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SWEARING NO VICE

English slang contrasted with Irish imprecation – The chase of St. Chrysostom, and his rescue – Meet garnish for an Hibernian anecdote – Futile attempts at imitation by English dramatists, &c. – Remarks of a puritan on the author and his book – A caution, and a shrewd way of observing it – Michael Heney, steward of the author’s father – His notions concerning swearing – Curious dialogue between him and the author – New mode of teaching children filial respect.

Though I have more than ordinary cause to be gratified by the reception the first two volumes of this work so unexpectedly met with, and am extremely grateful for that reception, yet I am well aware that certain starched moralists may conceive, and perhaps, primâ facie, with reason, that there is too much “imprecation,” and what the fastidious of Bond-street call vulgarity introduced into the Irish colloquies. I admit that a person who has never been in the interior of Ireland, or accustomed to the Irish people and their peculiarities, might naturally think so. I therefore feel it a duty to such critics, to give them at least one or two reasons why they should not consider Irish oaths immoral, or Irish colloquy vulgar.

The outrageous blasphemy and indecency, so copious in the slang of England, with neither wit, point, or national humour, to qualify it, might indeed disgust even the seven hundred imps whom the devil sent into this world to capture St. Chrysostom.¹³ The curses and imprecations of Ireland are of a nature totally different. They have no great variety; they are neither premeditated, nor acquired through habits of dissipation. They are idiomatic, a part and parcel of the regular language of the country, and repeated in other countries as a necessary appendage to the humour of an Irish story, though they would be utterly unadapted to any other people. Walter Scott’s delightful writings, with all the native simplicity and idiomatic dialect of the ancient Celtic, would be totally spoiled, for instance, had he mingled or introduced in them the oaths and idioms indispensable as a seasoning to Irish colloquy; an observation sufficiently illustrated by the absurd and stupid attempts to imitate Irish phraseology made by English dramatic mimics and grimacers.

Here I am quite prepared for the most severe criticism. “Upon my word (the lank-haired puritan will say), this is a most dangerous and sinful writer; holding out that an anecdote, if it be Irish, would lose its relish if there were neither oaths nor imprecations tacked to it. No man can, in the opinion of that immoral writer, repeat an innocent Irish story, unless he at the same time calls down the wrath of Heaven upon himself; and, moreover, upon such of his auditors as take any pleasure in hearing him.”

I know two very young ladies who told me that their mammas directed them to skim over any improper parts of the Sketches; – and that they read every word, to find out those improper parts. The book, they said, was extremely diverting; and as to the oaths, they never swore themselves, and never would, and therefore reading that part could do them no harm.

My own notions respecting this Irish habit of imprecation were illustrated many years ago by an actual dialogue with a man of low rank in that country; and as our conversation bore upon a subject of which scarce a day passes without reminding me, I have retained its import as if it had taken place yesterday: and though, after an interval of more than forty-five years, it is not to be expected I should repeat the exact words uttered, yet I really think my memory serves as to the precise sentences.

We had got accidentally upon the topic; and I expressed my opinion, as I have already stated it here, that these objectionable phrases were merely idiomatic and involuntary – betraying no radical or intentional vice. His notion went further; he apologised for the practice not only statistically, but said, with characteristic fervour, that the genuine Irish people could not “do without it.” “Many,” said he, “would not mind what was said to them, unless there was a curse tacked on to the direction. For instance, old Ned Doran, of Cherry Hill, ordered all his children, male and female, neither to curse nor swear, as they regarded their father’s orders; and the consequence was, the people all said they were going to turn swadlers, and not a maid or a labourer would do a farthing’s worth of work – for want of being forced to do it in the ‘owld way.’”

The man I talked with was a character not very general in England, but frequently met with among the Irish commonalty, whose acuteness of intellect, naturally exceeding that of English labourers, is rather increased by the simplicity of their ideas. Self-taught, they turn any thing they learn to all the purposes that their humble and depressed state can give room for.

