And now, Laertes, what's the news with you?
You told us of some suit: what is't, Laertes?
He hath, my lord, wrung from me my slow' leave
By laboursome petition; and at last,
Upon his will I sealed my hard consent.
Horatio. There's no offence, my lord.
Hamlet. Yes, by Saint Patrick, but there is, Horatio,
And much offence too.
—Hamlet.
THE Macnamara had been led away from his companionship in that old oak room by the time his son and Miss Gerald returned from the garden, and the consciousness of his own dignity seemed to have increased considerably since they had left him. This emotion was a variable possession with him: any one acquainted with his habits could without difficulty, from knowing the degree of dignity he manifested at any moment, calculate minutely the space of time, he must of necessity have spent in a room furnished similarly to that he had just now left.
He was talking pretty loudly in the room to which he had been led by Mr. Gerald when Daireen and Standish entered; and beside him was a whitehaired old lady whom Standish greeted as Mrs. Gerald and the girl called grandmamma—an old lady with very white hair but with large dark eyes whose lustre remained yet undimmed.
“Standish will reveal the mystery,” said this old lady, as the young man shook hands with her. “Your father has been speaking in proverbs, Standish, and we want your assistance to read them.”
“He is my son,” said The Macnamara, waving his hand proudly and lifting up his head. “He will hear his father speak on his behalf. Head of the Geralds, Gerald-na-Tor, chief of the hills, the last of The Macnamaras, king's of Munster, Innishdermot, and all islands, comes to you.”
“And I am honoured by his visit, and glad to find him looking so well.” said Mr. Gerald. “I am only sorry you can't make it suit you to come oftener, Macnamara.”
“It's that boy Eugene that's at fault,” said The Macnamara, dropping so suddenly into a colloquial speech from his eloquent Ossianic strain that one might have been led to believe his opening words were somewhat forced. “Yes, my lad,” he continued, addressing Mr. Gerald; “that Eugene is either breaking the springs or the straps or his own bones.” Here he recollected that his mission was not one to be expressed in this ordinary vein. He straightened himself in an instant, and as he went on asserted even more dignity than before. “Gerald, you know my position, don't you? and you know your 'own; but you can't say, can you, that The Macnamara ever held himself aloof from your table by any show of pride? I mixed with you as if we were equals.”
Again he waved his hand patronisingly, but no one showed the least sign of laughter. Standish was in front of one of the windows leaning his head upon his hand as he looked out to the misty ocean. “Yes, I've treated you at all times as if you had been born of the land, though this ground we tread on this moment was torn from the grasp of The Macnamaras by fraud.”
“True, true—six hundred years ago,” remarked Mr. Gerald. He had been so frequently reminded of this fact during his acquaintance with The Macnamara, he could afford to make the concession he now did.
“But I've not let that rankle in my heart,” continued The Macnamara; “I've descended to break bread with you and to drink—drink water with you—ay, at times. You know my son too, and you know that if he's not the same as his father to the backbone, it's not his father that's to blame for it. It was the last wish of his poor mother—rest her soul!—that he should be schooled outside our country, and you know that I carried out her will, though it cost me dear. He's been back these four years, as you know—what's he looking out at at the window?—but it's only three since he found out the pearl of the Lough Suangorm—the diamond of Slieve Docas—the beautiful daughter of the Geralds. Ay, he confessed to me this morning where his soft heart had turned, poor boy. Don't be blushing, Standish; the blood of the Macnamaras shouldn't betray itself in their cheeks.”
Standish had started away from the window before his father had ended; his hands were clenched, and his cheeks were burning with shame. He could not fail to see the frown that was settling down upon the face of Mr. Gerald. But he dared not even glance towards Daireen.
“My dear Macnamara, we needn't talk on this subject any farther just now,” said the girl's grandfather, as the orator paused for an instant.
But The Macnamara only gave his hand another wave before he proceeded. “I have promised my boy to make him happy,” he said, “and you know what the word of a Macnamara is worth even to his son; so, though I confess I was taken aback at first, yet I at last consented to throw over my natural family pride and to let my boy have his way. An alliance between the Macnamaras and the Geralds is not what would have been thought about a few years ago, but The Macnamaras have always been condescending.”
“Yes, yes, you condescend to a jest now and again with us, but really this is a sort of mystery I have no clue to,” said Mr. Gerald.
“Mystery? Ay, it will astonish the world to know that The Macnamara has given his consent to such an alliance; it must be kept secret for a while for fear of its effects upon the foreign States that have their eyes upon all our steps. I wouldn't like this made a State affair at all.”
“My dear Macnamara, you are usually very lucid,” said Mr. Gerald, “but to-day I somehow cannot arrive at your meaning.”
“What, sir?” cried The Macnamara, giving his head an angry twitch. “What, sir, do you mean to tell me that you don't understand that I have given my consent to my son taking as his wife the daughter of the Geralds?—see how the lovely Daireen blushes like a rose.”
Daireen was certainly blushing, as she left her seat and went over to the farthest end of the room. But Standish was deadly pale, his lips tightly closed.
