Edward O'Donnell. A story of Ireland of our day

Chapter I

A DAY'S LEAVE. " Get the dogs ready the first thing in the morning, Hynes; I am to have a day's shooting on Glenasheelah." "Yis, Docther." The first speaker was a handsome type of the Irish peasant: tall and well-proportioned, with dark brown hair setting off an ample, intellectual forehead ; and the reply given by his worthy servant showed he belonged to the professional classes. Dr. Murtagh O'Halloran was the son of a work ing tenant-farmer. The love of learning and the pardonable vanity of \ eing able to say that he had "a professional man in his family" had encouraged the industrious parent i -'.to taking his favorite son from the plough and sei ding him as a student to a grammar-school in a neighboring city. Aptitude, added to natural intelligence and a keen desire to study, in a short time advanced the young O'Halloran to the topmost seat in his class, until, when the summit of technical knowledge attainable in this elementary course had arrived, he departed for Dublin to pursue his career as a medical student.

As we find him at the opening of this tale, he is fully equipped with diplomas and the highest re commendations from his professors and demonstra tors. The question, however, of patients is the one great obstacle yet to be overcome; and, like many others of his class, he dawdles about the happy scenes of his boyhood until circumstances will throw him into that enviable line of advance ment so much sought after by young professionals of his class — a dispensary. As there are far more young medical men unem ployed in Ireland to-day than there are dispensaries unfilled, it will not seem strange to the reader that young Dr. O'Halloran had an enforced, but still much needed, vacation in his old country home, after the tedious and protracted course of his medical studies. Shooting was one of his youthful pleasures.

There is no country, perhaps, in the world wherein snipe-shooting can be indulged to greater advantage than in Ireland. Of course this particular sport is not the less devoid of its accompanying physical privations in this favored region than in any other locality; but the surroundings are such A DAY'S LEA VE. 7 as afford pleasure with success, and even make snipe-shooting a social as well as a sportsmanlike pastime. The green rushy bog once beaten by the parti colored dogs, the game set, flushed, shot, or missed, there is the easy-going saunter from one farm boundary to the other; the meeting of friends and acquaintances in the fields; the warm invitation — such as an Irishman only can understand — to " Step in an' welcome, an' have a drink o' milk," and then that "milk o' human kindness," the immortal pot thccn, as it is produced from its earthen jar in the cupboard of the dresser, makes friendship glow, kind words said, and mirth and happiness occupy the group.

The shooting excursion on which young Doctor O'Halloran was now about setting out was of a more pretentious character than the ordinary pot tering for snipe around the bogs in the vicinity of his home. Sir Percy Seymour the landlord and owner of that part of the barony on which the Doctor's father and numerous other tenants were situated, had conde scended — in anticipation of future services which he meant to reap — to grant O'Halloran a day's shooting on his grouse-mountain, which rose, viewed from the Doctor's homestead, like a purple cloud resting on the verge of the horizon. At daybreak the faithful servant, Hynes, arose from his slumber, and proceeded to awaken his master. There was little necessity, however, for this operation, as from the first moment the early dawn had appeared in the eastern sky O'Halloran was awake and dressed, and the approach of Hynes was only the signal to have the old market-pony tackled to the gig preparatory to the journey.

"We will have a grand day, Hynes," said -the Doctor, as, a hasty breakfast over, he took his seat within the little uncomfortable vehicle, and Hynes sat with his back to him, holding the brace of dogs that strove to break from their coupling-chains in eager anticipation of their day's hunt. " Yis, sir," remarked Hynes, " 'twill be a splendid day, thank God; but I fear 'twill be a thrifle hot whin we get on the mountain." "Don't mind that, Hynes," replied the master; " if we get tired we can rest ourselves; besides, this is not the only day we will have on Glena sheelah, as old Seymour promised my friend who got me the permission to repeat the dose any time I had a mind to." " Is it an ordher you have, Masther Murty," in quired Hynes, " or is it on'y be word o' mouth you're goin' to shoot ?

Be jabers ! if you haven't the bit o' writin' with ould Saymour's name at the foot of it, Foxy Jim, the gamekeeper, wouldn't let A DAY'S LEA VE. 9 1 you set foot on a tuft o' heather. He's the divil, Masther Murty. On'y a week afore you came home he gev poor Jim Nally a month at hard labor for shootin' a snipe; and poor Jim's family had all to go into the poorhouse while he was in jail. Oh ! don't be talkin', but a poor man has no show here at all, at all, if once those magistrates catch him at the petty sessions." " Is there no way to find favor with them ?" " Av coorse there is, Masther Murty; but 'tisn't the like o' me that could do it. Av, for instance, you wor an informer, or a friend o' the peelers, you could always get off wid a caution, afther half killin' a man; but if you happened to have an honest heart in your body, or if they knew you shouted for the Land League, begob ! they'd hang you at the petty sessions 'iddout judge or jury."

