Geoffrey Austin: student

Front matter

Alas ! what are we doing all our lives, both as a necessity and as a duty, but unlearning the world's poetry, and attaining to its prose? This is our education as boys, and as men, in the action of life, in the closet or the library, in our affections, in our aims, in our hopes, and in our memories. — Cardinal Newman. tov tppovitv fiporov; odMcr&vTety Ta Ta.$ii f/.a,$os QtvTec. xupiat; i%uv. ffTaX^a o iv $ uvrvcii Tpo xœpdias p.vyitrivf.f&ci/v Tovos} xxt Titp axovra; y>Xfa ffutppoveTv. Agamemnon, 170-173. Who guideth mortals into the way of being wise, Who causeth them signally to have instruction by affliction, But grief from the recollection of ills Drops even in sleep over the heart, And prudence comes even to the unwilling. DUBLIN M. H. GILL AND SON TO THE CATHOLIC YOUTH OF IRELAND, IN WHOSE future OUR HIGHEST INTERESTS ARE INVOLVED, THESE FEW PAGES — A PRELUDE TO DEEPER AND DIVINER THINGS — ARE AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED.

CONTENTS CHAP. pAGB I. MY GUARDIAN ...... 1 II. MAYFIELD ...... 10 III. MY LATIN TUTOR ..... 21 IV. MONSIEUR LE COMTE ..... 31 V. IS THIS FATE ? . . . . .40 VI. HERR MESSING ...... 55 VII. THE FATHER RECTOR ..... 60 VIII. MR. FERRIS DISMISSED ..... 66 IX. A PHILOSOPHICAL CHAPTER . . . .76 X. AT YULE-TIDE ...... 81 XI. THE COUNT'S STORY ..... 93 XII. THE IDES OF MARCH . . . . .104 XIII. THE FIRE AT THE ASYLUM .... 114 XIV. A SUBTLE REVENGE . . . . .120 XV. AN UNEXPECTED CHAMPION . . . .126 XVI. BY THE SEA ...... 131 XVII. THE WAIL OF A LOST BOUL . . .142 XVIII. UNDER THE LIMES ..... 149 XIX. HARD WORK FOR LOST TIME .... 155 XX. THE LONELY SCHOLAR . . . . - . 164 XXI. A LETTER ...... 170 XXII. THE VEIL UPLIFTS . . . . .176 XXIII. COULETTE DEPARTS ..... 183 XXIV. BURLINGTON HOUSE ..... 190 XXV. A SAD JOURNEY ...... 200 XXVI. THE PARTING OF THE WAYS .... 208 rii STUDENT — + —

Chapter I My Guardian

"O, wenn das Herz euch warnt, folgt seinem Triebe ! Das Herz ist Gottes Stimme." Schiller. ' ' If your heart speak to you, follow its impulse. "Tis the voice of God." I was just seventeen years old. I had spent the last five years of my life in our diocesan seminary, where I learned to play handhall well, and to become an excellent batsman, not to speak of knowing fairly Arnold's Latin Prose Composition, and Henry's First Greek Book; and I think I could have translated Virgil or Xenophon very well, if I had a good edition with copious notes, like Faussett's. Hitherto I had not dreamed of choosing a profession or other calling in life, to secure the wherewithal to live respectably. Life for me was a something to be enjoyed — not to be preserved. I had health enough to laugh at sickness and that mental ailment called ambition.

I had a guardian, however, who thought it high time for me to lay my plans for the future ; and towards the end of August 18 — , at one of my frequent visits, and immediately after dinner, he introduced the subject. I must here say, that if ever man passed through life with all his best instincts unimpaired, his i : STUDENT 2 spirits undepressed, and his heart unhardened, it was my guardian. There was a perpetual conflict going on between his head and heart. The one was exceedingly clear, the other was exceedingly soft and affectionate ; and, like most soft things in this world, it generally gained the victory. In the matter of charity, for example, he would make the most frantic resolutions to be thrifty and economical, for he had a most decided propensity to get into debt ; but the most transparent case of pretended poverty deceived him, and then, while his housekeeper raged, he had a philosophical way of consoling himself by the words of Pascal, of whom he was a great admirer : " Le cœur a ses raisons, que la raison ne connait pas."