“Macnamara, this is absurd—quite absurd!” said Mr. Gerald, hastily rising. “Pray let us talk no more in such a strain.”
Then The Macnamara's consciousness of his own dignity asserted itself. He drew himself up and threw back his head. “Sir, do you mean to put an affront upon the one who has left his proper station to raise your family to his own level?”
“Don't let us quarrel, Macnamara; you know how highly I esteem you personally, and you know that I have ever looked upon the family of the Macnamaras as the noblest in the land.”
“And it is the noblest in the land. There's not a drop of blood in our veins that hasn't sprung from the heart of a king,” cried The Macnamara.
“Yes, yes, I know it; but—well, we will not talk any further to-day. Daireen, you needn't go away.”
“Heavens! do you mean to say that I haven't spoken plainly enough, that——”
“Now, Macnamara, I must really interrupt you——”
“Must you?” cried the representative of the ancient line, his face developing all the secret resources of redness it possessed. “Must you interrupt the hereditary monarch of the country where you're but an immigrant when he descends to equalise himself with you? This is the reward of condescension! Enough, sir, you have affronted the family that were living in castles when your forefathers were like beasts in caves. The offer of an alliance ought to have come from you, not from me; but never again will it be said that The Macnamara forgot what was due to him and his family. No, by the powers, Gerald, you'll never have the chance again. I scorn you; I reject your alliance. The Macnamara seats himself once more upon his ancient throne, and he tramples upon you all. Come, my son, look at him that has insulted your family—look at him for the last time and lift up your head.”
The grandeur with which The Macnamara uttered this speech was overpowering. He had at its conclusion turned towards poor Standish, and waved his hand in the direction of Mr. Gerald. Then Standish seemed to have recovered himself.
“No, father, it is you who have insulted this family by talking as you have done,” he cried passionately.
“Boy!” shouted The Macnamara. “Recreant son of a noble race, don't demean yourself with such language!”
“It is you who have demeaned our family,” cried the son still more energetically. “You have sunk us even lower than we were before.” Then he turned imploringly towards Mr. Gerald. “You know—you know that I am only to be pitied, not blamed, for my father's words,” he said quietly, and then went to the door.
“My dear boy,” said the old lady, hastening towards him.
“Madam!” cried The Macnamara, raising his arm majestically to stay her.
She stopped in the centre of the room. Daireen had also risen, her pure eyes full of tears as she grasped her grandfather's hand while he laid his other upon her head.
From the door Standish looked with passionate gratitude back to the girl, then rushed out.
But The Macnamara stood for some moments with his head elevated, the better to express the scorn that was in his heart. No one made a motion, and then he stalked after his son.
What advancement may I hope from thee
That no revenue hast...
To feed and clothe thee?
Guildenstern. The King, sir,—
Hamlet. Ay, sir, what of him?
Guild. Is in his retirement marvellous distempered.
Hamlet. With drink, sir?
Guild. No, my lord, rather with choler.
Hamlet. The King doth wake to-night and takes his
rouse.
Keeps wassail, and the swaggering up-spring reels.
Horatio. Is it a custom?
Hamlet. Ay, marry is't:
But to my mind, though I am native here,
And to the manner born, it is a custom
More honour'd in the breach than the observance.
This heavy-headed revel...
Makes us traduced and taxed.—Hamlet.
TO do The Macnamara justice, while he was driving homeward upon that very shaky car round the lovely coast, he was somewhat disturbed in mind as he reflected upon the possible consequences of his quarrel with old Mr. Gerald. He was dimly conscious of the truth of the worldly and undeniably selfish maxim referring to the awkwardness of a quarrel with a neighbour. And if there is any truth in it as a general maxim, its value is certainly intensified when the neighbour in question has been the lender of sundry sums of money. A neighbour under these conditions should not be quarrelled with, he knew.
The Macnamara had borrowed from Mr. Gerald, at various times, certain moneys which had amounted in the aggregate to a considerable sum; for though Daireen's grandfather was not possessed of a very large income from the land that had been granted to his ancestors some few hundred years before, he had still enough to enable him from time to time to oblige The Macnamara with a loan. And this reflection caused The Macnamara about as much mental uneasiness as the irregular motion of the vehicle did physical discomfort. By the time, however, that the great hill, whose heather slope was now wrapped in the purple shade of twilight, its highest peak alone being bathed in the red glory of the sunset, was passed, his mind was almost at ease; for he recalled the fact that his misunderstandings with Mr. Gerald were exactly equal in number to his visits; he never passed an hour at Suanmara without what would at any rate have been a quarrel but for Mr. Gerald's good nature, which refused to be ruffled. And as no reference had ever upon these occasions been made to his borrowings, The Macnamara felt that he had no reason to conclude that his present quarrel would become embarrassing through any action of Mr. Gerald's. So he tried to feel the luxury of the scorn that he had so powerfully expressed in the room at Suanmara.