Fortune had denied him the means of emerging from obscurity; and Michael Heney was for many years the faithful steward of my father, living with him to the period of his death. His station in life had been previously very low; his education was correspondent; but he had from Nature a degree of mental strength which operated in possessing him with a smattering of every thing likely or proper to be understood by persons of his grade. He was altogether a singularity, and would not give up one iota of his opinions. To address him as a casuist, was the greatest favour you could confer on Mick Heney; and the originality of his ideas, and promptitude of his replies, often amused me extremely.

But for the detail of our dialogue: —

“Is it not extraordinary, Michael,” said I one day (as a great number of labourers were making up hay in one of the meadows, and Michael and myself were seated on a heap of it), “that those poor fellows can scarcely pronounce a sentence without some oath to confirm, or some deity to garnish it with?”

“Master Jonah, (he never said ‘please your honour’ to any body but his master,) sure its their only way of talking English. They can speak very good Irish without either swearing or cursing, because it’s their own tongue. Besides, all their forefathers used to be cursing the English day and night for many a hundred years; so that they never used the Sassanagh tongue without mixing curses along with it, and now it’s grown a custom, and they say that the devil himself could not break them of it – poor crethurs!”

“I should think the devil won’t try, Mick Heney.”

“It’s no joke, Master Jonah.”

“But,” said I, (desirous of drawing him out,) “they never fail to take the name of J – s on every silly occasion. Sure there’s no reason in that?”

“Yes, but there is, Master Jonah,” said Heney: “in the owld time, when the English used to be cutting and hacking, starving and burning the poor Irish, and taking all their lands, cattle and goods from them, the crethurs were always praying to Jesus and his holy Mother to save them from the Sassanaghs: and so, praying to Jesus grew so pat, that now they can’t help it.”

“But then, Michael,” said I, “the commandments!”

“Poo-o! what have the crethurs to do with the commandments? Sure it’s the Jews, and not the poor Catholics, that have to do with them: and sure the parliament men make many a law twice as strong as any commandments; and the very gentlemen that made those said laws don’t observe their own enactments, except it suits their own purposes – though every ’sizes some of the crethurs are hanged for breaking one or two of them.”

Heney was now waxing warm on the subject, and I followed him up as well as I could. “Why, Mick, I wonder, nevertheless, that your clergy don’t put a stop to the practice: perpetually calling on the name of our Redeemer, without any substantial reason for so doing, is certainly bad.”

“And what better name could they call on, Master Jonah?” said Heney. “Why should the clergy hinder them? It’s only putting them in mind of the name they are to be saved by. Sure there’s no other name could do them a pennyworth of good or grace. It’s well for the crethurs they have that same name to use. As father Doran says, pronouncing the glorified name puts them in mind every minute of the only friend any poor Irish boy can depend upon; and there can be no sin in reminding one of the place we must all go to, and the Holy Judge we’ll be all judged by at the latter end. Sure it’s not Sergeant Towler,¹⁴ or the likes of him, you’d have the crethurs swearing by, Master Jonah. He makes them remember him plentifully when he comes to these parts.”

“And even the schoolmasters don’t punish young children for the same thing,” remarked I.

“Why should they?” rejoined Michael Heney. “Sure Mr. Beal, though he’s a Protestant, does not forbid it.”

“How so?”

“Why, because he says if he did, it would encourage disobedience to their parents, which is by all clergy forbidden as a great sin as well as shame.”

“Disobedience!” said I, in wonder.

“Yes; the fathers and mothers of the childer generally curse and swear their own full share every day, at any rate: and if the master told the childer it was a great sin, they would consider their fathers and mothers wicked people, and so despise and fly in their faces!”

“But, surely you are ordered not to take God’s name in vain?”

“And sure,” said Heney, “its not in vain when it makes people believe the truth; and many would not believe a word a man said in this country unless he swore to it, Master Jonah.”

“But cursing,” persisted I, “is ill-natured as well as wicked.”

“Sure there’s no harm in cursing a brute beast,” said Heney, “because there’s no soul in it; and if one curses a Christian for doing a bad act, sure its only telling him what he’ll get a taste of on the day of judgment.”

“Or, perhaps, the day after, Michael Heney,” said I, laughing.

“The devil a priest in the county can tell that,” said Heney; “but, (looking at his watch,) you’re playing your pranks on me, Master Jonah! the bells should have been rung for the mowers’ dinner half an hour ago, and be d – d to them! The devil sweep them altogether, the idle crethurs!”