Something like the following scene was enacted night after night at his little presbytery. Hannah enters, dark and threat ening. " A woman at the door says she wants to see you, sir." " Hannah," says Father Tom sternly, " what have I told you about these calls ? " " Very well, your Eeverence, I'll send her away." " Certainly, Hannah ; I don't see what these people come here for at such an hour." We would then resume our conversation, but I could see clearly that the mind of the old man was anxious and disturbed. Presently he would ring for Hannah. And Hannah would come in, muttering, " I thought so." " Is that poor woman gone, Hannah ? " " No, sir." " Ahem ! What did she say exactly was her case ? " This in a most judicial and critical manner, as if he had not the slightest idea of entertaining it if it were not a case of the clearest necessity.

" She says her husband had his arm whipped off by a threshing-machine at four o'clock to-day, and that he is gone into hospital, and they must amplicate it to-morrow." " God bless me ! you don't say so, Hannah ! Here, give the poor woman this, and tell her that I'll go to the hospital myself to-morrow and be present at the operation. I have a taste for these scientific experi ments." This to me, who knew he would much rather suffer the amputation himself than witness it in another. It was much the same feeling that made him the poorest preacher, although perhaps he was the most finished scholar, in his diocese. He had an idea that the poorest woman in his parish was infinitely better than himself ; and he used to blush and be confused on Sundays, when he had to face his congregation and tell them those positive truths that seem too great to be uttered except by the lips of the All-Perfect.

Believ ing himself to be very imperfect, he could not preach perfection to others, and his sermons, therefore, wanted that tone of conviction and self-confident dogmatism that impress susceptible audiences. Yet never have I known one possessed of such fine and accurate tastes. He had a splendid knowledge of the Classics (as I knew to my cost), especially of Horace, which he knew almost as well as his Breviary; and next after Horace, and probably owing to his French education, the greatest pleasure in his hfe was reading and analysing Pascal's Thoughts. "Well, Geoffrey," he said to me this afternoon, " vacation is coming to a close." " 'Tis, sir," said I ; " but I hope I am not going back to St. S 's." " No, indeed," said he slowly ; " I have been thinking that we must make a change. You said, I think, that you didn't like the professions.

Let me see. You objected to the priesthood because you didn't consider yourself worthy, nor do you think you ever will be. If you think so, my boy, I shall not force your wishes there. But what objection have you to become a doctor ? " " Well, sir," said I, with the dogmatic manner I had picked up in our Debating Society, " theoretically, none. I admire the profession as such — perhaps I should say vocation. But, practically, I don't understand making money out of the anguish and pain caused by the bodily infirmities of men." " Whew ! " said Father Tom, in surprise ; " you're made, I see, for the Bar ! " "Certainly not, Father Tom," said I. "Whatever objections I have to living by the miseries of others, I have ten times a greater objection to march to fame or fortune over the bleeding hearts and blighted pro spects of ninety per cent, of those who are lawyers' clients."

Anyone else would have called me a young prig; but Father Tom looked at me long and earnestly. Then he said gravely — " I don't know, Geoffrey, where you have learned to speak in this manner. Young lads didn't speak so in my time. But whatever be thought of your language, your ideas are not too far wrong. I won't say that the professions are degraded; but there is some decided coordination in them. But keep, my boy, these ideas of humanity alive in your soul. You will have experiences enough to make you abandon them. The selfishness of men will harden you against men ; and the deceit of the world will make you think sometimes that men are made to serve as victims or tools for those who are clever enough to use them. But, my boy," said he earnestly, " never abandon yourself to bitterness or cynicism against your fellows.

