Handy Andy, etc

Introduction

BY CHARLES WHIBLEY fLon&on MACMILLAN AND CO., Ltd. NEW YORK : MACMILLAN & CO. 1896 All rights reserved

INTRODUCTION.

There was a time, in the early Victorian age, when the novel was exempt from the laws of scientific precision and psychologic analysis, when the novelist was content if he amused a desultory reader, or screwed a smile from the grim face of an unwilling churl. In those brave days a story began where it chose, and ended only on compulsion. The battle of the schools was as yet unsought, and realism, the commonplace of to-day, was no better understood than the shallow symbolism of pretentious mystics. The art, such as it was, differed not a jot from Homer's, and the artist, though he laid no claim to this tiresome title, preferred to tickle his victim to entertainment rather than to compel him to controversy. Fiction, in brief, was gay, free, and irre sponsible ; nor did any one pursue the craft with a looser sense of its intellectual tyranny than Samuel Lover.

Born at the waning of the last century, Lover grew up in an atmosphere of rebels and Whiteboys, of Emancipation and the Union. He understood the secret practices of Chalkers and Sweaters; he whistled the air of The Night before Larry was Stretched ; the reckless infamies of the Rapparees were completely familiar to him ; he listened at first hand to the recital of Tiger Roche's alternate cowardice and ferocity. To share in that life of audacious merriment and fearless brutality, which is revealed to us by Jonah HANDY ANDY Barrington and the author of Lreland Sixty Years Since, was a princely experience, and Lover, hampered as he was by his admiration of awell-ordered life, made the very best of his knowledge. Gambling, drinking, and the duel, these were the cherished vices (or virtues) of the well-bred Irishman ninety years ago, and Lover looks upon each with a lenient eye.

Though he probably never went upon the ground himself, he was a zealous champion of the appeal to arms, and in his hands the honour of his characters was always safe. Indeed the scrupulousness of Englishmen in accepting a combat betrays him into a rare passage of didacticism. He insists that the newspaper correspondence, so frequent in England, was unknown in his own country. ' In Ireland,' says he, 'the thing is sooner over.' With an admirable pride, this man of peace proclaims that Irish ' gentlemen don't consider whether it is too soon or too late to fight, or whether a gentleman is perfectly entitled to call him out or not, . . . they would be more likely to fight first, and leave the world to argue about the niceties after.' A worthy sentiment, entirely at variance with his own simple career.

The son of an unimaginative stock -broker, he was brought up to an unimaginative trade. His childhood was timid and secluded. Ill health drove him first to the shelter of his mother's solicitude, and presently to the wholesome air of Wicklow, where he learnt the lore and whimsicality of the Irish peasant. But no sooner was he old enough to adopt a profession than his father inveigled him into his office, and bade him assume an interest in stocks and shares. A brief apprenticeship was enough to convince him of his incapacity for business, and though he had hitherto been the idol of his father, he forthwith cut himself adrift, and adopted, at seventeen, an independent and an artistic career.

INTRODUCTION.

His difficulty was to choose the art which should afford him the easiest support. Cursed with versatility, he had dabbled in them all. His boyish glory had been won by music, but he recognised that neither the piano nor his voice would secure him a livelihood ; and he presently selected painting as the trade which might most readily supply his common necessities. He toiled at portraiture with a certain success ; he executed an endless series of miniatures ; he fought with the difficulties of landscape ; but his most ardent partisan will scarcely attribute to him the talent of a painter, and he had the misfortune to practise an art which he partially understood in a city which took not the smallest interest in its exercise. It is not strange, therefore, that his advance ment was due to an accident.

In 1818 Dublin offered a banquet to Tom Moore, then at the top of his fame ; Lover, a youth scarcely of age, was present, and, as became one who practised music, painting, and poetry with equal facility, he entered the room with a very fine impromptu in his pocket. Being asked to sing, he startled the company with a eulogy of Moore written and composed by himself. From this moment his fortune was made. Moore took him under his especial protection, and every drawing-room in Dublin was opened to him. He seized his opportunity with excellent courage ; commissions came to him apace ; he slaved at the drudgery of portraiture, until there was scarce a man or woman in Dublin whose features he had not put upon canvas or ivory; and in proper course he was elected a member of the Royal Hibernian Academy, of which body he presently became the Secretary.

