Project Gutenberg's My Lady of the Chimney Corner, by Alexander Irvine This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org Title: My Lady of the Chimney Corner Author: Alexander Irvine Release Date: March 25, 2010 [EBook #31765] Language: English Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY LADY OF THE CHIMNEY CORNER *** Produced by Suzanne Shell, Joseph R. Hauser and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net MY LADY OF THE CHIMNEY CORNER BY ALEXANDER IRVINE AUTHOR OF "FROM THE BOTTOM UP," ETC. NEW YORK THE CENTURY CO. 1914 Copyright 1913, by THE CENTURY CO. Published, August, 1913 TO LADY GREGORY AND THE PLAYERS OF THE ABBEY THEATRE DUBLIN FOREWORD This book is the torn manuscript of the most beautiful life I ever knew. I have merely pieced and patched it together, and have not even changed or disguised the names of the little group of neighbors who lived with us, at "the bottom of the world." CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I Love is Enough 3 II The Wolf and the Carpenter 21 III Rehearsing for the Show 38 IV Sunday in Pogue's Entry 63 V His Arm is not Shortened 85 VI The Apotheosis of Hughie Thornton 110 VII In the Glow of a Peat Fire 133 VIII The Wind Bloweth Where it Listeth 153 IX "Beyond th' Meadows an' th' Clouds" 171 X The Empty Corner 198 MY LADY OF THE CHIMNEY-CORNER A. I. [Pg 3] A A STORY OF LOVE AND POVERTY IN IRISH PEASANT LIFE CHAPTER I LOVE IS ENOUGH NNA'S purty, an' she's good as well as purty, but th' beauty an' goodness that's hers is short lived, I'm thinkin'," said old Bridget McGrady to her neighbor Mrs. Tierney, as Mrs. Gilmore passed the door, leading her five-year-old girl, Anna, by the hand. The old women were sitting on the doorstep as the worshipers came down the lane from early mass on a summer morning. "Thrue for you, Bridget, for th' do say that th' Virgin takes all sich childther before they're ten." "Musha, but Mrs. Gilmore'll take on terrible," continued Mrs. Tierney, "but th' will of God must be done." Anna was dressed in a dainty pink dress. A wide blue ribbon kept her wealth of jet black hair in order as it hung down her back and the squeaking of her little shoes drew attention to the fact that they were new and in the fashion. "It's a mortal pity she's a girl," said Bridget, "bekase she might hev been an althar boy before she goes." "Aye, but if she was a bhoy shure there's no tellin' what divilmint she'd get into; so maybe it's just as well." The Gilmores lived on a small farm near Crumlin in County Antrim. They were not considered "well to do," neither were they poor. They worked hard and by dint of economy managed to keep their children at school. Anna was a favorite child. Her quiet demeanor and gentle disposition drew to her many considerations denied the rest of the family. She was a favorite in the community. By the old women she was considered "too good to live"; she took "kindly" to the house of God. Her teacher said, "Anna has a great head for learning." This expression, oft repeated, gave the Gilmores an ambition to prepare Anna for teaching. Despite the schedule arranged for her she was confirmed in the parish chapel at the age of ten. At fifteen she had exhausted the educational facilities of the community and set her heart on institutions of higher learning in the larger cities. While her parents were figuring that way the boys of the parish were figuring in a different direction. Before Anna was seventeen there was scarcely a boy living within miles who had not at one time or another lingered around the gate of the Gilmore garden. Mrs. Gilmore watched Anna carefully. She warned her against the danger of an alliance with a boy of a lower station. The girl was devoted to the Church. She knew her Book of Devotions as few of the older people knew it, and before she was twelve she had read the Lives of the Saints. None of these things made her an ascetic. She could laugh heartily and had a keen sense of humor. The old women revised their prophecies. They now spoke of her "takin' th' veil." Some said she would make "a gey good schoolmisthress," for she was fond of children. While waiting the completion of arrangements to continue her schooling, she helped her mother with the household work. She spent a good deal of her time, too, in helping the old and disabled of the village. She carried water to them from the village well and tidied up their cottages at least once a week. The village well was the point of departure in many a romance. There the boys and girls met several times a day. Many a boy's first act of chivalry was to take the girl's place under the hoop that kept the cans apart and carry home the supply of water. Half a century after the incident that played havoc with the dreams and visions of which she was the central figure, Anna said to me: "I was fillin' my cans at th' well. He was standin' there lukin' at me. "'Wud ye mind,' says he, 'if I helped ye?' "'Deed no, not at all,' says I. So he filled my cans an' then says he: 'I would give you a nice wee cow if I cud carry thim home fur ye.' "'It's not home I'm goin',' says I, 'but to an' oul neighbor who can't carry it herself.' "'So much th' betther fur me,' says he, an' off he walked between the cans. At Mary McKinstry's doore that afthernoon we stood till the shadows began t' fall." From the accounts rendered, old Mary did not lack for water-carriers for months after that. One evening Mary made tea for the water-carriers and after tea she "tossed th' cups" for them. "Here's two roads, dear," she said to Anna, "an' wan day ye'll haave t' choose betwixt thim. On wan road there's love an' clane teeth (poverty), an' on t'other riches an' hell on earth." [Pg 4] [Pg 5] [Pg 6] [Pg 7] [Pg 8] "What else do you see on the roads, Mary?" Anna asked. "Plenty ov childther on th' road t' clane teeth, an' dogs an' cats on th' road t' good livin'." "What haave ye fur me, Mary?" Jamie Irvine, Anna's friend, asked. She took his cup, gave it a shake, looked wise and said: "Begorra, I see a big cup, me bhoy—it's a cup o' grief I'm thinkin' it is." "Oul Mary was jist bletherin'," he said, as they walked down the road in the