Chapter THE SECOND (4)

My friend, Dr. Herbert, was, and is, the best fellow breathing. He devoted for some weeks nearly the whole of his time to me. He endeavoured to draw my mind away from the one subject, which might, he thought, if entertained, once more overthrow my reason. He was mistaken. The very endeavour to discard that memory, as often as it recurred, would soon have distracted me. I encouraged it, therefore, and was strengthened by it;--my mind throve upon it,--it was a comfort to me.

The many slight indications of an attachment--of a passion--between _her_ and this man Hastings,--and they must have been but slight indications,--were presented to me now grossly and palpably. I could see them all,--they stung me;--and I would curse my fool's nature that was blind, or would not see and provide against the consequence. And why did I curse my easy nature? Could I have borne to live a wretched turnkey, a miserable listener at key-holes, a dealer out of "punishment, the drudgery of devils?" Did I marry to suspect virtue, or to control vice? Neither; and I was glad that, when they did wrong me, they permitted me to know it. These thoughts never affected my brain;--there was no fear of that. I thought no longer from the brain;--these thoughts were in my heart, and never moved thence.

One evening, as I was ascending the stairs, I overheard the child inquiring of one of the servants "who that white-haired gentleman was, and why he lived in the house?" I had hitherto refused to see the child; but I now rang the bell, and ordered the housekeeper, who constantly waited upon me, to bring him to me.

He was much grown since I had last seen him, and was a fine boy. He did not know me, and was at first fearful of approaching me; but I induced him to sit upon my knee, and, putting his hair from the forehead, asked him if he would not give me a kiss. As he lifted his face, and looked up at me--that look! his very mother was gazing through those eyes! A sudden faintness possessed me. I lifted the child gently from my knee, and motioned the housekeeper to take him from my sight. I did not see him again.

But there was comfort still:--Hastings was in London,--I was certain of it.

And so he was. One night, about a fortnight after my return to town from Paris, where I was told he had been seen, and where I had sought him in vain, I was proceeding home, baffled in my endeavours to discover him in some of his old haunts, which I had ascertained after many and fruitless inquiries. I was walking rapidly down a miserable street in the vicinity of Clare Market, when a squalid wretch, issuing from a public-house, came in contact with me. I think no human being in the world would have recognised him but myself. Hideously changed as he was, I knew him instantly. The half-shriek that burst from him as he recoiled from me showed that he had recognised me also. The struggle was a short one,--I had omitted to put my pistols in my pocket on that evening. With what a savage triumph, when I had dashed him on the pavement, did I stamp upon the prostrate carcass of the groaning wretch! But my joy was brief; for I was suddenly seized by three or four men, who held me firmly by the arms. I could not get at him. Heedless of my ravings, they assisted the miscreant to rise, who, casting one glance of terror towards me, darted down an alley, and was lost to me for ever. He had escaped me.

How I reached home I know not. Herbert, who visited me next morning, forbade me to rise from my bed. He said my brain was unsettled, and I believe it was. But I was well again in a month.

The one idea pervaded my whole being when I arose from my bed. My rencontre with Hastings had whetted my appetite for revenge so keenly, that no reason, no thought, no feeling could control me. He was evidently in a state of the most abject beggary and want. That conviction did not disarm me; it rendered me only the more determined and inflexible.

I went forth one evening, and with much difficulty discovered the public-house from which I had seen him emerge on _that_ night. From the landlord I obtained every particular I required to know. Hastings had, it seemed, changed his name;--it was now Harris. He resided in one small room on the first floor of a house in a filthy court hard by; that is, if he had not left the neighbourhood, for the man had not seen him for a month past.

It was well. I drank two glasses of brandy, for it was a cold night, and proceeded towards my destination. I found it easily. There was a light in the window, and, from the reflection of a man's figure on the wall, I judged he was at home. The house-door was open, and I entered the narrow passage. At that moment I trembled, and for an instant could not proceed. No: it was not that which made me tremble; I knew, and was prepared for, what I had to do. It was the other,--it was that face which I feared I could not bear to behold.

This was, as I have said, the weakness of a moment. I mounted the stairs, and burst into the room suddenly. A man and a woman were seated at a small fire, who arose abruptly on my entrance. It was not Harris and--his wife.

"Where is the man--Hastings?" I exclaimed, addressing the old couple.

As I uttered these words, a loud shriek proceeded from a bed behind me, and a female dropt upon the floor. I knew that voice,--I knew it well;--but it did not move me.

"Mrs. Harris is ill," said the old woman; "permit us to pass you, sir;--it is one of the fits to which she is subject."

I allowed the woman to step by me, who, raising the lifeless form beside her, drew it into an adjoining room.

"What do you want, sir? what is your business here?" inquired the man.

I placed one hand into my coat-pocket and grasped a pistol, and with the other seized the man by the collar.

"Where is Harris?" said I. "You had best tell me; you are a dead man else. He is hid somewhere--he is below, in the house--where is he?"

"He is there," gasped the man; and he pointed towards the bed, upon which a body was lying, covered with a linen cloth.

I sank upon a chair. Hastings had indeed escaped me, and for ever. I was left alone, for the man had hurried from the room. I cannot describe the agony of feeling which I underwent during the next half-hour. I took the light, and, walking to the bed, drew the linen cloth from the face of the corpse.

How awful! how mysterious is the power of death! The man who had insulted, who had wronged, who had betrayed me,--whose ingratitude--of all crimes the vilest and the basest--had inverted my very soul,--this man lay before me cold, serene, tranquil, miserable, callously insensible,--and yet I had no power to curse him. There was no serenity, no tranquillity upon the face, when I gazed upon it more closely. The brow was corrugated, the cheeks collapsed, and the eyelids sunken; and there was the soul's torture, as it left a tortured body impressed upon the face. Enough to have mitigated a more implacable hatred than mine!

