Merrily moves the dance along;—
    Although his poor partner was all in a fret,
       My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.

    He ate up the ice like a prudent young lord,—
       Merrily moves the dance along;—
    For he saw ’t was the very last ice on the board,
       My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.

    “Now, when shall we marry?” the gentleman cried;—
       Merrily moves the dance along;—
    “Sir, get you to Jordan,” the damsel replied,
       My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.

    “I never will wed with the pitiful elf”—
       Merrily moves the dance along—
    “Who ate up the ice which I wanted myself,”
       My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.

    “I’d pardon your backing from red Waterloo,”—
       Merrily moves the dance along—
    “But I never will wed with a coward and screw,”
       My Lord-Lieutenant so free and young.

CHAPTER XLIII.

THE next morning I began to think of departing; I had sewed up the money
which I had received for the horse in a portion of my clothing, where I
entertained no fears for its safety, with the exception of a small sum in
notes, gold and silver, which I carried in my pocket.  Ere departing,
however, I determined to stroll about and examine the town, and observe
more particularly the humours of the fair than I had hitherto an
opportunity of doing.  The town, when I examined it, offered no object
worthy of attention but its church—an edifice of some antiquity; under
the guidance of an old man, who officiated as sexton, I inspected its
interior attentively, occasionally conversing with my guide, who,
however, seemed much more disposed to talk about horses than the church.
“No good horses in the fair this time, measter,” said he; “none but one
brought hither by a chap whom nobody knows, and bought by a foreigneering
man, who came here with Jack Dale.  The horse fetched a good swinging
price, which is said, however, to be much less than its worth; for the
horse is a regular clipper; not such a one ’tis said, has been seen in
the fair for several summers.  Lord Whitefeather says that he believes
the fellow who brought him to be a highwayman, and talks of having him
taken up, but Lord Whitefeather is only in a rage because he could not
get him for himself.  The chap would not sell it to un; Lord Screw wanted
to beat him down, and the chap took huff, said he wouldn’t sell it to him
at no price, and accepted the offer of the foreigneering man, or of Jack,
who was his ’terpreter, and who scorned to higgle about such an hanimal,
because Jack is a gentleman, though bred a dickey-boy, whilst ’tother,
though bred a Lord, is a screw and a whitefeather.  Every one says the
cove was right, and I says so too; I likes spirit, and if the cove were
here, and in your place, measter, I would invite him to drink a pint of
beer.  Good horses are scarce now, measter, ay, and so are good men,
quite a different set from what there were when I was young; that was the
time for men and horses.  Lord bless you, I know all the breeders about
here; they are not a bad set, and they breed a very fairish set of
horses, but they are not like what their fathers were, nor are their
horses like their fathers’ horses.  Now there is Mr. —, the great
breeder, a very fairish man, with very fairish horses; but, Lord bless
you, he’s nothing to what his father was, nor his steeds to his father’s;
I ought to know, for I was at the school here with his father, and
afterwards for many a year helped him to get up his horses; that was when
I was young, measter—those were the days.  You look at that monument,
measter,” said he, as I stopped and looked attentively at a monument on
the southern side of the church near the altar; “that was put up for a
rector of this church, who lived a long time ago, in Oliver’s time, and
was ill-treated and imprisoned by Oliver and his men; you will see all
about it on the monument.  There was a grand battle fought nigh this
place, between Oliver’s men and the Royal party, and the Royal party had
the worst of it, as I’m told they generally had; and Oliver’s men came
into the town, and did a great deal of damage, and ill-treated the
people.  I can’t remember anything about the matter myself, for it
happened just one hundred years before I was born, but my father was
acquainted with an old countryman, who lived not many miles from here,
who said he remembered perfectly well the day of the battle; that he was
a boy at the time, and was working in a field near the place where the
battle was fought, and he heard shouting and noise of firearms, and also
the sound of several balls, which fell in the field near him.  Come this
way, measter, and I will show you some remains of that day’s field.”
Leaving the monument, on which was inscribed an account of the life and
sufferings of the Royalist Rector of Horncastle, I followed the sexton to
the western end of the church, where, hanging against the wall, were a
number of scythes stuck in the ends of poles.  “Those are the weapons,
measter,” said the sexton, “which the great people put into the hands of
a number of the country folks, in order that they might use them against
Oliver’s men; ugly weapons enough; however, Oliver’s men won, and Sir
Jacob Ashley and his party were beat.  And a rare time Oliver and his men
had of it, till Oliver died, when the other party got the better, not by
fighting, ’tis said, but through a General Monk, who turned sides.  Ah,
the old fellow that my father knew said he well remembered the time when
General Monk went over and proclaimed Charles the Second.  Bonfires were
lighted everywhere, oxen roasted, and beer drunk by pailfuls; the country
folks were drunk with joy, and something else; sung scurvy songs about
Oliver to the tune of Barney Banks, and pelted his men, wherever they
found them, with stones and dirt.”  “The more ungrateful scoundrels
they,” said I.  “Oliver and his men fought the battle of English
independence against a wretched king and corrupt lords.  Had I been
living at the time, I should have been proud to be a trooper of Oliver.”
“You would, measter, would you?  Well, I never quarrels with the opinions
of people who come to look at the church, and certainly independence is a
fine thing.  I like to see a chap of an independent spirit, and if I were
now to see the cove who refused to sell his horse to my Lord Screw and
Whitefeather, and let Jack Dale have him, I would offer to treat him to a
pint of beer—e’es, I would, verily.  Well, measter, you have now seen the
church, and all there’s in it worth seeing—so I’ll just lock up, and go
and finish digging the grave I was about when you came, after which I
must go into the fair to see how matters are going on.  Thank ye,
measter,” said he, as I put something into his hand; “thank ye kindly;
’tis not every one who gives me a shilling now-a-days who comes to see
the church, but times are very different from what they were when I was
young; I was not sexton then, but something better; helped Mr. — with his
horses, and got many a broad crown.  Those were the days, measter, both
for men and horses; and I say, measter, if men and horses were so much
better when I was young than they are now, what, I wonder, must they have
been in the time of Oliver and his men?”

          [Picture: Horncastle Church in 1820 (since restored)]

CHAPTER XLIV.

LEAVING the church, I strolled through the fair, looking at the horses,
listening to the chaffering of the buyers and sellers, and occasionally
putting in a word of my own, which was not always received with much
deference; suddenly, however, on a whisper arising that I was the young
cove who had brought the wonderful horse to the fair which Jack Dale had
bought for the foreigneering man, I found myself an object of the
greatest attention; those who had before replied with stuff! and
nonsense! to what I said, now listened with the greatest eagerness to any
nonsense which I chose to utter, and I did not fail to utter a great
deal; presently, however, becoming disgusted with the beings about me, I
forced my way, not very civilly, through my crowd of admirers; and
passing through an alley and a back street, at last reached an outskirt
of the fair, where no person appeared to know me.  Here I stood, looking
vacantly on what was going on, musing on the strange infatuation of my
species, who judge of a person’s words, not from their intrinsic merit,
but from the opinion—generally an erroneous one—which they have formed of
the person.  From this reverie I was roused by certain words which
sounded near me, uttered in a strange tone, and in a strange cadence—the
words were, “them that finds, wins; and them that can’t find, loses”.
Turning my eyes in the direction from which the words proceeded, I saw
six or seven people, apparently all countrymen, gathered round a person
standing behind a tall white table of very small compass.  “What!” said
I, “the thimble-engro of — Fair here at Horncastle.”  Advancing nearer,
however, I perceived that though the present person was a thimble-engro,
he was a very different one from my old acquaintance of — Fair.  The
present one was a fellow about half a foot taller than the other.  He had
a long, haggard, wild face, and was dressed in a kind of jacket,
something like that of a soldier, with dirty hempen trousers, and with a
foreign-looking peaked hat on his head.  He spoke with an accent
evidently Irish, and occasionally changed the usual thimble formule into,
“them that finds, wins, and them that can’t—och, sure!—they loses”;
saying also frequently, “your honour,” instead of “my lord”.  I observed,
on drawing nearer, that he handled the pea and thimble with some
awkwardness, like that which might be expected from a novice in the
trade.  He contrived, however, to win several shillings, for he did not
seem to play for gold, from “their honours”.  Awkward as he was, he
evidently did his best, and never flung a chance away by permitting any
one to win.  He had just won three shillings from a farmer, who, incensed
at his loss, was calling him a confounded cheat, and saying that he would
play no more, when up came my friend of the preceding day, Jack, the
jockey.  This worthy, after looking at the thimble-man a moment or two,
with a peculiarly crafty glance, cried out, as he clapped down a shilling
on the table, “I will stand you, old fellow!”  “Them that finds, wins;
and them that can’t—och, sure!—they loses,” said the thimble-man.  The
game commenced, and Jack took up the thimble without finding the pea;
another shilling was produced, and lost in the same manner: “this is slow
work,” said Jack, banging down a guinea on the table; “can you cover
that, old fellow?”  The man of the thimble looked at the gold, and then
at him who produced it, and scratched his head.  “Come, cover that, or I
shall be off,” said the jockey.  “Och, sure, my lord!—no, I mean your
honour—no, sure, your lordship,” said the other, “if I covers it at all,
it must be with silver, for divil a bit of gold have I by me.”  “Well,
then, produce the value in silver,” said the jockey, “and do it quickly,
for I can’t be staying here all day.”  The thimble-man hesitated, looked
at Jack with a dubious look, then at the gold, and then scratched his
head.  There was now a laugh amongst the surrounders, which evidently
nettled the fellow, who forthwith thrust his hand into his pocket, and
pulling out all his silver treasure, just contrived to place the value of
the guinea on the table.  “Them that finds, wins, and them that can’t
find—_loses_,” interrupted Jack, lifting up a thimble, out of which
rolled a pea.  “There, paddy, what do you think of that?” said he,
seizing the heap of silver with one hand, whilst he pocketed the guinea
with the other.  The thimble-engro stood, for some time, like one
transfixed, his eyes glaring wildly, now at the table, and now at his
successful customer; at last he said: “Arrah, sure, master!—no, I manes
my lord—you are not going to ruin a poor boy!”  “Ruin you!” said the
other; “what! by winning a guinea’s change? a pretty small dodger you—if
you have not sufficient capital, why do you engage in so deep a trade as
thimbling? come, will you stand another game?”  “Och, sure, master, no!
the twenty shillings and one which you have chated me of were all I had
in the world.”  “Cheated you,” said Jack, “say that again, and I will
knock you down.”  “Arrah! sure, master, you knows that the pea under the
thimble was not mine; here is mine master; now give me back my money.”
“A likely thing,” said Jack; “no, no, I know a trick worth two or three
of that; whether the pea was yours or mine, you will never have your
twenty shillings and one again; and if I have ruined you, all the better;
I’d gladly ruin all such villains as you, who ruin poor men with your
dirty tricks, whom you would knock down and rob on the road, if you had
but courage: not that I mean to keep your shillings, with the exception
of the two you cheated from me, which I’ll keep.  A scramble, boys! a
scramble!” said he, flinging up all the silver into the air, with the
exception of the two shillings; and a scramble there instantly was,
between the rustics who had lost their money and the urchins who came
running up; the poor thimble-engro tried likewise to have his share; but
though he flung himself down, in order to join more effectually in the
scramble, he was unable to obtain a single sixpence; and having in his
rage given some of his fellow-scramblers a cuff or two, he was set upon
by the boys and country fellows, and compelled to make an inglorious
retreat with his table, which had been flung down in the scuffle, and had
one of its legs broken.  As he retired, the rabble hooted, and Jack,
holding up in derision the pea with which he had out-manœuvred him,
exclaimed: “I always carry this in my pocket in order to be a match for
vagabonds like you”.