gloaming, hand in hand. "A cup of sorrow isn't so bad, Jamie, when there's two to drink it," Anna said. He pressed her hand tighter and replied: "Aye, that's thrue, fur then it's only half a cup." Jamie was a shoemaker's apprentice. His parents were very poor. The struggle for existence left time for nothing else. As the children reached the age of eight or nine they entered the struggle. Jamie began when he was eight. He had never spent a day at school. His family considered him fortunate, however, that he could be an apprentice. The cup that old Mary saw in the tea leaves seemed something more than "blether" when it was noised abroad that Anna and Jamie were to be married. The Gilmores strenuously objected. They objected because they had another career mapped out for Anna. Jamie was illiterate, too, and she was well educated. He was a Protestant and she an ardent Catholic. Illiteracy was common enough and might be overlooked, but a mixed marriage was unthinkable. The Irvines, on the other hand, although very poor, could see nothing but disaster in marriage with a Catholic, even though she was as "pure and beautiful as the Virgin." "It's a shame an' a scandal," others said, "that a young fella who can't read his own name shud marry sich a nice girl wi' sich larnin'." Jamie made some defense but it wasn't convincing. "Doesn't the Bible say maan an' wife are wan?" he asked Mrs. Gilmore in discussing the question with her. "Aye." "Well, when Anna an' me are wan won't she haave a thrade an' won't I haave an education?" "That's wan way ov lukin' at a vexed question, but you're th' only wan that luks at it that way!" "There's two," Anna said. "That's how I see it." When Jamie became a journeyman shoemaker, the priest was asked to perform the marriage ceremony. He refused and there was nothing left to do but get a man who would give love as big a place as religion, and they were married by the vicar of the parish church. Not in the memory of man in that community had a wedding created so little interest in one way and so much in another. They were both "turncoats," the people said, and they were shunned by both sides. So they drank their first big draft of the "cup o' grief" on their wedding-day. "Sufferin' will be yer portion in this world," Anna's mother told her, "an' in th' world t' come separation from yer maan." Anna kissed her mother and said: "I've made my choice, mother, I've made it before God, and as for Jamie's welfare in the next world, I'm sure that love like his would turn either Limbo, Purgatory or Hell into a very nice place to live in!" A few days after the wedding the young couple went out to the four cross-roads. Jamie stood his staff on end and said: "Are ye ready, dear?" "Aye, I'm ready, but don't tip it in the direction of your preference!" He was inclined toward Dublin, she toward Belfast. They laughed. Jamie suddenly took his hand from the staff and it fell, neither toward Belfast nor Dublin, but toward the town of Antrim, and toward Antrim they set out on foot. It was a distance of less than ten miles, but it was the longest journey she ever took—and the shortest, for she had all the world beside her, and so had Jamie. It was in June, and they had all the time there was. There was no hurry. They were as care-free as children and utilized their freedom in full. Between Moira and Antrim they came to Willie Withero's stone pile. Willie was Antrim's most noted stone-breaker in those days. He was one of the town's news centers. At his stone-pile he got the news going and coming. He was a strange mixture of philosophy and cynicism. He had a rough exterior and spoke in short, curt, snappish sentences, but behind it all he had a big heart full of kindly human feeling. [Pg 9] [Pg 10] [Pg 11] [Pg 12] [Pg 13] "Anthrim's a purty good place fur pigs an' sich to live in," he told the travelers. "Ye see, pigs is naither Fenians nor Orangemen. I get along purty well m'self bekase I sit on both sides ov th' fence at th' same time." "How do you do it, Misther Withero?" Anna asked demurely. "Don't call me 'Misther,'" Willie said; "only quality calls me 'Misther' an' I don't like it—it doesn't fit an honest stone breaker." The question was repeated and he said: "I wear a green ribbon on Pathrick's Day an' an orange cockade on th' Twelfth ov July, an' if th' ax m' why, I tell thim t' go t' h—l! That's Withero fur ye an' wan ov 'im is enough fur Anthrim, that's why I niver married, an' that'll save ye the throuble ov axin' me whither I've got a wife or no!" "What church d'ye attend, Willie?" Jamie asked. "Church is it, ye're axin' about? Luk here, me bhoy, step over th' stile." Willie led the way over into the field. "Step over here, me girl." Anna followed. A few yards from the hedge there was an ant-hill. "See thim ants?" "Aye." "Now if Withero thought thim ants hated aych other like th' men ov Anthrim d'ye know what I'd do?" "What?" "I'd pour a kittle ov boilin' wather on thim an' roast th' hides off ivery mother's son ov thim. Aye, that's what I'd do, shure as gun's iron!" "That would be a sure and speedy cure," Anna said, smiling. "What's this world but an ant-hill?" he asked. "Jist a big ant-hill an' we're ants begorra an' uncles, but instead ov workin' like these wee fellas do—help aych other an' shouldther aych other's burdens, an' build up th' town, an' forage fur fodder, begobs we cut aych other's throats over th' color ov ribbon or th' kind ov a church we attind! Ugh, what balderdash!" The stone-breaker dropped on his knees beside the ant-hill and eyed the manœuvering of the ants. "Luk here!" he said. They looked in the direction of his pointed finger and observed an ant dragging a dead fly over the hill. "Jist watch that wee fella!" They watched. The ant had a big job, but it pulled and pushed the big awkward carcass over the side of the hill. A second ant came along, sized up the situation, and took a hand. "Ha, ha!" he chortled, "that's th' ticket, now kape yez eye on him!" The ants dragged the fly over the top of the hill and stuffed it down a hole. "Now," said Withero, "if a fella in Anthrim wanted a han' th' other fellah wud say: 'Where d'ye hing