Kitabı oku: «Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 2, February 1886», sayfa 5
CHAPTER XX.
THE DEMONSTRATION
And thus it came to pass that the chief characters of this story found themselves in Ballybay again on its closing day, on exactly the same spot as they were on the day when it opened.
The Land League demonstration was not prepared with any particular care or organization, the Irish people being still, even in the matter of political demonstration, in a state of childish immaturity. It turned out to be better so, for the spontaneous inventiveness of the moment suggested a programme far more dramatic and picturesque than could have occurred to the mind of the most ingenious political stage-manager. The platform had been erected on the spot where the cabin had stood which the son of the Gombeen man had overthrown so many years ago. The field now was laid in grass, which, before the demonstration waved long and green; but as the hours went on and the thousands of feet passed over it, the grass was all crushed and torn. There were half a dozen bands—two of them dressed in the showy uniform which descends from the pictures of Robert Emmet in the dock—and they played continuously and for the most part discordantly. There were also many banners, there was a long procession of men on horseback, and the heads of the horses were covered with green boughs. Green, indeed, was everywhere; there were green banners, green scarves, green neck-ties, and the greater part of the men displayed the green ticket of the Tenant League in their hats. The air of the crowd was in no way serious, the whole affair was rather like a fête than a grave political demonstration. The multitudes, too, had the absence of self-control which characterizes popular demonstrations; their feelings seemed to express themselves without thought or premeditation, speech overflowed rather than fell from their lips. The result was that the cheering was continuous; now it was the arrival of a band; then the erect walk of a sturdy contingent from a distant point; sometimes it was simply the exchange of a look, that, though mute, spoke volumes, between the people in the procession and those on the sidepaths, that brought forth a wild cheer, in short the temper of the crowd was bright and electrical—the mood for unusual ideas and passionate scenes.
The good humor was hearty rather than inventive or articulate, but one man had had the genius to invent a comic device. This was a very wild creature, half beggar, half laborer, the last of a rapidly dying class in Ireland. He had got hold of a wretched nag of whom the knacker had been defrauded for many years and seated on this in fantastic dress he cudgelled it unmercifully, amid screams of laughter, for around its neck was a placard with the words, "Dead Landlordism."
About two o'clock, there was seen making a desperate attempt to penetrate through this teeming, densely-packed, and noisy multitude, a stout figure, with a face ugly, irregular, good-humored. He was dressed in a long and dull-colored and almost shabby ulster. His hat was as rough as if it had been brushed the wrong way, and he wore a suit of tweed that was now very old, but that even in its earliest days would have been scorned by the poorest shopman of the town with any pretensions to respectability, and the trousers were short and painfully bagged at the knees. But the divine light of genius shone from the brown eyes and the ample forehead. The enthusiasm of the multitude now knew no bounds. There was first a strange stillness, then, when the word seemed to have passed with a strange and lightning-like rapidity from mouth to mouth, there burst forth a great cheer, and it was known that Isaac Butt had come.
But even the Irish leader was destined to play a subordinate part in the proceedings of this strange day. It was a local speaker that stirred the hearts of the people to the uttermost, for he told the story of the eviction of the Widow Cunningham, of the death of her husband, the exile of her son, the shame of her daughter.
While he was speaking some one cried, "She'll have her own agin," and then a few of the young fellows disappeared from the platform. In the course of half-an-hour they returned. They ascended the platform, and after a while, and another pause, a strange and audible thrill passed through the multitude; and then there were passed in almost a hoarse whisper the words, "The Widow Cunningham." And she it was; acting on the hint of the speaker, she had been taken from the workhouse; and she was brought back to her old farm again and to the site of her shattered homestead and broken life. The multitude cheered themselves hoarse; hundreds rushed to the platform to seize her by the hand; a few women threw their arms around her neck, and wept and laughed. Finally, the enthusiasm could not be controlled, and, in spite of the entreaties of the political leaders and of the priests, a knot of young men caught the poor old creature up, and carried her around the field in triumph; the crowd everywhere swaying backwards and forwards, divided between the effort to make a way for the strange procession and the desire to catch sight of the old woman. Probably few of the people there could understand the strange effect which this sight had upon them; but their instincts guided them aright in the enthusiasm with which they hailed this visible token of a bad and terrible and irrevocable past.