The tumult over, Jack gone, and the rabble dispersed, I followed the
discomfited adventurer at a distance, who, leaving the town, went slowly
on, carrying his dilapidated piece of furniture, till coming to an old
wall by the roadside, he placed it on the ground, and sat down, seemingly
in deep despondency, holding his thumb to his mouth.  Going nearly up to
him, I stood still, whereupon he looked up, and perceiving I was looking
steadfastly at him, he said, in a angry tone: “Arrah! what for are you
staring at me so?  By my shoul, I think you are one of the thaives who
are after robbing me.  I think I saw you among them, and if I were only
sure of it, I would take the liberty of trying to give you a big bating.”
“You have had enough of trying to give people a beating,” said I; “you
had better be taking your table to some skilful carpenter to get it
repaired.  He will do it for sixpence.”  “Divil a sixpence did you and
your thaives leave me,” said he; “and if you do not take yourself off,
joy, I will be breaking your ugly head with the foot of it.”  “Arrah,
Murtagh!” said I, “would ye be breaking the head of your friend and
scholar to whom you taught the blessed tongue of Oilien nan Naomha, in
exchange for a pack of cards?”  Murtagh, for he it was, gazed at me for a
moment with a bewildered look; then, with a gleam of intelligence in his
eye, he said: “Shorsha! no, it can’t be—yes by my faith it is!”  Then,
springing up and seizing me by the hand, he said: “Yes, by the powers,
sure enough it is Shorsha agra! Arrah, Shorsha! where have you been this
many a day?  Sure, you are not one of the spalpeens who are after robbing
me?”  “Not I,” I replied, “but I saw all that happened.  Come, you must
not take matters so to heart; cheer up; such things will happen in
connection with the trade you have taken up.”  “Sorrow befall the trade,
and the thief who taught it me,” said Murtagh; “and yet the trade is not
a bad one, if I only knew more of it, and had some one to help and back
me.  Och! the idea of being cheated and bamboozled by that one-eyed thief
in the horseman’s dress.”  “Let bygones be bygones, Murtagh,” said I; “it
is no use grieving for the past; sit down, and let us have a little
pleasant gossip.  Arrah, Murtagh! when I saw you sitting under the wall,
with your thumb to your mouth, it brought to my mind tales which you used
to tell me all about Finn-ma-Coul.  You have not forgotten Finn-ma-Coul,
Murtagh, and how he sucked wisdom out of his thumb.”  “Sorrow a bit have
I forgot about him, Shorsha,” said Murtagh, as we sat down together, “nor
what you yourself told me about the snake.  Arrah, Shorsha! what ye told
me about the snake bates anything I ever told you about Finn.  Ochone,
Shorsha! perhaps you will be telling me about the snake once more?  I
think the tale would do me good, and I have need of comfort, God knows,
ochone!”  Seeing Murtagh in such a distressed plight, I forthwith told
him over again the tale of the snake, in precisely the same words as I
have related it in the first part of this history.  After which, I said:
“Now, Murtagh, tit for tat; ye will be telling me one of the old stories
of Finn-ma-Coul”.  “Och, Shorsha! I haven’t heart enough,” said Murtagh.
“Thank you for your tale, but it makes me weep; it brings to my mind
Dungarvon times of old—I mean the times we were at school together.”
“Cheer up, man,” said I, “and let’s have the story, and let it be about
Ma-Coul and the salmon and his thumb.”  “Arrah, Shorsha! I can’t.  Well,
to oblige you, I’ll give it you.  Well, you know Ma-Coul was an exposed
child, and came floating over the salt sea in a chest which was cast
ashore at Veintry Bay.  In the corner of that bay was a castle, where
dwelt a giant and his wife, very respectable and dacent people, and this
giant, taking his morning walk along the bay, came to the place where the
child had been cast ashore in his box.  Well, the giant looked at the
child, and being filled with compassion for his exposed state, took the
child up in his box, and carried him home to his castle, where he and his
wife, being dacent respectable people, as I telled ye before, fostered
the child and took care of him, till he became old enough to go out to
service and gain his livelihood, when they bound him out apprentice to
another giant, who lived in a castle up the country, at some distance
from the bay.

“This giant, whose name was Darmod David Odeen, was not a respectable
person at all, but a big ould wagabone.  He was twice the size of the
other giant, who, though bigger than any man, was not a big giant; for,
as there are great and small men, so there are great and small giants—I
mean some are small when compared with the others.  Well, Finn served
this giant a considerable time, doing all kinds of hard and unreasonable
service for him, and receiving all kinds of hard words, and many a hard
knock and kick to boot—sorrow befall the ould wagabone who could thus
ill-treat a helpless foundling.  It chanced that one day the giant caught
a salmon, near a salmon-leap upon his estate—for, though a big ould
blackguard, he was a person of considerable landed property, and high
sheriff for the county Cork.  Well, the giant brings home the salmon by
the gills, and delivers it to Finn, telling him to roast it for the
giant’s dinner; ‘but take care, ye young blackguard,’ he added, ‘that in
roasting it—and I expect ye to roast it well—you do not let a blister
come upon its nice satin skin, for if ye do, I will cut the head off your
shoulders’.  ‘Well,’ thinks Finn, ‘this is a hard task; however, as I
have done many hard tasks for him, I will try and do this too, though I
was never set to do anything yet half so difficult.’  So he prepared his
fire, and put his gridiron upon it, and lays the salmon fairly and softly
upon the gridiron, and then he roasts it, turning it from one side to the
other just in the nick of time, before the soft satin skin could be
blistered.  However, on turning it over the eleventh time—and twelve
would have settled the business—he found he had delayed a little bit of
time too long in turning it over, and that there was a small, tiny
blister on the soft outer skin.  Well, Finn was in a mighty panic,
remembering the threats of the ould giant; however, he did not lose
heart, but clapped his thumb upon the blister in order to smooth it down.
Now the salmon, Shorsha, was nearly done, and the flesh thoroughly hot,
so Finn’s thumb was scalt, and he, clapping it to his mouth, sucked it,
in order to draw out the pain, and in a moment—hubbuboo!—became imbued
with all the wisdom of the world.”

_Myself_.  Stop, Murtagh! stop!

_Murtagh_.  All the witchcraft, Shorsha.

_Myself_.  How wonderful!

_Murtagh_.  Was it not, Shorsha?  The salmon, do you see, was a fairy
salmon.

_Myself_.  What a strange coincidence!

_Murtagh_.  A what, Shorsha?

_Myself_.  Why, that the very same tale should be told of Finn-ma-Coul
which is related of Sigurd Fafnisbane.

“What thief was that, Shorsha?”

“Thief!  ’Tis true, he took the treasure of Fafnir.  Sigurd was the hero
of the North, Murtagh, even as Finn is the great hero of Ireland.  He,
too, according to one account, was an exposed child, and came floating in
a casket to a wild shore, where he was suckled by a hind, and afterwards
found and fostered by Mimir, a fairy blacksmith; he, too, sucked wisdom
from a burn.  According to the Edda, he burnt his finger whilst feeling
of the heart of Fafnir, which he was roasting, and putting it into his
mouth in order to suck out the pain, became imbued with all the wisdom of
the world, the knowledge of the language of birds, and what not.  I have
heard you tell the tale of Finn a dozen times in the blessed days of old,
but its identity with the tale of Sigurd never occurred to me till now.
It is true, when I knew you of old, I had never read the tale of Sigurd,
and have since almost dismissed matters of Ireland from my mind; but as
soon as you told me again about Finn’s burning his finger, the
coincidence struck me.  I say, Murtagh, the Irish owe much to the Danes—”

“Devil a bit, Shorsha, do they owe to the thaives, except many a bloody
bating and plundering, which they never paid them back.  Och, Shorsha!
you, edicated in ould Ireland, to say that the Irish owes anything good
to the plundering villains—the _Siol Loughlin_.”

“They owe them half their traditions, Murtagh, and amongst others,
Finn-ma-Coul and the burnt finger; and if ever I publish the Loughlin
songs, I’ll tell the world so.”

“But, Shorsha, the world will never believe ye—to say nothing of the
Irish part of it.”

“Then the world, Murtagh—to say nothing of the Irish part of it—will be a
fool, even as I have often thought it; the grand thing, Murtagh, is to be
able to believe oneself, and respect oneself.  How few whom the world
believes believe and respect themselves.”

“Och, Shorsha! shall I go on with the tale of Finn?”

“I’d rather you should not, Murtagh, I know all about it already.”

“Then why did you bother me to tell it at first, Shorsha?  Och, it was
doing my ownself good, and making me forget my own sorrowful state, when
ye interrupted me with your thaives of Danes!  Och, Shorsha! let me tell
you how Finn, by means of sucking his thumb, and the witchcraft he
imbibed from it, contrived to pull off the arm of the ould wagabone,
Darmod David Odeen, whilst shaking hands with him—for Finn could do no
feat of strength without sucking his thumb, Shorsha, as Conan the Bald
told the son of Oisin in the song which I used to sing ye in Dungarvon
times of old;” and here Murtagh repeated certain Irish words to the
following effect:—

    O little the foolish words I heed
    O Oisin’s son, from thy lips which come;
    No strength were in Finn for valorous deed,
    Unless to the gristle he suck’d his thumb.

“Enough is as good as a feast, Murtagh, I am no longer in the cue for
Finn.  I would rather hear your own history.  Now tell us, man, all that
has happened to ye since Dungarvon times of old?”

“Och, Shorsha, it would be merely bringing all my sorrows back upon me!”

“Well, if I know all your sorrows, perhaps I shall be able to find a help
for them.  I owe you much, Murtagh; you taught me Irish, and I will do
all I can to help you.”

“Why, then, Shorsha, I’ll tell ye my history.  Here goes!”

CHAPTER XLV.

“WELL, Shorsha, about a year and a half after you left us—and a sorrowful
hour for us it was when ye left us, losing, as we did, your funny stories
of your snake, and the battles of your military—they sent me to Paris and
Salamanca, in order to make a _saggart_ of me.”

“Pray excuse me,” said I, “for interrupting you, but what kind of place
is Salamanca?”

“Divil a bit did I ever see of it, Shorsha!”

“Then why did you say ye were sent there?  Well, what kind of place is
Paris?  Not that I care much about Paris.”

“Sorrow a bit did I ever see of either of them, Shorsha, for no one sent
me to either.  When we says at home a person is going to Paris and
Salamanca, it manes that he is going abroad to study to be a _saggart_,
whether he goes to them places or not.  No, I never saw either—bad luck
to them—I was shipped away from Cork up the straits to a place called
Leghorn, from which I was sent to — to a religious house, where I was to
be instructed in saggarting till they had made me fit to cut a dacent
figure in Ireland.  We had a long and tedious voyage, Shorsha; not so
tedious, however, as it would have been had I been fool enough to lave
your pack of cards behind me, as the thaif, my brother Denis, wanted to
persuade me to do, in order that he might play with them himself.  With
the cards I managed to have many a nice game with the sailors, winning
from them ha’pennies and sixpences until the captain said that I was
ruining his men, and keeping them from their duty; and being a heretic
and a Dutchman, swore that unless I gave over he would tie me up to the
mast and give me a round dozen.  This threat obliged me to be more on my
guard, though I occasionally contrived to get a game at night, and to win
sixpennies and ha’pennies.

“We reached Leghorn at last, and glad I was to leave the ship and the
master, who gave me a kick as I was getting over the side, bad luck to
the dirty heretic for kicking a son of the Church, for I have always been
a true son of the Church, Shorsha, and never quarrelled with it unless it
interfered with me in my playing at cards.  I left Leghorn with certain
muleteers, with whom I played at cards at the baiting-houses, and who
speedily won from me all the ha’pennies and sixpences I had won from the
sailors.  I got my money’s worth, however, for I learnt from the
muleteers all kind of quaint tricks upon the cards, which I knew nothing
of before; so I did not grudge them what they chated me of, and when we
parted we did so in kindness on both sides.  On getting to — I was
received into the religious house for Irishes.  It was the Irish house,
Shorsha, into which I was taken, for I do not wish ye to suppose that I
was in the English religious house which there is in that city, in which
a purty set are edicated, and in which purty doings are going on if all
tales be true.

“In this Irish house I commenced my studies, learning to sing and to read
the Latin prayers of the Church.  ’Faith, Shorsha, many’s the sorrowful
day I passed in that house learning the prayers and litanies, being
half-starved, with no earthly diversion at all, at all, until I took the
cards out of my chest and began instructing in card-playing the chum
which I had with me in the cell; then I had plenty of diversion along
with him during the times when I was not engaged in singing, and
chanting, and saying the prayers of the Church; there was, however, some
drawback in playing with my chum, for though he was very clever in
learning, divil a sixpence had he to play with, in which respect he was
like myself, the master who taught him, who had lost all my money to the
muleteers who taught me the tricks upon the cards; by degrees, however,
it began to be noised about the religious house that Murtagh from
Hibrodary, {284} had a pack of cards with which he played with his chum
in the cell; whereupon other scholars of the religious house came to me,
some to be taught and others to play, so with some I played, and others I
taught, but neither to those who could play, or to those who could not,
did I teach the elegant tricks which I learnt from the muleteers.  Well,
the scholars came to me for the sake of the cards, and the porter and the
cook of the religious house, who could both play very well, came also; at
last I became tired of playing for nothing, so I borrowed a few bits of
silver from the cook, and played against the porter, and by means of my
tricks I won money from the porter and then I paid the cook the bits of
silver which I had borrowed of him, and played with him, and won a little
of his money, which I let him win back again, as I had lived long enough
in a religious house to know that it is dangerous to take money from the
cook.  In a little time, Shorsha, there was scarcely anything going on in
the house but card-playing; the almoner played with me, and so did the
sub-rector, and I won money from both; not too much, however, lest they
should tell the rector, who had the character of a very austere man and
of being a bit of a saint; however, the thief of a porter, whose money I
had won, informed the rector of what was going on, and one day the rector
sent for me into his private apartment, and gave me so long and pious a
lecture upon the heinous sin of card-playing, that I thought I should
sink into the ground; after about half an hour’s inveighing against
card-playing, he began to soften his tone, and with a long sigh told me
that at one time of his life he had been a young man himself, and had
occasionally used the cards; he then began to ask me some questions about
card-playing, which questions I afterwards found were to pump from me
what I knew about the science.  After a time he asked me whether I had
got my cards with me, and on my telling him I had, he expressed a wish to
see them, whereupon I took the pack out of my pocket, and showed it to
him; he looked at it very attentively, and at last, giving another deep
sigh, he said: that though he was nearly weaned from the vanities of the
world, he had still an inclination to see whether he had entirely lost
the little skill which at one time he possessed.  When I heard him speak
in this manner, I told him that if his reverence was inclined for a game
of cards, I should be very happy to play one with him; scarcely had I
uttered these words than he gave a third sigh, and looked so very much
like a saint that I was afraid he was going to excommunicate me.  Nothing
of the kind, however, for presently he gets up and locks the door, then
sitting down at the table, he motioned me to do the same, which I did,
and in five minutes there we were playing at cards, his reverence and
myself.