yer hat up on Sunday?' or some other sich fool question!" "He wud that." "Now mind ye, I'm not huffed at th' churches, aither Orange or Green, or th' praychers aither—tho 'pon m' sowl ivery time I luk at wan o' thim I think ov God as a first class journeyman tailor! But I get more good switherin' over an ant-hill than whin wan o' thim wee praychers thry t' make me feel as miserable as th' divil!" "There's somethin' in that," Jamie said. "Aye, ye kin bate a pair ov oul boots there is!" "What will th' ants do wi' th' fly?" Jamie asked. "Huh!" he grunted with an air of authority, "they'll haave rump steaks fur tay and fly broth fur breakvist th' morra!" "Th' don't need praychers down there, do th', Willie?" "Don't need thim up here!" he said. "They're sign-boards t' point th' way that iverybody knows as well as th' nose on his face!" "Good-by," Anna said, as they prepared to leave. "Good-by, an' God save ye both kindly," were Willie's parting words. He adjusted the wire protectors to his eyes and the sojourners went on down the road. They found a mossy bank and unpacked their dinner. "Quare, isn't he?" Jamie said. [Pg 14] [Pg 15] [Pg 16] [Pg 17] F "He has more sense than any of our people." "That's no compliment t' Withero, Anna, but I was jist thinkin' about our case; we've got t' decide somethin' an' we might as well decide it here as aanywhere." "About religion, Jamie?" "Aye." "I've decided." "When?" "At the ant-hill." "Ye cudn't be Withero?" "No, dear, Willie sees only half th' world. There's love in it that's bigger than color of ribbon or creed of church. We've proven that, Jamie, haven't we?" "But what haave ye decided?" "That love is bigger than religion. That two things are sure. One is love of God. He loves all His children and gets huffed at none. The other is that the love we have for each other is of the same warp and woof as His for us, and love is enough, Jamie." "Aye, love is shure enough an' enough's as good as a faste, but what about childther if th' come, Anna?" "We don't cross a stile till we come to it, do we?" "That's right, that's right, acushla; now we're as rich as lords, aren't we, but I'm th' richest, amn't I? I've got you an' you've only got me." "I've got book learning, but you've got love and a trade, what more do I want? You've got more love than any man that ever wooed a woman—so I'm richer, amn't I?" "Oh, God," Jamie said, "but isn't this th' lovely world, eh, Anna?" Within a mile of Antrim they saw a cottage, perched on a high bluff by the roadside. It was reached by stone steps. They climbed the steps to ask for a drink of water. They were kindly received. The owner was a follower of Wesley and his conversation at the well was in sharp contrast to the philosophy at the stone-pile. The young journeyman and his wife were profoundly impressed with the place. The stone cottage was vine-clad. There were beautiful trees and a garden. The June flowers were in bloom and a cow grazed in the pasture near by. "Some day we'll haave a home like this," Jamie said as they descended the steps. Anna named it "The Mount of Temptation," for it was the nearest she had ever been to the sin of envy. A one-armed Crimean pensioner named Steele occupied it during my youth. It could be seen from Pogue's entry and Anna used to point it out and tell the story of that memorable journey. In days when clouds were heavy and low and the gaunt wolf stood at the door she would say: "Do you mind the journey to Antrim, Jamie?" "Aye," he would say with a sigh, "an' we've been in love ever since, haven't we, Anna?" CHAPTER II THE WOLF AND THE CARPENTER OR a year after their arrival in Antrim they lived in the home of the master-shoemaker for whom Jamie worked as journeyman. It was a great hardship, for there was no privacy and their daily walk and conversation, in front of strangers, was of the "yea, yea" and "nay, nay" order. In the summer time they spent their Sundays on the banks of Lough Neagh, taking whatever food they needed and cooking it on the sand. They continued their courting in that way. They watched the water-fowl on the great wide marsh, they waded in the water and played as children play. In more serious moods she read to him Moore's poems and went over the later lessons of her school life. Even with but part of a day in each week together they were very happy. The world was full of sunshine for them then. There were no clouds, no regrets, no fears. It was a period—a brief period—that for the rest of their lives they looked back upon as a time when they really lived. I am not sure, but I am of the impression that the chief reason she could not be persuaded to visit the Lough in later life was because she wanted to remember it as she had seen it in that first year of their married life. Their first child was two years of age when the famine came—the famine that swept over Ireland like a plague, [Pg 18] [Pg 19] [Pg 20] [Pg 21] [Pg 22] leaving in its wake over a million new-made graves. They had been in their own house for over a year. It was scantily furnished, but it was home. As the ravages of the famine spread, nearly every family in the town mourned the absence of some member. Men and women met on the street, one day were gone the next. Jamie put his bench to one side and sought work at anything he could get to do. Prices ran up beyond the possibilities of the poor. The potato crop only failed. The other crops were reaped and the proceeds sent to England as rent and interest, and the reapers having sent the last farthing, lay down with their wives and children and died. Of the million who died four hundred thousand were able-bodied men. The wolf stood at every door. The carpenter alone was busy. Of course it was the poor who died—the poor only. In her three years of married life Anna realized in a measure that the future held little change for her or her husband, but she saw a ray of hope for the boy in the cradle. When the foodless days came and the child was not getting food enough to survive, she gave vent to her feelings of despair. Jamie did not quite understand when she spoke of the death of hope. "Spake what's in yer heart plainly, Anna!" he said