And how was it with the chief actor in the scene? Five years of life in a workhouse had left no trace of the handsome, long-haired, and passionate woman who had cursed the destroyer of her house and her children with wild vehemence, and had resisted the assault of the Crowbar Brigade with murderous energy. She was now simply a feeble old woman, with scanty grey hair; the light had died out of her eyes; and there was nothing left in them now but weariness and pain; her cheeks were sunk and were dreadfully discolored; in short, she was a poor, feeble, old woman, with broken spirits and dulled brain. The revenge for which she had longed and prayed had come at last; but it had come too late.
She went through the whole scene with curious and unconscious gaze, as of one passing through a waking dream, and the only sign she gave of understanding anything that was going on was that she gave a weak and weary little smile when the people cried out to her enthusiastically, "Bravo, Widow Cunningham!"—a smile as spectral as the state of things of which she was the relic. She was very wearied and almost fainting when she was brought back to the platform; and then she said, in a voice that was a little louder than a whisper, and with a strange wistfulness in her eyes, "I'd like a cup of tay."
But there was no tea to be had, and the thoughtless good-nature of the day helped to precipitate the tragedy which the equally thoughtless enthusiasm had begun. A dozen flasks were produced; a tumbler was taken from the table, and a large quantity of whiskey was poured down her throat. She became feeble, and the rays of intelligence almost disappeared from her face.
At last, as the evening fell, the crowd dispersed; the old pauper was left by the men who had brought her to the platform, and there were but a couple of women more watchful than the rest to take care of her. They tried to bring her home, but she showed a strange kind of obstinacy, and refused for a long time to move. When she was got to make a stir she seemed most unwilling to go in the direction of the workhouse, she would give no reason—for indeed she seemed either unable or unwilling to speak at all, but with the silent obstinacy of an animal she tried to go in an opposite direction. At last the two women thought it wisest to humor her, and let her go where she wished. By this time night had completely fallen, and in going down a dark boreen she managed to escape from her companions altogether. They searched everywhere around, and at last frightened, they went home for their husbands. A party of five people—the husbands, the son of one of them, and the two women came along the boreen, guided by the dim light of the farthing dip which is the only light the Irish farmer has yet been able to use. After a long search they came to a spot well known to all of them, and then the truth burst suddenly upon them. One of the women had been at the funeral of the Widow Cunningham's husband when she was a little girl, and remembered the spot where he was buried. They all followed her there in a strange anxiety, and their anticipations proved right. On the grave of her husband they found the Widow Cunningham, and she was a corpse.
CHAPTER XXI.
DEAD MAN'S ISLAND
There was one person in Ballybay at least who envied the woman that lay forever free from life's fitful fever. The day's demonstration in the town had brought no joy to Mat's heart. He had not yet learned to make any distinction between the agitators who had broken his own life and murdered the hopes of his country, and the very different class of men who had brought new life and hope to the Irish nation. The whole business of the meeting to him, therefore, appeared nothing but gabble, treason, and folly. He spent his hours, after a scornful look or two at the preparations for the speeches of the day, in wandering through the fields and streets which he had known in boyhood, and appeared to have left so very, very long ago. Every sight deepened his depression. He thought of the first day he had spent in the town long ago, when he visited Ballybay for the first time after years of absence. Then he thought that he had exhausted the possibilities of grief over the waste of a nation's life; but he now found that there were deeper depths and larger possibilities of suffering in the Irish tragedy. Famine, plague, a whirlwind, or an earthquake could not, as he thought, have worked mischief more deadly, more appalling, more complete. He saw, with a curious sinking of the heart and an overwhelming sadness, that nearly every well-remembered spot of his boyhood was marked by the ruins of a desolated home. Here was the corner where he used to turn from the one to the two mile round—as two of the walks around Ballybay were called—but where was the house with its crowd of noisy children, which he saw every morning with the same confident familiarity as a well-remembered piece of furniture in his own house? Yes: there was the little road where he remembered to have stood one day so many years ago. It was a bright, beautiful day in summer, the sky was blue, and the roses bloomed; but everything was dark to him, for Betty, his first nurse, the strongest affection of his childhood, had retired to her mother's home the day before. And as he recalled how all the world seemed to be over for him on that day, he felt the full brotherhood of sorrow, and in one moment understood all the tragic significance of the separation which emigration had caused in more than a million Irish homes. The road had changed as though the country had been turned from a civilized to a savage land. The grass was growing thick and rank, the roses had gone, thick weeds choked festering pools, and of the little cottage in which Betty had dwelt there was not even a vestige.