I left the room, and walked down stairs. As I proceeded along the passage, the man whom I had before seen came out of a lower room, and opened the door for me. I was about to depart, when he caught me gently but firmly by the arm.

"Oh, sir!" said he earnestly, "do not leave the house without seeing Mrs. Harris. She has relapsed into another fit; but when she comes to herself, it will be a comfort to her to see a friend of her husband. You knew him, sir, when living; and for his sake, perhaps--" the man paused for a moment, and continued,--"you have a benevolent heart, sir,--I am sure you have,--and if you knew all, even though he may have wronged you----"

It was an unseasonable time for an appeal of this nature. The passions that had been forced back upon my heart had yet scarce begun to subside, but I spoke calmly.

"You will tell her Mr. Saville has been here;" and I was going.

"Mr. Saville!" repeated the man. "Oh, sir, we have heard that name mentioned frequently of late. You will come again, or send, perhaps;--will you not, sir?"

"She will know where to find me, should she wish to see me, which I think is hardly probable;" and with a cold "good-night" I left him.

I called upon Herbert on my way home, and told him all that had taken place. He was surprised and shocked.

"Saville," said he, after a long pause, during which he had been absorbed in reflection, "this cursed affair is destroying you. I am a plain man. You may shake your head, and tell me coolly and calmly that you have ceased to feel the injury which all the while is preying upon you. It is that calmness which I fear most; it will kill you, or worse than that,--you understand me. You must pursue this matter no farther. The man is dead, and your wife---- Well," he resumed, "I beg your pardon; I was wrong to call her by that name. May I speak plainly?"

"You may."

"She is evidently in a state of want--of destitution. This must not be. You must allow her--settle upon her--enough to rescue her from poverty and its temptations. She must not starve;--I see you could not bear that. And you must forget her. It will not do to see a young man like yourself sacrificed, self-sacrificed, to the villany of a scoundrel. I will say no more, Saville. Vice has too much homage paid to her when an honourable man is made her victim."

Herbert was right--he was always so. No, no;--she must not starve. That were indeed a miserable triumph to me. I went to my solicitor on the next morning, and a deed was made out, settling a competence upon her, and I sent with it as much money as she could require for immediate exigencies. And I was resolved that I would forget her. The worst was past, and time and occupation would do much, and I would think this misery down. But the worst was not yet past.

I was informed, one morning, that a woman in the hall desired to speak with me. Concluding that she was one of the many persons who are accustomed to wait upon the wealthy with petitions, I ordered the servant to admit her. A woman meanly dressed, and whose countenance was concealed, moved towards me, and sinking upon her knees, with her palms pressed together and raised towards me, looked up into my face. Madness in me, and misery and famine in her, must have wrought more strongly, if that were possible, than they had done, could I have failed to recognise that face instantly. Her lips moved,--she would have spoken, but she had no power to speak,--and with a deep and heavy groan she fell upon the floor before me. I rang the bell violently. A servant entered the room.

"Send Mrs. Martin to me instantly. Mrs. Martin," said I, as the woman hastened into the room, "let Dr. Herbert be sent for immediately. You must take care of her. See that she wants nothing."

"Gracious God! it is my mistress!" said the woman, as she raised her head upon her knee. "You will let her remain in the house, Mr. Saville?--in one of the upper rooms?"

"In her own room, Mrs. Martin.--I commit her to you. When she recovers, we can make other arrangements."

It is out of the power of fortune or of fate to excite such feelings within me now as pressed upon my heart for some days after this scene. I thank God for it. Human strength or weakness could not again endure so dreadful a conflict of brute passion and of human feeling. That piteous face raised to mine would not depart from me. That she should kneel,--that she should have been degraded abjectly to crouch before me for forgiveness, for pardon, for the vilest pity,--and that I should know and feel that the base expiation was the poorest recompense--oh! I cannot pursue this farther.

Some days after this,--it was on a Sunday forenoon,--Mrs. Martin entered the room. She took a seat opposite to me.

"I am come to speak with you, Mr. Saville," she said.

"Well, madam, proceed."

"Mrs. Saville, my mistress, sir, is dying."

I spoke not for some minutes, although I was not altogether unprepared for a communication of this nature.

"You will take the child to her, madam; she will wish to see him."

"Oh, sir, she has seen him every day since she came here, and he is with her now. You will not be offended, sir, if I tell you that she has seen him many times within the last two years. Yes, sir, when you were----"

"Mad, madam!--speak plainly!--I _was_ mad."

"She came, sir, to me, and fell at my feet, imploring to see the child, and I could not refuse her. I could not bear that my mistress should kneel to me, and not be permitted to behold her own son;" and here the woman wept bitterly.

"It is very well," said I, after a pause; "I do not blame you. It is better, perhaps, that it should have been so."

"Could I prevail upon you, sir?" she continued, wiping her eyes; "might I be so bold as to hope----"

I anticipated the woman's thoughts.

"She has expressed no wish that I should see her, Mrs. Martin."

"She does not mention your name even to me," said she; "but she must not die without seeing you;--she _must_ not, Mr. Saville."

My nature at times was changed from what it had been since I was released from the mad-house. I cast a glance at the woman, which she understood and feared.

"Mention not this subject again, madam, and leave me. I would be alone."

I was disturbed by what the housekeeper had told me. She was dying. It was well. I wished her to die. I felt that until she was dead, my heart could not be brought to forgive her.