plaintively. "Jamie, we must not blame each other for anything, but we must face the fact—we live at the bottom of the world where every hope has a headstone—a headstone that only waits for the name." "Aye, dear, God help us, I know, I know what ye mane." "Above and beyond us," she continued, "there is a world of nice things—books, furniture, pictures—a world where people and things can be kept clean, but it's a world we could never reach. But I had hope"— She buried her face in her hands and was silent. "Aye, aye, acushla, I know yer hope's in the boy, but don't give up. We'll fight it out together if th' worst comes to th' worst. The boy'll live, shure he will!" He could not bear the agony on her face. It distracted him. He went out and sought solitude on a pile of stones back of the house. There was no solitude there, nor could he have remained long if there had been. He returned and drawing a stool up close beside her he sat down and put an arm tenderly over her shoulder. "Cheer up, wee girl," he said, "our ship's comin' in soon." "If we can only save him!" she said, pointing to the cradle. "Well, we won't cry over spilt milk, dear—not at laste until it's spilt." "Ah," she exclaimed, "I had such hopes for him!" "Aye, so haave I, but thin again I've thought t' myself, suppose th' wee fella did get t' be kind-a quality like, wudn't he be ashamed ov me an' you maybe, an' shure an ingrate that's somethin' is worse than nothin'!" "A child born in pure love couldn't be an ingrate, Jamie; that isn't possible, dear." "Ah, who knows what a chile will be, Anna?" The child awoke and began to cry. It was a cry for food. There was nothing in the house; there had been nothing all that day. They looked at each other. Jamie turned away his face. He arose and left the house. He went aimlessly down the street wondering where he should try for something to eat for the child. There were several old friends whom he supposed were in the same predicament, but to whom he had not appealed. It was getting to be an old story. A score of as good children as his had been buried. Everybody was polite, full of sympathy, but the child was losing his vitality, so was the mother. Something desperate must be done and done at once. For the third time he importuned a grocer at whose shop he had spent much money. The grocer was just putting up the window shutters for the night. "If ye cud jist spare us a ha'p'orth ov milk to keep th' life in th' chile fur th' night?" he pleaded. "It wudn't be a thimbleful if I had it, Jamie, but I haven't—we haave childther ov our own, ye know, an' life is life!" "Aye, aye," he said, "I know, I know," and shuffled out again. Back to the house he went. He lifted the latch gently and tiptoed in. Anna was rocking the child to sleep. He went softly to the table and took up a tin can and turned again toward the door. Anna divined his stealthy movement. She was beside him in an instant. "Where are you going, Jamie?" He hesitated. She forced an answer. "Jamie," she said in a tone new to her, "there's been nothing but truth and love between us; I must know." "I'm goin' out wi' that can to get somethin' fur that chile, Anna, if I haave t' swing fur it. That's what's in my mind an' God help me!" "God help us both," she said. He moved toward the street. She planted herself between him and the door. [Pg 23] [Pg 24] [Pg 25] [Pg 26] [Pg 27] "No, we must stand together. They'll put you in jail and then the child and I will die anyway. Let's wait another day!" They sat down together in the corner. It was dark now and they had no candle. The last handful of turf was on the fire. They watched the sparks play and the fitful spurts of flame light up for an instant at a time the darkened home. It was a picture of despair—the first of a long series that ran down the years with them. They sat in silence for a long time. Then they whispered to each other with many a break the words they had spoken in what now seemed to them the long ago. The fire died out. They retired, but not to sleep. They were too hungry. There was an insatiable gnawing at their vitals that made sleep impossible. It was like a cancer with excruciating pain added. Sheer exhaustion only, stilled the cries of the starving child. There were no more tears in their eyes, but anguish has by-valves more keen, poignant and subtle. In agony they lay in silence and counted time by the repercussion of pain until the welcome dawn came with its new supply of hope. The scream of a frenzied mother who had lost a child in the night was the prelude to a tragic day. Anna dressed quickly and in a few minutes stood by the side of the woman. There was nothing to say. Nothing to do. It was her turn. It would be Anna's next. All over the town the specter hovered. Every day the reaper garnered a new harvest of human sheaves. Every day the wolf barked. Every day the carpenter came. When Anna returned Jamie had gone. She took her station by the child. Jamie took the tin can and went out along the Gray-stone road for about a mile and entered a pasture where three cows were grazing. He was weak and nervous. His eyes were bloodshot and his hands trembled. He had never milked a cow. He had no idea of the difficulty involved in catching a cow and milking her in a pasture. There was the milk and yonder his child, who without it would not survive the day. Desperation dominated and directed every movement. The cows walked away as he approached. He followed. He drove them into a corner of the field and managed to get his hand on one. He tried to pet her, but the jingling of the can frightened her and off they went—all of them— on a fast trot along the side of the field. He became cautious as he cornered them a second time. This time he succeeded in reaching an udder. He got a tit in his hand. He lowered himself to his haunches and proceeded to tug vigorously. His hand was waxy and stuck as if glued to the flesh. Before there was any sign of milk the cow gave him a swift kick that sent him flat on his back. By the time he pulled himself together again the cows were galloping to the other end of the pasture. "God!" he muttered as he mopped the sweat from