And so, alas, in the town. At its entrance a whole street had disappeared, black and charred the walls stood—silent and deserted. This constant recurrence of the symbols of separation, desertion, silence, death, produced a strange numbness in his mind, and he walked along in a dream that became deeper and deeper. But he saw everything with the obscurity, and still with the strange, piercing look, of the dreamer. Turning from the houses to the people, he saw as it were in a flash the true meaning of that weary look which he had first observed as the prevalent expression of most faces; he loathed and at the same time he understood the prematurely bloated and blotched faces of so many of the young men whom he met everywhere, and read the story of the hopeless struggle against daily deepening gloom which had sought desperate relief in whiskey. He understood the procession of sad, and, as in his exalted mood he thought, spectral, men and women, that flowed in a noiseless stream to the chapel. It was May, "the month of Mary," as it is so touchingly called in Ireland, and in that month there are devotions every night in honor of the Mother of God. It was with difficulty he restrained his tears as there rose from the voices of the congregation the well-known and well-remembered hymn to the Blessed Virgin—the fitting wail of a people who dwell in a land of sorrows.
"Hail, Holy Queen, Mother of Mercy. Our Life, Our Sweetness, and Our Hope, to thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve, to thee do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this valley of tears." How well he recalled the evening long ago, when the hymn first struck him as the wail from the helpless agony of a dying nation.
Then Mat went home, and, as he entered the house, he noticed with the new-born light in his eyes many things that had escaped his attention when he first entered there in the morning. His father, as he answered the door, seemed to him to have aged ten years since he had looked at him in the morning, and he saw with a pang that seemed to squeeze his heart as in a vice that his clothes were shabby, and that even his boots were patched and broken. Then he went upstairs, and, entering the parlor noiselessly, caught sight of his mother. She turned sharply around, and to his horror and surprise he saw a fierce, violent blush overspread her pale cheek. He could not help looking at the table, and there he saw the same dread sight that had met him at so many painful crises in his life, for his mother was examining bank bills and pawn tickets. Then he rushed back in memory to the days of his own childhood, when he had wondered why it was that his mother occasionally wept as she turned over these mysterious slips of blue paper and small pieces of stiff card. The abject failure of his life never appeared to him so clearly as it did at that moment, and the sense of complete disaster was aggravated by the awful feeling that he had made others suffer even more bitterly than himself. And for a moment it seemed, too, as if his mother were resolved that he should taste the full bitterness of the moral, for she looked at him fixedly as the blush died from her cheeks; but her heart was too touched by his look of pain, and in a moment she had kissed him on the cheek, after the frigid and self-restrained fashion of Ballybay.
Mat had a battle with himself as to whether he should visit Mary on this day; but after a while he felt that it would be a sort of savage triumph if he could fill the whole day with all the pain that could be packed within its hours. He had no idea as yet what he was going to do with the morrow, but it would certainly bring some new departure; this day he was, for this reason, the more resolutely ready to abandon to the luxury of woe.
Mary was alone when he visited the house; her husband had left town, for he did not dare, with all his courage, to aggravate the popular hatred by being visible on the day of the demonstration. She came into the room and shook hands with him, to his surprise, without any appearance of embarrassment. He looked at her without a word for a few moments, while she asked a few questions in a perfectly natural tone of voice about the meeting, his imprisonment, etc. As he looked he thought he saw a strange and mournful change in her face. The features seemed to have grown not merely hard, but coarse. He remembered the time when her upper lip had appeared to his eyes short, expressive, elegant; now it seemed to have grown long and vulgar. Her dark eyes were cold and impenetrable.