"Is the law then so changed here since I went away five years ago ?" "Changed! Begor! everything is changed; an' for the worse, too, wid all the talk they have about it." " Did you join the Land League, Hynes ?" " Is it me, Masther Murty ? Why, what in the name o' goodness 'id make me a mimber ? Begor ! I haven't as much land as would sod a lark, an' my self nor any one o' my class will never get a pinny benefit out of all their agitation." " Why do you say that ?" " Bekase I'm on'y a poor laborer workin' for your father; an' although the laborers helped the farmers to get what little they say they're afther gettin', we have nothin' more than the dead owld thing: two males a day an' a shake-down in a barn at night." "I'm sorry for that, Hynes; you know I would do all I could for you, and I will speak to my father when we get home to-night about you."

" Ah ! Masther Murty, don't mind. Sure I'm not badly off. Look at the fine times I have, goin' off to see you shootin' to-day. But 'tisn't about myself I'm talkin', but about the poor half-starved craytures — some of them with families — of my own class. If the farmers wor right they'd join in with us, throw the whole Land League overboord, an' go the whole hog wid us against the villains that are crushing us." "What do you mean ? Would you have a war in the country; have the farm-houses burned, and the people shot down like dogs in the ditches ?" " I would, Masther Murty; I'd as soon any day be shot down dacint on the green fields I played in whin a boy, as be starved to death by the present laws an' have on'y the choice left to me of goin' into the poorhouse an' wearin' a convict's jacket wid a big black stamp on it, or be shipped off to Manitoba A DAY'S LEA VE. 11 or one of those new big graveyards where I'd be a frozen skeleton the first winther I landed."

" Faith ! Hynes, I fear you are not a law-abiding subject. I can see Father Casey away at the top of the hill, driving towards us; and when he meets us I will tell him of your conduct." " Oh, begor ! you may, sir. Father Tim knows me well, an' my opinions too, into the bargain. I never was complained of to him for being drunk in my life — but wanst — an' he knows I never hurted a hair o' the head o' man, woman, or child since I first wint to my duty to him." "When were you with him last ?" inquired the Doctor, with a sly look under his eyebrows at his man, whom he could observe visibly coloring at the interrogatory. "Ah ! sir, that would be tellin'. We had a little fallin' out. He made me acknowledge I was one " o' the boys," and begob ! since then he wouldn't spake to me. He's well off, sir; has his fine house, an' his two fine horses, an' is hand an' glove wid the owld ' Sir ' that you're gettin' the day's shootin' from.

Av coorse 'tis his interest to keep the country quiet, no matther how the poor people are crushed, for then he wouldn't have any risk or trouble like the poor priests, long ago, who had to say mass in the rocks and woods, an' if they wor caught would be torn to pieces by the bloodhounds. But of course, Masther Murty, 'tisn't for a poor man like me to be talkin' or commentin' on the clergy. I wouldn't have said what I did, but you dragged it out o' me. But one thing I know: no matther what they say or what they do, I'm ' one o' the boys,' thank God, an' I only hope the day will come when I can show what I can do for the poor owld country."

Chapter II

V FATHER TIM CASEY. The Doctor's trap was now within a few yards of the priest's, and O'Halloran at once checked his pony, an action which was instantly imitated by the portly, good-humored-looking gentleman who was the pastor of the district. "How are you, Father Tim?" called out O'Hal loran, throwing the pony's reins to Hynes, and ex tricating his legs from their uncomfortable position in the little vehicle to alight and greet the priest. " Murtagh, my boy," was the familiar reply, " I am as well as I can be. I was just driving over to your father's to see you, as I heard only yesterday you had come home to us a full-fledged doctor. I wanted to congratulate you, and also to get some professional advice free gratis. Did you bring down with you from Dublin any cure against old age ? I want a bottle of that recipe very badly."

O'Halloran had now reached the priest's side, and was standing by his jaunting-car, shaking him warmly7 by the hand. "I'm very glad to see you looking so well, Father Tim," he said. " And you too, Murty," replied the priest; " turn round until I'll look at you. 'Tis five years now since I laid eyes on you, and I declare you have grown five inches taller. It must have cost your father a heap of money to make you a doctor. I always knew the old man had a little pile stowed away somewhere; and now I hope you'll repay him for all his outlay." " Well, Father Tim, I don't think my father has much money. I'm sure he is worse off to-day than when I left him, although I was not much of a drain on his purse, as I worked my own way in" a great measure in the big city." " How did you do that ?" " I got a situation in a large apothecary's shop, and my services there during the day provided me with support and lodging.