his face with his sleeve, "if ye've got aany pity or kindly feelin' giv me a sup ov that milk fur m' chile! Come on!" His legs trembled so that he could scarcely stand. Again he approached. The cows eyed him with sullen concern. They were thoroughly scared now and he couldn't get near enough to lay a hand on any of them. He stood in despair, trembling from head to foot. He realized that what he would do he must do quickly. The morning had swift wings—it was flying away. Some one would be out for the cows ere long and his last chance would be gone. He dropped the can and ran to the farm-house. There was a stack-yard in the rear. He entered and took a rope from a stack. It was a long rope—too long for his use, but he did not want to destroy its usefulness. He dragged it through the hedge after him. This time with care and caution he got near enough to throw the rope over the horns of a cow. Leading her to a fence he tied her to it and began again. It came slowly. His strength was almost gone. He went from one side to the other—now at one tit, now at another. From his haunches he went to his knees and from that position he stretched out his legs and sat flat on the grass. He no sooner had a good position than the cow would change hers. She trampled on his legs and swerved from side to side, but he held on. It was a life and death struggle. The little milk at the bottom of the can gave him strength and courage. As he literally pulled it out of her his strength increased. When the can was half full he turned the cow loose and made for the gap in the hedge. Within a yard of it he heard the loud report of a gun and the can dropped to the ground. The ball had plowed through both lugs of the can disconnecting the wire handle. Not much of the milk was lost. He picked up the can and started down the road as fast as his legs could take him. He had only gone a hundred yards when a man stepped out into the road and leveled a gun at him. "Another yard an' I'll blow yer brains out!" the man said. "Is this yer milk?" Jamie asked. "Aye, an' well ye know it's m' milk!" Jamie put the can down on the road and stood silent. The farmer delivered himself of a volume of profane abuse. Jamie did not reply. He stood with his head bowed and to all appearances in a mood of penitence. When the man finished his threats and abuse he stooped to pick up the can. Before his hand touched it Jamie sprang at him with the ferocity of a panther. There was a life and death tussle for a few seconds and both men went down on the road—Jamie on top. Sitting on the man's chest he took a wrist in each hand and pinned him to the ground. "Ye think I'm a thief," he said to the man as he looked at him with eyes that burned like live coals. "I'm not, I'm an honest maan, but I haave a chile dying wi' hunger—now it's your life or his, by —— an' ye'll decide!" [Pg 28] [Pg 29] [Pg 30] [Pg 31] [Pg 32] [Pg 33] [Pg 34] F "I think yer a liar as well as a thief," the man said, "but if we can prove what ye say I'm yer friend." "Will ye go with me?" "Aye." "D'ye mane it?" "Aye, I do!" "I'll carry th' gun." "Ye may, there's nothin' in it." "There's enough in th' butt t' batther a maan's brains out." Jamie seized the gun and the can and the man got up. They walked down the road in silence, each watching the other out of the corners of his eyes. "D'ye believe in God?" Jamie asked abruptly. The farmer hesitated before answering. "Why d'ye ask?" "I'd like t' see a maan in these times that believed wi' his heart insted ov his mouth!" "Wud he let other people milk his cows?" asked the man, sneeringly. "He mightn't haave cows t' milk," Jamie said. "But he'd be kind and not a glutton!" They arrived at the house. The man went in first. He stopped near the door and Jamie instinctively and in fear shot past him. What he saw dazed him. "Ah, God!" he exclaimed. "She's dead!" Anna lay on her back on the floor and the boy was asleep by the hearth with his head in the ashes. The neighbors were alarmed and came to assist. The farmer felt Anna's pulse. It was feebly fluttering. "She's not dead," he said. "Get some cold wather quickly!" They dashed the water in her face and brought her back to consciousness. When she looked around she said: "Who's this kind man come in to help, Jamie?" "He's a farmer," Jamie said, "an' he's brot ye a pint ov nice fresh milk!" The man had filled a cup with milk and put it to Anna's lips. She refused. "He's dying," she said, pointing to the boy, who lay limp on the lap of a neighbor. The child was drowsy and listless. They gave him the cup of milk. He had scarcely enough strength to drink. Anna drank what was left, which was very little. "God bless you!" Anna said as she held out her hand to the farmer. "God save you kindly," he answered as he took her hand and bowed his head. "I've a wife an' wains myself," he continued, "but we're not s' bad off on a farm." Turning to Jamie he said: "Yer a Protestant!" "Aye." "An' I'm a Fenian, but we're in t' face ov bigger things!" He extended his hand. Jamie clasped it, the men looked into each other's faces and understood. That night in the dusk, the Fenian farmer brought a sack of potatoes and a quart of fresh milk and the spark of life was prolonged. CHAPTER III REHEARSING FOR THE SHOW AMINE not only carried off a million of the living, but it claimed also the unborn. Anna's second child was born a few months after the siege was broken, but the child had been starved in its mother's womb and lived only three months. There was no wake. Wakes are for older people. There were no candles to burn, no extra sheet to put over the old dresser, and no clock to stop at the moment of death. The little wasted thing lay in its undressed pine coffin on the table and the neighbors came in and had a look. [Pg 35] [Pg 36] [Pg 37] [Pg 38] Custom said it should be kept the allotted time and the tyrant was obeyed. A dozen of those to whom a wake was a means of change and recreation came late and planted themselves for the night. "Ye didn't haave a hard time wi' th' second, did ye, Anna?" asked Mrs. Mulholland. "No," Anna said quietly. "Th' hard times play'd th' divil wi' it before it was