“I soon found that his reverence knew quite as much about card-playing as
I did.  Divil a trick was there connected with cards that his reverence
did not seem awake to.  As, however, we were not playing for money, this
circumstance did not give me much uneasiness; so we played game after
game for two hours, when his reverence, having business, told me I might
go, so I took up my cards, made my obedience, and left him.  The next day
I had other games with him, and so on for a very long time, still playing
for nothing.  At last his reverence grew tired of playing for nothing,
and proposed that we should play for money.  Now, I had no desire to play
with his reverence for money, as I knew that doing so would bring on a
quarrel.  As long as we were playing for nothing, I could afford to let
his reverence use what tricks he pleased; but if we played for money, I
couldn’t do so.  If he played his tricks, I must play mine, and use every
advantage to save my money; and there was one I possessed which his
reverence did not.  The cards being my own, I had put some delicate
little marks on the trump cards, just at the edges, so that when I daylt,
by means of a little sleight of hand, I could dale myself any trump card
I pleased.  But I wished, as I said before, to have no dealings for money
with his reverence, knowing that he was master in the house, and that he
could lead me a dog of a life, if I offended him, either by winning his
money, or not letting him win mine.  So I told him I had no money to play
with, but the ould thief knew better; he knew that I was every day
winning money from the scholars, and the sub-rector, and the other people
of the house, and the ould thaif had determined to let me go on in that
way winning money, and then by means of his tricks, which he thought I
dare not resent, to win from me all my earnings—in a word, Shorsha, to
let me fill myself like a sponge, and then squeeze me for his own
advantage.  So he made me play with him, and in less than three days came
on the quarrel; his reverence chated me, and I chated his reverence; the
ould thaif knew every trick that I knew, and one or two more; but in
daling out the cards I nicked his reverence; scarcely a trump did I ever
give him, Shorsha, and won his money purty freely.  Och, it was a purty
quarrel!  All the delicate names in the _Newgate Calendar_, if ye ever
heard of such a book; all the hang-dog names in the Newgate histories,
and the lives of Irish rogues, did we call each other—his reverence and
I!  Suddenly, however, putting out his hand, he seized the cards, saying,
‘I will examine these cards, ye chating scoundrel! for I believe there
are dirty marks on them, which ye have made in order to know the winning
cards.’  ‘Give me back my pack,’ said I, ‘or _m’anam on Dioul_ if I be
not the death of ye!’  His reverence, however, clapped the cards into his
pocket, and made the best of his way to the door, I hanging upon him.  He
was a gross, fat man, but, like most fat men, deadly strong, so he forced
his way to the door, and, opening it, flung himself out, with me still
holding on him like a terrier dog on a big fat pig; then he shouts for
help, and in a little time I was secured and thrust into a lock-up room,
where I was left to myself.  Here was a purty alteration.  Yesterday I
was the idol of the religious house, thought more on than his reverence,
every one paying me court and wurtship, and wanting to play cards with
me, and to learn my tricks, and fed, moreover, on the tidbits of the
table; and to-day I was in a cell, nobody coming to look at me but the
blackguard porter who had charge of me, my cards taken from me, and with
nothing but bread and water to live upon.  Time passed dreary enough for
a month, at the end of which time his reverence came to me, leaving the
porter just outside the door in order to come to his help should I be
violent; and then he read me a very purty lecture on my conduct, saying I
had turned the religious house topsy-turvy, and corrupted the scholars,
and that I was the chate of the world, for that on inspecting the pack he
had discovered the dirty marks which I had made upon the trump cards for
to know them by.  He said a good dale more to me, which is not worth
relating, and ended by telling me that he intended to let me out of
confinement next day, but that if ever I misconducted myself any more, he
would clap me in again for the rest of my life.  I had a good mind to
call him an ould thaif, but the hope of getting out made me hold my
tongue, and the next day I was let out; and need enough I had to be let
out, for what with being alone, and living on the bread and water, I was
becoming frighted, or, as the doctors call it, narvous.  But when I was
out—oh, what a change I found in the religious house; no card-playing,
for it had been forbidden to the scholars, and there was now nothing
going on but reading and singing; divil a merry visage to be seen, but
plenty of prim airs and graces; but the case of the scholars, though bad
enough, was not half so bad as mine, for they could speak to each other,
whereas I could not have a word of conversation, for the ould thaif of a
rector had ordered them to send me to ‘Coventry,’ telling them that I was
a gambling chate, with morals bad enough to corrupt a horse regiment; and
whereas they were allowed to divert themselves with going out, I was kept
reading and singing from morn till night.  The only soul who was willing
to exchange a word with me was the cook, and sometimes he and I had a
little bit of discourse in a corner, and we condoled with each other, for
he liked the change in the religious house almost as little as myself;
but he told me that, for all the change below stairs, there was still
card-playing going on above, for that the ould thaif of a rector, and the
sub-rector, and the almoner played at cards together, and that the rector
won money from the others—the almoner had told him so—and, moreover, that
the rector was the thaif of the world, had been a gambler in his youth,
and had once been kicked out of a club-house at Dublin for chating at
cards, and after that circumstance had apparently reformed and lived
dacently till the time when I came to the religious house with my pack,
but that the sight of that had brought him back to his ould gambling.  He
told the cook, moreover, that the rector frequently went out at night to
the houses of the great clergy and chated at cards.

“In this melancholy state, with respect to myself, things continued a
long time, when suddenly there was a report that his Holiness the Pope
intended to pay a visit to the religious house in order to examine into
its state of discipline.  When I heard this I was glad, for I determined,
after the Pope had done what he had come to do, to fall upon my knees
before him, and make a regular complaint of the treatment I had received,
to tell him of the chating at cards of the rector, and to beg him to make
the ould thaif give me back my pack again.  So the day of the visit came,
and his Holiness made his appearance with his attendants, and, having
looked over the religious house, he went into the rector’s room with the
rector, the sub-rector, and the almoner.  I intended to have waited until
his Holiness came out, but finding he stayed a long time I thought I
would e’en go into him, so I went up to the door without anybody
observing me—his attendants being walking about the corridor—and opening
it I slipped in, and there what do you think I saw?  Why, his Holiness
the Pope, and his reverence the rector, and the sub-rector, and the
almoner seated at cards; and the ould thaif of a rector was dealing out
the cards which ye had given me, Shorsha, to his Holiness the Pope, the
sub-rector, the almoner, and himself.”

In this part of his history I interrupted Murtagh, saying that I was
afraid he was telling untruths, and that it was highly improbable that
the Pope would leave the Vatican to play cards with Irish at their
religious house, and that I was sure, if on his, Murtagh’s authority, I
were to tell the world so, the world would never believe it.

“Then the world, Shorsha, would be a fool, even as you were just now
saying you had frequently believed it to be; the grand thing, Shorsha, is
to be able to believe oneself; if ye can do that, it matters very little
whether the world believes ye or no.  But a purty thing for you and the
world to stickle at the Pope’s playing at cards at a religious house of
Irish; och! if I were to tell you and the world what the Pope has been
sometimes at, at the religious house of English thaives, I would excuse
you and the world for turning up your eyes.  However, I wish to say
nothing against the Pope.  I am a son of the Church, and if the Pope
don’t interfere with my cards divil a bit will I have to say against him;
but I saw the Pope playing, or about to play, with the pack which had
been taken from me, and when I told the Pope, the Pope did not—ye had
better let me go on with my history, Shorsha; whether you or the world
belave it or not, I am sure it is quite as true as your tale of the
snake, or saying that Finn got his burnt finger from the thaives of
Loughlin; and whatever you may say, I am sure the world will think so
too.”

I apologised to Murtagh for interrupting him, and telling him that his
history, whether true or not, was infinitely diverting, begged him to
continue it.

CHAPTER XLVI.

“I WAS telling ye, Shorsha, when ye interrupted me, that I found the
Pope, the rector, the sub-rector and the almoner seated at the table, the
rector with my pack of cards in his hands, about to dale out to the Pope
and the rest, not forgetting himself, for whom he intended all the
trump-cards, no doubt.  No sooner did they perceive me than they seemed
taken all aback; but the rector, suddenly starting up with the cards in
his hand, asked me what I did there, threatening to have me well
disciplined if I did not go about my business; ‘I am come for my pack,’
said I, ‘ye ould thaif, and to tell his Holiness how I have been treated
by ye’; then going down on my knees before his Holiness, I said, ‘Arrah,
now, your Holiness! will ye not see justice done to a poor boy who has
been sadly misused?  The pack of cards which that ould ruffian has in his
hand are my cards, which he has taken from me, in order to chate with.
Arrah! don’t play with him, your Holiness, for he’ll only chate ye—there
are dirty marks upon the cards which bear the trumps, put there in order
to know them by; and the ould thaif in dealing out will give himself all
the good cards, and chate ye of the last farthing in your pocket; so let
them be taken from him, your Holiness and given back to me; and order him
to lave the room, and then, if your Holiness be for an honest game, don’t
think I am the boy to baulk ye.  I’ll take the ould ruffian’s place, and
play with ye till evening, and all night besides, and divil an advantage
will I take of the dirty marks, though I know them all, having placed
them on the cards myself.’  I was going on in this way when the ould
thaif of a rector, flinging down the cards, made at me as if to kick me
out of the room, whereupon I started up and said: ‘If ye are for kicking,
sure two can play at that’; and then I kicked at his reverence, and his
reverence at me, and there was a regular scrimmage between us, which
frightened the Pope, who, getting up, said some words which I did not
understand, but which the cook afterwards told me were, ‘English
extravagance, and this is the second edition’; for it seems that, a
little time before, his Holiness had been frightened in St. Peter’s
Church by the servant of an English family, which those thaives of the
English religious house had been endeavouring to bring over to the
Catholic faith, and who didn’t approve of their being converted.  Och!
his Holiness did us all sore injustice to call us English, and to
confound our house with the other; for however dirty our house might be,
our house was a clane house compared with the English house, and we
honest people compared with those English thaives.  Well, his Holiness
was frighted, and the almoner ran out, and brought in his Holiness’s
attendants, and they laid hold of me, but I struggled hard, and said: ‘I
will not go without my pack; arrah, your Holiness! make them give me back
my pack, which Shorsha gave me in Dungarvon times of old’; but my
struggles were of no use.  I was pulled away and put in the ould dungeon,
and his Holiness went away sore frighted, crossing himself much, and
never returned again.

“In the ould dungeon I was fastened to the wall by a chain, and there I
was disciplined once every other day for the first three weeks, and then
I was left to myself, and my chain, and hunger; and there I sat in the
dungeon, sometimes screeching, sometimes holloing, for I soon became
frighted, having nothing in the cell to divert me.  At last the cook
found his way to me by stealth, and comforted me a little, bringing me
tidbits out of the kitchen; and he visited me again and again—not often,
however, for he dare only come when he could steal away the key from the
custody of the thaif of a porter.  I was three years in the dungeon, and
should have gone mad but for the cook, and his words of comfort, and his
tidbits, and nice books which he brought me out of the library, which
were the _Calendars of Newgate_ and the _Lives of Irish Rogues and
Raparees_, the only English books in the library.  However, at the end of
three years, the ould thaif of a rector, wishing to look at them books,
missed them from the library, and made a perquisition about them, and the
thaif of a porter said that he shouldn’t wonder if I had them, saying
that he had once seen me reading; and then the rector came with others to
my cell, and took my books from me, from under my straw, and asked me how
I came by them; and on my refusal to tell, they disciplined me again till
the blood ran down my back; and making more perquisition they at last
accused the cook of having carried the books to me, and the cook not
denying, he was given warning to leave next day, but he left that night,
and took me away with him, for he stole the key, and came to me and cut
my chain through, and then he and I escaped from the religious house
through a window—the cook with a bundle, containing what things he had.
No sooner had we got out than the honest cook gave me a little bit of
money and a loaf, and told me to follow a way which he pointed out, which
he said would lead to the sea; and then, having embraced me after the
Italian way, he left me, and I never saw him again.  So I followed the
way which the cook pointed out, and in two days reached a seaport called
Chiviter Vik, terribly foot foundered, and there I met a sailor who spoke
Irish, and who belonged to a vessel just ready to sail for France; and
the sailor took me on board his vessel, and said I was his brother, and
the captain gave me a passage to a place in France called Marseilles; and
when I got there, the captain and sailor got a little money for me and a
passport, and I travelled across the country towards a place they
directed me to called Bayonne, from which they said I might, perhaps, get
to Ireland.  Coming, however, to a place called Pau, all my money being
gone, I enlisted into a regiment called the Army of the Faith, which was
going into Spain, for the King of Spain had been dethroned and imprisoned
by his own subjects, as perhaps you may have heard; and the King of
France, who was his cousin, was sending an army to help him, under the
command of his own son, whom the English called Prince Hilt, because when
he was told that he was appointed to the command, he clapped his hand on
the hilt of his sword.  So I enlisted into the regiment of the Faith,
which was made up of Spaniards, many of them priests who had run out of
Spain, and broken Germans, and foot-foundered Irish like myself.  It was
said to be a blackguard regiment, that same regiment of the Faith; but,
’faith, I saw nothing blackguardly going on in it, for you would hardly
reckon card-playing, and dominoes, and pitch and toss blackguardly, and I
saw nothing else going on in it.  There was one thing in it which I
disliked—the priests drawing their Spanish knives occasionally, when they
lost their money.  After we had been some time at Pau, the Army of the
Faith was sent across the mountains into Spain, as the vanguard of the
French; and no sooner did the Spaniards see the Faith than they made a
dash at it, and the Faith ran away, myself along with it, and got behind
the French army, which told it to keep there, and the Faith did so, and
followed the French army, which soon scattered the Spaniards, and in the
end placed the king on his throne again.  When the war was over the Faith
was disbanded; some of the foreigners, however, amongst whom I was one,
were put into a Guard regiment, and there I continued for more than a
year.