I walked out, and bent my steps towards the lodging which Hastings had formerly occupied. I found the woman of the house at home, and, with a calmness which I have since marvelled at, I drew from her all the particulars of their sojourn at her house. They had been living with her about ten months before the death of Hastings, who, she understood, had been entirely deserted by his relations, but why she knew not. About a month previous to the decease of Hastings, he came home one night, saying that he had been waylaid by a ruffian and much injured, and he had never risen from his bed again.

I ventured to ask "if Mr. Harris and his wife lived happily together?"

The woman shook her head. "There was a strange mystery about them," said she, "which I never could rightly make out. She was ever gentle and obedient; but still there was something unlike a wife, I used to think, whenever she addressed him. And he, sir,--poor man! we should not speak ill of the dead,--but when he came home--from the gaming-house, we often thought--how he used to strike and beat her, telling her to go to her Mr. Saville! He was jealous of you, sir, I suppose, but I am certain without cause; for she was an angel, sir, if ever angel was born upon this earth.--But you are ill, sir. What is the matter?"

"Nothing, nothing," said I, rising suddenly; "I am better now;" and pressing my purse upon the woman, I rushed from the house.

God of justice! how dreadful is thy vengeance, and how thou oft-times makest the sinner work out his own punishment! I thought not of the wife at first,--I thought of Isabella Denham. My heart dwelt upon her once more as I had first beheld her at the theatre,--the young, the lovely, the innocent being of former days. I remembered when but to see her for a moment at the window was happiness unspeakable,--when even the pressure of her hand in mine was a blessing and a delight to me. And to think that this creature, who had lain in my bosom, who had been tended, watched, almost served, with a degree of love akin to idolatry,--who had never seen one glance of unkindness from me, who had heard no tone from my lips save of affection--too often of foolish weakness;--to think that this creature should have become the slave, the drudge,--the spurned and beaten drudge of a brutal miscreant,--the thought was too horrible!

I had scarcely entered my own house when Mrs. Martin sought me.

"For mercy's sake, sir!" she said in agitation, "come and take your last leave of my mistress. She is dying, and has prayed to see you once more."

I followed her in silence. I met Herbert at the door of the room. "I am glad you are come," said he. He was in tears.

"I am too weak, Herbert; am I not?"

He pressed my hand,--"No, no,"--and he left me.

I entered the room, and sat down by her side. She spoke not for some minutes.

"I wished to see you once more, Mr. Saville," she said at length in a low tone, and without raising her eyes to my face, "to implore, not your pardon, for that I dare not expect; but that you will not curse my memory when I am gone. You would not, Edward,"--and she tremblingly touched my hand as it lay upon the bed,--"if you knew all, or if I could tell you all."

I answered something, but I know not what.

"I have been guilty," she resumed, "but I did not meditate guilt. Heaven is my witness that I speak the truth. I was betrayed;--and the rest was fear, and frenzy, and despair!"

I could conceive that now--I could believe it:--I did believe it,--and I was human. I took both her hands in mine: "Look at me, Isabella! look in my face!"

She did so, but with hesitation, and as she did so she started.--"Nay, we are both altered: but other miseries might have done this. I forgive you from my heart and from my soul. As we first met, so shall we now part. All shall be forgotten,--all is forgiven. God bless you!"

Those words had killed her. Her eyes dwelt upon me for one moment with their first sweetness in them;--a sigh,--and earth alone remained!

A FRAGMENT OF ROMANCE.
WARRANTED GENUINE.

[ A young lady who rejoices in
the appellation of Czarina Amabelle St. Cloud has
addressed a lengthened epistle to us, in which she
feelingly deplores the gradual decline and downfall of
the Minerva Press. She has favoured us with a catalogue
of her unpublished works, and a spirit-stirring extract
from her last manuscript romance, which is indeed a
masterpiece in a department of literature now unhappily
but too much neglected. We willingly subjoin both. For
a young lady under twenty years of age, Miss St. Cloud
in the most voluminous writer we ever had the pleasure
of meeting with.--ED. ]

CATALOGUE OF MISS ST. CLOUD'S UNPUBLISHED WORKS.

A Nympholept Lover, or, the Whispering Fungus.
Lycanthropy, the Wolfish Exquisite.
The Vampyre's Elixir, or, the Undying Wanderer.
The Spectre Steam-boat's Monster Supercargo.
The Pawned Shadow; a Vision of Invisibility.
The Idiot Oracle and the Infant Wizard.
Ventriloquism; the Life of a Fratricidal Freemason.
Dyke-impia, the Watery Doublegoer.
Basiliska, the Snake-eyed Skeleton of Enniskillen.
The Last Woman; or, the Parentless Pigmies.
Amuletus's Enchanted Chessmen; from the German.
Second Sight; or, the Crimson Behemoth.
Frozen Echoes; or, Wraithology; a Shetland story.
The Evil Ear: a legend of love.
Venomgorgia, the Arsenic-eater; a pastoral romance.
The Politics of the Gnomes; a satiric allegory.
Pestilia, the Plague Perie; or, the Eternal Earthquake.
The Fog Fairy; or, a Fire in Fleet-ditch.
The Hydra of Hyde Park; or, High-life Eclogues.
Aristocratic Atrocities; or, the Banker's Widow.
The Fatal Furbelow; or, the Tempted Templar.
The Murderous Marchioness of Mesopotamia. With coloured plates.
Boadicea at Jaugarnaut; interspersed with Della Cruscan Poetry.
Romanzritter and Nomansreden; a tradition of ancient Norwegia.