Christianity is the deepest and divinest knowledge of this world and of eternity, and it bears one word for ever emblazoned on its banners — Charity." It was on my lips to say something. " But," he continued, after a pause, " to be practical, there is only one other avenue to success open to you ; and that is the Civil Service. I understand that some valuable offices are open to competition. There is, for example, the Indian Service, where men, I am told, make money rapidly — I hope, honestly. Then there is the Sub-Inspectorship of Police — but I don't care for that, so long as English power uses its forces against the people. Then there is the Revenue Department, or, best of all, the Control Department in the Army. What do you think of that ? An officer's uniform — gold lace from head to heel, epaulettes and stripes, and a good sword by your side " — " And no fighting, Father Tom ?

" said I. "No," said my guardian; "you feed, the others fight." " Hardly the thing for an Irishman," said I ; " but I prefer it to any of your other fancy pictures." " Well, be it so," said Father Tom ; " and I'll look up in Dublin for a tutor. I should certainly prefer that you could reside in a college or academy, where you would be safe from the contamination of city life — but we'll do the best we can." So the matter rested for some days ; my boyish fancy being meantime very busy with dreams of a certain officer, very tall and distinguished, with uniform cut mathematically to the figure ; and I dreamt of war and all its dread panoply, and the clanging of swords and the jingling of spurs were the music of my dreams. Then one day a note came from Father Tom ; and he met me in a state of great delight.

" Just the thing, Geoffrey," said he, " that I desired. I've had a letter this morning, and a prospectus of a new college opened in Dublin, and conducted nearly altogether on the tutorial or grinding system. A very dear old classfellow of mine, Father Bellamy, is rector ; and he has a distinguished young graduate as vice principal, and Latin, German, French, and mathematical tutors — just the place for you." " Yes, sir," said I ; "it seems to be exactly what we desire." "I have ascertained," said he, "that with your attainments [here I winced] you can easily pass for the Control in twelve months. You will then be eighteen, and just eligible." " And when must I leave, sir ? " said I. "Well," said Father Tom, "I won't press you, Geoffrey ; but you know the value of time." " Very well, sir," said I, " I shall be ready to start on Monday."

This was Friday. " Then come up and dine with me on Sunday," said he, looking pleased, "and we'll talk the situation over." Sunday came, and we dined together ; and, strange enough, almost for the first time in my hfe I felt exceedingly dispirited. I had been orphaned in my infancy, and my dying mother had placed me under the guardianship of this good priest. And so, with the exception of my college chums, I had grown up without giving or receiving much love from my fellow-creatures. And a young lad, with good health and spirits, does not generally take to brooding over his sad fate in life. It never occurred to me, therefore, to think my lot was cast in rough places in this world, because I did not receive those soft caresses or httle tokens of love which were shared by my college companions.

To tell the truth, I thought lightly of such things, especially as I saw how little they were appreciated by those who received them. Indeed, I was often not a little shocked at hearing our young lads speaking of their parents as " the Gov." and " the old woman " ; and once I could have heartily licked a young scamp of my acquaintance, who was visited by his sisters — two pale girls in mourning after their mother's death. I saw them tear themselves away, their eyes swollen, as they said " good-bye " to this graceless puppy, and he sauntered up to the group where I was standing, and stopped his whistling for a moment to say, " I don't know what girls want in a place like this." I usually spent my vacations at a distant watering place which I was in the habit of visiting since I was a child.

I loved every stone in its pebbly beach ; and my heart used to swell with emotion as I stepped every summer from the railway carriage, and the " murmurs and scents of the infinite sea" came to me. One picture was for ever coming before me, the phantom of a delight that can be tasted but once in life ; and if ever I walked alone on this beach it rose before me, to my torture and delight. A glorious sunset, sky wrapped in gold and purple, sea flashing back with dulled splendour the glories of the sky. Deep peace and calm on all things, but for the purring of the waves. A solitary cottage on this very beach, with cliffs of sand rising behind it. My mother walking here, my sister and I gamboling and laughing as we ran towards, or fled from, the approaching tide. Half the picture is here still, for ever reproducing itself with the wanton kind ness of Nature — sea and sky are here, with their music, and splendours, and peace as of yore ; but cottage and cliff, mother and sister, have been blotted out, and with them the infinite exuberance of youth, and the celestial bliss of loving and being loved.