“One day, being at a place called the Escurial, I took stock, as the
tradesmen say, and found I possessed the sum of eighty dollars won by
playing at cards, for though I could not play so well with the foreign
cards as with the pack ye gave me, Shorsha, I had yet contrived to win
money from the priests and soldiers of the Faith.  Finding myself
possessed of such a capital I determined to leave the service, and to
make the best of my way to Ireland; so I deserted, but coming in an evil
hour to a place they calls Torre Lodones, I found the priest playing at
cards with his parishioners.  The sight of the cards made me stop, and
then, fool like, notwithstanding the treasure I had about me, I must wish
to play, so not being able to speak their language, I made signs to them
to let me play, and the priest and his thaives consented willingly; so I
sat down to cards with the priest and two of his parishioners, and in a
little time had won plenty of their money, but I had better never have
done any such a thing, for suddenly the priest and all his parishioners
set upon me and bate me, and took from me all I had, and cast me out of
the village more dead than alive.  Och! it’s a bad village that; and if I
had known what it was I would have avoided it, or run straight through
it, though I saw all the card-playing in the world going on in it.  There
is a proverb about it, as I was afterwards told, old as the time of the
Moors, which holds good to the present day—it is, that in Torre Lodones
there are twenty-four housekeepers, and twenty-five thieves, maning that
all the people are thaives, and the clergyman to boot, who is not
reckoned a housekeeper; and troth I found the clergyman the greatest
thaif of the lot.  After being cast out of that village I travelled for
nearly a month, subsisting by begging tolerably well, for though most of
the Spanish are thaives, they are rather charitable; but though
charitable thaives they do not like their own being taken from them
without leave being asked, as I found to my cost; for on my entering a
garden near Seville, without leave, to take an orange, the labourer came
running up and struck me to the ground with a hatchet, giving me a big
wound in the arm.  I fainted with loss of blood, and on reviving I found
myself in a hospital at Seville, to which the labourer and the people of
the village had taken me.  I should have died of starvation in that
hospital had not some English people heard of me and come to see me; they
tended me with food till I was cured, and then paid my passage on board a
ship to London, to which place the ship carried me.

“And now I was in London with five shillings in my pocket—all I had in
the world—and that did not last for long; and when it was gone I begged
in the streets, but I did not get much by that, except a month’s hard
labour in the correction-house; and when I came out I knew not what to
do, but thought I would take a walk in the country, for it was
springtime, and the weather was fine, so I took a walk about seven miles
from London, and came to a place where a great fair was being held; and
there I begged, but got nothing but a halfpenny, and was thinking of
going farther when I saw a man with a table, like that of mine, playing
with thimbles, as you saw me.  I looked at the play, and saw him win
money, and run away, and hunted by constables more than once.  I kept
following the man, and at last entered into conversation with him; and
learning from him that he was in want of a companion to help him, I
offered to help him if he would pay me; he looked at me from top to toe,
and did not wish at first to have anything to do with me, as he said my
appearance was against me.  ’Faith, Shorsha, he had better have looked at
home, for his appearance was not much in his favour: he looked very much
like a Jew, Shorsha.  However, he at last agreed to take me to be his
companion or bonnet as he called it; and I was to keep a look-out, and
let him know when constables were coming, and to spake a good word for
him occasionally, whilst he was chating folks with his thimbles and his
pea.  So I became his bonnet, and assisted him in the fair, and in many
other fairs beside; but I did not like my occupation much, or rather my
master, who, though not a big man, was a big thaif, and an unkind one,
for do all I could I could never give him pleasure; and he was
continually calling me fool and bogtrotter, and twitting me because I
could not learn his thaives’ Latin, and discourse with him in it, and
comparing me with another acquaintance, or bit of a pal of his, whom he
said he had parted with in the fair, and of whom he was fond of saying
all kinds of wonderful things, amongst others, that he knew the grammar
of all tongues.  At last, wearied with being twitted by him with not
being able to learn his thaives’ Greek, I proposed that I should teach
him Irish, that we should spake it together when we had anything to say
in secret.  To that he consented willingly; but, och! a purty hand he
made with Irish, ’faith, not much better than did I with his thaives’
Hebrew.  Then my turn came, and I twitted him nicely with dulness, and
compared him with a pal that I had in ould Ireland, in Dungarvon times of
yore, to whom I teached Irish, telling him that he was the broth of a
boy, and not only knew the grammar of all human tongues, but the dialects
of the snakes besides; in fact, I tould him all about your own swate
sell; Shorsha, and many a dispute and quarrel had we together about our
pals, which was the cleverest fellow, his or mine.

“Well, after having been wid him about two months, I quitted him without
noise, taking away one of his tables, and some peas and thimbles; and
that I did with a safe conscience, for he paid me nothing, and was not
over free with the meat and the drink, though I must say of him that he
was a clever fellow, and perfect master of his trade, by which he made a
power of money, and bating his not being able to learn Irish, and a
certain Jewish lisp which he had, a great master of his tongue, of which
he was very proud; so much so, that he once told me that when he had
saved a certain sum of money he meant to leave off the thimbling
business, and enter Parliament; into which, he said, he could get at any
time, through the interest of a friend of his, a Tory Peer—my Lord
Whitefeather, with whom, he said, he had occasionally done business.
With the table, and other things which I had taken, I commenced trade on
my own account, having contrived to learn a few of his tricks.  My only
capital was the change for half a guinea, which he had once let fall, and
which I picked up, which was all I could ever get from him: for it was
impossible to stale any money from him, he was so awake, being up to all
the tricks of thaives, having followed the diving trade, as he called it,
for a considerable time.  My wish was to make enough by my table to
enable me to return with credit to ould Ireland, where I had no doubt of
being able to get myself ordained as priest; and, in troth,
notwithstanding I was a beginner, and without any companion to help me, I
did tolerably well, getting my meat and drink, and increasing my small
capital, till I came to this unlucky place of Horncastle, where I was
utterly ruined by the thaif in the rider’s dress.  And now, Shorsha, I am
after telling you my history; perhaps you will now be telling me
something about yourself?”

I told Murtagh all about myself that I deemed necessary to relate, and
then asked him what he intended to do; he repeated that he was utterly
ruined, and that he had no prospect before him but starving, or making
away with himself.  I inquired “How much would take him to Ireland, and
establish him there with credit”.  “Five pounds,” he answered, adding,
“but who in the world would be fool enough to lend me five pounds, unless
it be yourself, Shorsha, who, may be, have not got it; for when you told
me about yourself, you made no boast of the state of your affairs.”  “I
am not very rich,” I replied, “but I think I can accommodate you with
what you want.  I consider myself under great obligations to you,
Murtagh; it was you who instructed me in the language of _Oilein nan
Naomha_, which has been the foundation of all my acquisitions in
philology; without you, I should not be what I am—Lavengro! which
signifies a philologist.  Here is the money, Murtagh,” said I, putting my
hand into my pocket, and taking out five pounds, “much good may it do
you.”  He took the money, stared at it, and then at me—“And you mane to
give me this, Shorsha?”  “It is no longer mine to give,” said I; “it is
yours.”  “And you give it to me for the gratitude you bear me?”  “Yes,”
said I, “and for Dungarvon times of old.”  “Well, Shorsha,” said he, “you
are a broth of a boy, and I’ll take your benefaction—five pounds! och,
Jasus!”  He then put the money in his pocket, and springing up, waved his
hat three times, uttering some old Irish cry; then, sitting down, he took
my hand, and said: “Sure, Shorsha, I’ll be going thither; and when I get
there, it is turning over another leaf I will be; I have learnt a thing
or two abroad; I will become a priest; that’s the trade, Shorsha! and I
will cry out for repale; that’s the cry, Shorsha! and I’ll be a fool no
longer.”  “And what will you do with your table?” said I.  “’Faith, I’ll
be taking it with me, Shorsha; and when I gets to Ireland, I’ll get it
mended, and I will keep it in the house which I shall have; and when I
looks upon it, I will be thinking of all I have undergone.”  “You had
better leave it behind you,” said I; “if you take it with you, you will,
perhaps, take up the thimble trade again before you get to Ireland, and
lose the money I am after giving you.”  “No fear of that, Shorsha; never
will I play on that table again, Shorsha, till I get it mended, which
shall not be till I am a priest, and have a house in which to place it.”

Murtagh and I then went into the town, where we had some refreshment
together, and then parted on our several ways.  I heard nothing of him
for nearly a quarter of a century, when a person who knew him well,
coming from Ireland, and staying at my humble house, told me a great deal
about him.  He reached Ireland in safety, soon reconciled himself with
his Church, and was ordained a priest; in the priestly office he
acquitted himself in a way very satisfactory, upon the whole, to his
superiors, having, as he frequently said, learned wisdom abroad.  The
Popish Church never fails to turn to account any particular gift which
its servants may possess; and discovering soon that Murtagh was endowed
with considerable manual dexterity—proof of which he frequently gave at
cards, and at a singular game which he occasionally played at thimbles—it
selected him as a very fit person to play the part of exorcist; and
accordingly he travelled through a great part of Ireland, casting out
devils from people possessed, which he afterwards exhibited, sometimes in
the shape of rabbits, and occasionally birds and fishes.  There is a holy
island in a lake in Ireland, to which the people resort at a particular
season of the year.  Here Murtagh frequently attended, and it was here
that he performed a cure which will cause his name long to be remembered
in Ireland, delivering a possessed woman of two demons, which he
brandished aloft in his hands, in the shape of two large eels, and
subsequently hurled into the lake, amidst the shouts of an enthusiastic
multitude.  Besides playing the part of an exorcist, he acted that of a
politician with considerable success; he attached himself to the party of
the sire of agitation—“the man of paunch,” and preached and hallooed for
repeal with the loudest and best, as long as repeal was the cry; as soon,
however, as the Whigs attained the helm of Government, and the greater
part of the loaves and fishes—more politely termed the patronage of
Ireland—was placed at the disposition of the priesthood, the tone of
Murtagh, like that of the rest of his brother saggarts, was considerably
softened; he even went so far as to declare that politics were not
altogether consistent with sacerdotal duty; and resuming his exorcisms,
which he had for some time abandoned, he went to the Isle of Holiness,
and delivered a possessed woman of six demons in the shape of white mice.
He, however, again resumed the political mantle in the year 1848, during
the short period of the rebellion of the so-called Young Irelanders.  The
priests, though they apparently sided with this party, did not approve of
it, as it was chiefly formed of ardent young men, fond of what they
termed liberty, and by no means admirers of priestly domination, being
mostly Protestants.  Just before the outbreak of this rebellion, it was
determined between the priests and the —, that this party should be
rendered comparatively innocuous by being deprived of the sinews of
war—in other words, certain sums of money which they had raised for their
enterprise.  Murtagh was deemed the best qualified person in Ireland to
be entrusted with the delicate office of getting their money from them.
Having received his instructions, he invited the leaders to his parsonage
amongst the mountains, under pretence of deliberating with them about
what was to be done.  They arrived there just before nightfall, dressed
in red, yellow and green, the colours so dear to enthusiastic Irishmen;
Murtagh received them with great apparent cordiality, and entered into a
long discourse with them, promising them the assistance of himself and
order, and received from them a profusion of thanks.  After a time
Murtagh, observing, in a jocular tone, that consulting was dull work,
proposed a game of cards, and the leaders, though somewhat surprised,
assenting, he went to a closet, and taking out a pack of cards, laid it
upon the table; it was a strange dirty pack, and exhibited every mark of
having seen very long service.  On one of his guests making some remarks
on the “ancientness” of its appearance, Murtagh observed that there was a
very wonderful history attached to that pack; it had been presented to
him, he said, by a young gentleman, a disciple of his, to whom, in
Dungarvon times of yore, he had taught the Irish language, and of whom he
related some very extraordinary things; he added that he, Murtagh, had
taken it to —, where it had once the happiness of being in the hands of
the Holy Father; by a great misfortune, he did not say what, he had lost
possession of it, and had returned without it, but had some time since
recovered it; a nephew of his, who was being educated at — for a priest,
having found it in a nook of the college, and sent it to him.