For a while they talked about indifferent things, but though he had sworn to himself a thousand times that he would never utter a word about her broken troth, his nerves were still too shaken and unsteady, after his sufferings in prison and the wearing experiences through which he had passed, to allow him to maintain complete self-control.
"And so you married Cosgrave," he said, as a beginning.
She looked at him sharply, and then answered, in the same cold and perfectly collected voice, "Yes, I married Cosgrave."
"Are you happy?"
"Yes."
"You never cared for me?" he said with bitterness; and then the venom, which had been choking him from the hour when he heard that his betrothed was gone, overflowed. He went on, in a voice that grew hoarse in its vehemence: "Look! I have been four years in prison; in the company of burglars, pickpockets, murderers; I have been kept in silence and solitude and restraint; and yet in all these four years I never suffered a pang so horrible as when I heard that you had proved untrue."
"No," she answered, with a stillness that sounded strangely after the high-pitched and passionate tones of his voice; "I was not untrue, for I was faithful to my highest duty." Then she paused, and when next she spoke her voice was also passionate; but it was passion that was expressed in low and biting, and not in a loud tone. "You have known the life of a prison: but you have not passed through the hell of Irish poverty."… Then, after a pause, in which she seemed buried in an agonizing retrospect, she said—"I would marry a cripple to help my family."
She had scarcely said these words when her father entered. The father was as much changed in Mat's eyes as the daughter; he could scarcely walk; his feet seemed just able to bear him; and his hand was palsied. He did not at first recognize Mat; and when at last he knew who it was, said in the old voice, the familiar words which Mat so loathed, "Ah! the crachure! Ah! the crachure!"
Mat now had the key to the hideous tragedy which had separated him from the woman he loved, and who loved him. He looked quickly at her; but the light of momentary excitement had died out of the face, and the expression was now perfectly serene. Several reflections passed rapidly through Mat's mind. He saw clearly that the girl had not a particle of self-reproach; not a doubt of the rectitude or even the nobility of her conduct; she had immolated herself with the same inflexible resolve and unquestioning faith as the sublime murderer of Marat. Then passing rapidly in mental review the history of so many self-murdered hearts, he asked which was the more cruel—the Irish or the Indian suttee. Perhaps in that moment Mat gained more knowledge than is given to other men in years of that strangest of all, even feminine, problems—an Irish girl's heart.
For a moment the two were left alone, for the first and only time in all their lives.
"What?" said Mat, in an audible soliloquy, "is Irish life?" And then he answered the question himself as she remained silent. "A tragedy, a squalid tragedy!" But she looked at him cold, irresponsive, defiant, and he rushed away before the old man came back with the whiskey.
The wreck of this girl's nature; her acceptance in full faith of the sordid and terrible gospel of loveless marriage; the omnipotence of even a little money in a land of abject and hopeless and helpless poverty, brought the realities of Irish life with a clearness to his mind more terrible than even uprooted houses and echoless streets.
He accepted the invitation of a friend to take a row up the river, beautiful with its eternal and changeless beauty amid all this wreck of hopes and blasting of lives.
They passed a small island.
"What is that called," asked Mat of the boatman.
"Dead Man's Island."
"What did you say?"
"Dead Man's Island."
"A–h,–Dead—Man's—Island!"
The End
Going on Foot to Rome.—In these days, when pilgrims go to Rome and Jerusalem by railway and steamer, it is refreshing to hear that the old-fashioned pilgrim may still be found. The last of these appears to be Ignacio Martinez, a native of Valladolid, who has nearly completed his pilgrimage to the Holy Place begun two years ago.