His masterpiece — a miniature of Paganini — was exhibited at the Royal Academy of London in 1832, and instantly be came famous. What were the merits or the ultimate fate of this work one does not know, but it is recorded that X HANDY ANDY Paganini was enchanted with the painter's wit and apprecia tion, a tribute which should always have been a source of legitimate pride. Meanwhile Lover had already attempted the austerer art of literature. His song ' Rory O'More ' was on everybody's tongue, while his Legends and Stories of Ireland (published in 1 831) was secure of approval. His energy, if various, was indefatigable. When he was not illustrating the Irish Horn Book he was helping to establish the Dublin University Magazine, and it is not surprising that upon his arrival in London (in 1835) he found the world eager to receive him.

He was the fashion of a season, nor did his popularity fade as his presence grew intimate. Lady Blessington was enchanted to entertain him, and Dickens awarded him the privilege of friendship. The publication of his first novel — Rory O'More — still further assured his position, and a popular triumph followed at the theatre. To prove that all forms of art were possible to him, he did not stop at the Adelphi, but composed also a musical drama, and a burlesque opera. Nor did he allow either plays or novels to interrupt the practice of painting. He still devoted himself to portraiture with energy and success, until in 1844 failing eyesight compelled him to surrender his early profession. But even then he was not content to fall back upon writing. With characteristic resourcefulness he went upon the stage, and devised an entertainment called Irish Evenings, wherein songs, recitations, and stories were ingeniously blended.

It was after this fashion that Dibdin and the elder Mathews had amused the town, and with them Lover was a forerunner of the modern Music Hall. His Evenings proved so sound a speculation, that he repeated his performance up and down America, and, returning, gave a picture of his travels in Paddy's Portfolio.

INTRODUCTION.

Thus he lived with his eye always upon a fresh invention ; thus he died — in 1868 — an amateur of more arts than any of his generation. His versatility was his inveterate drawback. How should he expect to be perfect in one craft, when he attempted half a dozen? His pictures have passed into oblivion ; his songs, being no better than a feeble echo of Moore, have won the obscurity which their cheap rhythm and common diction deserve. The single work by which he will be remembered is Handy Andy, a work which you read in childhood with delight, and re-read in less im pressionable years with a certain admiration. It is the novel in its most elementary form ; it obeys none of the rules which are supposed to govern the craft ; its incidents are as impossible as its characters ; you know that none of these comedies could have happened, and the reflection cheers you.

If Dick Dawson and Squire O'Grady are preposterous perversions, if Murtough Murphy and Doctor Growling never lived even in Ireland at its wildest, that is no drawback to your enjoyment of their extravagances. You do not expect psychological accuracy in an Irish romance, and you are grateful to Samuel Lover that the pace of his story is not hampered by any pedantry. It is a book of farce and irresponsibility, a rough and tumble from end to end. The foolish servant who ever leads his master into embarrassments is as old as Plautus, but Handy Andy is a foolish servant of a new type. He is the Irish bull in action ; in the least of his escapades there is that element of contradiction which is the essence of Irish humour ; and you recognise in Andy a countryman of the peerless Sir Boyle Roche. He was an artful rogue 'who had the most singularly ingenious knack of doing every thing the wrong way ; disappointment waited on all affairs HANDY ANDY in which he bore a part, and destruction was at his fingers' ends.' Thus his creator describes him, and plunges him at once into a series of appalling disasters.

He enjoys the same career as the old man in the pantomime : he is fair game for everybody's stick, and whatever happens he gets thoroughly beaten. But here, again, the romantic method has an advantage, and you are saved from a too poignant sympathy by the conviction that the bruises which should have been given are as unreal as the cudgel which should have given them. To pretend that Andy's misadventures are uniformly amusing would be extravagant ; but not a few are cunningly invented, and they seem to have been received by the victims with the utmost good nature. It was an age of practical jokes, so that a master could scarce do more than laugh when his servant bidden to ice the champagne emptied the whole half-dozen into a pail. Also, when Andy, at a first experience of soda-water, put out two candles, struck the Squire in the eye, and drenched the Squire's lady, you feel that he was living up to the high spirits of his master, Dick the Devil.