Murtagh and the leaders then played various games with this pack, more
especially one called by the initiated “blind hookey,” the result being
that at the end of about two hours the leaders found they had lost
one-half of their funds; they now looked serious, and talked of leaving
the house, but Murtagh begging them to stay supper, they consented.
After supper, at which the guests drank rather freely, Murtagh said that,
as he had not the least wish to win their money, he intended to give them
their revenge; he would not play at cards with them, he added, but at a
funny game of thimbles, at which they would be sure of winning back their
own; then going out, he brought in a table, tall and narrow, on which
placing certain thimbles and a pea, he proposed that they should stake
whatever they pleased on the almost certainty of finding the pea under
the thimbles.  The leaders, after some hesitation, consented, and were at
first eminently successful, winning back the greater part of what they
had lost; after some time, however, Fortune, or rather Murtagh, turned
against them, and then, instead of leaving off, they doubled and trebled
their stakes, and continued doing so until they had lost nearly the whole
of their funds.  Quite furious, they now swore that Murtagh had cheated
them, and insisted on having their property restored to them.  Murtagh,
without a word of reply, went to the door, and shouting into the passage
something in Irish, the room was instantly filled with bogtrotters, each
at least six feet high, with a stout shillelah in his hand.  Murtagh then
turning to his guests, asked them what they meant by insulting an
anointed priest; telling them that it was not for the likes of them to
avenge the wrongs of Ireland.  “I have been clane mistaken in the whole
of ye,” said he, “I supposed ye Irish, but have found, to my sorrow, that
ye are nothing of the kind; purty fellows to pretend to be Irish, when
there is not a word of Irish on the tongue of any of ye, divil a
ha’porth; the illigant young gentleman to whom I taught Irish, in
Dungarvon times of old, though not born in Ireland, has more Irish in him
than any ten of ye.  He is the boy to avenge the wrongs of Ireland, if
ever foreigner is to do it.”  Then saying something to the bogtrotters,
they instantly cleared the room of the young Irelanders, who retired
sadly disconcerted; nevertheless, being very silly young fellows, they
hoisted the standard of rebellion; few, however, joining them, partly
because they had no money, and partly because the priests abused them
with might and main, their rebellion ended in a lamentable manner;
themselves being seized and tried, and though convicted, not deemed of
sufficient importance to be sent to the scaffold, where they might have
had the satisfaction of saying—

                    Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori.

My visitor, after saying that of the money won, Murtagh retained a
considerable portion, that a part went to the hierarchy for what were
called church purposes, and that the — took the remainder, which it
employed in establishing a newspaper, in which the private characters of
the worthiest and most loyal Protestants in Ireland were traduced and
vilified, concluded his account by observing, that it was the common
belief that Murtagh, having by his services, ecclesiastical and
political, acquired the confidence of the priesthood and favour of the
Government, would, on the first vacancy, be appointed to the high office
of Popish Primate of Ireland.

CHAPTER XLVII.

LEAVING Horncastle I bent my steps in the direction of the east.  I
walked at a brisk rate, and late in the evening reached a large town,
situate at the entrance of an extensive firth, or arm of the sea, which
prevented my farther progress eastward.  Sleeping that night in the
suburbs of the town, I departed early next morning in the direction of
the south.  A walk of about twenty miles brought me to another large
town, situated on a river, where I again turned towards the east.  At the
end of the town I was accosted by a fiery-faced individual, somewhat
under the middle size, dressed as a recruiting sergeant.

“Young man,” said the recruiting sergeant, “you are just the kind of
person to serve the Honourable East India Company.”

“I had rather the Honourable Company should serve me,” said I.

“Of course, young man.  Well, the Honourable East India Company shall
serve you—that’s reasonable.  Here, take this shilling; ’t is
service-money.  The Honourable Company engages to serve you, and you the
Honourable Company; both parties shall be thus served; that’s just and
reasonable.”

“And what must I do for the Company?”

“Only go to India; that’s all.”

“And what should I do in India?”

“Fight, my brave boy! fight, my youthful hero!”

“What kind of country is India?”

“The finest country in the world!  Rivers, bigger than the Ouse.  Hills,
higher than anything near Spalding!  Trees—you never saw such trees!
Fruits—you never saw such fruits!”

“And the people—what kind of folk are they?”

“Pah!  Kauloes—blacks—a set of rascals not worth regarding.”

“Kauloes!” said I; “blacks!”

“Yes,” said the recruiting sergeant; “and they call us lolloes, which in
their beastly gibberish, means reds.”

“Lolloes!” said I; “reds!”

“Yes,” said the recruiting sergeant, “kauloes and lolloes; and all the
lolloes have to do is to kick and cut down the kauloes, and take from
them their rupees, which mean silver money.  Why do you stare so?”

“Why,” said I, “this is the very language of Mr. Petulengro.”

“Mr. Pet—?”

“Yes,” said I, “and Tawno Chikno.”

“Tawno Chik—?  I say, young fellow, I don’t like your way of speaking;
no, nor your way of looking.  You are mad, sir; you are mad; and what’s
this?  Why your hair is grey!  You won’t do for the Honourable
Company—they like red.  I’m glad I didn’t give you the shilling.
Good-day to you.”

“I shouldn’t wonder,” said I as I proceeded rapidly along a broad
causeway, in the direction of the east, “if Mr. Petulengro and Tawno
Chikno came originally from India.  I think I’ll go there.”

  [_End of Vol. II._, _and of the fifth and last of the Autobiography_.]

APPENDIX.

CHAPTER I.
A WORD FOR _LAVENGRO_.

[Shortly after the publication of the first three volumes of the present
work, the author received various letters from individuals, in which he
was requested to state what might be the drift and tendency of
_Lavengro_.  The author cannot help thinking it somewhat extraordinary,
that, after a preface in which he was particularly careful to tell the
public what the book was, and the object with which it was written, any
fresh information with respect to it should be required of him.  As,
however, all the letters which he has received have been written in a
friendly spirit, he will now endeavour to be a little more explicit than
on a former occasion.]

_Lavengro_ is the history up to a certain period of one of rather a
peculiar mind and system of nerves, with an exterior shy and cold, under
which lurk much curiosity, especially with regard to what is wild and
extraordinary, a considerable quantity of energy and industry, and an
unconquerable love of independence.  It narrates his earliest dreams and
feelings, dwells with minuteness on the ways, words and characters of his
father, mother and brother, lingers on the occasional resting-places of
his wandering half-military childhood, describes the gradual hardening of
his bodily frame by robust exercises, his successive struggles, after his
family and himself have settled down in a small local capital, to obtain
knowledge of every kind, but more particularly philological lore; his
visits to the tent of the Romany chal, and the parlour of the
Anglo-German philosopher; the effect produced upon his character by his
flinging himself into contact with people all widely differing from each
other, but all extraordinary; his reluctance to settle down to the
ordinary pursuits of life; his struggles after moral truth; his glimpses
of God and the obscuration of the Divine Being, to his mind’s eye; and
his being cast upon the world of London by the death of his father, at
the age of nineteen.  In the world within a world, the world of London,
it shows him playing his part for some time as he best can, in the
capacity of a writer for reviews and magazines, and describes what he saw
and underwent whilst labouring in that capacity; it represents him,
however, as never forgetting that he is the son of a brave but poor
gentleman, and that if he is a hack author, he is likewise a scholar.  It
shows him doing no dishonourable jobs, and proves that if he occasionally
associates with low characters, he does so chiefly to gratify the
curiosity of a scholar.  In his conversations with the apple-woman of
London Bridge, the scholar is ever apparent, so again in his acquaintance
with the man of the table; for the book is no raker up of the uncleanness
of London, and if it gives what at first sight appears refuse, it
invariably shows that a pearl of some kind, generally a philological one,
is contained amongst it; it shows its hero always accompanied by his love
of independence, scorning in the greatest poverty to receive favours from
anybody, and describes him finally rescuing himself from peculiarly
miserable circumstances by writing a book, an original book, within a
week, even as Johnson is said to have written his _Rasselas_, and
Beckford his _Vathek_, and tells how, leaving London, he betakes himself
to the roads and fields.

In the country it shows him leading a life of roving adventure, becoming
tinker, gypsy, postillion, ostler; associating with various kinds of
people, chiefly of the lower classes, whose ways and habits are
described; but, though leading this erratic life, we gather from the book
that his habits are neither vulgar nor vicious, that he still follows to
a certain extent his favourite pursuits, hunting after strange
characters, or analysing strange words and names.  At the conclusion of
the fifth volume, which terminates the first part of the history, it
hints that he is about to quit his native land on a grand philological
expedition.

Those who read this book with attention—and the author begs to observe
that it would be of little utility to read it hurriedly—may derive much
information with respect to matters of philology and literature; it will
be found treating of most of the principal languages from Ireland to
China, and of the literature which they contain; and it is particularly
minute with regard to the ways, manners and speech of the English section
of the most extraordinary and mysterious clan or tribe of people to be
found in the whole world—the children of Roma.  But it contains matters
of much more importance than anything in connection with philology, and
the literature and manners of nations.  Perhaps no work was ever offered
to the public in which the kindness and providence of God have been set
forth by more striking examples, or the machinations of priestcraft been
more truly and lucidly exposed, or the dangers which result to a nation
when it abandons itself to effeminacy, and a rage for what is novel and
fashionable, than the present.

With respect to the kindness and providence of God, are they not
exemplified in the case of the old apple-woman and her son?  These are
beings in many points bad, but with warm affections, who, after an
agonising separation, are restored to each other, but not until the
hearts of both are changed and purified by the influence of affliction.
Are they not exemplified in the case of the rich gentleman, who touches
objects in order to avert the evil chance?  This being has great gifts
and many amiable qualities, but does not everybody see that his besetting
sin is selfishness?  He fixes his mind on certain objects, and takes
inordinate interest in them, because they are his own, and those very
objects, through the providence of God, which is kindness in disguise,
become snakes and scorpions to whip him.  Tired of various pursuits, he
at last becomes an author, and publishes a book, which is very much
admired, and which he loves with his usual inordinate affection; the
book, consequently becomes a viper to him, and at last he flings it aside
and begins another; the book, however, is not flung aside by the world,
who are benefited by it, deriving pleasure and knowledge from it: so the
man who merely wrote to gratify self, has already done good to others,
and got himself an honourable name.  But God will not allow that man to
put that book under his head and use it as a pillow: the book has become
a viper to him, he has banished it, and is about another, which he
finishes and gives to the world; it is a better book than the first, and
every one is delighted with it; but it proves to the writer a scorpion,
because he loves it with inordinate affection; but it was good for the
world that he produced this book, which stung him as a scorpion.  Yes;
and good for himself, for the labour of writing it amused him, and
perhaps prevented him from dying of apoplexy; but the book is banished,
and another is begun, and herein, again, is the providence of God
manifested; the man has the power of producing still, and God determines
that he shall give to the world what remains in his brain, which he would
not do, had he been satisfied with the second work; he would have gone to
sleep upon that as he would upon the first, for the man is selfish and
lazy.  In his account of what he suffered during the composition of this
work, his besetting sin of selfishness is manifest enough; the work on
which he is engaged occupies his every thought, it is his idol, his
deity, it shall be all his own, he won’t borrow a thought from any one
else, and he is so afraid lest, when he publishes it, that it should be
thought that he had borrowed from any one, that he is continually
touching objects, his nervous system, owing to his extreme selfishness,
having become partly deranged.  He is left touching, in order to banish
the evil chance from his book, his deity.  No more of his history is
given; but does the reader think that God will permit that man to go to
sleep on his third book, however extraordinary it may be?  Assuredly not.
God will not allow that man to rest till he has cured him to a certain
extent of his selfishness, which has, however, hitherto been very useful
to the world.