“Mushrooms of a night's growth!” he muttered. “I trampled them beneath my feet. They may go down on their knees before me now, I'll have nothing to say to them.” Then as the car passed out of the glen and he saw before him the long shadows of the hills lying amongst the crimson and yellow flames that swept from the sunset out on the Atlantic, and streamed between the headlands at the entrance to the lough, he became more fixed in his resolution. “The son of The Macnamara will never wed with the daughter of a man that is paid by the oppressors of the country, no, never!”
This was an allusion to the fact of Daireen's father being a colonel in the British army, on service in India. Then exactly between the headlands the sun went down in a gorgeous mist that was permeated with the glow of the orb it enveloped. The waters shook and trembled in the light, but the many islands of the lough remained dark and silent in the midst of the glow. The Macnamara became more resolute still. He had almost forgotten that he had ever borrowed a penny from Mr. Gerald. He turned to where Standish sat silent and almost grim.
“And you, boy,” said the father—“you, that threw your insults in my face—you, that's a disgrace to the family—I've made up my mind what I'll do with you; I'll—yes, by the powers, I'll disinherit you.”
But not a word did Standish utter in reply to this threat, the force of which, coupled with an expressive motion of the speaker, jeopardised the imperfect spring, and wrung from Eugene a sudden exclamation.
“Holy mother o' Saint Malachi, kape the sthring from breakin' yit awhile!” he cried devoutly.
And it seemed that the driver's devotion was efficacious, for, without any accident, the car reached the entrance to Innishdermot, as the residence of the ancient monarchs had been called since the days when the waters of Lough Suangorm had flowed all about the castle slope, for even the lough had become reduced in strength.
The twilight, rich and blue, was now swathing the mountains and overshadowing the distant cliffs, though the waters at their base were steel gray and full of light that seemed to shine upwards through their depth. Desolate, truly, the ruins loomed through the dimness. Only a single feeble light glimmered from one of the panes, and even this seemed agonising to the owls, for they moaned wildly and continuously from the round tower. There was, indeed, scarcely an aspect of welcome in anything that surrounded this home which one family had occupied for seven hundred years.
As the car stopped at the door, however, there came a voice from an unseen figure, saying, in even a more pronounced accent than The Macnamara himself gloried in, “Wilcome, ye noble sonns of noble soyers! Wilcome back to the anshent home of the gloryous race that'll stand whoile there's a sod of the land to bear it.”
“It's The Randal himself,” said The Macnamara, looking in the direction from which the sound came. “And where is it that you are, Randal? Oh, I see your pipe shining like a star out of the ivy.”
From the forest of ivy that clung about the porch of the castle the figure of a small man emerged. One of his hands was in his pocket, the other removed a short black pipe, the length of whose stem in comparison to the breadth of its bowl was as the proportion of Falstaff's bread to his sack.
“Wilcome back, Macnamara,” said this gentleman, who was indeed The Randal, hereditary chief of Suangorm. “An' Standish too, how are ye, my boy?” Standish shook hands with the speaker, but did not utter a word. “An' where is it ye're afther dhrivin' from?” continued The Randal.
“It's a long drive and a long story,” said The Macnamara.
“Thin for hivin's sake don't begin it till we've put boy the dinner. I'm goin' to take share with ye this day, and I'm afther waitin' an hour and more.”
“It's welcome The Randal is every day in the week,” said The Macnamara, leading the way into the great dilapidated hall, where in the ancient days fifty men-at-arms had been wont to feast royally. Now it was black in night.
In the room where the dinner was laid there were but two candles, and their feeble glimmer availed no more than to make the blotches on the cloth more apparent: the maps of the British Isles done in mustard and gravy were numerous. At each end a huge black bottle stood like a sentry at the border of a snowfield.
By far the greater portion of the light was supplied by the blazing log in the fireplace. It lay not in any grate but upon the bare hearth, and crackled and roared up the chimney like a demon prostrate in torture. The Randal and his host stood before the blaze, while Standish seated himself in another part of the room. The ruddy flicker of the wood fire shone upon the faces of the two men, and the yellow glimmer of the candle upon the face of Standish. Here and there a polish upon the surface of the black oak panelling gleamed, but all the rest of the high room was dim.
Salmon from the lough, venison from the forest, wild birds from the moor made up the dinner. All were served on silver dishes strangely worked, and plates of the same metal were laid before the diners, while horns mounted on massive stands were the drinking vessels. From these dishes The Macnamaras of the past had eaten, and from these horns they had drunken, and though the present head of the family could have gained many years' income had he given the metal to be melted, he had never for an instant thought of taking such a step. He would have starved with that plate empty in front of him sooner than have sold it to buy bread.
Standish spoke no word during the entire meal, and the guest saw that something had gone wrong; so with his native tact he chatted away, asking questions, but waiting for no answer.
When the table was cleared and the old serving-woman had brought in a broken black kettle of boiling water, and had laid in the centre of the table an immense silver bowl for the brewing of the punch, The Randal drew up the remnant of his collar and said: “Now for the sthory of the droive, Macnamara; I'm riddy whin ye fill the bowl.”