The small salary I earned, with what my father could afford to send me, paid for my lectures, and I worked at my profession during the night. It was hard work, I must admit; but my mind was set upon the diploma, and I wanted to trouble my father as little as I could. But all that is now passed, and the future is before me, and I have nothing to do but recuperate. How have you been ? You look the picture of good health, and, without complimenting you, younger-looking than when I last saw you." " Go on, now, Murty; you were always a smooth tongued joker. I think 'twas a lawyer your father ought to have made of you, and not a doctor. Where are you off to now ?" " To Glenasheelah, for a day's grouse-shooting. I won't forget dropping a brace or two for you, Father Tim, as I pass the door on my way home."

" That's a good boy. Always be kind to your priest going through life, and you will be sure to have luck. God be with the time I used to tramp the mountain myself when I was your age; but now, if I don't get a cure for my rheumatism, I fear I'll have to do the rest of my journey through life in this little jaunting-car. There's great dis tress now in the country, and sickness too — the Lord save us! — and when you will get a dispensary you will have work enough to keep you going, and kill two horses on the road into the bargain. I'm going down now to see some unfortunate people who are in Land League huts below, near Cross bog, and I intended stopping at your house on my way." " But, Father Tim, couldn't these poor people get other small farms? I can see a great many of them idle." "Yes; I could get them all small farms to go into from Sir Percy Seymour, whom I may say is a great friend of mine; but because others have been evicted out of them they won't take them.

Times are greatly changed here, Murty, since you left. You know I always went in for fair and easy dealing, and set my voice against the Fenians; but it seems the world is after turning upside down here within the last year or two, as the people are getting tired of Parnell, and are growing more wicked in their designs. I suppose, though, 'tis all the will of God; but I have always been an old Dan O'Connell man, and would like to get what was right for the country without the shedding of blood." Hynes, who was holding the dogs quiet in the back of his master's car, emitted a very suggestive cough on hearing the last expression from the priest, which attracted the attention of his rever rence. " If I hear any of your coughing or barking, Hynes, I'll lay my whip across your back, you outlawed moonlighter !"

"Sure, yer reverence, I wasn't coughing at any thin'," he said. " 'Twas on'y a cowld I got cuttin' rishes in the masther's bog." " I don't believe a word you say," retorted the priest. " You're nothing but a disgrace to my parish with your revolutionary notions. The idea of a fellow like you imagining you know what is best for the country !" " Begor ! yer reverence, I ax yer pardon; but I on'y tould you what was best for the farmers and the laborers, an' sure the farmers and the laborers are the biggest figures in the country. I don't know anything about the landlords and the bailiffs; the country would do as well if there was never one o' them in it." "Silence, you communistic villain! I'll teach you a lesson one of these days you won't soon forget. Who tarred and feathered Billy Griffin, the bailiff, I'd like to know ?

I'd bet a five-pound note to-day, if I had one to spare, that if you didn't do it you were one of the gang. The county jail will never be full until you're in the body of it." " Ah, thin, faith ! yer reverence, that won't be a great wonder. Sure, every honest man, now, is goin' in under the Coercion Act. Be gosh ! if the guvvirmint go on as they're goin', they'll have to turn all the national schools into jails, so many now are gittin' recommended by the peelers." " Don't mind Hynes, Father Tim," laughingly interposed the Doctor; "I'm afraid the Land League has turned his head." "I'm afraid," interrupted the priest somewhat testily, " something else worse than the Land League has been at work. He was caught only last Sunday reading one of those dynamite newspa pers that they smuggle into my parish from their friends in New York.

Take care of yourself, Hynes. I'm giving you a fair warning;" and here the priest shook his whip menacingly at the dyna miter. " If I ever catch you reading any American newspapers in the chapel-yard, I'll make an exam ple of you for the benefit of others. Good-by, Murty, my boy. I fear I'm after keeping you too long. Get into your trap now and drive off. You know you needn't be in a fright to be first on the mountain, as no one has leave but yourself. Tell me, did you get a note from Sir Percy for Foxy Jim?" " No; the ladies are bringing it to me. And to tell you the truth, that is the reason I am so late in starting. 'Tis now only eight, and I am to meet them at Cloernagh bridge at ten." " The ladies ! The Misses Seymour ?" "Yes; there's nothing wonderful in that, Father Tim, is there ?"