_Extract._

"Let the tear of sensibility be wiped for the simple Clotilde, who, fresh as an opening zoöphyte, awoke her aged nurse, Fidgita, to prepare her for the evening masque; and still the unconscious being warbled,

"While meekly blends the azure dew,
And starry dawn invests the grove,
When listening doves in fancy coo,
O'er faintest dreams by memory wove;
Then shall the blameless brigand bless
The suit of his Bohemian fair,
Or read in every golden tress
The token flowers of India's air!
Singing tink a tink, fal lira la,
Fal lira la, sing tink a tink!"

"Gramercy!" quoth the garrulous crone, who had numbered ninety summers; "will my foster babe mock with troubadour odes, and ballads, and the like, one whose every artery hath hardened into a tendon? Hear me, wench, and tremble!" In an unearthly and sepulchral tone, she gutturally muttered the ancient Runic prophecy--

"Two children, each of spell-bound mother,
Shall meet, and one shall love the other;
But mother young, and mother old,
Each the blessing shall withhold.
When by parent's tooth is child's flesh riven,
When by child's hand, parent hurl'd from heaven,
Then shall the serfs with joy be tipsy,
For then shall the robber espouse the gipsy."

The mysterious Fidgita disappeared. Clotilde pondered o'er the prediction. She was, indeed, a natural daughter of a wealthy baron, by some beauteous wanderer. The lawless but exemplary idol of her heart had rescued herself and nurse from these Tartar hordes, and restored her to her father, in whose halls she had been received by the Hebrew Duchess Ketura Boaz, and wooed, somewhat against the will of that mature enchantress, by the Danish Lord Wooden Murkenhole, whose cause Fidgita had warmly espoused. Clotilde still stood, clammily clasping her clay-cold hands, as her sportive Grace tripped into the corridor.

"Is the Lady Gunterzwartz turned puritan?" she asked with her wonted wit.

"Not at all," was the dignified reply; for the high patrician blood which had descended from the old Romans to our fair papist ill brooked the familiarity of the Israelitish dame.

"Lady Clotilde," resumed the Duchess Ketura, playing with the handle of the dagger which marked her caste, and which, like other creoles of that region and period, she wore stuck in her plaid bonnet, "I must tell your ladyship----"

"Nothing about that Wooden Murkenhole!" interrupted Clotilde. "Were he a sable pagan Esquimaux bowing to the abominations of Isis, I could not regard him with more repugnance."

"Ha!" laughed her Grace of Boaz, "'tis only when Guzman sails his gondola beneath the spreading cocoa-trees, and strikes his ganjam to the praise of thy charms, that thou art pleased, flirting Tory! Truly, friend Clotilde, I little dreamed, an' please you, when, flying from the invading Normans, I left the luxurious woods of Dover, and the contingent mountains of Cheshire, that I should find thee, my own--no matter! so unlike in taste to thy hapless--hush!"

"Oh, Albion!" sighed Clotilde, "decidedly thou must be the queen of cities. Thy gallant outlaws and highwaymen will with joy the bride of Guzman greet; for, rather than wive the Rosicrucian Murkenhole, I will throw myself off Mount Damthopovit, or into the monastery of St. Kussanblastre."

"My lovely pupil," said Ketura, "had far better accompany me to the munchen-hall, where the kooken-vrow is already serving up the duntarags."

Clotilde followed her friend. What, then, was her amaze at finding the phorontrom filled with armed men, headed by the rejected and vindictive Wooden! To seize his victim; to place her in the fatal trot-joggeur; to drive across the extensive crags of Smashaltobitz; to consign her to the dungeons of Glumanough,--was the work of a moment. It was not long, however, ere Fidgita apprised the Chevalier Guzman of his lady's peril: that nobleman, we may well imagine, lost no time in attempting to succour.

We must now return to the chateau. Between those fated women stood the unforgiving one.

"Mothers both!" he uttered, pointing jocosely. "Mother, traitress to your son, we part no more. Mother, rival to your daughter, Jewess or Gingaree, you have lost your Clotilde. Vainly, like your sires, may you wander crying Chloe! Chloe! till she too is old Clo--till--"

But we draw the curtain o'er his savage joy. Poison and poignard had been pacific penances to those he dealt the Duchess, ere, with delirious haste, he ascended with his wretched parent in the aërial car. The Lady Ketura, meanwhile, fled to her skiff, which, but for the incantations of the wizard Gorius, she could not have steered, her wrists being yet stiff from the thumb-screws applied to extort her unutterable secret. Thus for weeks did they buffet,--one with ether, the other with the waves,--without touching even earth, much less any more palatable food. Their squalid tatters spread pestilence around, and the rage of hunger gnawed them both.

It was now that the volcano began to spout in tragic lines of liquid fire: a furious tempest added shipwreck to the scene. A flaming brand from the irruption lighted on the sail,--the conflagration spread,--a spiral blaze darted on high,--the roar of combustion announced that it had ignited the infernal gas, and the accursed aëronaut was precipitated on the shore. Ketura now remembered how she _had_ loved, and crawled to kiss the dear perfidious Murkenhole. Bats, toads, lemurs, owls, snails, spiders, and other reptilous vermin, slimily beset her loathsome way, gibbering with too intelligible triumph; but, leaning her back against a rock, and firmly placing her foot before, she shouted, "Come one, come all! this rock shall fly from its firm base as soon as Ketura!"