Commonly his exploits are without result ; but when he drove a cork into the trumpet, on the pretence of bottling the music, he saved the election from many discordant sounds, and succeeded in irritating the enraged Squire O'Grady to a blind fury. His later career was not entirely reputable: it is a sad fallingoff for a youthful pantaloon to sacrifice himself for his cousin's honour, and not even Lover's extravagance should have detected in his amiable fool the son and heir of the long -lost Lord Scatterbrain. But Handy Andy is an incident of the book, whose irresponsible action is but slightly interrupted by the rascal's follies. There are two squires, well drawn and admirably contrasted. Squire Egan is a scholar and a

INTRODUCTION.

gentleman and a Protestant, to boot, who well deserved to represent his country in Parliament, while O'Grady is the most appalling fire-eater of fiction. He makes no appearance without yelling and screaming; the most in famous blasphemies are ever on his tongue, and his hatred of the human race is untempered either by fear or pity. When he loses a letter through Andy's folly, he launches forth upon a magnificent tirade : ' I wish all the post-offices in the world were blown up ; and all the postmasters hanged, postmaster-general and all — I do — by the 'ternal war — and all the mail-coaches in the world ground to powder, and the roads they go on, into the bargain — devil a use in them but to carry bad news over the universe. Blow the post-office, say I, — blow it, and sink it!' Thus roars O'Grady, at every entrance, until an ill -tended wound makes an end of him.

The sketch of Neck-or-Nothing Hall and its inmates is Lover's masterpiece. It is evident that he drew it with his eye upon the object, and, while the more respectable of his creations are sad shadows, O'Grady and his family live and storm and wrangle. The Justice of the Peace, him self, who maintains a plucky siege against his creditors, and flagrantly bullies the neighbourhood, is a most spirited portrait. His insolence is as remarkable as his bravery, and he dies because he neglects a wound received in a desperate encounter with the virtuous prig. The wild squalor of his house, the reckless courage of his sons, the stupidity of his daughter, are admirably realised. But best of all is the portrait of O'Grady's mother, an old dowager, who once had been a belle in the Irish court, who rouged her cheeks, painted her eyebrows, and wore an ancient tin cowl upon her head.

She lives entirely in the past, murmurs of Mrs. Jordan and dead tenors, plays an English HANDY ANDY guitar, and takes counsel with a cuckoo-clock. The picture is excellently imagined ; and the old lady's appearance in Dublin, with a brace of duelling pistols and the cuckoo to see fair play was assuredly seized from life. But it is not only Handy Andy who is always in the melee. The other characters put the most monstrous jokes upon one another. They resemble rather large schoolboys than grown men, and even their duels, in spite of their danger, are opportunities for a humorous display. Some times the battles are between friends and without reason, as when Dick Dawson meets Murtough Murphy ; at other times a real offence justifies the encounter, as when Ned O'Connor pinks Squire O'Grady. But in any case the world is there to see the fun, and to treat the duel in the best style of Irish levity.

Thus, also, is the election con ducted, and a large part of the book is devoted to the humours of the combat. When Squire Egan is returned by a comfortable majority, the Sheriff has the last word and returns the Hon. Mr. Scatterbrain. But even the virtuous Egan is not superior to the tricks of the time, and his supporters intercept a coach-load of voters, steal their boots, drench their small-clothes, and leave them helpless many a mile from the polling-booth. The serious blot upon the work is the serious hero, Edward O'Connor. He is a sort of Mr. Barlow, caught young, and he should have worn side-whiskers and check trousers. His accomplishments were many and various. He could fight, or sing, or moralise, or weep, or make love, as often as he was called upon. But he was as incapable of dishonour as of unkindliness.