Standish rose from the table and walked away to a seat at the furthest end of the great room, where he sat hidden in the gloom of the corner. The Randal did not think it inconsistent with his chieftainship to wink at his host.
“Randal,” said The Macnamara, “I've made up my mind. I'll disinherit that boy, I will.”
“No,” cried The Randal eagerly. “Don't spake so loud, man; if this should git wind through the counthry who knows what might happen? Disinhirit the boy; ye don't mane it, Macnamara,” he continued in an excited but awe-stricken whisper.
“But by the powers, I do mean it,” cried The Macnamara, who had been testing the potent elements of the punch.
“Disinherit me, will you, father?” came the sudden voice of Standish echoing strangely down the dark room. Then he rose and stood facing both men at the table, the red glare of the log mixing with the sickly candlelight upon his face and quivering hands. “Disinherit me?” he said again, bitterly. “You cannot do that. I wish you could. My inheritance, what is it? Degradation of family, proud beggary, a life to be wasted outside the world of life and work, and a death rejoiced over by those wretches who have lent you money. Disinherit me from all this, if you can.”
“Holy Saint Malachi, hare the sonn of The Macnamaras talkin' loike a choild!” cried The Randal.
“I don't care who hears me,” said Standish. “I'm sick of hearing about my forefathers; no one cares about them nowadays. I wanted years ago to go out into the world and work.”
“Work—a Macnamara work!” cried The Randal horror-stricken.
“I told you so,” said The Macnamara, in the tone of one who finds sudden confirmation to the improbable story of some enormity.
“I wanted to work as a man should to redeem the shame which our life as it is at present brings upon our family,” said the young man earnestly—almost passionately; “but I was not allowed to do anything that I wanted. I was kept here in this jail wasting my best years; but to-day has brought everything to an end. You say you will disinherit me, father, but I have from this day disinherited myself—I have cast off my old existence. I begin life from to-day.”
Then he turned away and went out of the room, leaving his father and his guest in dumb amazement before their punch. It was some minutes before either could speak. At last The Randal took adraught of the hot spirit, and shook his head thoughtfully.
“Poor boy! poor boy! he needs to be looked after till he gets over this turn,” he said.
“It's all that girl—that Daireen of the Geralds,” said The Macnamara. “I found a paper with poetry on it for her this morning, and when I forced him he confessed that he was in love with her.”
“D'ye tell me that? And what more did ye do, Mac?”
“I'll tell you,” said the hereditary prince, leaning over the table.
And he gave his guest all the details of the visit to the Geralds at length.
But poor Standish had rushed up the crumbling staircase and was lying on his bed with his face in his hands. It was only now he seemed to feel all the shame that had caused his face to be red and pale by turns in the drawing-room at Suanmara. He lay there in a passion of tears, while the great owls kept moaning and hooting in the tower just outside his window, making sympathetic melody to his ears.
At last he arose and went over to the window and stood gazing out through the break in the ivy armour of the wall. He gazed over the tops of the trees growing in a straggling way down the slope to the water's edge. He could see far away the ocean, whose voice he now and again heard as the wind bore it around the tower. Thousands of stars glittered above the water and trembled upon its moving surface. He felt strong now. He felt that he might never weep again in the world as he had just wept. Then he turned to another window and sent his eyes out to where that great peak of Slieve Docas stood out dark and terrible among the stars. He could not see the house at the base of the hill, but he clenched his hands as he looked out, saying “Hope.”
It was late before he got into his bed, and it was still later when he awoke and heard, mingling with the cries of the night-birds, the sound of hoarse singing that floated upward from the room where he had left his father and The Randal. The prince and the chief were joining their voices in a native melody, Standish knew; and he was well aware that he would not be disturbed by the ascent of either during the night. The dormitory arrangements of the prince and the chief when they had dined in company were of the simplest nature.
Standish went to sleep again, and the ancient rafters, that had heard the tones of many generations of Macnamaras' voices, trembled for some hours with the echoes from the room below, while outside the ancient owls hooted and the ancient sea murmured in its sleep.
What imports this song?
The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail
And you are stay'd for. There; my blessing with thee.
Hamlet. I do not set my life at a pin's fee...
It waves me forth again: I'll follow it.
Horatio. What if it tempt you toward the flood?...
Look whether he has not changed his colour.
—Hamlet.
THE sounds of wild harp-music were ascending at even from the depths of Glenmara. The sun had sunk, and the hues that had been woven round the west were wasting themselves away on the horizon. The faint shell-pink had drifted and dwindled far from the place of sunset. The woods of the slopes looked very dark now that the red glances from the west were withdrawn from their glossy foliage; but the heather-swathed mountains, towering through the soft blue air to the dark blue sky, were richly purple, as though the sunset hues had become entangled amongst the heather, and had forgotten to fly back to the west that had cast them forth.
The little tarn at the foot of the lowest crags was black and still, waiting for the first star-glimpse, and from its marge came the wild notes of a harp fitfully swelling and waning; and then arose the still wilder and more melancholy tones of a man's voice chanting what seemed like a weird dirge to the fading twilight, and the language was the Irish Celtic—that language every song of which sounds like a dirge sung over its own death:—
Why art thou gone from us, White Dove of the Irish
woods?