He of the charmed life had fallen unharmed, and, hearing this heroic defiance, rushed to consummate his hellish vengeance. But the Duchess of Boaz anticipated his asking eye. Madly she dashed her veined temples against the jagged rock--all was black darkness. Wooden hurried forward,--slipped,--fell. Was it the ocean foam which rendered his path precarious? He scooped up some, in the hollow of his hand, to quench his burning thirst, and lend him voice for one more vow of hate! Holy nature! his slide was formed of Ketura's brain!--'twas that his lip had touched. Still, as life ebbed from her gangrenous coagulated wounds, her lacerated arms, like crushed vipers, wound their torn muscles round his felon knee. With a glare of fury he beheld the demon laughing o'er his prey, but, as the master of these forfeit souls, spurned the already putrescent masses of still conscious mortality into the turgid sable of that yawning gulf: their life-rending shriek awaked the distant bandits, who had been deaf to the phenomena of nature. What sight awaits them?

Now all the gods to speed! it is the Steam Beacon of the Railroad, which begins to flare in token of their chieftain's victory: and lo! he comes, bearing in one hand two papers;--the first, a free pardon for himself and gallant band; the second, a restitution of his Italian estates, as the rightful Count Cigaro. In his other hand he leads the rescued Clotilde, followed by her venerable father Sir Gunterzwartz; and if a momentary cloud o'ershadowed their spirits at the memory of the dead, it was dissipated on the morrow at the altar of Hymen, where the Druidic high-priest, assisted by his patriarchs, conferred the blushing hand of Clotilde on the joy-o'erflowed eye of her devoted Guzman; announcing to the assembled senate this moral lesson,--that necromancy dislocates every vital tie; but that whene'er irregular valour substitutes, in favour of injured beauty, the boudoir of bliss for the dungeon of despair, there is in such exchange no robbery."

To this we can only add, that Miss St. Cloud and a young gentleman we know might write a delightful book between them; and that the sooner they form a literary partnership, the better.

LINES

_On seeing "The Young Veteran,"_ JOHN BANNISTER, _toddling up
Gower-street, after he had attained his seventieth birthday_.

WRITTEN BY SIR GEORGE ROSE, AND COMMUNICATED BY J. P. HARLEY, ESQ.

With seventy years upon his back,
Still is my honest friend "Young Jack,"
Nor spirits check'd nor fancy slack,
But fresh as any daisy.
Though Time has knock'd his stumps about,
He cannot bowl his temper out;
And all the _Bannister_ is stout,
Although the STEPS be crazy.

HANDY ANDY.--No. II.

Andy walked out of the room with an air of supreme triumph, having laid the letters on the table, and left the squire staring after him in perfect amazement.

"Well, by the holy Paul! that's the most extraordinary genius I ever came across," was the soliloquy the master uttered as the servant closed the door after him; and the squire broke the seal of the letter that Andy's blundering had so long delayed. It was from his law-agent, on the subject of an expected election in the county which would occur in case of the demise of the then-sitting member;--it ran thus:

"Dublin, Thursday. MY DEAR
SQUIRE.--I am making all possible exertions to have
every and the earliest information on the subject of
the election. I say the election,--because, though the
seat for the county is not yet vacant, it is impossible
but that it must soon be so. Any other man than the
present member must have died long ago; but Sir Timothy
Trimmer has been so undecided all his life that he
cannot at present make up his mind to die; and it is
only by Death himself giving the casting vote that the
question can be decided. The writ for the vacant county
is expected to arrive by every mail, and in the mean
time I am on the alert for information. You know we
are sure of the barony of Ballysloughgutthery, and the
boys of Killanmaul will murder any one that dares to
give a vote against you. We are sure of Knockdoughty
also, and the very pigs in Glanamuck would return you;
but I must put you on your guard in one point where
you least expected to be betrayed. You told me you
were sure of Neck-or-nothing Hall; but I can tell you
you're out there; for the master of the aforesaid is
working heaven and earth to send us all to h--ll. He
backs the other interest; for he is so over head and
ears in debt, that he is looking out for a pension,
and hopes to get one by giving his interest to the
Honourable Sackville Scatterbrain, who sits for the
borough of Old Gooseberry at present, but whose friends
think his talents are worthy of a county. If Sack wins,
Neck-or-nothing gets a pension,--that's _poz_. I had
it from the best authority. I lodge at a milliner's
here:--no matter; more when I see you. But don't be
afraid; we'll bag Sack; and distance Neck-or-nothing.
But, seriously speaking, it's a d--d good joke that
O'Grady should use you in this manner, who have been
so kind to him in money matters; but, as the old song
says, 'Poverty parts good company;' and he is so cursed
poor that he can't afford to know you any longer, now
that you have lent him all the money you had, and the
pension _in prospectu_ is too much for his feelings.
I'll be down with you again as soon as I can, for I
hate the diabolical town as I do poison. They have
altered Stephen's Green--_ruined_ it, I should say.
They have taken away the big ditch that was round it,
where I used to hunt water-rats when a boy. They are
destroying the place with their d--d improvements.
All the dogs are well, I hope, and my favorite bitch.
Remember me to Mrs. Egan, Whom all admire. My dear
squire, Your's per quire, "_To Edward Egan, Esq.
Merryvale._"
MURTOUGH MURPHY.

Murtough Murphy was a great character, as may be guessed from his letter. He was a country attorney of good practice;--good, because he could not help it,--for he was a clever, ready-witted fellow, up to all sorts of trap, and one in whose hands a cause was very safe; therefore he had plenty of clients without his seeking them. For, if Murtough's practice had depended on his looking for it, he might have made broth of his own parchment; for though, to all intents and purposes, a good attorney, he was so full of fun and fond of amusement, that it was only by dint of the business being thrust upon him he was so extensive a practitioner. He loved a good bottle, a good hunt, a good joke, and a good song, as well as any fellow in Ireland; and even when he was obliged in the way of business to press a gentleman hard,--to hunt his man to the death,--he did it so good-humouredly that his very victim could not be angry with him. As for those he served, he was their prime favourite; there was nothing they _could_ want to be done in the parchment line that Murtough would not find out some way of doing; and he was so pleasant a fellow, that he shared in the hospitality of all the best tables in the county. He kept good horses, was on every race-ground within twenty miles, and a steeple-chase was no steeple-chase without him. Then he betted freely, and, what's more, won his bets very generally; but no one found fault with him for that, and he took your money with such a good grace, and mostly gave you a _bon-mot_ in exchange for it,--so that, next to winning the money yourself, you were glad it was won by Murtough Murphy.