He is described as a poet-singer, whose mellow tones vibrated with feeling, and whose dark, earnest eyes beamed with devotion. Assuredly he had a talent for the making of preposterous verses, and

INTRODUCTION.

on the smallest excuse or none he would break forth into song and oblige the company with a trifle of his own com position. In the presence of the ineffable Fanny he would content himself with making sheep's eyes ; but if unhappily she were absent he would lean distracted over the piano, push back the black curls which lay scattered upon his lofty brow, and break forth into this simple song : How sweet is the hour we give, When fancy may wander free, To the friends who in memory live ! — For then I remember thee ! Then wing'd, like the dove from the ark, My heart, o'er a stormy sea, Brings back to my lonely bark A leaf that reminds of thee ! Melting, isn't it ! And do you wonder that before the first verse was over, ' the room was filled with eager listeners ' ? But Lover's gift lay in the domain of the humorous and grotesque.

He had far too heavy a hand to deal with early Victorian sentiment, and the entrance of Edward or of Fanny is a signal of desperate weariness. When in their honeymoon they linger on the shore of Killarney Lake, ' Do you not think, Fanny,' said Edward O'Connor — for it was he who spoke to his bride — 'do you not think 'tis more in unison with the tranquil hour and the coming shadows to glide softly over the lulled waters ? ' And Fanny of course thought it was, and they lived happily ever after. But despite the sentiment, despite the style which in duced Lover to describe a left eye as a ' sinister luminary,' Handy Andy is a work of abounding energy and merriment. The dialogue is often so crisp and sharp as to suggest the stichomuthia of the Greeks; the more high-spirited of the characters — the most admirable doctor, for instance— HANDY ANDY keep up a ceaseless fire of anecdote ; and the sketches of Irish life are pleasantly interspersed with folk-lore and legend.

The author was modest enough in his appraisement of his work. 'Composed as it was, it could not,' said he, 'be other than sketchy and desultory.' But it has already amused several generations of readers, and after fifty years its power of entertainment is still fresh. Charles Whibley. LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE They wandered up and down together . . Frontispiece Andy held it from him at arm's length 14 Mrs. O'Grady rolled herself up in the bed-curtains j' He began a very smart horsewhipping of the attorney 35 Dick fastened on him, pummelling away most unmercifully ■17 He then continued to describe the various other regions of his injuries ....... 5S He lay hugging the leg of the table 78 Oonah listened with mixed curiosity and fear S7 At last the pet cabinet was opened, and out came the tooth 9? ' How are you, Miss Riley ? ' said he, as he drew rein I 10 n8 ' Dwive on, you wascal, dwive on ! ' Looking tenderly at Fanny ■33 Squire O'Grady shaking his fist in his face and storming at him .

M3 The Squire offered his hand i58 Stuck in a tub, with his legs upwards 170 iS5 Goggy bellowed lustily Pelting large stones into the river close beside Furlong . 197 O'Grady dragged the trumpeter to the ditch, and rolled him into it 218 The electors thronging towards the town HANDY ANDY PAGE 246 Seizing him by the leg, attempted to unhorse him Miss Riley was led over to the piano . 259 269 Without the smallest regard to Reddy's singing The sonsy landlady was all lamentations 276 With his candlestick in one hand, and the remnant of his burnt stocking between the finger and thumb of the other 294 The lines were shown to her in triumph Father Phil accosted by Andy . 3'4 33' Tied up to a tree, and looking more dead than alive He took the book, and read the lines with much feeling ' Augh, howld your tongue ' . . 348 373 383 ' What are you doing here ? ' he said to the labourers 396 Many a story of every conceivable crime was related for the amusement of the circle ..... 404 416 A simultaneous roar of terror burst from the group Ratty was obliged to stand on a chair and cover his grandmamma's eye with his hand .... 424 An ancient crosier of curious workmanship She began soundly to thrash Furlong . 432 452 ' I believe I have the honour of addressing Mister Durfy, sir ' The door opened, and Mr. Goggins made his appearance ' Where's the wine, sir ? ' said Dick 456 468 475 A ready - made suit of gentlemanly apparel made Andy pay several visits to the looking-glass .... 495 Two men sprang up 5°9 ADDRESS I HAVE been accused, in certain quarters, of giving flattering portraits of my countrymen.