born, I'll be bound," said a second. A third averred that the child was "the very spit out of its father's mouth." Ghost stories, stories of the famine, of hard luck, of hunger, of pain and the thousand and one aspects of social and personal sorrow had the changes rung on them. Anna sat in the corner. She had to listen, she had to answer when directly addressed and the prevailing idea of politeness made her the center of every story and the object of every moral! The refreshments were all distributed and diplomatically the mourners were informed that there was nothing more; nevertheless they stayed on and on. Nerve-racked and unstrung, Anna staggered to her feet and took Jamie to the door. "I'll go mad, dear, if I have to stand it all night!" They dared not be discourteous. A reputation for heartlessness would have followed Anna to the grave if she had gone to bed while the dead child lay there. Withero had been at old William Farren's wake and was going home when he saw Anna and Jamie at the door. They explained the situation. "Take a dandther down toward th' church," he said, "an' then come back." Willie entered the house in an apparently breathless condition. "Yer takin' it purty aisy here," he said, "whin 'Jowler' Hainey's killin' his wife an' wreckin' th' house!" In about two minutes he was alone. He put a coal in his pipe and smoked for a minute. Then he went over to the little coffin. He took his pipe out of his mouth, laid it on the mantel-shelf and returned. The little hands were folded. He unclasped them, took one of them in his rough calloused palm. "Poore wee thing," he said in an undertone, "poore wee thing." He put the hands as he found them. Still looking at the little baby face he added: "Heigho, heigho, it's bad, purty bad, but it's worse where there isn't even a dead wan!" When Anna returned she lay down on her bed, dressed as she was, and Jamie and Withero kept the vigil—with the door barred. Next morning at the earliest respectable hour Withero carried the little coffin under his arm and Jamie walked beside him to the graveyard. During the fifteen years that followed the burial of "the famine child" they buried three others and saved three— four living and four dead. I was the ninth child. Anna gave me a Greek name which means "Helper of men." Shortly after my arrival in Scott's entry, they moved to Pogue's entry. The stone cabin was thatch-covered and measured about twelve by sixteen feet. The space comprised three apartments. One, a bedroom; over the bedroom and beneath the thatch a little loft that served as a bedroom to those of climbing age. The rest of it was workshop, dining-room, sitting-room, parlor and general community news center. The old folks slept in a bed, the rest of us slept on the floor and beneath the thatch. Between the bedroom door and the open fireplace was the chimney-corner. Near the door stood an old pine table and some dressers. They stood against the wall and were filled with crockery. We never owned a chair. There were several pine stools, a few creepies (small stools), and a long bench that ran along the bedroom wall, from the chimney corner to the bedroom door. The mud floor never had the luxury of a covering, nor did a picture ever adorn the bare walls. When the floor needed patching, Jamie went to somebody's garden, brought a shovelful of earth, mixed it and filled the holes. The stools and creepies were scrubbed once a week, the table once a day. I could draw an outline of that old table now and accurately mark every dent and crack in it. I do not know where it came from, but each of us had a hope that one day we should possess a pig. We built around the hope a sty and placed it against the end of the cabin. The pig never turned up, but the hope lived there throughout a generation! We owned a goat once. In three months it reduced the smooth kindly feeling in Pogue's entry to the point of total eclipse. We sold it and spent a year in winning back old friends. We had a garden. It measured thirty-six by sixteen inches, and was just outside the front window. At one end was a small currant bush and in the rest of the space Anna grew an annual crop of nasturtiums. Once we were prosperous. That was when two older brothers worked with my father at shoemaking. I [Pg 39] [Pg 40] [Pg 41] [Pg 42] [Pg 43] [Pg 44] remember them, on winter nights, sitting around the big candlestick—one of the three always singing folk-songs as he worked. As they worked near the window, Anna sat in her corner and by the light of a candle in her little sconce made waxed ends for the men. I browsed among the lasts, clipping, cutting and scratching old leather parings and dreaming of the wonderful days beyond when I too could make a boot and sing "Black-eyed Susan." Then the news came—news of a revolution. "They're making boots by machinery now," Anna said one day. "It's dotin' ye are, Anna," Jamie replied. She read the account. "How cud a machine make a boot, Anna?" he asked in bewilderment. "I don't know, dear." Barney McQuillan was the village authority on such things. When he told Jamie, he looked aghast and said, "How quare!" Then makers became menders—shoemakers became cobblers. There was something of magic and romance in the news that a machine could turn out as much work as twenty-five men, but when my brothers moved away to other parts of the world to find work, the romance was rubbed off. "Maybe we can get a machine?" Jamie said. "Aye, but shure ye'd have to get a factory to put it in!" "Is that so?" "Aye, an' we find it hard enough t' pay fur what we're in now!" Barney McQuillan was the master-shoe-maker in our town who was best able to readjust himself to changed conditions. He became a master-cobbler and doled out what he took in to men like Jamie. He kept a dozen men at work, making a little off each, just as the owner of the machine did in the factory. In each case the need of skill vanished and the power of capital advanced. Jamie dumbly took what was left—cobbling for Barney. To Anna the whole thing meant merely the death of a few more hopes. For over twenty years she had fought a good fight, a fight in which she played a losing