The squire read his letter two or three times, and made his comments as he proceeded. "'Working heaven and earth to send us to--' So, that's the work O'Grady's at--that's old friendship--d--d unfair: and after all the money I lent him too;--he'd better take care--I'll be down on him if he plays foul;--not that I'd like that much either;--but--Let's see who's this is coming down to oppose me?--Sack Scatterbrain--the biggest fool from this to himself;--the fellow can't ride a bit,--a pretty member for a sporting county! 'I lodge at a milliner's'--divil doubt you, Murtough; I'll engage you do.--Bad luck to him!--he'd rather be fooling away his time in a back-parlour, behind a bonnet-shop, than minding the interests of the county. 'Pension'--ha!--wants it sure enough,--take care, O'Grady, or by the powers I'll be at you.--You may baulk all the bailiffs, and defy any other man to serve you with a writ; but, by jingo! if I take the matter in hand, I'll be bound I'll get it done. 'Stephen's Green--big ditch--where I used to hunt water-rats.'--Divil sweep you, Murphy! you'd rather be hunting water-rats any day than minding your business.--He's a clever fellow for all that. 'Favourite bitch--Mrs. Egan.' Ay!--there's the end of it--with his bit o' po'thry too! The divil!

The squire threw down the letter, and then his eye caught the other two that Andy had purloined.

"More of that stupid blackguard's work!--robbing the mail--no less!--that fellow will be hanged some time or other. 'Egad, maybe they'll hang him for this! What's best to be done?--Maybe it will be the safest way to see who they are for, and send them to the parties, and request they will say nothing: that's it."

The squire here took up the letters that lay before him, to read their superscriptions; and the first he turned over was directed to Gustavus Granby O'Grady, Esq. Neck-or-nothing Hall, Knockbotherum. This was what is called a curious coincidence. Just as he had been reading all about O'Grady's intended treachery to him, here was a letter to that individual, and with the Dublin post-mark too, and a very grand seal.

The squire examined the arms, and, though not versed in the mysteries of heraldry, he thought he remembered enough of most of the arms he had seen to say that this armorial bearing was a strange one to him. He turned the letter over and over again, and looked at it back and front, with an expression in his face that said, as plain as countenance could speak, "I'd give a trifle to know what is inside of this." He looked at the seal again: "Here's a--goose, I think it is, sitting in a bowl, with cross-bars on it, and a spoon in its mouth: like the fellow that owns it, maybe. A goose with a silver spoon in his mouth! Well, here's the gable-end of a house, and a bird sitting on the top of it. Could it be Sparrow? There's a fellow called Sparrow that's under-secretary at the Castle. D--n it! I wish I knew what it's about."

The squire threw down the letter as he said "d--n it," but took it up again in a few seconds, and, catching it edgewise between his fore-finger and thumb, gave a gentle pressure that made the letter gape at its extremities; and the squire, exercising that sidelong glance which is peculiar to postmasters, waiting-maids, and magpies who inspect marrow-bones, peeped into the interior of the epistle, saying to himself as he did so, "All's fair in war, and why not in electioneering?" His face, which was screwed up to the scrutinizing pucker, gradually lengthened as he caught some words that were on the last turn-over of the sheet, and so could be read thoroughly, and his brow darkened into the deepest frown as he scanned these lines: "As you very properly and pungently remark, poor Egan is a _bladder_--a mere _bladder_." "I am a _bladdher_? by Jasus!" said the squire, tearing the letter into pieces and throwing it into the fire. "And so, _Misther_ O'Grady, you say I'm a bladdher!" and the blood of the Egans rose as the head of that pugnacious family strided up and down the room: "I'll bladdher you, my buck,--I'll settle your hash!"

Here he took up the poker, and made a very angry lunge at the fire, that did not want stirring, and there he beheld the letter blazing merrily away. He dropped the poker as if he had caught it by the hot end, as he exclaimed, "What the d--l shall I do? I've burnt the letter!" This threw the squire into a fit of what he was wont to call his "considering cap;" and he sat with his feet on the fender for some minutes, occasionally muttering to himself what he began with,--"What the d--l shall I do? It's all owing to that infernal Andy--I'll murder that fellow some time or other. If he hadn't brought it, I shouldn't have seen it--to be sure, if I hadn't looked; but then the temptation--a saint couldn't have withstood it. Confound it! what a stupid trick to burn it. Another here, too--must burn that as well, and say nothing about either of them;" and he took up the second letter, and, merely looking at the address, threw it into the fire. He then rang the bell, and desired Andy to be sent to him. As soon as that ingenious individual made his appearance, the squire desired him with peculiar emphasis to shut the door, and then opened upon him with,

"You unfortunate rascal!"

"Yis, your honour."

"Do you know that you might be hanged for what you did to-day?"

"What did I do, sir?"

"You robbed the post-office."

"How did I rob it, sir?"

"You took two letters you had no right to."

"It's no robbery for a man to get the worth of his money."

"Will you hold your tongue, you stupid villain! I'm not joking: you absolutely might be hanged for robbing the post-office."