Then, again, in the tale of Peter Williams, is not the hand of Providence
to be seen?  This person commits a sin in his childhood, utters words of
blasphemy, the remembrance of which, in after life, preying upon his
imagination, unfits him for quiet pursuits, to which he seems to have
been naturally inclined; but for the remembrance of that sin, he would
have been Peter Williams the quiet, respectable Welsh farmer, somewhat
fond of reading the ancient literature of his country in winter evenings,
after his work was done.  God, however, was aware that there was
something in Peter Williams to entitle him to assume a higher calling; he
therefore permits this sin, which, though a childish affair, was yet a
sin, and committed deliberately, to prey upon his mind till he becomes at
last an instrument in the hand of God, a humble Paul, the great preacher,
Peter Williams, who, though he considers himself a reprobate and a
castaway, instead of having recourse to drinking in mad desperation, as
many do who consider themselves reprobates, goes about Wales and England
preaching the word of God, dilating on his power and majesty, and
visiting the sick and afflicted, until God sees fit to restore to him his
peace of mind; which he does not do, however, until that mind is in a
proper condition to receive peace, till it has been purified by the pain
of the one idea which has so long been permitted to riot in his brain;
which pain, however, an angel, in the shape of a gentle, faithful wife,
had occasionally alleviated; for God is merciful even in the blows which
He bestoweth, and will not permit any one to be tempted beyond the
measure which he can support.  And here it will be as well for the reader
to ponder upon the means by which the Welsh preacher is relieved from his
mental misery: he is not relieved by a text from the Bible, by the words
of consolation and wisdom addressed to him by his angel-minded wife, nor
by the preaching of one yet more eloquent than himself; but by a
quotation made by Lavengro from the life of Mary Flanders, cut-purse and
prostitute, which life Lavengro had been in the habit of reading at the
stall of his old friend the apple-woman, on London Bridge, who had
herself been very much addicted to the perusal of it, though without any
profit whatever.  Should the reader be dissatisfied with the manner in
which Peter Williams is made to find relief, the author would wish to
answer, that the Almighty frequently accomplishes his purposes by means
which appear very singular to the eyes of men, and at the same time to
observe that the manner in which that relief is obtained, is calculated
to read a lesson to the proud, fanciful and squeamish, who are ever in a
fidget lest they should be thought to mix with low society or to bestow a
moment’s attention on publications which are not what is called of a
perfectly unobjectionable character.  Had not Lavengro formed the
acquaintance of the old apple-woman on London Bridge, he would not have
had an opportunity of reading the life of Mary Flanders; and,
consequently, of storing in a memory, which never forgets anything, a
passage which contained a balm for the agonised mind of poor Peter
Williams.  The best medicines are not always found in the finest shops.
Suppose, for example, if, instead of going to London Bridge to read, he
had gone to Albemarle Street, and had received from the proprietors of
the literary establishment in that very fashionable street, permission to
read the publications on the tables of the saloons there, does the reader
think he would have met any balm in those publications for the case of
Peter Williams? does the reader suppose that he would have found Mary
Flanders there?  He would certainly have found that highly
unobjectionable publication _Rasselas_, and the _Spectator_, or _Lives of
Royal and Illustrious Personages_, but, of a surety, no Mary Flanders; so
when Lavengro met with Peter Williams, he would have been unprovided with
a balm to cure his ulcerated mind, and have parted from him in a way not
quite so satisfactory as the manner in which he took his leave of him;
for it is certain that he might have read _Rasselas_, and all the other
unexceptionable works to be found in the library of Albemarle Street,
over and over again, before he would have found any cure in them for the
case of Peter Williams.  Therefore the author requests the reader to drop
any squeamish nonsense he may wish to utter about Mary Flanders, and the
manner in which Peter Williams was cured.

And now with respect to the old man who knew Chinese, but could not tell
what was o’clock.  This individual was a man whose natural powers would
have been utterly buried and lost beneath a mountain of sloth and
laziness had not God determined otherwise.  He had in his early years
chalked out for himself a plan of life in which he had his own ease and
self-indulgence solely in view; he had no particular bad passions to
gratify, he only wished to lead an easy, quiet life, just as if the
business of this mighty world could be carried on by innocent people fond
of ease and quiet, or that Providence would permit innocent, quiet drones
to occupy any portion of the earth and to cumber it.  God had at any rate
decreed that this man should not cumber it as a drone.  He brings a
certain affliction upon him, the agony of which produces that terrible
whirling of the brain which, unless it is stopped in time, produces
madness; he suffers indescribable misery for a period, until one morning
his attention is arrested, and his curiosity is aroused, by certain
Chinese letters on a teapot; his curiosity increases more and more, and,
of course, in proportion as his curiosity is increased with respect to
the Chinese marks, the misery in his brain, produced by his mental
affliction, decreases.  He sets about learning Chinese, and after the
lapse of many years, during which his mind subsides into a certain state
of tranquillity, he acquires sufficient knowledge of Chinese to be able
to translate with ease the inscriptions to be found on its singular
crockery.  Yes, the laziest of human beings, through the providence of
God, a being, too, of rather inferior capacity, acquires the written part
of a language so difficult that, as Lavengro said on a former occasion,
none but the cleverest people in Europe, the French, are able to acquire
it.  But God did not intend that man should merely acquire Chinese.  He
intended that he should be of use to his species, and by the
instrumentality of the first Chinese inscription which he translates, the
one which first arrested his curiosity, he is taught the duties of
hospitality; yes, by means of an inscription in the language of a people,
who have scarcely an idea of hospitality themselves, God causes the
slothful man to play a useful and beneficent part in the world, relieving
distressed wanderers, and, amongst others, Lavengro himself.  But a
striking indication of the man’s surprising sloth is still apparent in
what he omits to do; he has learnt Chinese, the most difficult of
languages, and he practises acts of hospitality, because he believes
himself enjoined to do so by the Chinese inscription, but he cannot tell
the hour of the day by the clock within his house; he can get on, he
thinks, very well without being able to do so; therefore, from this one
omission, it is easy to come to a conclusion as to what a sluggard’s part
the man would have played in life, but for the dispensation of
Providence; nothing but extreme agony could have induced such a man to do
anything useful.  He still continues, with all he has acquired, with all
his usefulness, and with all his innocence of character, without any
proper sense of religion, though he has attained a rather advanced age.
If it be observed, that this want of religion is a great defect in the
story, the author begs leave to observe that he cannot help it.  Lavengro
relates the lives of people so far as they were placed before him, but no
further.  It was certainly a great defect in so good a man to be without
religion; it was likewise a great defect in so learned a man not to be
able to tell what was o’clock.  It is probable that God, in His loving
kindness, will not permit that man to go out of the world without
religion; who knows but some powerful minister of the Church, full of
zeal for the glory of God, will illume that man’s dark mind; perhaps some
clergyman will come to the parish who will visit him and teach him his
duty to his God.  Yes, it is very probable that such a man, before he
dies, will have been made to love his God; whether he will ever learn to
know what’s o’clock, is another matter.  It is probable that he will go
out of the world without knowing what’s o’clock.  It is not so necessary
to be able to tell the time of day by the clock as to know one’s God
through His inspired word; a man cannot get to heaven without religion,
but a man can get there very comfortably without knowing what’s o’clock.

But, above all, the care and providence of God are manifested in the case
of Lavengro himself, by the manner in which he is enabled to make his way
in the world up to a certain period, without falling a prey either to
vice or poverty.  In his history, there is a wonderful illustration of
part of the text, quoted by his mother: “I have been young, but now am
old, yet never saw I the righteous forsaken, or his seed begging bread”.
He is the son of good and honourable parents, but at the critical period
of life, that of entering into the world, he finds himself without any
earthly friend to help him, yet he manages to make his way; he does not
become a Captain in the Life Guards, it is true, nor does he get into
Parliament, nor does the last volume conclude in the most satisfactory
and unobjectionable manner, by his marrying a dowager countess, as that
wise man Addison did, or by his settling down as a great country
gentleman, perfectly happy and contented, like the very moral Roderick
Random, or the equally estimable Peregrine Pickle; he is hack author,
gypsy, tinker and postillion, yet, upon the whole, he seems to be quite
as happy as the younger sons of most earls, to have as high feelings of
honour; and when the reader loses sight of him, he has money in his
pocket honestly acquired, to enable him to commence a journey quite as
laudable as those which the younger sons of earls generally undertake.
Surely all this is a manifestation of the kindness and providence of God;
and yet he is not a religious person; up to the time when the reader
loses sight of him, he is decidedly not a religious person; he has
glimpses, it is true, of that God who does not forsake him, but he prays
very seldom, is not fond of going to church; and, though he admires Tate
and Brady’s version of the Psalms, his admiration is rather caused by the
beautiful poetry which that version contains than the religion; yet his
tale is not finished—like the tale of the gentleman who touched objects,
and that of the old man who knew Chinese without knowing what was
o’clock; perhaps, like them, he is destined to become religious, and to
have, instead of occasional glimpses frequent and distinct views of his
God; yet, though he may become religious, it is hardly to be expected
that he will become a very precise and straightlaced person; it is
probable that he will retain, with his scholarship, something of his
gypsyism, his predilection for the hammer and tongs, and perhaps some
inclination to put on certain gloves, not white kid, with any friend who
may be inclined for a little old English diversion, and a readiness to
take a glass of ale, with plenty of malt in it, and as little hop as may
well be—ale at least two years old—with the aforesaid friend, when the
diversion is over; for, as it is the belief of the writer that a person
may get to heaven very comfortably without knowing what’s o’clock, so it
is his belief that he will not be refused admission there, because to the
last he has been fond of healthy and invigorating exercises, and felt a
willingness to partake of any of the good things which it pleases the
Almighty to put within the reach of his children during their sojourn
upon earth.

CHAPTER II.
ON PRIESTCRAFT.

THE writer will now say a few words about priestcraft, and the
machinations of Rome, and will afterwards say something about himself,
and his motives for writing against them.

With respect to Rome, and her machinations, much valuable information can
be obtained from particular parts of _Lavengro_, and its sequel.  Shortly
before the time when the hero of the book is launched into the world, the
Popish agitation in England had commenced.  The Popish propaganda had
determined to make a grand attempt on England; Popish priests were
scattered over the land, doing the best they could to make converts to
the old superstition.  With the plans of Rome, and her hopes, and the
reasons on which those hopes are grounded, the hero of the book becomes
acquainted, during an expedition which he makes into the country, from
certain conversations which he holds with a priest in a dingle, in which
the hero had taken up his residence; he likewise learns from the same
person much of the secret history of the Roman See, and many matters
connected with the origin and progress of the Popish superstition.  The
individual with whom he holds these conversations is a learned,
intelligent, but highly-unprincipled person, of a character however very
common amongst the priests of Rome, who in general are people void of all
religion, and who, notwithstanding they are tied to Rome by a band which
they have neither the power nor wish to break, turn her and her
practices, over their cups with their confidential associates, to a
ridicule only exceeded by that to which they turn those who become the
dupes of their mistress and themselves.

It is now necessary that the writer should say something with respect to
himself, and his motives for waging war against Rome.  First of all, with
respect to himself, he wishes to state, that to the very last moment of
his life, he will do and say all that in his power may be to hold up to
contempt and execration the priestcraft and practices of Rome; there is,
perhaps, no person better acquainted than himself, not even among the
choicest spirits of the priesthood, with the origin and history of
Popery.  From what he saw and heard of Popery in England, at a very early
period of his life, his curiosity was aroused, and he spared himself no
trouble, either by travel or study, to make himself well acquainted with
it in all its phases, the result being a hatred of it, which he hopes and
trusts he shall retain till the moment when his spirit quits the body.
Popery is the great lie of the world; a source from which more misery and
social degradation have flowed upon the human race, than from all the
other sources from which those evils come.  It is the oldest of all
superstitions; and though in Europe it assumes the name of Christianity,
it existed and flourished amidst the Himalayan hills at least two
thousand years before the real Christ was born in Bethlehem of Judea; in
a word, it is Buddhism; and let those who may be disposed to doubt this
assertion, compare the Popery of Rome, and the superstitious practices of
its followers, with the doings of the priests who surround the grand
Lama; and the mouthings, bellowing, turnings round, and, above all, the
penances of the followers of Buddh with those of Roman devotees.  But he
is not going to dwell here on this point; it is dwelt upon at tolerable
length in the text, and has likewise been handled with extraordinary
power by the pen of the gifted but irreligious Volney; moreover, the
_élite_ of the Roman priesthood are perfectly well aware that their
system is nothing but Buddhism under a slight disguise, and the European
world in general has entertained for some time past an inkling of the
fact.

And now a few words with respect to the motives of the writer for
expressing a hatred for Rome.

This expressed abhorrence of the author for Rome might be entitled to
little regard, provided it were possible to attribute it to any
self-interested motive.  There have been professed enemies of Rome, or of
this or that system; but their professed enmity may frequently be traced
to some cause which does them little credit; but the writer of these
lines has no motive, and can have no motive, for his enmity to Rome, save
the abhorrence of an honest heart for what is false, base and cruel.  A
certain clergyman wrote with much heat against the Papists in the time of
— {311a} who was known to favour the Papists, but was not expected to
continue long in office, and whose supposed successor, {311b} the person,
indeed, who did succeed him, was thought to be hostile to the Papists.
This divine, who obtained a rich benefice from the successor of — {311c}
who during —’s {311d} time had always opposed him in everything he
proposed to do, and who, of course, during that time affected to be very
inimical to Popery—this divine might well be suspected of having a motive
equally creditable for writing against the Papists, as that which induced
him to write for them, as soon as his patron, who eventually did
something more for him, {312a} had espoused their cause; but what motive,
save an honest one, can the present writer have, for expressing an
abhorrence of Popery?  He is no clergyman, and consequently can expect
neither benefices nor bishoprics, supposing it were the fashion of the
present, or likely to be the fashion of any future administration to
reward clergymen with benefices or bishoprics, who, in the defence of the
religion of their country write, or shall write, against Popery, and not
to reward those who write, or shall write, in favour of it, and all its
nonsense and abominations.

“But if not a clergyman, he is the servant of a certain society which has
the overthrow of Popery in view, and therefore,” etc.  This assertion,
which has been frequently made, is incorrect, even as those who have made
it probably knew it to be.  He is the servant of no society whatever.  He
eats his own bread, {312b} and is one of the very few men in England who
are independent in every sense of the word.

