mr. Carter said nothing. He said not a word, but he thought much.This then was their pretended poorness of living! with all their mockhumility, these false Irishmen could not resist the opportunity ofshowing off before the English stranger, and of putting on theirtable before him a dish which an English dean could afford only ongala days. And then this clergyman, who was so loudly anxious forthe poor, could not repress the sorrow of his heart because therich delicacy was somewhat marred in the cooking. "It was too bad,"thought Mr. Carter to himself, "too bad."
"None, thank you," said he, drawing himself up with gloomyreprobation of countenance. "I will not take any fish, I am muchobliged to you."
Then the face of Mrs. Townsend was one on which neither Christiannor heathen could have looked without horror and grief. What, theman whom in her heart she believed to be a Jesuit, and for whomnevertheless, Jesuit though he was, she had condescended to caterwith all her woman's wit!--this man, I say, would not eat fish inLent! And it was horrible to her warm Irish heart to think that afterthat fish now upon the table there was nothing to come but two orthree square inches of cold bacon. Not eat turbot in Lent! Had hebeen one of her own sort she might have given him credit for trueantagonism to popery; but every inch of his coat gave the lie to sucha supposition as that.
"Do take a bit," said Mr. Townsend, hospitably. "The fins should nothave been cut off, otherwise I never saw a finer fish in my life."
"None, I am very much obliged to you," said Mr. Carter, with sternestreprobation of feature.
It was too much for Mrs. Townsend. "Oh, Aeneas," said she, "what arewe to do?" Mr. Townsend merely shrugged his shoulders, while hehelped himself. His feelings were less acute, perhaps, than thoseof
his wife, and he, no doubt, was much more hungry. Mr. Carterthe while sat by, saying nothing, but looking daggers. He also washungry, but under such circumstances he would rather starve than eat.
"Don't you ever eat fish, Mr. Carter?" said Mr. Townsend, proceedingto help himself for a second time, and poking about round the edgesof the delicate creature before him for some relics of the glutinousmorsels which he loved so well. He was not, however, enjoying itas he should have done, for seeing that his guest ate none, andthat his wife's appetite was thoroughly marred, he was alone in hisoccupation. No one but a glutton could have feasted well under suchcircumstances, and Mr. Townsend was not a glutton.
"Thank you, I will eat none to-day," said Mr. Carter, sitting boltupright, and fixing his keen gray eyes on the wall opposite.
"Then you may take away, Biddy; I've done with it. But it's athousand pities such a fish should have been so wasted."
The female heart of Mrs. Townsend could stand these wrongs no longer,and with a tear in one corner of her eye, and a gleam of anger in theother, she at length thus spoke out. "I am sure then I don't knowwhat you will eat, Mr. Carter, and I did think that all you Englishclergymen always ate fish in Lent,--and indeed nothing else; forindeed people do say that you are much the same as the papists inthat respect."
"Hush, my dear!" said Mr. Townsend.
"Well, but I can't hush when there's nothing for the gentleman toeat."
"My dear madam, such a matter does not signify in the least," saidMr. Carter, not unbending an inch.
"But it does signify; it signifies a great deal; and so you'd know ifyou were a family man;"--"as you ought to be," Mrs. Townsend wouldhave been delighted to add. "And I'm sure I sent Jerry five miles,and he was gone four hours to get that bit of fish from PaddyMagrath, as he stops always at Ballygibblin Gate; and indeed Ithought myself so lucky, for I only gave Jerry one and sixpence. Butthey had an uncommon take of fish yesterday at Skibbereen, and--"
"One and sixpence!" said Mr. Carter, now slightly relaxing his browfor the first time.
"I'd have got it for one and three," said Mr. Townsend, upon whosemind an inkling of the truth was beginning to dawn.
"Indeed and you wouldn't, Aeneas; and Jerry was forced to promise theman a glass of whisky the first time he comes this road, which hedoes sometimes. That fish weighed over nine pounds, every ounce ofit."
"Nine fiddlesticks," said Mr. Townsend.
"I weighed it myself, Aeneas, with my own hands, and it was ninepounds four ounces before we were obliged to cut it, and as firm as arock the flesh was."
"For one and sixpence!" said Mr. Carter, relaxing still a littlefurther, and condescending to look his hostess in the face.
"Yes, for one and six; and now--"
"I'm sure I'd have bought it for one and four, fins and all," saidthe parson, determined to interrupt his wife in her pathos.
"I'm sure you would not then," said his wife, taking his assertion inearnest. "You could never market against Jerry in your life; I willsay that for him."
"If you'll allow me to change my mind, I think I will have a littlebit of it," said Mr. Carter, almost humbly.
"By all means," said Mr. Townsend. "Biddy, bring that fish back. NowI think of it, I have not half dined myself yet."
And then they all three forgot their ill humours, and enjoyed theirdinner thoroughly,--in spite of the acknowledged fault as touchingthe lost fins of the animal.