And so my affections, such as they were, were centred on this good and guileless man, to whom my mother had confided my future interests. I remember well the first time I saw him. I was a mere child, and was standing at a window overlooking the main street of our town, when a strange procession passed by. A few loads of hay and straw and turf, one solitary cart piled with rough furniture such as a labourer might have, and the priest trudging along the pavement, his aged mother on one side, and his orphaned niece on the other, holding his hand, as he proceeded from one scene of wretched ness to another — from the barren solitude of a mountain at one end of the diocese, for ever wrapped in mists, and black and stubborn even in summer, when the fields were laughing with their harvests, and the trees were gay in their feathery robes, to a dismal swamp where two of his predecessors had perished from the vapours and slime that dropped from the clouds above and sweated from the marshes below.

Child as I was, I understood the significance of the sacrifice this man of God was making; and the reverence begotten then bloomed and budded : STUDENT 8 into strong affection when I heard his voice, and knew the pressure of his hand. But to resume. I felt very despondent this evening. After some vain attempts to rally me, Father Tom suggested a walk, and we strolled along the roads, where the first red leaves were whispering to the fall, until he led me to the little cemetery which surrounded his parish church. Now, if Father Tom had any failing at all, which I doubt, it was a pardonable pride in the manner in which this little cemetery was kept. He had an almost superstitious reverence for the dead. He knew every text on Death and Immortality that was spoken by pagan philosopher or Christian saint from Plato to Wordsworth ; and he told me that whenever he came into God's Acre, as he called it, he had taught himself to see, not the plots of grass so carefully kept, nor the iron railings, nor the crosses or more ambitious ornaments over the graves : but he saw, robed in their white shrouds, with their still faces turned to the East, and the peace of Eternity on their eyelids, the undecayed and perfect bodies of the just that slept there.

But he was scrupulously solicitous about the appearance of that cemetery. The walks were perfect, not a blade of grass showing in the gravel. The grass was kept mown down to the brown earth. Not a yellow weed, nor even an innocent daisy, was to be seen. The railings or chains had to be painted every year, and the lettering restored ; and if a lichen the size of sixpence appeared on limestone slab or marble cross, there was an immediate message to the person interested, who promptly removed the stain. We strolled along from grave to grave, and he told me the story of the occupants of each, and he vied with the epitaphs in charitableness, until at last we came to the spot where my own father and mother and sisters were laid. We knelt and prayed together. Then, as I rose, he pressed his hand on my shoulder, that I might remain kneeling.

Then he said, and it was dreadfully solemn — " Next after the sanctuary and the Holy of Holies, I know no place more sacred than this. You are kneeling near the sleeping forms of those who gave you life, and were linked with you in that love which perishes not nor decays. I make no doubt they are watching you now ; and if anything disturbs their eternal peace, it is their anxiety about the years that are speeding towards you, and which will be yours to make or mar — for better, for worse. But one thing I ask you to promise me in their presence : you will never let a morning pass without placing yourself in the presence of God. Do you promise ? " " I promise." " You will never lie down to rest without reciting the Rosary of our Blessed Mother ? " " I promise." I rose from my knees as the knights rose at the presence of their phantom king, and we went home.

And as we went, he said many things to me which I had never heard before; and the mysteries of Life and Immortality were made very plain to me, in lessons which have been as a staff to the hand and as bread in the wilderness to the weary. As I was about to say "good-bye," he went to his little escritoire, and took out five notes. " Geoffrey," said he, " you know I'm not rich " — I thought of the turf and the straw — " but you'll want many things in college ; and I won't touch your money, except to pay the £80 pension. You will then have one hundred and fifty left to buy a uniform. Then you'll want books and many other things, and a lad has more courage when he has a pound in his pocket." " Father Tom," said I, " X will not — I cannot take it." " Oh, but I insist." " Oh, but I insist." After a war of words, in which I was almost getting angry, I consented to take one pound.