“Fie to yourself, Mr. Heney!” cried I: but he waited for no further argument, and I got out, I really think, the reasons which they all believe justify the practice. The French law makes an abatement of fifteen years out of twenty at the gallies, if a man kills another without premeditation: and I think the same principle may apply to the involuntary assemblage of oaths which, it should seem, have been indigenous in Ireland for some centuries past.

A BARRISTER BESIEGED

Dinner-party at the Rev. Mr. Thomas’s – The author among the guests, in company with John Philpot Curran – General punctuality of the latter at dinner-time – His mysterious non-appearance – Speculations and reports – Diver, from Newfoundland – His simultaneous absence – The house searched – Discovery of a ghost, and its metamorphosis into Curran – A curious blockade – Its relief, and accompanying circumstances – Comments of the author.

The late Mr. Curran was certainly one of the most distinguished of Irishmen, not only in wit and eloquence, but in eccentricity: of this quality in him, one or two traits have been presented to the reader in the former part of this work; and the following incident will still further illustrate it.

The Reverend Mr. Thomas, whose sobriquet in his neighbourhood was “Long Thomas,” he being nearly six feet and a half high, resided near Carlow, and once invited Curran and myself to spend a day and sleep at his house on our return from the assizes. We accepted the invitation with pleasure, as he was an old college companion of mine – a joyous, good-natured, hospitable, hard-going divine as any in his county.

The Reverend Jack Read, a three-bottle parson of Carlow, with several other jolly neighbours, were invited to meet us, and to be treated with the wit and pleasantry of the celebrated Counsellor Curran, who was often extremely fond of shining in that class of society.

We all arrived in due time; – dinner was appointed for five precisely, as Curran always stipulated (wherever he could make so free) for the punctuality of the dinner-bell to a single minute. The very best cheer was provided by our host: at the proper time, the dishes lay basking before the fire, in readiness to receive the several provisions all smoking for the counsellor, &c. The clock, which, to render the cook more punctual, had been that very noon regulated by the sundial, did not on its part vary one second. Its hammer and bell melodiously sounded five, and announced the happy signal for the banquet. All the guests assembled in the dining-room, which was, in honest Thomas’s house, that apartment which the fine people of our day would call a drawing-room – the latter being then by no means regarded as indispensable in the dwelling-house of a moderate gentlemen. The family parlour, in fact, answered its purpose mighty well.

Every guest of the reverend host having now decided on his chair, and turned down his plate, in order to be as near as possible to Counsellor Curran, proceeded to whet his knife against the edge of his neighbour’s, to give it a due keenness for the most tempting side of the luscious sirloin, which by anticipation frizzed upon its pewter dish. Veal, mutton, turkey, ham, duck, and partridge, all “piping hot,” were ready and willing to leap from their pots and spits into their respective dishes, and to take a warm bath each in its proper gravy. The cork-screw was busily employed: the wine-decanters ornamented the four corners of the well-dressed table, and the punch, jugged, and bubbling hot upon the hearth-stone, perfumed the whole room with its aromatic potsheen odour.

Every thing bespoke a most joyous and protracted banquet; – but, meanwhile, where was the great object of the feast? – the wheedler of the petty juries, and the admonisher of the grand ones? Where was the great orator, in consequence of whose brilliant reputation such a company was collected? The fifth hour had long passed, and impatience became visible on every countenance. Each guest, who had a watch, gave his fob no tranquillity, and never were timekeepers kept on harder duty. The first half-hour surprised the company; the next quarter astonished, and the last alarmed it. The clock, by six solemn notes, set the whole party surmising, and the host appeared nearly in a state of stupefaction. Day had departed, and twilight was rapidly following its example, yet no tidings of the orator: never had the like been known with regard to Curran – punctuality at dinner being a portion of his very nature. There are not more days in a leap year than there were different conjectures broached as to the cause of my friend’s non-appearance. The people about the house were sent out on the several roads to reconnoitre. He had been seen, certainly, in the garden at four o’clock, but never after; – yet every now and then a message came in to announce, that “an old man had seen a counsellor, as he verily believed, walking very quick on the road to Carlow.” Another reported that “a woman who was driving home her cow met one of the counsellors going leisurely toward Athy, and that he seemed very melancholy; that she had seen him at the ’sizes that blessed morning, and the people towld her it was the great law preacher that was in it.” Another woman who was bringing home some turf from the bog, declared before the Virgin and all the Saints that she saw “a little man in black with a stick in his hand going toward the Barrow;” and a collough sitting at her own cabin door feeding the childer, positively saw a “black gentleman going down to the river, and soon afterward heard a great splash of water at the said river; whereupon, she went hot-foot to her son, Ned Coyle, to send him thither to see if the gentleman was in the water; but that Ned said, sure enuff nothing natural would be after going at that time of the deep dusk to the place where poor Armstrong’s corpse lay the night he was murthered; and he’d see all the gentlemen in the county to the devil (God bless them!) before he’d go to the said place till morning early.”