The Boys in Green
After reading the Reminiscences of the Ninth Massachusetts, Volunteers, published in late numbers of Donahoe's, it occurred to the writer that a few incidents which came under my own personal observation, in which that regiment figured, occurring over twenty-three years ago, may be of interest to the survivors of the gallant Ninth, or their descendants. It may also interest the general public, and your Irish-American readers in particular, for my experience will speak more particularly of the corps with which my fortunes were cast—Gen. Thomas Francis Meagher's Irish Brigade. It was originally composed of three regiments, viz., Sixty-Third New York, Eighty-Eighth New York, and Sixty-Ninth New York, all organized in New York City, but some of its companies hailing from Albany, Boston, etc. The writer of this was connected with the Albany Company K, Sixty-Third Regiment, in the capacity of "high private" when the regiment was organized. This paper is merely intended to give an account of a few incidents in which the brigade participated, not by any means as a history of that organization.
It is well known to those familiar with events at the beginning of the war, that the Washington authorities decided to change McClellan's base of operations in the movement against the rebel capital (Richmond, Va.), to the Peninsula. Accordingly, in the spring of 1862, over one hundred thousand men and material of the Army of the Potomac, at that time, and subsequently, the largest and best disciplined body of troops in the service of the Republic, were sent by water to Fortress Monroe, Ship Point, and adjacent places for disembarkation. Very few people in civil life have any conception of the labor attending an operation of this kind. Not alone was this immense body of men carried by water, but all the material as well: heavy and field artillery; animals for the same; horses for the cavalry; and baggage, ammunition and supply trains. Thanks to the superiority of our navy at the time, the movement was entirely successful. It is true a few sailing crafts, and some armed rebel vessels showed themselves; but they took refuge up the York, Pamunkey, Elizabeth and James Rivers, to be afterwards destroyed as the Union Army advanced.
The writer was at the time on detached service (recruiting) in New York City; but at the period the advanced vessels of the Flotilla reached the Peninsula he received orders to rejoin his regiment. Accordingly I left Albany (depot for recruits) April 11, 1862, in charge of twenty-two men, eleven for Sixty-Third and eleven for Eighty-Eighth Regiments, reaching Fort Monroe April 14, by steamer from Washington. I shall never forget the impression made on my civilian mind as we steamed under the frowning guns of the weather-beaten Fort, in the gray of the morning. It impressed me with awe, as the black muzzles of the "War Dogs" bade defiance in their silent grandeur to rebels in arms and European enemies, who, at the time, entertained anything but friendly feelings towards the Republic.
The achievement of the famous Monitor was, at the time, in everybody's mouth. Your older readers will remember how the "Yankee Cheese-Box," the gallant Worden in command, put in appearance in Hampton Roads, a day or two after the finest wooden war ships in the government service were sent to the bottom, by the guns and ram of the rebel Merrimac. When the saucy, insignificant-looking craft boldly steamed for the victorious rebel iron-clad, the officers on board could not believe their senses, never having seen anything like the mysterious stranger before; but when fire and smoke belched forth from the Monitor's revolving turret, they were reminded that they had better look to their guns. Not being able to damage the stranger with their British cannon, the rebel tried the effect of its powerful ram; but the "cheese-box" divining its intentions, nimbly got out of harm's way. Its powerful eleven-inch guns in the turret continued to pound the iron sides of the Merrimac, until the latter thought "discretion the better part of valor," and sought safety in flight by ascending the Elizabeth River to Norfolk, not before being badly damaged in the encounter. Notwithstanding the rebel had numerous guns of the most approved pattern, their shot glanced harmlessly from the Monitor's revolving turret, the only object visible above water. You may think we looked upon the champion with no little pleasure as she peacefully lay in the channel, with steam up, waiting for the appearance of its powerful adversary, which never came. (The Merrimac was so badly damaged in the encounter, its commander, Jones, blew her up sooner than see her in the enemy's hands.) The masts of the ill-fated Cumberland and her consorts were plainly visible in the distance, where they sank with their brave tars standing nobly by their guns.
I am afraid the editor of the Magazine will get impatient with my description before coming to the Ninth. The writer goes into these particulars because another generation has come on the scene since they happened, and it may interest them.