He folded the other notes regretfully, and said — " Good-bye ! Write often, and particularly if you are in trouble. You know you have no one but me " — GEOFFRE Y A USTIN : S TUDENT 10 I turned away without a word, because there came into my throat a curious swelling — that strange emotion which, perhaps, does us more honour than the heavings of vain ambition, or the pantings of foolish desire.

Chapter II Mayfield

" A brow cut deep as with a knife With many a dubious deed in life, A brow of blended pride and pain And yearnings for what should have been." Joacquin Miller. I suppose there is something exhilarating in the speed and variety of a railway journey, for I had hardly stowed away my valise and coat next morning, as I stepped into the mail for Dublin, when up went my mood from the zero of despondency to the highest degree of boyish animal spirits. I studied with un conscious intentness my fellow-travellers; I watched the long ditches come sweeping into line, and the slow procession of distant forests ; I counted the telegraph poles that dipped or rose with the road levels — all the time my fancy singing some song to the rattle and roar of the train, as we leaped and bounded and were flung from side to side by the awful velocity.

Since then I have heard people say that engineers come to beheve that the giant power they direct is a living thing, that must be petted and soothed and caressed, and that it has peculiarities, vicious and otherwise, like a spirited horse, and seems to know what is expected in a crisis, and nerves itself to the wishes of its master, and seems to know, when it glides into a station, whether it has done well or ill. I can readily believe it ; for I never enter a railway carriage without the conviction that I am committing myself to the mercies of a giant, who MA Y FIELD 11 probably will take me safely to my destination, but who may, in a fit of passion, if too much pressed, leap with me and all its freight into a ruin which fancy does not care to contemplate. It was just at the close of the Franco-Prussian war, or rather that terrible sequel to it — the civil war be tween the Versaillais and the Commune ; and the sympathies of Ireland, which were given so warmly to the "grande nation" in her distress, were still alive, but quivering with sorrow and indignation.

Curious tales of the feelings of the lower classes in our cities and towns were related — tales of self-sacrifice and devotion to an ideal cause, which are not infrequent in the annals of our race. Partly for fun, and partly as an experiment, I determined to test the truth of these reports. When I stood on the platform of the Kingsbridge terminus, I challenged the driver of a cab in execrable French as follows : — "Voulez-vous m'apporter a college qu'on nomme 'Mayfield'?" In an incredibly short time a crowd had gathered ; and whilst poor cabby was looking into the crown of his hat in his perplexity, he was mercilessly assailed by the bystanders. " Yerra, Jim, why don't you spake to the gintleman ? Sure, you haven't forgotten your French, man, since you wor in college ? " " Say it again, sor," said a young gamin, whose attire was more airy than respectable ; " it's some time since he was in France, and you must spake aisier."

And some, whispering amongst them selves, came rapidly to the conclusion, " A young gentleman escaped from the siege of Paris ! " I tried again, this time in bad English. " I wish you to me carry to a house which they call ' Mayfield' " " Mayfield ! Mayfield ! Where the devil is that ? " said the cabman. " Sure 'tis the Twelve Acres in the Phœnix Park he STUDENT 12 manes," said another driver ; " drive him round the Park, Jim, and set him down at the Imperial." Jim was going to act on that suggestion, when I interposed, again in broken English — " The house is in some place where the Irish do break the heads at the Fair." " Donnybrook ! be gobs ! " said they all in chorus ; and with three times three for France we set out on our journey. I need hardly say that I was silent ; but my companion made up for it by nods and winks, and hinted sometimes in more articulate language, that he was carrying a most distinguished personage.