Why art thou gone who made all the leaves tremulous with
the low voice of love?
Love that tarried yet afar, though the fleet swallow had
come back to us—
Love that stayed in the far lands though the primrose had
cast its gold by the streams—
Love that heard not the voice sent forth from every new-budded briar—
This love came only when thou earnest, and rapture thrilled
the heart of the green land.
Why art thou gone from us, White Dove of the Irish
woods?
This is a translation of the wild lament that arose in the twilight air and stirred up the echoes of the rocks. Then the fitful melody of the harp made an interlude:—
Why art thou gone from us, sweet Linnet of the Irish
woods?
Why art thou gone from us whose song brought the Spring
to our land?
Yea, flowers to thy singing arose from the earth in bountiful
bloom,
And scents of the violet, scents of the hawthorn—all scents
of the spring
Were wafted about us when thy voice was heard albeit in
autumn.
All thoughts of the spring—all its hopes woke and breathed
through our hearts,
Till our souls thrilled with passionate song and the perfume
of spring which is love.
Why art thou gone from us, sweet Linnet of the Irish
woods?
Again the chaunter paused and again his harp prolonged the wailing melody. Then passing into a more sadly soft strain, he continued his song:—
Why art thou gone from us, Soul of all beauty and joy?
Now thou art gone the berry drops from the arbutus,
The wind comes in from the ocean with wail and the
autumn is sad,
The yellow leaves perish, whirled wild whither no one can
know.
As the crisp leaves are crushed in the woods, so our hearts
are crushed at thy parting;
As the woods moan for the summer departed, so we mourn
that we see thee no more.
Why art thou gone from us, Soul of all beauty and joy?
Into the twilight the last notes died away, and a lonely heron standing among the rushes at the edge of the tarn moved his head critically to one side as if waiting for another song with which to sympathise. But he was not the only listener. Far up among the purple crags Standish Macnamara was lying looking out to the sunset when he heard the sound of the chant in the glen beneath him. He lay silent while the dirge floated up the mountain-side and died away among the heather of the peak. But when the silence of the twilight came once more upon the glen, Standish arose and made his way downwards to where an old man with one of the small ancient Irish harps, was seated on a stone, his head bent across the strings upon which his fingers still rested. Standish knew him to be one Murrough O'Brian, a descendant of the bards of the country, and an old retainer of the Gerald family. A man learned in Irish, but not speaking an intelligible sentence in English.
“Why do you sing the Dirge of Tuathal on this evening, Murrough?” he asked in his native tongue, as he came beside the old man.
“What else is there left for me to sing at this time, Standish O'Dermot Macnamara, son of the Prince of Islands and all Munster?” said the bard. “There is nothing of joy left us now. We cannot sing except in sorrow. Does not the land seem to have sympathy with such songs, prolonging their sound by its own voice from every glen and mountain-face?”
“It is true,” said Standish. “As I sat up among the cliffs of heather it seemed to me that the melody was made by the spirits of the glen bewailing in the twilight the departure of the glory of our land.”
“See how desolate is all around us here,” said the bard. “Glenmara is lonely now, where it was wont to be gay with song and laughter; when the nobles thronged the valley with hawk and hound, the voice of the bugle and the melody of a hundred harps were heard stirring up the echoes in delight.”
“But now all are gone; they can only be recalled in vain dreams,” said the second in this duet of Celtic mourners—the younger Marius among the ruins.
“The sons of Erin have left her in her loneliness while the world is stirred with their brave actions,” continued the ancient bard.
“True,” cried Standish; “outside is the world that needs Irish hands and hearts to make it better worth living in.” The young man was so enthusiastic in the utterance of his part in the dialogue as to cause the bard to look suddenly up.
“Yes, the hands and the hearts of the Irish have done much,” he said. “Let the men go out into the world for a while, but let our daughters be spared to us.”
Standish gave a little start and looked inquiringly into the face of the bard.
“What do you mean, Murrough?” he asked slowly.
The bard leant forward as if straining to catch some distant sound.
“Listen to it, listen to it,” he said. There was a pause, and through the silence the moan of the far-off ocean was borne along the dim glen.
“It is the sound of the Atlantic,” said Standish. “The breeze from the west carries it to us up from the lough.”
“Listen to it and think that she is out on that far ocean,” said the old man. “Listen to it, and think that Daireen, daughter of the Geralds, has left her Irish home and is now tossing upon that ocean; gone is she, the bright bird of the South—gone from those her smile lightened!”
Standish neither started nor uttered a word when the old man had spoken; but he felt his feet give way under him. He sat down upon a crag and laid his head upon his hand staring into the black tarn. He could not comprehend at first the force of the words “She is gone.” He had thought of his own departure, but the possibility of Daireen's had not occurred to him. The meaning of the bard's lament was now apparent to him, and even now the melody seemed to be given back by the rocks that had heard it:
Why art thou gone from us, Soul of all beauty and joy?