It is true he went to Spain with the colours of that society on his
hat—oh! the blood glows in his veins! oh! the marrow awakes in his old
bones when he thinks of what he accomplished in Spain in the cause of
religion and civilisation with the colours of that society in his hat,
and its weapon in his hand, even the sword of the word of God; how with
that weapon he hewed left and right, making the priests fly before him,
and run away squeaking: “_Vaya_! _qué demonio es este_!”  Ay, and when he
thinks of the plenty of Bible swords which he left behind him, destined
to prove, and which have already proved, pretty calthrops in the heels of
Popery.  “Halloo!  Batuschca,” he exclaimed the other night on reading an
article in a newspaper; {312c} “what do you think of the present doings
in Spain?  Your old friend the zingaro, the gitano who rode about Spain,
to say nothing of Galicia, with the Greek Buchini behind him as his
squire, had a hand in bringing them about; there are many brave Spaniards
connected with the present movement {312d} who took Bibles from his
hands, and read them and profited by them, learning from the inspired
page the duties of one man towards another, and the real value of a
priesthood and their head, who set at nought the Word of God, and think
only of their own temporal interests; ay, and who learned Gitano—their
own Gitano—from the lips of the London Caloró, and also songs in the said
Gitano, very fit to dumbfounder your semi-Buddhist priests when they
attempt to bewilder people’s minds with their school-logic and
pseudo-ecclesiastical nonsense, songs such as—

          “‘Un Erajai
    Sinaba chibando un sermon—’.” {313}

But with that society he has long since ceased to have any connection; he
bade it adieu with feelings of love and admiration more than fourteen
years ago, so in continuing to assault Popery, no hopes of interest
founded on that society can sway his mind—interest! who, with worldly
interest in view, would ever have anything to do with that society?  It
is poor and supported, like its founder Christ, by poor people; and so
far from having political influence, it is in such disfavour, and has
ever been, with the dastardly great, to whom the government of England
has for many years past been confided, that the having borne its colours
only for a month would be sufficient to exclude any man, whatever his
talents, his learning, or his courage may be, from the slightest chance
of being permitted to serve his country either for fee, or without.  A
fellow who unites in himself the bankrupt trader, the broken author, or
rather book-maker, and the laughed-down single speech spouter of the
House of Commons, may look forward, always supposing that at one time he
has been a foaming radical, to the government of an important colony.
Ay, an ancient fox who has lost his tail may, provided he has a score of
radical friends, who will swear that he can bark Chinese, though Chinese
is not barked but sung, be forced upon a Chinese colony, though it is
well known that to have lost one’s tail, is considered by the Chinese in
general as an irreparable infamy, whilst to have been once connected with
a certain society, to which, to its honour be it said, all the radical
party are vehemently hostile, would be quite sufficient to keep any one
not only from a government, but something much less, even though he could
translate the rhymed _Sessions of Hariri_, and were versed, still
retaining his tail, in the two languages in which Kien-Loung wrote his
Eulogium on Moukden, that piece which, translated by Amyot, the learned
Jesuit, won the applause of the celebrated Voltaire.

No! were the author influenced by hopes of fee or reward, he would,
instead of writing against Popery, write for it; all the trumpery
titled—he will not call them great again—would then be for him, and their
masters the radicals, with their hosts of newspapers, would be for him,
more especially if he would commence maligning the society whose colours
he had once on his hat—a society which, as the priest says in the text,
is one of the very few Protestant institutions for which the Popish
Church entertains any fear, and consequently respect, as it respects
nothing which it does not fear.  The writer said that certain “rulers”
would never forgive him for having been connected with that society; he
went perhaps too far in saying “never”.  It is probable that they would
take him into favour on one condition, which is, that he should turn his
pen and his voice against that society; such a mark “of a better way of
thinking,” would perhaps induce them to give him a government, nearly as
good as that which they gave to a certain ancient radical fox at the
intercession of his radical friends (who were bound to keep him from the
pauper’s kennel), after he had promised to foam, bark and snarl at
corruption no more; he might even entertain hopes of succeeding, nay, of
superseding, the ancient creature in his government; but even were he as
badly off as he is well off, he would do no such thing.  He would rather
exist on crusts and water; he has often done so, and been happy; nay, he
would rather starve than be a rogue—for even the feeling of starvation is
happiness compared with what he feels who knows himself to be a rogue,
provided he has any feeling at all.  What is the use of a mitre or
knighthood to a man who has betrayed his principles?  What is the use of
a gilt collar, nay, even of a pair of scarlet breeches, to a fox who has
lost his tail?  Oh! the horror which haunts the mind of the fox who has
lost his tail; and with reason, for his very mate loathes him and more
especially if, like himself, she has lost her brush.  Oh! the horror
which haunts the mind of the two-legged rogue who has parted with his
principles, or those which he professed—for what?  We’ll suppose a
government.  What’s the use of a government, if, the next day after you
have received it, you are obliged for very shame to scurry off to it with
the hoot of every honest man sounding in your ears?

    “Lightly liar leaped and away ran.”

                                                           —PIERS PLOWMAN.

But bigotry, it has been said, makes the author write against Popery; and
thorough-going bigotry, indeed, will make a person say or do anything.
But the writer is a very pretty bigot truly!  Where will the public find
traces of bigotry in anything he has written?  He has written against
Rome with all his heart, with all his mind, with all his soul, and with
all his strength; but as a person may be quite honest, and speak and
write against Rome, in like manner he may speak and write against her,
and be quite free from bigotry; though it is impossible for any one but a
bigot or a bad man to write or speak in her praise; her doctrines,
actions and machinations being what they are.

Bigotry!  The author was born, and has always continued, in the wrong
Church for bigotry, the quiet, unpretending Church of England; a Church
which, had it been a bigoted Church, and not long suffering almost to a
fault, might with its opportunities, as the priest says in the text, have
stood in a very different position from that which it occupies at
present.  No! let those who are in search of bigotry, seek for it in a
Church very different from the inoffensive Church of England, which never
encourages cruelty or calumny.  Let them seek for it amongst the members
of the Church of Rome, and more especially amongst those who have
renegaded to it.  There is nothing, however false and horrible, which a
pervert to Rome will not say for his Church, and which his priests will
not encourage him in saying; and there is nothing, however horrible—the
more horrible indeed and revolting to human nature, the more eager he
would be to do it—which he will not do for it and which his priests will
not encourage him in doing.

Of the readiness which converts to Popery exhibit to sacrifice all the
ties of blood and affection on the shrine of their newly-adopted
religion, there is a curious illustration in the work of Luigi Pulci.
This man, who was born in Florence in the year 1432, and who was deeply
versed in the Bible, composed a poem, called the _Morgante Maggiore_,
which he recited at the table of Lorenzo de’ Medici, the great patron of
Italian genius.  It is a mock-heroic and religious poem, in which the
legends of knight-errantry, and of the Popish Church, are turned to
unbounded ridicule.  The pretended hero of it is a converted giant,
called Morgante; though his adventures do not occupy the twentieth part
of the poem, the principal personages being Charlemagne, Orlando, and his
cousin Rinaldo of Montalban.  Morgante has two brothers, both of them
giants, and in the first canto of the poem, Morgante is represented with
his brothers as carrying on a feud with the abbot and monks of a certain
convent, built upon the confines of heathenesse; the giants being in the
habit of flinging down stones, or rather huge rocks, on the convent.
Orlando, however, who is banished from the court of Charlemagne, arriving
at the convent, undertakes to destroy them, and, accordingly, kills
Passamonte and Alabastro, and converts Morgante, whose mind had been
previously softened by a vision, in which the “Blessed Virgin” figures.
No sooner is he converted than, as a sign of his penitence, what does he
do, but hastens and cuts off the hands of his two brothers, saying—

    “Io vo’ tagliar le mani à tutti quanti
    E porterolle à que’ monaci santi”. {316a}

And he does cut off the hands of his brethren, and carries them to the
abbot, who blesses him for so doing.  Pulci here is holding up to
ridicule and execration the horrid butchery or betrayal of friends by
popish converts, and the encouragement they receive from the priest.  No
sooner is a person converted to Popery, than his principal thought is how
he can bring the hands and feet of his brethren, however harmless they
may be, and different from the giants, to the “holy priests,” who, if he
manages to do so, never fail to praise him, saying to the miserable
wretch, as the abbot said to Morgante:—

    “Tu sarai or perfetto e veto amico
    A Cristo, quauto tu gli eri nemico”. {316b}

Can the English public deny the justice of Pulci’s illustration, after
something which it has lately witnessed?  Has it not seen equivalents for
the hands and feet of brothers carried by popish perverts to the “holy
priests,” and has it not seen the manner in which the offering has been
received?  Let those who are in quest of Bigotry seek for it among the
perverts to Rome, and not amongst those who, born in the pale of the
Church of England, have always continued in it.

CHAPTER III.
ON FOREIGN NONSENSE.

WITH respect to the third point, various lessons which the book reads to
the nation at large, and which it would be well for the nation to ponder
and profit by.

There are many species of nonsense to which the nation is much addicted,
and of which the perusal of _Lavengro_ ought to give them a wholesome
shame.  First of all, with respect to the foreign nonsense so prevalent
now in England.  The hero is a scholar; but, though possessed of a great
many tongues, he affects to be neither Frenchman, nor German, nor this or
that foreigner; he is one who loves his country, and the language and
literature of his country, and speaks up for each and all when there is
occasion to do so.  Now what is the case with nine out of ten amongst
those of the English who study foreign languages?  No sooner have they
picked up a smattering of this or that speech than they begin to abuse
their own country, and everything connected with it, more especially its
language.  This is particularly the case with those who call themselves
German students.  It is said, and the writer believes with truth, that
when a woman falls in love with a particularly ugly fellow, she squeezes
him with ten times more zest than she would a handsome one, if captivated
by him.  So it is with these German students; no sooner have they taken
German in hand than there is nothing like German.  Oh, the dear,
delightful German!  How proud I am that it is now my own, and that its
divine literature is within my reach!  And all this whilst mumbling the
most uncouth speech, and crunching the most crabbed literature in Europe.
The writer is not an exclusive admirer of everything English; he does not
advise his country people never to go abroad, never to study foreign
languages, and he does not wish to persuade them that there is nothing
beautiful or valuable in foreign literature; he only wishes that they
would not make themselves fools with respect to foreign people, foreign
languages or reading; that if they chance to have been in Spain, and have
picked up a little Spanish, they would not affect the airs of Spaniards;
that if males they would not make Tom-fools of themselves by sticking
cigars into their mouths, dressing themselves in _zamarras_, and saying,
_carajo_! {318} and if females that they would not make zanies of
themselves by sticking cigars into their mouths, flinging mantillas over
their heads, and by saying _carai_, and perhaps _carajo_ too; or if they
have been in France or Italy, and have picked up a little French or
Italian, they would not affect to be French or Italians; and
particularly, after having been a month or two in Germany, or picked up a
little German in England, they would not make themselves foolish about
everything German, as the Anglo-German in the book does—a real character,
the founder of the Anglo-German school in England, and the cleverest
Englishman who ever talked or wrote encomiastic nonsense about Germany
and the Germans.  Of all infatuations connected with what is foreign, the
infatuation about everything that is German, to a certain extent
prevalent in England, is assuredly the most ridiculous.  One can find
something like a palliation for people making themselves somewhat foolish
about particular languages, literatures and people.  The Spanish
certainly is a noble language, and there is something wild and
captivating in the Spanish character, and its literature contains the
grand book of the world.  French is a manly language.  The French are the
great martial people in the world; and French literature is admirable in
many respects.  Italian is a sweet language, and of beautiful
simplicity—its literature perhaps the first in the world.  The
Italians!—wonderful men have sprung up in Italy.  Italy is not merely
famous for painters, poets, musicians, singers and linguists—the greatest
linguist the world ever saw, the late Cardinal Mezzofanti, was an
Italian; but it is celebrated for men—men emphatically speaking: Columbus
was an Italian, Alexander Farnese was an Italian, so was the mightiest of
the mighty, Napoleon Bonaparte; but the German language, German
literature, and the Germans!  The writer has already stated his opinion
with respect to German; he does not speak from ignorance or prejudice; he
has heard German spoken, and many other languages.  German literature!
He does not speak from ignorance, he has read that and many a literature,
and he repeats—however, he acknowledges that there is one fine poem in
the German language, that poem is the _Oberon_; a poem, by-the-bye,
ignored by the Germans—a speaking fact—and of course, by the
Anglo-Germanists.  The Germans! he has been amongst them, and amongst
many other nations, and confesses that his opinion of the Germans, as
men, is a very low one.  Germany, it is true, has produced one very great
man, the monk who fought the Pope, and nearly knocked him down; but this
man his country-men—a telling fact—affect to despise, and, of course, the
Anglo-Germanists: the father of Anglo-Germanism was very fond of
inveighing against Luther.

The madness, or rather foolery, of the English for foreign customs,
dresses and languages, is not an affair of to-day, or yesterday—it is of
very ancient date, and was very properly exposed nearly three centuries
ago by one Andrew Borde, who under the picture of a “Naked man, with a
pair of shears in one hand, and a roll of cloth in the other,” inserted
the following lines along with others:—{319}

    I am an Englishman, and naked I stand here,
    Musing in my mind what garment I shall weare;
    For now I will weare this, and now I will weare that,
    Now I will weare, I cannot tell what.
    All new fashions be pleasant to mee,
    I will have them, whether I thrive or thee;
    What do I care if all the world me fail?
    I will have a garment [shall] reach to my taile;
    Then am I a minion, for I weare the new guise.
    The next yeare after I hope to be wise,
    Not only in wearing my gorgeous array,
    For I will go to learning a whole summer’s day,
    I will learn Latine, Hebrew, Greek, and French,
    And I will learn Dutch, sitting on my bench.
    I had no peere if to myself I were true,
    Because I am not so, divers times do I rue.
    Yet I lacke nothing, I have all things at will
    If I were wise and would hold myself still,
    And meddle with no matters but to me pertaining,
    But ever to be true to God and my King.
    But I have such matters rowling in my pate,
       That I will and do — — I cannot tell what, etc.