After landing with my detachment of twenty-two men, we turned our faces landward to find the army then moving towards Richmond. On the way we passed through the village of Hampton, and subsequently were much interested in looking over the battlefield of Big Bethel, where Magruder made his first fight on the Peninsula, not long previous, and where the Union troops were roughly handled. Gen. Joseph B. Carr, of Troy, N. Y., in command of the Second New York Volunteers, one of the most successful Irish-American soldiers of the late war, took a prominent part in this battle. It is thought he would have retrieved the blunders of some of the Union officers, if he had not been ordered to retire by Gen. B. F. Butler, who was in command. Gen. Carr is now serving out his third successive term as Secretary of State of New York. He recently ran for Lieutenant Governor on the Republican ticket; and although he failed to get elected, he ran nearly nine thousand votes ahead of his ticket. The rebel field works were just as they left them. The neighboring forests told the story of the desperate conflict by the manner in which they were torn from the effects of the artillery.
It was a long and tedious journey before we struck the army of "Little Mac;" and when the shades of night began to envelope us, the little squad was footsore, tired and hungry, having covered twenty-four miles since leaving the steamer. To add to our inconvenience, we had eaten nothing since leaving the vessel, and then a limited supply of "hard tack," washed down with coffee. The location of Meagher's Brigade was among the uncertainties. All our inquiries of troops in the vicinity were fruitless.
Learning from the men of a battery, encamped on the edge of a clearing, that an Irish Regiment was not far distant, inquired the name (State and number).
"I think, sergeant," said the officer addressed, "that it is an Irish Regiment from Massachusetts, but I do not know the number; they have an Irish flag anyhow." Thanking the captain for the information, we sought the locality of the Irish boys and their green flag.
"Halt! who comes there?" demanded a sentinel, pacing his beat, a few yards from the road, as the squad approached in the twilight.
"Friends!" was the response.
"Advance, friends, and give the countersign!"
We had no "countersign," and could not give it. I did the next best thing, and addressed the sentinel thus:
"We are Union soldiers, trying to find our regiment, having landed this morning at Fortress Monroe. We are tired and without anything to eat, since early this morning. Be good enough to tell us the name of that regiment yonder."
"That is the Ninth Massachusetts, Col. Tom Cass," was his response.
"Call the corporal of the guard; I would like to see the colonel."
"Corporal of the guard, Post Five!" he lustily called out, at the top of his voice.
"Corporal of the guard, Post Five!" was repeated in succession by the respective posts; bringing that officer on the run, in a few minutes to the post designated.
I repeated the request to the "corporal of the guard," a bright little man, about twenty-four years old. He requested us to remain where we were until the "officer of the guard" was consulted, "for ye know we are in the enemy's counthry, and we must be cautious." We assented, of course. Presently a lieutenant made his appearance, and after hearing our story, told us to follow him. We passed the guard and made our way to the colonel's quarters, before which a soldier was leisurely pacing. The lieutenant entered, but returned in a moment and desired me to follow him. I did so, and found myself in a group of officers. I saluted and came to "attention."
"Well, sergeant, what can we do for you?" kindly asked an officer with the eagles of a colonel on his shoulders.
"We are benighted, sir; my men and I landed at the Fort this morning, and are on the way to find our regiments. We have had nothing to eat in twelve hours. We're hungry and tired, and claim your hospitality for the night."
"May I ask what command you belong to, sir?"
"My regiment is the Sixty-Third New York, colonel, and the detachment is for that regiment and the Eighty-Eighth New York."
"What! Gen. Meagher, the Irish Brigade! Consider yourself at home, sergeant. The best in our camp is at your service. You can have all you can eat and drink, and a place to rest. Orderly," addressing a soldier in front of the tent, "send Sergeant – to me."
"I see by your chevrons you are a non-commissioned officer. May I ask your name?" addressing me.
"Sergeant J– D–, Company K, colonel," was my response.
The sergeant made his appearance, and Col. Cass (for we learned, subsequently, it was he) gave him directions to take Sergeant D–and his men, and give them everything they wanted for the night, and their breakfast before leaving in the morning. As we were about retiring the colonel remarked:—
"The night is chilly, sergeant; fog is heavy, malaria abroad, and you are tired. Wouldn't you like something in the way of liquid refreshments?"