part, though she was never wholly defeated. Her first fight was against slang and slovenly speech. She started early in their married life to correct Jamie. He tried hard and often, but he found it difficult to speak one language to his wife and another to his customers. From the lips of Anna, it sounded all right, but the same pronunciation by Jamie seemed affected and his customers gaped at him. Then she directed her efforts anew to the children. One after another she corrected their grammar and pronunciation, corrected them every day and every hour of the day that they were in her presence. Here again she was doomed to failure. The children lived on the street and spoke its language. It seemed a hopeless task. She never whined over it. She was too busy cleaning, cooking, sewing and at odd times helping Jamie, but night after night for nearly a generation she took stock of a life's effort and each milestone on the way spelt failure. She could see no light—not a glimmer. Not only had she failed to impress her language upon others, but she found herself gradually succumbing to her environment and actually lapsing into vulgar forms herself. There was a larger and more vital conflict than the one she had lost. It was the fight against dirt. In such small quarters, with so many children and such activity in work she fought against great odds. Bathing facilities were almost impossible: water had to be brought from the town well, except what fell on the roof, and that was saved for washing clothes. Whatever bathing there was, was done in the tub in which Jamie steeped his leather. We children were suspicious that when Jamie bathed Anna had a hand in it. They had a joke between them that could only be explained on that basis. She called it "grooming the elephant." "Jist wait, m' boy," she would say in a spirit of kindly banter, "till the elephant has to be groomed, and I'll bring ye down a peg or two." There was a difference of opinion among them as to the training of children. "No chile iver thrived on saft words," he said; "a wet welt is betther." "Aye, yer wet welt stings th' flesh, Jamie, but it niver gets at a chile's mind." "Thrue for you, but who th' —— kin get at a chile's mind?" One day I was chased into the house by a bigger boy. I had found a farthing. He said it was his. The money was handed over and the boy left with his tongue in his cheek. I was ordered to strip. When ready he laid me across his knee and applied the "wet welt." An hour later it was discovered that a week had elapsed between the losing and finding of the farthing. No sane person would believe that a farthing could lie for a whole week on the streets of Antrim. [Pg 45] [Pg 46] [Pg 47] [Pg 48] [Pg 49] "Well," he said, "ye need a warmin' like that ivery day, an' ye had nown yestherday, did ye?" On another occasion I found a ball, one that had never been lost. A boy, hoping to get me in front of my father, claimed the ball. My mother on this occasion sat in judgment. "Where did you get the ball?" she asked the boy. He couldn't remember. She probed for the truth, but neither of us would give in. When all efforts failed she cut the ball in half and gave each a piece! "Nixt time I'll tell yer Dah," the boy said when he got outside, "he makes you squeal like a pig." When times were good—when work and wages got a little ahead of hunger, which was seldom, Anna baked her own bread. Three kinds of bread she baked. "Soda,"—common flour bread, never in the shape of a loaf, but bread that lay flat on the griddle; "pirta oaten"—made of flour and oatmeal; and "fadge"—potato bread. She always sung while baking and she sang the most melancholy and plaintive airs. As she baked and sang I stood beside her on a creepie watching the process and awaiting the end, for at the close of each batch of bread I always had my "duragh"—an extra piece. When hunger got ahead of wages the family bread was bought at Sam Johnson's bakery. The journey to Sam's was full of temptation to me. Hungry and with a vested interest in the loaf on my arm, I was not over punctilious in details of the moral law. Anna pointed out the opportunities of such a journey. It was a chance to try my mettle with the arch tempter. It was a mental gymnasium in which moral muscle got strength. There wasn't in all Ireland a mile of highway so well paved with good intentions. I used to start out, well keyed up morally and humming over and over the order of the day. When, on the home stretch, I had made a dent in Sam's architecture, I would lay the loaf down on the table, good side toward my mother. While I was doing that she had read the story of the fall on my face. I could feel her penetrating gaze. "So he got ye, did he?" "Aye," I would say in a voice too low to be heard by my father. The order at Sam's was usually a sixpenny loaf, three ha'pence worth of tea and sugar and half an ounce of tobacco. There were times when Barney had no work for my father, and on such occasions I came home empty-handed. Then Jamie would go out to find work as a day laborer. Periods like these were glossed over by Anna's humor and wit. As they sat around the table, eating "stir-about" without milk, or bread without tea, Jamie would grunt and complain. "Aye, faith," Anna would say, "it's purty bad, but it's worse where there's none at all!" When the wolf lingered long at the door I went foraging—foraging as forages a hungry dog and in the same places. Around the hovels of the poor where dogs have clean teeth a boy has little chance. One day, having exhausted the ordinary channels of relief without success, I betook myself to the old swimming-hole on the mill race. The boys had a custom of taking a "shiverin' bite" when they went bathing. It was on a Sunday afternoon in July and quite a crowd sat around the hole. I neither needed nor wanted a bath—I wanted a bite. No one offered a share of his crust. A big boy named Healy was telling of his prowess as a fighter. "I'll fight ye fur a penny!" said I. "Where's yer penny?" said Healy. "I'll get it th' morra." A man seeing the difficulty and willing to invest in a scrap advanced the wager. I was utterly outclassed and beaten. Peeling