" No, nothing wonderful. Have you been introduced to them ?" " Not yet; but I hope to be." " I think, Murty, I must give you my blessing. You know they are considered the most attractive and the most comfortable ladies in the whole county; but then you must remember they are Protes tants." "Yes; but not bigoted ones. Are they not as intimate as equals with Mary MacMahon ?" " So they ought. Although Mary is only Mick Mac's daughter, she is as handsome and as educated as either of them. Mary was educated in Bel gium, you know, and the convent she came from ought to be proud of her. Murty," continued the priest impressively, " if you want a good wife, a perfect lady in manners and education, come down to the house and dine with me on Sunday, and I'll introduce you to Mary." " I have heard a great deal spoken in Miss Mac- Mahon's praise since I came home.

Does she not play the organ for you ?" "Yes, she does; and not only that, but she has trained the school-children to sing, and we have now, thanks to her, as good a choir in the little chapel as they have in the cathedral in Kilkenny. But I won't delay you any further. Get into your car now. I hope you'll have good sport. Don't head the dogs whatever you do, and don't forget the brace when you're passing home." With a polite wave of his hand, the priest grasped the reins of his horse tightly, and, after a flourish of his whip in true coachman style, jogged on upon his way. The Doctor now climbed into his little box, and, after a vigorous jerk at the bridle, his old pony re sumed her old-fashioned sling-trot in the pleasant morning light. Cloernagh bridge was now visible at a turn in the road.

The old creeper-covered stone structure which spanned the brawling trout stream and di vided two counties looked as unchanged to O'Hal loran's sight as when last he saw it. The day was now, as Hynes predicted, growing warm and even sultry. The twelfth of August is remarkable among sporting men as the hottest day in the year. Not that its heat equals the midsum mer fervor; but the excitement of the opening day of the grouse-shooting, and the physical exertion necessary to enjoy the sport, tire out the most ar dent, and the accompanying fatigue is inevitably attributed to the imagined intensity of the heat of the weather. There was yet some time to wait before the ladies from Woodville House could be expected to appear. O'Halloran threw the reins loosely on the pony's back, and that patient animal jogged along through the sweet-scented country until, arrived at the old bridge, a convulsive tug at her mouth told her a halt had been proclaimed, and that for a time she might nibble the grass by the wayside with ease and comfort.

O'Halloran now jumped out on the road, and, placing his gun under his arm, leaned musingly over the battlements of the old bridge. There babbled the silvery stream from which in years back he hooked the speckled trout. The huge forest-trees that shut in from prying eyes the spacious lawn and grounds of Woodville were familiar objects to his sight; and as he gazed in deep abstraction, "revolving many memories," a noise of crackling branches in his vicinity attracted his attention, and in a moment an able-bodied, handsome-looking peasant jumped into the centre of the road.

Chapter III. Edward O'donnell

"Murty!" "Ned!" The two young men rushed towards each other, warmly grasping hands. "I made a short cut across the fields to meet you," said Edward O'Donnell, the companion of O'Halloran's boyish days, "as I heard you were to wait at the bridge for a note from old Seymour." "Who told you, Ned ?" " Foxy Jim, the gamekeeper. He passed over our way last night, and I asked him if there would be any one on the mountain the first day, and he told me you were the only one who got leave, and that you were to get a letter here to-day and bring it to him. But never mind about that. By Jove! you look well after your five years in Dublin. Are you going to set up as a doctor here ?" " That's more than I can tell, old fellow. On private practice I would starve, as, although I could get plenty to do, from all I can hear the poor peo ple have no coin.

I have hopes of getting a dispensary shortly, and in that way I may creep on. But tell me how are your father and all at home ?" "Only middling, indeed. Things have gone very badly with us since you went away. Everything seems changed for the worse, and unless some thing is done shortly we must all quit the country and run for America. I would be gone long ago, were it not for the old people. 'Twould break the poor mother's heart to see me leave her, and then who knows but things may mend by and by." " I'm sorry to hear that, Ned. I thought your father had a lease of his place." " He has — bad luck to it ! I wish he had never signed it, for it has been our ruin. He was forced to take it, a few years ago, that he might raise some money on it in the bank to buy y7oung stock, and prices fell when the stock were fat, and there it is now lying in the bank, pledged to the last penny, and the labor of my life, my father's, aye, begob! and my grandfather's, is gone now in rent, losses, and interest.