"Sure I didn't know there was any harm in what I done; and for that matther, sure, if they're sitch wondherful value, can't I go back again wid 'em?"

"No, you thief! I hope you have not said a word to any one about it."

"Not the sign of a word passed my lips about it."

"You're sure?"

"Sartin."

"Take care, then, that you never open your mouth to mortal about it, or you'll be hanged, as sure as your name is Andy Rooney."

"Oh, at that rate I never will. But maybe your honour thinks I ought to be hanged?"

"No,--because you did not intend to do a wrong thing; but, only I have pity on you, I could hang you to-morrow for what you've done."

"Thank you, sir."

"I've burnt the letters, so no one can know anything about the business unless you tell on yourself: so remember,--not a word."

"Faith. I'll be as dumb as the dumb baste."

"Go, now; and, once for all, remember you'll be hanged so sure as you ever mention one word about this affair."

Andy made a bow and a scrape, and left the squire, who hoped the secret was safe. He then took a ruminating walk round the pleasure-grounds, revolving plans of retaliation upon his false friend O'Grady; and having determined to put the most severe and sudden measure of the law in force against him for the monies in which he was indebted to him, he only awaited the arrival of Murtough Murphy from Dublin to execute his vengeance. Having settled this in his own mind, he became more contented, and said, with a self-satisfied nod of the head, "We'll see who's the _bladdher_."

In a few days Murtough Murphy returned from Dublin, and to Merryvale he immediately proceeded. The squire opened to him directly his intention of commencing hostile law proceedings against O'Grady, and asked what most summary measures could be put in practice against him.

"Oh! various, various, my dear squire," said Murphy; "but I don't see any great use in doing so _yet_,--he has not openly avowed himself."

"But does he not intend to coalesce with the other party?"

"I believe so;--that is, if he's to get the pension."

"Well, and that's as good as done, you know; for if they want him, the pension is easily managed."

"I'm not so sure of that."

"Why, they're as plenty as blackberries."

"Very true; but, you see, Lord Gobblestown swallows all the pensions for his own family; and there are a great many complaints in the market against him for plucking that blackberry-bush very bare indeed; and unless Sack Scatterbrain has swingeing interest, the pension may not be such an easy thing."

"But still O'Grady has shown himself not my friend."

"My dear squire, don't be so hot: he has not _shown_ himself yet----"

"Well, but he means it."

"My dear squire, you oughtn't to jump a conclusion like a twelve-foot drain or a five-bar gate."

"Well, he's a blackguard."

"No denying it; and therefore keep him on your side, if you can, or he'll be a troublesome customer on the other."

"I'll keep no terms with him;--I'll slap at him directly. What can you do that's wickedest?--latitat, capias--fee-faw-fum, or whatever you call it?"

"Hollo! squire, you're overrunning your game: maybe, after all, he _won't_ join the Scatterbrains, and----"

"I tell you it's no matter; he intended doing it, and that's all the same. I'll slap at him,--I'll blister him!"

Murtough Murphy wondered at this blind fury of the squire, who, being a good-humoured and good-natured fellow in general, puzzled the attorney the more by his present manifest malignity against O'Grady. But he had not seen the turn-over of the letter: he had not seen "_bladdher_,"--the real and secret cause of the "war to the knife" spirit which was kindled in the squire's breast.

"Of course you can do what you please; but, if you'd take a friend's advice----"

"I tell you I'll blister him."

"He certainly _bled_ you very freely."

"I'll blister him, I tell you, and that smart. Lose no time, Murphy, my boy: let loose the dogs of law on him, and harass him till he'd wish the d--l had him."

"Just as you like; but----"

"I'll have it my own way, I tell you; so say no more."

"I'll commence against him at once then, as you wish it; but it's no use, for you know very well that it will be impossible to serve him."

"Let me alone for that: I'll be bound I'll find fellows to get the inside of him."

"Why, his house is barricaded like a jail, and he has dogs enough to bait all the bulls in the country."

"No matter; just send me the blister for him, and I'll engage I'll stick it on him."

"Very well, squire; you shall have the blister as soon as it can be got ready. I'll tell you whenever you may send over to me for it, and your messenger shall have it hot and warm for him. Good-b'ye, squire."

"Good-b'ye, Murphy!--lose no time."

"In the twinkling of a bed-post. Are you going to Tom Durfy's steeple-chase?"

"I'm not sure."

"I've a bet on it. Did you see the Widow Flanagan lately? You didn'? They say Tom's pushing it strong there. The widow has money, you know, and Tom does it all for the love o' God; for you know, squire, there are two things God hates,--a coward and a poor man. Now, Tom's no coward; and, that he may be sure of the love o' God on the other score, he's making up to the widow; and, as he's a slashing fellow, she's nothing loth, and, for fear of any one cutting him out, Tom keeps as sharp a look-out after her as she does after him. He's fierce on it, and looks pistols at any one that attempts putting his _comether_ on the widow, while she looks "as soon as you plaze," as plain as an optical lecture can enlighten the heart of man: in short, Tom's all ram's horns, and the widow all sheep's eyes. Good-b'ye, squire!" And Murtough put spurs to his horse and cantered down the avenue, singing.

Andy was sent over to Murtough Murphy's for the law process at the appointed time; and, as he had to pass through the village, Mrs. Egan desired him to call at the apothecary's for some medicine that was prescribed for one of the children.

"What'll I ax for, ma'am?"

"I'd be sorry to trust to you, Andy, for remembering. Here's the prescription; take great care of it, and Mr. M'Grane will give you something to bring back; and mind, if it's a powder, don't let it get wet as you did the sugar the other day."