my clothes off I went into the race for a swim and to wash the blood off. When I came out Healy had hidden my trousers. I searched for hours in vain. The man who paid the wager gave me an extra penny and I went home holding my jacket in front of my legs. The penny saved me from a "warming," but Anna, feeling that some extra discipline was necessary, made me a pair of trousers out of an old potato sack. "That's sackcloth, dear," she said, "an' ye can aither sit in th' ashes in them or wear them in earning another pair! Hold fast t' yer penny!" In this penitential outfit I had to sell my papers. Every fiber of my being tingled with shame and humiliation. I didn't complain of the penance, but I swore vengeance on Healy. She worked the desire for vengeance out of my system in her chimney-corner by reading to me often enough, so that I memorized the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah. Miss McGee, the postmistress, gave me sixpence for the accomplishment and that went toward a new pair of trousers. Concerning Healy, Anna said: "Bate 'im with a betther brain, dear!" Despite my fistic encounters, my dents in the family loaves, my shinny, my marbles and the various signs of total or at least partial depravity, Anna clung to the hope that out of this thing might finally come what she was looking, praying and hoping for. An item on the credit side of my ledger was that I was born in a caul—a thin filmy veil that covered me at birth. [Pg 50] [Pg 51] [Pg 52] [Pg 53] [Pg 54] [Pg 55] Of her twelve I was the only one born in "luck." In a little purse she kept the caul, and on special occasions she would exhibit it and enumerate the benefits and privileges that went with it. Persons born in a caul were immune from being hung, drawn and quartered, burned to death or lost at sea. It was on the basis of the caul I was rented to old Mary McDonagh. My duty was to meet her every Monday morning. The meeting insured her luck for the week. Mary was a huckster. She carried her shop on her arm—a wicker basket in which she had thread, needles, ribbons and other things which she sold to the farmers and folks away from the shopping center. No one is lucky while bare-footed. Having no shoes I clattered down Sandy Somerville's entry in my father's. At the first clatter, she came out, basket on arm, and said: "Morra, bhoy, God's blessin' on ye!" "Morra, Mary, an' good luck t' ye," was my answer. I used to express my wonder that I couldn't turn this luck of a dead-sure variety into a pair of shoes for myself. Anna said: "Yer luck, dear, isn't in what ye can get, but in what ye can give!" When Antrim opened its first flower show I was a boy of all work at old Mrs. Chaine's. The gardener was pleased with my work and gave me a hothouse plant to put in competition. I carried it home proudly and laid it down beside her in the chimney-corner. "The gerd'ner says it'll bate th' brains out on aany geranium in the show!" I said. "Throth it will that, dear," she said, "but sure ye couldn't take a prize fur it!" "Why?" I growled. "Ah, honey, shure everybody would know that ye didn't grow it—forby they know that th' smoke in here would kill it in a few days." I sulked and protested. "That's a nice way t' throw cowld wather on th' chile," Jamie said. "Why don't ye let 'im go on an' take his chances at the show?" A pained look overspread her features. It was as if he had struck her with his fist. Her eyes filled with tears and she said huskily: "The whole world's a show, Jamie, an' this is the only place the wee fella has to rehearse in." I sat down beside her and laid my head in her lap. She stroked it in silence for a minute or two. I couldn't quite see, however, how I could miss that show! She saw that after all I was determined to enter the lists. She offered to put a card on it for me so that they would know the name of the owner. This is what she wrote on the card: "This plant is lent for decorative purposes." That night there was an unusual atmosphere in her corner. She had a newly tallied cap on her head and her little Sunday shawl over her shoulders. Her candle was burning and the hearthstones had an extra coat of whitewash. She drew me up close beside her and told me a story. "Once, a long, long time ago, God, feelin' tired, went to sleep an' had a nice wee nap on His throne. His head was in His han's an' a wee white cloud came down an' covered him up. Purty soon He wakes up an' says He: "'Where's Michael?' "'Here I am, Father!' said Michael. "'Michael, me boy,' says God, 'I want a chariot and a charioteer!' "'Right ye are!' says he. Up comes the purtiest chariot in the city of Heaven an' finest charioteer. "'Me boy,' says God, 'take a million tons ov th' choicest seeds of th' flowers of Heaven an' take a trip around th' world wi' them. Scatther them,' says He, 'be th' roadsides an' th' wild places of th' earth where my poor live.' "'Aye,' says the charioteer, 'that's jist like ye, Father. It's th' purtiest job of m' afther-life an' I'll do it finely.' "'It's jist come t' Me in a dream,' says th' Father, 'that th' rich have all the flowers down there and th' poor haave nown at all. If a million tons isn't enough take a billion tons!'" At this point I got in some questions about God's language and the kind of flowers. "Well, dear," she said, "He spakes Irish t' Irish people and the charioteer was an Irishman." "Maybe it was a wuman!" I ventured. "Aye, but there's no difference up there." [Pg 56] [Pg 57] [Pg 58] [Pg 59] [Pg 60] J "Th' flowers," she said, "were primroses, butthercups an' daisies an' th' flowers that be handy t' th' poor, an' from that day to this there's been flowers a-plenty for all of us everywhere!" "Now you go to-morra an' gether a basketful an' we'll fix them up in th' shape of th' Pryamid of Egypt an' maybe ye'll get a prize." I spent the whole of the following day, from dawn to dark, roaming over the wild places near Antrim gathering the flowers of the poor. My mother arranged them in a novel bouquet—a bouquet of wild flowers, the base of it yellow primroses, the apex of pink shepherd's sundials, and between the base and the apex one of the greatest variety o...