Against this charge, I may plead that, being a portrait-painter by profession, the habit of taking the best view of my subject, so long prevalent in my eye, has gone deeper, and influenced my mind : — and if to paint one's country in its gracious aspect has been a weakness, at least, to use the words of an illustrious compatriot, the failing leans to virtue's side.' I am disinclined, however, to believe myself an offender in this particular. That I love my country dearly, I acknowledge, and I am sure every Englishman will respect me the more for loving mine, when he is, with justice, so proud of his — but I repeat my disbelief that I overrate my own. The present volume, I hope, will disarm any cavil from old quarters on the score of national prejudice. The hero is a blundering servant. No English or any other gentleman would like him in his service ; but still he has some redeeming natural traits : he is not made either a brute or a villain, yet his 'twelve months' character,' given in the successive numbers of this volume, would not get him a place upon advertisment, either in The Times or The Chronicle.

So far am I clear of the charge of national prejudice as regards the hero of the following pages. In the subordinate personages, the reader will see two ' Squires ' of a different type — good and bad : there are such in all countries. And, as a tale cannot get on without villains, I have given some touches of villainy, quite sufficient to prove my belief in Irish villains, though I do not wish it to be believed the Irish are all villains. B i E HANDY ANDY I confess I have attempted a slight sketch, in one of the persons represented, of a gentleman and a patriot ; — and I conceive there is a strong relationship between the two. He loves the land that bore him — and so did most of the great spirits recorded in history. His own mental cultivation, while it yields him personal enjoyment, teaches him not to treat with contumely inferior men.

Though he has courage to protect his honour, he is not deficient in conscience to feel for the consequences ; and when opportunity offers the means of amende, it is embraced. In a word, I wish it to be believed that, while there are knaves, and fools, and villains in Ireland, as in other parts of the world, honest, intelligent, and noble spirits are there as well. I cannot conclude without offering my sincere thanks for the cordial manner in which my serial offering has been received by the public and noticed by the critical press, whose valuable columns have been so often opened to it in quotation ; and, when it is considered how large an amount of intellect is employed in this particular department of literature, the highest names might be proud of such recognition. SAMUEL LOVER Charles Street, Berners Street, London, December 1st, 1842.

NOTICE Kind Reader, — A few short papers, under the title of this little venture, appeared, at intervals, in Bentley's Miscellany. Frequent inquiries have been made ' Why Handy Andy was not continued?' and, indeed, I myself regretted the abandonment of what I thought a fruitful subject for fun and whimsicality, though, from various causes, needless to particularise here, the papers were discontinued ; still, from time to time, recurred the question, ' Why Handy Andy was not continued ? ' and the frequency of the demand has produced the supply. Ancient custom declares ' we should begin at the beginning,' therefore, a short reprint is unavoidable in the first number ; but, while fairness to the public demands this acknowledgment, justice to myself requires me to state, that much revision and the introduction of fresh matter has taken place, with a view to the development of story and character necessary to a sustained work ; for the first paper of Handy Andy was written without any intention of continuation, and required the amend ments and additions I have mentioned.

The reprint cannot affect those who have not read the beginning of Andy's adventures ; and those who have, and wish to know more, will, it is hoped, skim over the first number to refresh their memories, and lead them well into the second. If, after all this explanation, there be any who object to the partial reprint, I answer, in the words of the well-known old saying, ' Sure hasn't an srishman lave to spake twice ?' SAMUEL LOVER.