"No, ma'am."

"And if it's a bottle, don't break it as you did the last."

"No, ma'am."

"And make haste."

"Yis, ma'am:" and off went Andy.

In going through the village he forgot to leave the prescription at the apothecary's, and pushed on for the attorney's: there he saw Murtough Murphy, who handed him the law process, enclosed in a cover, with a note to the squire.

"Have you been doing anything very clever lately, Andy?" said Murtough.

"I don't know, sir," said Andy.

"Did you shoot any one with soda-water since I saw you last?"

Andy grinned.

"Did you kill any more dogs lately, Andy?"

"Faith, you're too hard on me, sir: sure I never killed but one dog, and that was an accident----"

"An accident!--D--n your impudence, you thief! Do you think, if you killed one of the pack on purpose, we wouldn't cut the very heart out o' you with our hunting-whips?"

"Faith, I wouldn't doubt you, sir: but, sure, how could I help that divil of a mare runnin' away wid me, and thramplin' the dogs?"

"Why didn't you hold her, you thief?"

"Hould her, indeed!--you just might as well expect to stop fire among flax as that one."

"Well, be off with you now, Andy, and take care of what I gave you for the squire."

"Oh, never fear, sir," said Andy, as he turned his horse's head homeward. He stopped at the apothecary's in the village to execute his commission for "misthis." On telling the son of Galen that he wanted some physic "for one o' the childre up at the big house," the dispenser of the healing art asked _what_ physic he wanted.

"Faith, I dunna what physic."

"What's the matter with the child?"

"He's sick, sir."

"I suppose so, indeed, or you wouldn't be sent for medicine.--You're always making some blunder. You come here, and don't know what description of medicine is wanted."

"Don't I?" said Andy with a great air.

"No you don't, you omadhaun!" said the apothecary.

Andy fumbled in his pockets and could not lay hold of the paper his mistress entrusted him with until he had emptied them thoroughly of their contents upon the counter of the shop; and then taking the prescription from the collection, he said, "So you tell me I don't know the description of the physic I'm to get. Now, you see you're out; for _that's_ the _description_." And he slapped the counter impressively with his hand, as he threw down the recipe before the apothecary.

While the medicine was in the course of preparation for Andy, he commenced restoring to his pockets the various parcels he had taken from them in hunting for the recipe, Now, it happened that he had laid them down close beside some articles that were compounded, and sealed up for going out, on the apothecary's counter; and as the law process which Andy had received from Murtough Murphy chanced to resemble in form another enclosure that lay beside it, containing a blister, Andy, under the influence of his peculiar genius, popped the blister into his pocket instead of the packet which had been confided to him by the attorney, and having obtained the necessary medicine from M'Grane, rode home with great self-complacency that he had not forgot to do a single thing that had been entrusted to him: "I'm all right this time," said Andy to himself.

Scarcely had he left the apothecary's shop when another messenger alighted at its door, and asked "If Squire O'Grady's things was ready?"

"There they are," said the innocent M'Grane, pointing to the bottles, boxes, and _blister_, he had made up and set aside, little dreaming that the blister had been exchanged for a law process; and Squire O'Grady's own messenger popped into his pocket the legal instrument, that it was as much as any seven men's lives were worth to bring within gun-shot of Neck-or-nothing Hall.

Home he went, and the sound of the old gate creaking on its hinges at the entrance to the avenue awoke the deep-mouthed dogs around the house, who rushed infuriate to the spot to devour the unholy intruder on the peace and privacy of the patrician O'Grady; but they recognised the old grey hack and his rider, and quietly wagged their tails and trotted back, and licked their lips at the thoughts of the bailiff they had hoped to eat. The door of Neck-or-nothing Hall was carefully unbarred and unchained, and the nurse-tender was handed the parcel from the apothecary, and re-ascended to the sick-room with slippered foot as quietly as she could; for the renowned O'Grady was, according to her account, "as cross as two sticks;" and she protested, furthermore, "that her heart was grey with him."

Mrs. O'Grady was near the bed of the sick man as the nurse-tender entered.

"Here's the things for your honour now," said she in her most soothing tone.

"I wish the d--l had you and them!" said O'Grady.

"Gusty, dear!" said his wife. She might have said stormy instead of gusty.

"Oh! they'll do you good, your honour," said the nurse-tender, curtsying, and uncorking bottles, and opening a pill-box.

"Curse them all!" said the squire. "A pretty thing to have a gentleman's body made a perfect sink for these blackguard doctors and apothecaries to pour their dirty stuff into--faugh!"

"Now, sir, dear, there's a little blisther just to go on your chest--if you plaze----"

"A _what_!"

"A warm plasther, dear."

"A _blister_ you said, you old _divil_!"

"Well, sure, it's something to relieve you."

The squire gave a deep growl, and his wife put in the usual appeal of "Gusty, dear!"

"Hold your tongue, will you? how would _you_ like it? I wish you had it on your----"

"'Deed-an-deed, dear,--" said the nurse-tender.

"By the 'ternal war! if you say another word, I'll throw the jug at you!"

"And there's a nice dhrop o' gruel I have on the fire for you," said the nurse, pretending not to mind the rising anger of the squire, as she stirred the gruel with one hand, while with the other she marked herself with the sign of the cross, and said in a mumbling manner, "God presarve us! he's the most cantankerous Christian I ever kem across!"

"Show me that infernal thing!" said the squire.

"What thing, dear?"

"You know well enough, you old hag!--that blackguard blister!"

"Here it is, dear. Now, just open the brust o' your shirt, and let me put it an you."

"Give it into my hand here, and let me see it."