But there's no use talking about dismal matters of this kind. 'Twas not for this I came down to meet you." " But, really, you interest me. I have been five years only away, and I did not think so short a time would have worked so great a change." " Change, man ! Why, we're broke horse and foot." "But what about the Land League; won't it do something for you ?" " The Land League be . What can those spouters do for us ? Are we, the leaseholders, a bit better off by all their new laws ? Are the poor idiots who got a big rent saddled on them for the next fifteen years better off? Are the unfortunate la borers one step nearer getting the means of a decent living? Bad cess to me! but I think the Land Leaguers did a d sight more harm than good. If we are ever to have any sort of a decent living at home, and the true and safe value of our labor, my opinion is, Murty, we must make a bold stroke for it.

We must, in fact, follow the advice of 'the boys' in America if we are ever to live like Christians." "Thim's my sintimints eggsackly," interposed Hynes, who with an approving grimace had been eagerly drinking in the conversation. " Shut your mouth, you old communist!" growled the Doctor. " If you say another word I'll complain of you to Father Tim." " Oh, begor ! Masther Murty, you can do that if you like; but the priest never wants his dinner, and there's thousands o' poor people would die of star vation in this country wor it not for their relations in America." "He's right, Murty," said O'Donnell; "the money that comes here from America is going to pay the rent for hundreds. The relatives who send it naturally think they are doing some good for their own, but the landlord gobbles it all up, and in the end, after starving and killing themselves, the most of the farmers about here get turned out on the roadside."

"Is this a fact?" " As true as Gospel. No man could do more than my poor father has done; no one could have worked harder than I have worked: and yet it was only a few days ago we had Billy Griffin, the bailiff, down on us with a writ. You remember the evening, Hynes ?" "Faith! and I do, Misther O'Donnell. Sure, you don't forget, be the same token, I had a pillow un der my arm an' a deeshy little tar-pot in my hand that I wanted down at your place for a thrifle o' business." " By Jove! Hynes," interposed O'Halloran, "but the priest was right. You're the blackguard that tarred and feathered the bailiff." " An' if I did, Misther Murtagh, didn't he desarve it? Couldn't the dirty, drunken, red-nosed, lazy bummer get some dacint work to do, an' not go about sarvin' what ould Gladstone calls ' death warrants ' on the poor people ?

Begor! all I'm sorry for is that I didn't put the match to him whin I gev him his new coat." " Hynes," said the Doctor, " you'll be hanged yet if you don't mind yourself." " Well, what if I am ? I wouldn't be the first o' my family that died in a good cause. My brother Tim — the Lord have mercy on him! — was hung in the jail o' Clonmel for killin' an informer. An' wasn't there Misther O'Donnell's namesake hung the other day in London for killin' Cary ? Begor ! Misther Murty, whin a man hangs for the good o' the ould country, 'tis no disgrace, I can tell you." The noise of approaching carriage-wheels now attracted the attention of the party, and through the trees a handsome phaeton drawn by a pair of high-stepping bays could be observed moving in their direction. " Here's the letter," said the Doctor.

" Hynes, run and catch the pony and pull him out of the road. I'll walk up a few steps to meet the ladies." "And I'll get out of the way, Murty," said O'Don nell; "they might recognize me, and they know I'm no friend of their father's." "You're not — bad luck to him!" — growled Hynes under his teeth, as O'Halloran, with his gun under his arm, sauntered leisurely up in the direc tion of the carriage. "Doctor O'Halloran, I presume ?" said a sweet voice as the phaeton pulled up, and the young medicus, with his hat uplifted, approached its fair in mates. " Yes, ladies, I have waited here by appointment for the letter which, I perceive, you have been kind enough to bring me." Harriet and Florence Seymour, familiarly known as Miss Hattie and Miss Flo, were of a type of beauty which is not often met with.

From their Irish mother they had caught the clear, transparent skin, the wondrously lustrous eyes, and the rippling wavy hair which is so often observable in the Celt; from their father they derived the clear-cut Saxon visage and Romanesque nasal organ which gave strength, character, and intellectual firmness to the otherwise pensive Celtic features. In a great meas ure these young ladies were strangers at Woodville, only paying it a visit in summer-time, and passing the spring in London, and winter in the south of Europe. The young lady who now extended her hand, with the letter held daintily therein, gazed for a moment intently at O'Halloran. Perhaps her own and her sister's training had taught them that the sons of their father's tenants were a rough and uncouth class, whose only mission in life it was to toil unremittingly that Sir Percy should main tain in style and elegance his house in Clavendish Square, and his palazzo by the Mediterranean, receiving the unbounded thanks of his tenants because of his condescension in visiting the old Irish country-seat for a few weeks in the year.