The faithful clock now announced seven, and the matter became too serious to admit of any doubt as to poor Curran having met his catastrophe. I was greatly shocked; our only conjectures now being, not whether, but how, he had lost his life. As Curran was known every day to strip naked and wash himself all over with a sponge and cold water, I conjectured, as most rational, that he had, in lieu of his usual ablution, gone to the Barrow to bathe before dinner, and thus unfortunately perished. All agreed in my hypothesis, and hooks and a draw-net were sent for immediately to Carlow, to scour the river for his body. Nobody, whatever might have been their feelings, said a word about dinner. The beef, mutton, and veal, as if in grief, had either turned into broth, or dropped piecemeal from the spit; the poultry fell from their strings, and were seen broiling in the dripping-pan. The cook had forgotten her calling, and gone off to make inquiries. The stable-boy left his horses; indeed, all the domestics, with one accord, dispersed with lanterns to search for Counsellor Curran in the Barrow. The Irish cry was let loose, and the neighbourhood soon collected; and the good-natured parson, our host, literally wept like an infant. I never saw so much confusion at any dinner-table. Such of the guests as were gifted by Nature with keen appetites, suffered all the tortures of hunger, of which, nevertheless, they could not in humanity complain; but a stomachic sympathy of woe was very perceptible in their lamentations for the untimely fate of so great an orator.

It was at length suggested by our reverend host that his great Newfoundland dog, who was equally sagacious, if not more so, with many of the parishioners, and rivalled, in canine proportion, the magnitude of his master, was not unlikely, by diving in the Barrow, to discover where the body lay deposited – and thus direct the efforts of the nets and hookers from Carlow. This idea met with universal approbation; and every body took up his hat, to go down to the river. Mary, a young damsel, the only domestic who remained in the house, was ordered to call Diver, the dog; – but Diver was absent, and did not obey the summons. Every where resounded, “Diver! Diver!” but in vain.

New and multifarious conjectures now crossed the minds of the different persons assembled: – the mystery thickened: all the old speculations went for nothing; it was clear that Curran and Diver had absconded together.

At length, a gentleman in company mentioned the circumstance of a friend of his having been drowned while bathing, whose dog never left his clothes, on the bank, till discovered nearly dead with hunger. The conjecture founded hereon was, however, but momentary, since it soon appeared that such could not be the case with Curran. I knew that he both feared and hated big dogs;¹⁵ and besides, there was no acquaintance between him and the one in question. Diver had never seen the counsellor before that day, and therefore could have no personal fondness for him, not to say, that those animals have a sort of instinctive knowledge as to who likes or dislikes them, and it was more probable that Diver, if either, would be an enemy instead of a friend to so great a stranger. But the creature’s absence, at any rate, was unaccountable, and the more so, inasmuch as he never before had wandered from his master’s residence

Mary, the maid, was now desired to search all the rooms and offices for Diver, while we sat pensive and starving in the parlour. We were speedily alarmed by a loud shriek, immediately after which Mary rushed tottering into the room, just able to articulate: —

“O, holy Virgin! holy Virgin! yes, gentlemen! the counsellor is dead, sure enough. And I’ll die too, gentlemen! I’ll never recover it!” and she crossed herself twenty times over in the way the priest had taught her.