CHAPTER IV.
ON GENTILITY NONSENSE.

What is gentility?  People in different stations in England entertain
different ideas of what is genteel, {320} but it must be something
gorgeous, glittering or tawdry, to be considered genteel by any of them.
The beau-ideal of the English aristocracy, of course with some
exceptions, is some young fellow with an imperial title, a military
personage of course, for what is military is so particularly genteel,
with flaming epaulets, a cocked hat and plume, a prancing charger, and a
band of fellows called generals and colonels, with flaming epaulets,
cocked hats and plumes, and prancing chargers vapouring behind him.  It
was but lately that the daughter of an English marquis was heard to say,
that the sole remaining wish of her heart—she had known misfortunes, and
was not far from fifty—was to be introduced to—whom?  The Emperor of
Austria!  The sole remaining wish of the heart of one who ought to have
been thinking of the grave and judgment, was to be introduced to the
miscreant who had caused the blood of noble Hungarian females to be
whipped out of their shoulders, for no other crime than devotion to their
country, and its tall and heroic sons.  The middle classes—of course
there are some exceptions—admire the aristocracy, and consider them
pinks, the aristocracy who admire the Emperor of Austria, and adored the
Emperor of Russia, till he became old, ugly and unfortunate, when their
adoration instantly terminated; for what is more ungenteel than age,
ugliness and misfortune!  The beau-ideal with those of the lower classes,
with peasants and mechanics, is some flourishing railroad contractor:
look, for example, how they worship Mr. Flamson.  This person makes his
grand début in the year ’thirty-nine, at a public meeting in the
principal room of a country inn.  He has come into the neighbourhood with
the character of a man worth a million pounds, who is to make everybody’s
fortune; at this time, however, he is not worth a shilling of his own,
though he flashes about dexterously three or four thousand pounds, part
of which sum he has obtained by specious pretences, and part from certain
individuals who are his confederates.  But in the year ’forty-nine, he is
really in possession of the fortune which he and his agents pretended he
was worth ten years before—he is worth a million pounds.  By what means
has he come by them?  By railroad contracts, for which he takes care to
be paid in hard cash before he attempts to perform them, and to carry out
which he makes use of the sweat and blood of wretches who, since their
organisation, have introduced crimes and language into England to which
it was previously almost a stranger—by purchasing, with paper, shares by
hundreds in the schemes to execute which he contracts, and which are of
his own devising; which shares he sells as soon as they are at a high
premium, to which they are speedily forced by means of paragraphs,
inserted by himself and agents, in newspapers devoted to his interest,
utterly reckless of the terrible depreciation to which they are almost
instantly subjected.  But he is worth a million pounds, there can be no
doubt of the fact—he has not made people’s fortunes, at least those whose
fortunes it was said he would make; he has made them away; but his own he
has made, emphatically made it; he is worth a million pounds.  Hurrah for
the millionnaire!  The clown who views the pandemonium of red brick which
he has built on the estate which he has purchased in the neighbourhood of
the place of his grand début in which every species of architecture,
Greek, Indian and Chinese, is employed in caricature—who hears of the
grand entertainment he gives at Christmas in the principal dining-room,
the hundred wax-candles, the waggon-load of plate, and the oceans of wine
which form parts of it, and above all the two ostrich poults, one at the
head, and the other at the foot of the table, exclaims: “Well! if he
a’n’t bang up, I don’t know who be; why he beats my lord hollow!”  The
mechanic of the borough town, who sees him dashing through the streets in
an open landau, drawn by four milk-white horses, amidst its attendant
out-riders; his wife, a monster of a woman, by his side, stout as the
wife of Tamerlane, who weighed twenty stone, and bedizened out like her
whose person shone with the jewels of plundered Persia, stares with
silent wonder, and at last exclaims: “That’s the man for my vote!”  You
tell the clown that the man of the mansion has contributed enormously to
corrupt the rural innocence of England; you point to an incipient branch
railroad, from around which the accents of Gomorrah are sounding, and beg
him to listen for a moment, and then close his ears.  Hodge scratches his
head and says: “Well, I have nothing to say to that; all I known is that
he is bang up, and I wish I were he”; perhaps he will add—a Hodge has
been known to add—“He has been kind enough to put my son on that very
railroad; ’tis true the company is somewhat queer, and the work rather
killing, but he gets there half a crown a day, whereas from the farmers
he would only get eighteenpence.”  You remind the mechanic that the man
in the landau has been the ruin of thousands, and you mention people whom
he himself knows, people in various grades of life, widows and orphans
amongst them, whose little all he has dissipated, and whom he has reduced
to beggary by inducing them to become sharers in his delusive schemes.
But the mechanic says: “Well, the more fools they to let themselves be
robbed.  But I don’t call that kind of thing robbery, I merely call it
out-witting; and everybody in this free country has a right to outwit
others if he can.  What a turn-out he has!”  One was once heard to add:
“I never saw a more genteel-looking man in all my life except one, and
that was a gentleman’s walley, who was much like him.  It is true he is
rather undersized, but then, madam, you know, makes up for all.”

CHAPTER V.
SUBJECT OF GENTILITY CONTINUED.

IN the last chapter have been exhibited specimens of gentility, so
considered by different classes; by one class, power, youth and epaulets
are considered the _ne plus ultra_ of gentility; by another class, pride,
stateliness and title; by another, wealth and flaming tawdriness.  But
what constitutes a gentleman?  It is easy to say at once what constitutes
a gentleman, and there are no distinctions in what is gentlemanly, {323}
as there are in what is genteel.  The characteristics of a gentleman are
high feeling—a determination never to take a cowardly advantage of
another—a liberal education—absence of narrow views—generosity and
courage, propriety of behaviour.  Now a person may be genteel according
to one or another of the three standards described above, and not possess
one of the characteristics of a gentleman.  Is the emperor a gentleman,
with spatters of blood on his clothes, scourged from the backs of noble
Hungarian women?  Are the aristocracy gentlefolks, who admire him?  Is
Mr. Flamson a gentleman, although he has a million pounds?  No! cowardly
miscreants, admirers of cowardly miscreants, and people who make a
million pounds by means compared with which those employed to make
fortunes by the getters up of the South Sea Bubble might be called honest
dealing, are decidedly not gentlefolks.  Now as it is clearly
demonstrable that a person may be perfectly genteel according to some
standard or other, and yet be no gentleman, so is it demonstrable that a
person may have no pretensions to gentility, and yet be a gentleman.  For
example, there is Lavengro!  Would the admirers of the emperor, or the
admirers of those who admire the emperor, or the admirers of Mr. Flamson,
call him genteel? and gentility with them is everything!  Assuredly they
would not; and assuredly they would consider him respectively as a being
to be shunned, despised, or hooted.  Genteel!  Why at one time he is a
hack author—writes reviewals for eighteenpence a page—edits a Newgate
chronicle.  At another he wanders the country with a face grimy from
occasionally mending kettles; and there is no evidence that his clothes
are not seedy and torn, and his shoes down at the heel; but by what
process of reasoning will they prove that he is no gentleman?  Is he not
learned?  Has he not generosity and courage?  Whilst a hack author, does
he pawn the books entrusted to him to review?  Does he break his word to
his publisher?  Does he write begging letters?  Does he get clothes or
lodgings without paying for them?  Again, whilst a wanderer, does he
insult helpless women on the road with loose proposals or ribald
discourse?  Does he take what is not his own from the hedges?  Does he
play on the fiddle, or make faces in public-houses, in order to obtain
pence or beer? or does he call for liquor, swallow it, and then say to a
widowed landlady, “Mistress, I have no brass?”  In a word, what vice and
crime does he perpetrate—what low acts does he commit?  Therefore, with
his endowments, who will venture to say that he is no gentleman?—unless
it be an admirer of Mr. Flamson—a clown—who will, perhaps, shout: “I say
he is no gentleman; for who can be a gentleman who keeps no gig?”

The indifference exhibited by Lavengro for what is merely genteel,
compared with his solicitude never to infringe the strict laws of honour,
should read a salutary lesson.  The generality of his countrymen are far
more careful not to transgress the customs of what they call gentility,
than to violate the laws of honour or morality.  They will shrink from
carrying their own carpet-bag, and from speaking to a person in seedy
raiment, whilst to matters of much higher importance they are shamelessly
indifferent.  Not so Lavengro; he will do anything that he deems
convenient, or which strikes his fancy, provided it does not outrage
decency, or is unallied to profligacy; is not ashamed to speak to a
beggar in rags, and will associate with anybody, provided he can gratify
a laudable curiosity.  He has no abstract love for what is low, or what
the world calls low.  He sees that many things which the world looks down
upon are valuable, so he prizes much which the world contemns; he sees
that many things which the world admires are contemptible, so he despises
much which the world does not; but when the world prizes what is really
excellent, he does not contemn it, because the world regards it.  If he
learns Irish, which all the world scoffs at, he likewise learns Italian,
which all the world melts at.  If he learns Gypsy, the language of the
tattered tent, he likewise learns Greek, the language of the college
hall.  If he learns smithery, he also learns—ah! what does he learn to
set against smithery?—the law?  No; he does not learn the law, which, by
the way, is not very genteel.  Swimming?  Yes, he learns to swim.
Swimming, however, is not genteel; and the world—at least the genteel
part of it—acts very wisely in setting its face against it; for to swim
you must be naked, and how would many a genteel person look without his
clothes?  Come, he learns horsemanship; a very genteel accomplishment,
which every genteel person would gladly possess, though not all genteel
people do.

Again as to associates: if he holds communion when a boy with Murtagh,
the scarecrow of an Irish academy, he associates in after life with
Francis Ardry, a rich and talented young Irish gentleman about town.  If
he accepts an invitation from Mr. Petulengro to his tent, he has no
objection to go home with a rich genius to dinner; who then will say that
he prizes a thing or a person because they are ungenteel?  That he is not
ready to take up with everything that is ungenteel he gives a proof, when
he refuses, though on the brink of starvation, to become bonnet to the
thimble-man, an office, which, though profitable, is positively
ungenteel.  Ah! but some sticker-up for gentility will exclaim: “The hero
did not refuse this office from an insurmountable dislike to its
ungentility, but merely from a feeling of principle”.  Well! the writer
is not fond of argument, and he will admit that such was the case; he
admits that it was a love of principle, rather than an over-regard for
gentility, which prevented the hero from accepting, when on the brink of
starvation, an ungenteel though lucrative office, an office which, the
writer begs leave to observe, many a person with a great regard for
gentility, and no particular regard for principle, would in a similar
strait have accepted; for when did a mere love for gentility keep a
person from being a dirty scoundrel, when the alternatives apparently
were “either be a dirty scoundrel or starve?”  One thing, however, is
certain, which is, that Lavengro did not accept the office, which if a
love for what is low had been his ruling passion he certainly would have
done; consequently, he refuses to do one thing which no genteel person
would willingly do, even as he does many things which every genteel
person would gladly do, for example, speaks Italian, rides on horseback,
associates with a fashionable young man, dines with a rich genius, et
cetera.  Yet—and it cannot be minced—he and gentility with regard to many
things are at strange divergency; he shrinks from many things at which
gentility placidly hums a tune, or approvingly simpers, and does some
things at which gentility positively shrinks.  He will not run into debt
for clothes or lodgings, which he might do without any scandal to
gentility; he will not receive money from Francis Ardry, and go to
Brighton with the sister of Annette Le Noir, though there is nothing
ungenteel in borrowing money from a friend, even when you never intend to
repay him, and something poignantly genteel in going to a watering-place
with a gay young Frenchwoman; but he has no objection, after raising
twenty pounds by the sale of that extraordinary work _Joseph Sell_, to
set off into the country, mend kettles under hedge-rows, and make pony
and donkey shoes in a dingle.  Here, perhaps, some plain, well-meaning
person will cry—and with much apparent justice—how can the writer justify
him in this act?  What motive, save a love for what is low, could induce
him to do such things?  Would the writer have everybody who is in need of
recreation go into the country, mend kettles under hedges, and make pony
shoes in dingles?  To such an observation the writer would answer, that
Lavengro had an excellent motive in doing what he did, but that the
writer is not so unreasonable as to wish everybody to do the same.  It is
not everybody who can mend kettles.  It is not everybody who is in
similar circumstances to those in which Lavengro was.  Lavengro flies
from London and hack authorship, and takes to the roads from fear of
consumption; it is expensive to put up at inns, and even at
public-houses, and Lavengro has not much money; so he buys a tinker’s
cart and apparatus, and sets up as tinker, and subsequently as
blacksmith; a person living in a tent, or in anything else, must do
something or go mad; Lavengro had a mind, as he himself well knew, with
some slight tendency to madness, and had he not employed himself, he must
have gone wild; so to employ himself he drew upon one of his resources,
the only one available at the time.  Authorship had nearly killed him, he
was sick of reading, and had besides no books; but he possessed the
rudiments of an art akin to tinkering; he knew something of smithery,