The words moaned through the dim air with the sound of the distant waters for accompaniment.
“Gone—gone—Daireen,” he whispered. “And you only tell me of it now,” he added almost fiercely to the old man, for he reflected upon the time he had wasted in that duet of lamentation over the ruins of his country. What a wretchedly trivial thing he felt was the condition of the country compared with such an event as the departure of Daireen Gerald.
“It is only since morning that she is gone,” said the bard. “It was only in the morning that the letter arrived to tell her that her father was lying in a fever at some place where the vessel called on the way home. And now she is gone from us, perhaps for ever.”
“Murrough,” said the young man, laying his hand upon the other's arm, and speaking in a hoarse whisper. “Tell me all about her. Why did they allow her to go? Where is she gone? Not out to where her father was landed?”
“Why not there?” cried the old man, raising his head proudly. “Did a Gerald ever shrink from duty when the hour came? Brave girl she is, worthy to be a Gerald!”
“Tell me all—all.”
“What more is there to tell than what is bound up in those three words 'She is gone'?” said the man. “The letter came to her grandfather and she saw him read it—I was in the hall—she saw his hand tremble. She stood up there beside him and asked him what was in the letter; he looked into her face and put the letter in her hand. I saw her face grow pale as she read it. Then she sat down for a minute, but no word or cry came from her until she looked up to the old man's face; then she clasped her hands and said only, 'I will go to him.' The old people talked to her of the distance, of the danger; they told her how she would be alone for days and nights among strangers; but she only repeated, 'I will go to him.' And now she is gone—gone alone over those waters.”
“Alone!” Standish repeated. “Gone away alone, no friend near her, none to utter a word of comfort in her ears!” He buried his face in his hands as he pictured the girl whom he had loved silently, but with all his soul, since she had come to her home in Ireland from India where she had lived with her father since the death of his wife ten years ago. He pictured her sitting in her loneliness aboard the ship that was bearing her away to, perhaps, the land of her father's grave, and he felt that now at last all the bitterness that could be crowded upon his life had fallen on him. He gazed into the black tarn, and saw within its depths a star glittering as it glittered in the sky above, but it did not relieve his thoughts with any touch of its gold.
He rose after a while and gave his hand to Murrough.
“Thank you,” he said. “You have told me all better than any one else could have done. But did she not speak of me, Murrough—only once perhaps? Did she not send me one little word of farewell?”
“She gave me this for you,” said the old bard, producing a letter which Standish clutched almost wildly.
“Thank God, thank God!” he cried, hurrying away without another word. But after him swept the sound of the bard's lament which he commenced anew, with that query:
Why art thou gone from us, Soul of all beauty and joy?
It was not yet too dark outside the glen for Standish to read the letter which he had just received; and so soon as he found himself in sight of the sea he tore open the cover and read the few lines Daireen Gerald had written, with a tremulous hand, to say farewell to him.
“My father has been left ill with fever at the Cape, and I know that he will recover only if I go to him. I am going away to-day, for the steamer will leave Southampton in four days, and I cannot be there in time unless I start at once. I thought you would not like me to go without saying good-bye, and God bless you, dear Standish.”
“You will say good-bye to The Macnamara for me. I thought poor papa would be here to give you the advice you want. Pray to God that I may be in time to see him.”
He read the lines by the gray light reflected from the sea—he read them until his eyes were dim.
“Brave, glorious girl!” he cried. “But to think of her—alone—alone out there, while I—— oh, what a poor weak fool I am! Here am I—here, looking out to the sea she is gone to battle with! Oh, God! oh, God! I must do something for her—I must—but what—what?”
He cast himself down upon the heather that crawled from the slopes even to the road, and there he lay with his head buried in agony at the thought of his own impotence; while through the dark glen floated the wild, weird strain of the lament:
“Why art thou gone from us, Soul of all beauty and joy?”
Hamlet. How chances it they travel? their residence,
both in reputation and profit, was better both ways.
Rosencrantz. I think their inhibition comes by the means
of the late innovation.
Many, wearing rapiers, are afraid of goose-quills.
What imports the nomination of this gentleman?
Hamlet.
AWAY from the glens and the heather-clad mountains, from the blue loughs and their islands of arbutus, from the harp-music, and from the ocean-music which makes those who hear it ripe for revolt; away from the land whose life is the memory of ancient deeds of nobleness; away from the land that has given birth to more heroes than any nation in the world, the land whose inhabitants live in thousands in squalor and look out from mud windows upon the most glorious scenery in the world; away from all these one must now be borne.
Upon the evening of the fourth day after the chanting of that lament by the bard O'Brian from the depths of Glenmara, the good steamshipCardwell Castlewas making its way down Channel with a full cargo and heavy mails for Madeira, St. Helena, and the Cape. It had left its port but a few hours and already the coast had become dim with distance. The red shoreway of the south-west was now so far away that the level rays of sunlight which swept across the water were not seen to shine upon the faces of the rocks, or to show where the green fields joined the brown moorland; the windmills crowning every height were not seen to be in motion.