We all now flocked round, and asked her simultaneously how she knew the counsellor was dead?

Crossing herself again, “I saw his ghost, please your reverence!” cried poor Mary, “and a frightful ghost it was! just out of the river, and not even decent itself. I’m willing to take my affidavy that I saw his ghost, quite indecent, straight forenent me.”

“Where? where?” cried every body, as if with one breath.

“In the double-bedded room next your reverence’s,” stammered the terrified girl.

We waited for no more to satisfy us either that she was mad, or that robbers were in the house: each person seized something by way of a weapon: one took a poker, another a candlestick, a third a knife or fire-shovel, and up stairs we rushed. Only one could go in, conveniently, abreast; and I was among the first who entered. The candles had been forgotten; but the moon was rising, and we certainly saw what, in the opinion of some present, corroborated the statement of Mary. Two or three instantly drew back in horror, and attempted to retreat, but others pressed behind; and lights being at length produced, an exhibition far more ludicrous than terrific presented itself. In a far corner of the room stood, erect and formal, and stark naked (as a ghost should be), John Philpot Curran, one of his majesty’s counsel, learned in the law, – trembling as if in the ague, and scarce able to utter a syllable, through the combination of cold and terror. Three or four paces in his front lay Diver, from Newfoundland, stretching out his immense shaggy carcase, his long paws extended their full length, and his great head lying on them with his nose pointed toward the ghost, as true as the needle to the pole. His hind legs were gathered up like those of a wild beast ready to spring upon his prey. He took an angry notice of the first of us that came near him, growled, and seemed disposed to resent our intrusion; – but the moment his master appeared, his temper changed, he jumped up, wagged his tail, licked the parson’s hand, cast a scowling look at Curran, and then a wistful one at his master, – as much as to say, “I have done my duty, now do you yours:” he looked, indeed, as if he only waited for the word of command, to seize the counsellor by the throttle.

A blanket was now considerately thrown over Curran by one of the company, and he was put to bed with half a dozen more blankets heaped upon him: a tumbler of hot potsheen punch was administered, and a second worked miracles: the natural heat began to circulate, and he was in a little time enabled to rise and tell us a story which no hermit even telling his last beads could avoid laughing at. Related by any one, it would have been good; but as told by Curran, with his powers of description and characteristic humour, was superexcellent; – and we had to thank Diver, the water-dog, for the highest zest of the whole evening.

The fact was, that a little while previous to dinner-time, Curran, who had omitted his customary ablution in the morning, went to our allotted bed-chamber to perform that ceremony; and having stripped, had just begun to apply the sponge, when Diver, strolling about his master’s premises to see if all was right, placed by chance his paw against the door, which not being fastened, it flew open, he entered unceremoniously, and observing what he conceived to be an extraordinary and suspicious figure, concluded it was somebody with no very honest intention, and stopped to reconnoitre. Curran, unaccustomed to so strange a valet, retreated, while Diver advanced, and very significantly showed an intention to seize him by the naked throat; which operation, if performed by Diver, whose tusks were a full inch in length, would no doubt have admitted an inconvenient quantity of atmospheric air into his œsophagus. He therefore crept as close into the corner as he could, and had the equivocal satisfaction of seeing his adversary advance and turn the meditated assault into a complete blockade– stretching himself out, and “maintaining his position” with scarcely the slightest motion, till the counsellor was rescued, and the siege raised.

Curran had been in hopes that when Diver had satisfied his curiosity he would retire; and with this impression, spoke kindly to him, but was answered only by a growl. If Curran repeated his blandishments, Diver showed his long white tusks; – if he moved his foot, the dog’s hind legs were in motion. Once or twice Curran raised his hand: but Diver, considering that as a sort of challenge, rose instantly, and with a low growl looked significantly at Curran’s windpipe. Curran, therefore, stood like a model, if not much like a marble divinity. In truth, though somewhat less comely, his features were more expressive than those of the Apollo Belvidere. Had the circumstance occurred at Athens to Demosthenes, or in the days of Phidias, it is probable my friend Curran, and Diver, would have been at this moment exhibited in virgin marble at Florence or at the Vatican; – and I am quite sure the subject would have been better and more amusing than that of “the dying gladiator.”