Whenever a block occurred on the quays or streets, the drivers of less honoured vehicles, and the conductors of the tram cars, were informed of my nationality, my past history, and my future prospects. The first of these never changed ; but the two latter particulars grew and developed in majesty and importance as we proceeded. I heard Jim tell a fellow-driver at the corner of Sack ville Street that I had just escaped from the siege of Paris ; at the corner of Grafton Street, that I was "a young ossifer come over to learn ingineering in Ireland " ; at the eastern end of Stephen's Green, I was " the fust to inter Paris after the blagard Communists were expelled " ; and lastly, when we had got into the suburbs, and imagination was free to revel as it chose, " I was sint specially by MacMahon to steady the forti fications of Dublin Harbour ; and we know the rest."

And so, half amused with my conductor, half curious about my destination, we turned sharply to the right from the Donnybrook road, rattled up a short byway, and came to an exceedingly shabby lodge, whitewashed and unplastered. The gates were opened by an old woman, and, after a semicircular drive around an ill kept lawn, we drew up at the door of the college. I had then to face the unpleasant task of undeceiving my imaginative driver. " Combien faut-il payer ? " I said. " How much shall I pay ? " MA YFIELD 13 " Nothing, sir," said he gallantly. " Nothing to a Frenchman. I'd do more than that for your country." " But," said I, speaking in my natural tone of voice, " I am not a Frenchman." " W — what ? " said he, starting back in surprise. " I am not a Frenchman," I repeated ; " I was never in Paris in my life, so I couldn't have escaped ; I was never even a private in the Army, much less an officer ; I didn't enter Paris with Trochu, and never had the pleasure of knowing him ; and I have not been sent by MacMahon or anyone else to study fortifications.

All the same, you are a good fellow, and here's your fare, and something with it. Now, help me with this trunk." He stood during this explanation like one suddenly paralysed, his mouth open, his whip lying carelessly in his hands. Then he heaved a bitter sigh, as he thought how his splendid fabric was rudely knocked to pieces, and how he dare not tell at the public-house that night all that he had been inventing, when the very foundations of his story had been uprooted. But he simply said, in a tone of bitter regret, " God forgive you, sir ! " He turned away mournfully, adjusted the harness, and his anger outbidding his sorrow, he changed his whole tone. " Be gobs, what a play-boy you are ! All the way from the bogs of Kerry to make fools of dacent people ! It's on the boords of the Gaiety, or perhaps the Theayter-Royal, we'll soon see you, unless you are trans ported for swindling."

He bit the coin I gave him, lest there might be deception even there ; and, seeing that I was not in clined to answer him back, he gave a saucy blow to his horse, and cantered down the avenue. Once or twice I saw him look back with his mouth screwed up, and he shook his head mournfully, as if to predict an evil future for me. Mayfield was to all outer appearance a splendid : STUDENT 14 mansion. Two rather shortened wings, the entire width and height of which were occupied with broad, stately windows, were thrown out at its sides ; and, in the centre, a long, broad flight of limestone steps led up to a portico, whose rounded pillars upheld a pediment, crowned by a reclining statue of some pagan goddess. Evidently it was one of those stately buildings which the enterprise and artistic tastes of Ireland threw up in that short period in her history when the incubus of foreign and hostile domination was lifted.

Up that avenue rolled the carriages of her nobility, ancestral and intellectual, to one of those Augustan entertain ments which were freely given at the time. Thronging those steps were the brilliant wits of Dublin, and the officers of the Volunteers in their picturesque uniforms, and orators, the echoes of whose words were vibrating through the land, and stately ladies, who came to relieve the heaviness of masculine humour by the brightness and esprit that belong to intellectual beauty. I was not at all surprised when, in answer to the bell, I was ushered into a stately hall, whose ceiling was loaded with arabesques, and whose floor was covered with a rich mosaic of tiles, of which we have lost the pattern and the secret. I allowed the servant to go on before me with my trunk and valise, whilst in the twilight I measured and studied and wondered, when a door shot open at my left, and I heard — " What brought you here at study-time, sir ?