Chapter I

Andy Rooney was a fellow who had the most singularly ingenious knack of doing everything the wrong way ; disappointment waited on all affairs in which he bore a part, and destruction was at his fingers' ends : so the nickname the neighbours stuck upon him was Handy Andy, and the jeering jingle pleased them. Andy's entrance into this world was quite in character with his after achievements, for he was nearly the death of his mother. She survived, however, to have herself clawed almost to death while her darling babby was in arms, for he would not take his nourishment from the parent fount unless he had one of his little red fists twisted into his mother's hair, which he dragged till he made her roar ; while he diverted the pain by scratching her till the blood came, with the other. Never theless she swore he was ' the loveliest and sweetest craythur the sun ever shined upon ' ; and when he was able to run about and wield a little stick, and smash everything breakable belonging to her, she only praised his precocious powers, and used to ask, ' Did ever any one see a darlin' of his age handle a stick so bowld as he did ? ' Andy grew up in mischief and the admiration of his mammy ; but, to do him justice, he never meant harm in the course of his life, and was most anxious to offer his services on all occasions to those who would accept them ; but they were only the persons who had not already proved Andy's peculiar powers.

There was a farmer hard by in this happy state of ignorance, named Owen Doyle, or, as he was familiarly called, Owny na Coppal, or, ' Owen of the Horses,' because he bred many of these animals, and sold them at the neighbouring fairs ; and Andy one day offered his services to Owny when he was in want of some one to drive up a horse to his house from a distant ' bottom,' as low grounds by a river side are always called in Ireland. 'Oh, he's wild, Andy, and you'd never be able to ketch him,' said Owny. < Throth, an' I'll engage I'll ketch him if you'll let me go.

I never seen the horse I couldn't ketch, sir,' said Andy. ' Why, you little spridhogue, if he took to runnin' over the long bottom, it 'ud be more than a day's work for you to folly him.' ' Oh, but he won't run.' ' Why won't he run ? ' ' Bekaze I won't make him run.' ' How can you help it ? ' ' I'll soother him.' ' Well, you're a willin' brat, anyhow ; and so go, and God speed you ! ' said Owny. ' Just gi' me a wisp o' hay an' a han'ful iv oats,' said Andy, ' if I should have to coax him.' ' Sartinly,' said Owny, who entered the stable and came forth with the articles required by Andy, and a halter for the horse also. ' Now, take care,' said Owny, ' that you're able to ride that horse if you get on him.' ' Oh never fear, sir. I can ride owld Lanty Gubbins's mule betther nor any o' the other boys on the common, and he couldn't throw me th' other day, though he kicked the shoes av him.' ' After that you may ride anything,' said Owny : and indeed it was true ; for Lanty's mule, which fed on the common, being ridden slily by all the young vagabonds in the neighbourhood, had become such an adept in the art of getting rid of his troublesome customers, that it might be well considered a feat to stick on him. ' Now, take grate care of him, Andy, my boy,' said the farmer. ' Don't be afeard, sir,' said Andy, who started on his errand in that peculiar pace which is elegantly called a ' sweep's trot ' ; and as the river lay between Owny Doyle's and the bottom, and was too deep for Andy to ford at that season, he went round by Dinny Dowling's mill, where a small wooden bridge crossed the stream.

Here he thought he might as well secure the assistance of Paudeen, the miller's son, to help him in catching the horse ; so he looked about the place until he found him, and, telling him the errand on which he was going, said, ' If you like to come wid me, we can both have a ride.' This was tempta tion sufficient for Paudeen, and the boys proceeded together to the bottom, and they were not long in securing the horse. When they had got the halter over his head, ' Now,' said Andy, ' give me a lift on him ' ; and accordingly, by Paudeen's catching Andy's left foot in both his hands clasped together in the fashion of a stirrup, he hoisted his friend on the horse's back ; and, as soon as he was secure there, Master Paudeen, by the aid of Andy's hand, contrived to scramble up after him ; upon which Andy applied his heels to the horse's side with many vigorous kicks, and crying ' hurrup ! ' at the same time, endeavoured to stimulate Owny's steed into something of a pace as he turned his head towards the mill. ' Sure aren't you going to crass the river ? ' said Paudeen. ' No, I'm going to lave you at home.' ' Oh, I'd rather go up to Owny's, and it's the shortest way acrass the river.' 'Yes, but I don't like.' ' Is it afeard you are ? ' said Paudeen. ' Not I, indeed,' said Andy ; though it was really the fact, for the width of the stream startled him ; ' but Owny towld me to take grate care o' the baste, and I'm loath to wet his feet.' ' Go 'long wid you, you fool ! what harm would it do him ?