The passengers were for the most part very cheerful, as passengers generally are during the first couple of hours of a voyage, when only the gentle ripples of the Channel lap the sides of the vessel. The old voyagers, who had thought it prudent to dine off a piece of sea-biscuit and a glass of brandy and water, while they watched with grim smiles the novices trifling with roast pork and apricot-dumplings, were now sitting in seats they had arranged for themselves in such places as they knew would be well to leeward for the greater part of the voyage, and here they smoked their cigars and read their newspapers just as they would be doing every day for three weeks. To them the phenomenon of the lessening land was not particularly interesting. The novices were endeavouring to look as if they had been used to knock about the sea all their lives; they carried their telescopes under their arms quite jauntily, and gave critical glances aloft every now and again, consulting their pocket compasses gravely at regular intervals to convince themselves that they were not being trifled with in the navigation of the vessel.
Then there were, of course, those who had come aboard with the determination of learning in three weeks as much seamanship as should enable them to accept any post of marine responsibility that they might be called upon to fill in after life. They handled the loose tackle with a view of determining its exact utility, and endeavoured to trace stray lines to their source. They placed the captain entirely at his ease with them by asking him a number of questions regarding the dangers of boiler-bursting, and the perils of storms; they begged that he would let them know if there was any truth in the report which had reached them to the effect that the Atlantic was a very stormy place; and they left him with the entreaty that in case of any danger arising suddenly he would at once communicate with them; they then went down to put a few casual questions to the quartermaster who was at the wheel, and doubtless felt that they were making most of the people about them cheerful with their converse.
Then there were the young ladies who had just completed their education in England and were now on their way to join their relations abroad. Having read in the course of their studies of English literature the poems of the late Samuel Rogers, they were much amazed to find that the mariners were not leaning over the ship's bulwarks sighing to behold the sinking of their native land, and that not an individual had climbed the mast to partake of the ocular banquet with indulging in which the poet has accredited the sailor. Towards this section the glances of several male eyes were turned, for most of the young men had roved sufficiently far to become aware of the fact that the relief of the monotony of a lengthened voyage is principally dependent on—well, on the relieving capacities of the young ladies, lately sundered from school and just commencing their education in the world.
But far away from the groups that hung about the stern stood a girl looking over the side of the ship towards the west—towards the sun that was almost touching the horizon. She heard the laughter of the groups of girls and the silly questions of the uninformed, but all sounded to her like the strange voices of a dream; for as she gazed towards the west she seemed to see a fair landscape of purple slopes and green woods; the dash of the ripples against the ship's side came to her as the rustle of the breaking ripples amongst the shells of a blue lough upon whose surface a number of green islets raised their heads. She saw them all—every islet, with its moveless I shadow beneath it, and the light touching the edges of the leaves with red. Daireen Gerald it was who stood there looking out to the sunset, but seeing in the golden lands of the west the Irish land she knew so well.
She remained motionless, with her eyes far away and her heart still farther, until the red sun had disappeared, and the delicate twilight change was slipping over the bright gray water. With every change she seemed to see the shifting of the hues over the heather of Slieve Docas and the pulsating of the tremulous red light through the foliage of the deer ground. It was only now that the tears forced themselves into her eyes, for she had not wept at parting from her grandfather, who had gone with her from Ireland and had left her aboard the steamer a few hours before; and while her tears made everything misty to her, the light laughter of the groups scattered about the quarter-deck sounded in her ears. It did not come harshly to her, for it seemed to come from a world in which she had no part. The things about her were as the things of a dream. The reality in which she was living was that which she saw out in the west.
“Come, my dear,” said a voice behind her—“Come and walk with me on the deck. I fancied I had lost you, and you may guess what a state I was in, after all the promises I made to Mr. Gerald.”
“I was just looking out there, and wondering what they were all doing at home—at the foot of the dear old mountain,” said Daireen, allowing herself to be led away.
“That is what most people would call moping, dear,” said the lady who had come up. She was a middle-aged lady with a pleasant face, though her figure was hardly what a scrupulous painter would choose as a model for a Nausicaa.
“Perhaps I was moping, Mrs. Crawford,” Daireen replied; “but I feel the better for it now.”
“My dear, I don't disapprove of moping now and again, though as a habit it should not be encouraged. I was down in my cabin, and when I came on deck I couldn't understand where you had disappeared to. I asked the major, but of course, you know, he was quite oblivious to everything but the mutiny at Cawnpore, through being beside Doctor Campion.”
“But you have found me, you see, Mrs. Crawford.”
“Yes, thanks to Mr. Glaston; he knew where you had gone; he had been watching you.” Daireen felt her face turning red as she thought of this Mr. Glaston, whoever he was, with his eyes fixed upon her movements. “You don't know Mr. Glaston, Daireen?—I shall call you 'Daireen' of course, though we have only known each other a couple of hours,” continued the lady. “No, of course you don't. Never mind, I'll show him to you.” For the promise of this treat Daireen did not express her gratitude. She had come to think the most unfavourable things regarding this Mr. Glaston. Mrs. Crawford, however, did not seem to expect an acknowledgment. Her chat ran on as briskly as ever. “I shall point him out to you, but on no account look near him for some time—young men are so conceited, you know.”
