The Macdermots of Ballycloran. Anthony Trollope
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was not certainly so grand, nor so conspicuous, as the gas-lighted, mahogany fitted, pilastered gin palaces of London; but the freedom from decent restraint, and the power of inebriety at a cheap rate, were the same in each.
There was a door at the further end of the room, which opened into the one where Mrs. Mulready's more known and regular visitors were accustomed to sit and drink, and here rumour said a Ribon lodge was held; there was a fire also here, at the further end, and a long narrow table ran nearly the whole length of the room under the two windows, with a form on each side of it. Opposite this was Mrs. Mulready's own bed, which proved that whatever improprieties might be perpetrated in the house, the careful widow herself never retired to rest till they were all over.
The assembly on the night in question was not very numerous; there might be about twelve in it, and they all were of the poorer kind; some even had neither shoes or stockings, and there was one poor fellow had neither hat nor coat—nothing but a tattered shirt and trousers.
The most decent among them all was Pat Brady, who occupied a comfortable seat near the fire, drinking his tumbler of punch and smoking like a gentleman; Joe Reynolds was sitting on the widow's bed, with a spade in his hand; he had only just come in. They were all from Drumleesh, with one or two exceptions; the man without the coat was Jack Byrne, the brother of the man whom Captain Ussher had taken when the malt was found in his brother-in-law's house.
"Kathleen, agra," hallooed Joe Reynolds, "bring me a glass of sperrits, will you?"
"Send out the rint, Joe," hallooed out the wary widow, and Kathleen came in for the money.
"Sorrow to your sowl then, mother Mulready; d'ye think I'm so bad already then, that they haven't left me the price of a glass?" and he put three halfpence into the girl's hand.
"Oh, Joe," said Brady, "don't be taking your sperrits that way; come over here, like a dacent fellow, and we'll be talking over this."
"Oh, that's all right for you, Pat; you've nothing to be dhriving the life out of yer very heart. I am cowld within me, and divil a word I'll spake, till I dhriv it out of me with the sperrits," and he poured the glass of whiskey down his throat, as though he was pouring it into a pitcher. "And now, my boys, you'll see Joe Reynolds 'll talk may be as well as any of you. Give us a draw of the pipe, Pat."
He took the pipe from Pat's hand, and stuck it in his mouth.
"Well, Jack, I see'd your brother in Carrick; and I towld him how you'd done all you could for him, and pawned the clothes off your back to scrape the few shillings together for him; and what d'ye think he'd have me do then? why he towld me to take the money to Hyacinth Keegan, Esq., jist to stand to him and get him off. Why he couldn't do it, not av he was to give his sowl—and that's not his own to give, for the divil has it; and av he could, he wouldn't walk across Carrick to do them a good turn—though, by Jasus, he'd be quick enough pocketing the brads. Begad, Jack, and it's cowld you're looking without the frieze; come and warm your shins, my boy, and take a draw out of Pat's pipe."
"And Joe," said Pat, "what magisthrates war there in it?"
"Why, there war Sir Michael, and Counsellor Webb, and there war that black ruffian Jonas Brown."
"And they jist sent him back to gaol agin, Joe?"
"No, they didn't! Counsellor Webb stuck to the boys hard and fast, while he could; both his own boys and poor Tim; and that he may never sup sorrow; for he proved hisself this day the raal friend to the poor man—"
"But it war all no good in the end?"
"Divil a good. That thief of the world, old Brown, after axing Ussher a sight of questions, was sthrong for sending 'em back; and then Counsellor Webb axed Ussher how he could prove that the boys knew the stuff was in it; and he, the black-hearted viper, said, that warn't necessary, so long as they war in the same house; and then they jawed it out ever so long, and Ussher said as how the whole counthry through war worse than ever with the stills; and Counsellor Webb said that war the fault of the landlords; and Brown said, he hoped they'd take every mother's son of 'em as they could lay hands on in the counthry, and bring 'em there; and so they jawed it out a long while; and then, Sir Michael, who'd niver said a word at all, good, bad, or indifferent, said, as how Paddy Byrne and Smith war to pay each twenty pounds, and Tim ten, or else to go to gaol as long as the bloody owld barrister chose to keep 'em there."
"Jack," said one of the others, "did Paddy, d'y remimber, happen to have an odd twenty pound in his breeches pocket? becase av so, he might jist put it down genteel, and walk out afore thim all."
"Well, then, Corney," answered Jack, with Pat Brady's pipe in his mouth, "av Paddy had sich a thrifle about then, I disremember it entirely; but shure, why wouldn't he? He'd hardly be so far as Carrick, in sich good company too, without a little change in his pocket."
"But to go and put twenty pound on them boys!" observed the more earnest Joe; "the like of them to be getting twenty pounds! mightn't he as well have said twenty thousand? and tin pounds on Tim too! More power to you, Jonas Brown; tin pounds for a poor boy's warming his shins, and gagging over an owld hag's bit of turf!"
"But Joe," said Brady, "is it in Carrick they're to stop?"
"Not at all; they're to go over to the Bridewell in Ballinamore. Captain Greenough was there. A lot of his men is to take them to Ballinamore to-morrow; unless indeed, they all has the thrifle of change in their pockets, Corney was axing about."
"And supposing now, Joe," said Jack, "the boys paid the money, or some of the gentlemen put it down for 'em; who'd be getting it?"
"Sorrow a one of me rightly knows. Who would be getting the brads, Pat, av they war paid?"
"Who'd be getting 'em? why, who would have 'em but Masther Ussher? D'ye think he'd be so keen afther the stills, av he war not to make something by it? where d'ye think he'd be making out the hunters, and living there better nor the gentlemen themselves, av he didn't be getting the fines, and rewards, and things, for sazing the whiskey?"
"Choke him for fines!" said Jack; "that the gay horse he rides might break the wicked neck of him!"
"Sorrow a good is there in cursing, boys," continued Joe. "Av there war any of you really'd have the heart to be doing anything!"
"What'd we be doing, Joe? kicking our toes agin Carrick Gaol, till the police comed and spiked us? The boys is now in gaol, and there they're like to be, for anything we'll do to get 'em out again."
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