Daireen had heard this peculiarity ascribed to the race before, and so when her guide, as they walked towards the stern of the vessel, indicated to her that a young man sitting in a deck-chair smoking a cigar was Mr. Glaston, she certainly did not do anything that might possibly increase in Mr. Glaston this dangerous tendency which Mrs. Crawford had assigned to young men generally.
“What do you think of him, my dear?” asked Mrs. Crawford, when they had strolled up the deck once more.
“Of whom?” inquired Daireen.
“Good gracious,” cried the lady, “are your thoughts still straying? Why, I mean Mr. Glaston, to be sure. What do you think of him?”
“I didn't look at him,” the girl answered.
Mrs. Crawford searched the fair face beside her to find out if its expression agreed with her words, and the scrutiny being satisfactory she gave a little laugh. “How do you ever mean to know what he is like if you don't look at him?” she asked.
Daireen did not stop to explain how she thought it possible that contentment might exist aboard the steamer even though she remained in ignorance for ever of Mr. Glaston's qualities; but presently she glanced along the deck, and saw sitting at graceful ease upon the chair Mrs. Crawford had indicated, a tall man of apparently a year or two under thirty. He had black hair which he had allowed to grow long behind, and a black moustache which gave every indication of having been subjected to the most careful youthful training. His face would not have been thought expressive but for his eyes, and the expression that these organs gave out could hardly be called anything except a neutral one: they indicated nothing except that nothing was meant to be indicated by them. No suggestion of passion, feeling, or even thoughtfulness, did they give; and in fact the only possible result of looking at this face which some people called expressive, was a feeling that the man himself was calmly conscious of the fact that some people were in the habit of calling his face expressive.
“And whatdoyou think of him now, my dear?” asked Mrs. Crawford, after Daireen had gratified her by taking that look.
“I really don't think that I think anything,” she answered with a little laugh.
“That is the beauty of his face,” cried Mrs. Crawford. “It sets one thinking.”
“But that is not what I said, Mrs. Crawford.”
“You said you did not think you were thinking anything, Daireen; and that meant, I know, that there was more in his face than you could read at a first glance. Never mind; every one is set thinking when one sees Mr. Glaston.”
Daireen had almost become interested in this Mr. Glaston, even though she could not forget that he had watched her when she did not want to be watched. She gave another glance towards him, but with no more profitable conclusion than her previous look had attained.
“I will tell you all about him, my child,” said Mrs. Crawford confidentially; “but first let us make ourselves comfortable. Dear old England, there is the last of it for us for some time. Adieu, adieu, dear old country!” There was not much sentimentality in the stout little lady's tone, as she looked towards the faint line of mist far astern that marked the English coast. She sat down with Daireen to the leeward of the deck-house where she had laid her rugs, and until the tea-bell rang Daireen had certainly no opportunity for moping.
Mrs. Crawford told her that this Mr. Glaston was a young man of such immense capacities that nothing lay outside his grasp either in art or science. He had not thought it necessary to devote his attention to any subject in particular; but that, Mrs. Crawford thought, was rather because there existed no single subject that he considered worthy of an expenditure of all his energies. As things unfortunately existed, there was nothing left for him but to get rid of the unbounded resources of his mind by applying them to a variety of subjects. He had, in fact, written poetry—never an entire volume of course, but exceedingly clever pieces that had been published in his college magazine. He was capable of painting a great picture if he chose, though he had contented himself with giving ideas to other men who had worked them out through the medium of pictures. He was one of the most accomplished of musicians; and if he had not yet produced an opera or composed even a song, instances were on record of his having performed impromptus that would undoubtedly have made the fame of a professor. He was the son of a Colonial Bishop, Mrs. Crawford told Daireen, and though he lived in England he was still dutiful enough to go out to pay a month's visit to his father every year.
“But we must not make him conceited, Daireen,” said Mrs. Crawford, ending her discourse; “we must not, dear; and if he should look over and see us together this way, he would conclude that we were talking of him.”
Daireen rose with her instructive companion with an uneasy sense of feeling that all they could by their combined efforts contribute to the conceit of a young man who would, upon grounds so slight, come to such a conclusion as Mrs. Crawford feared he might, would be but trifling.
Then the tea-bell rang, and all the novices who had enjoyed the roast pork and dumplings at dinner, descended to make a hearty meal of buttered toast and banana jelly. The sea air had given them an appetite, they declared with much merriment. The chief steward, however, being an experienced man, and knowing that in a few hours the Bay of Biscay would be entered, did not, from observing the hearty manner in which the novices were eating, feel uneasy on the matter of the endurance of the ship's stores. He knew it would be their last meal for some days at least, and he smiled grimly as he laid down another plate of buttered toast, and hastened off to send up some more brandy and biscuits to Major Crawford and Doctor Campion, whose hoarse chuckles called forth by pleasing reminiscences of Cawnpore were dimly heard from the deck through the cabin skylight.