"Indeed, then, I did, Joe; and I 'd like to know why I would n't. Is it a shame or a disgrace to us! At any rate, _she_ didn't think so, for she said, 'You must be very proud of him;' and I told her so I was, and that he was as good as he was clever; and, moreover, that the newspapers said the time was coming when men like young Nelligan would soar their way up to honors and distinctions in spite of the oppressive aristocracy that so long had combined to degrade them."

"Good Heavens! mother, you could n't have made such a speech as that?"

cried he, in a voice of downright misery.

"Did n't I, then? And did n't she say, if there were any such oppression as could throw obstacles in the way of deserving merit, she heartily hoped it might prove powerless; and then she got up to wish me good-evening. I thought, at first, a little stiffly,--that is, more haughty in her manner than at first; but when I arose to see her out, and she saw I was lame, she pressed me down into my chair, and said, in such a kind voice, 'You must n't stir, my dear Mrs. Nelligan. I, who can find my road over half of the county, can surely discover my way to the door.' 'Am I ever like to have the happiness of seeing you again, miss?'

said I, as I held her hand in mine. 'Certainly, if it would give you the very slightest pleasure,' said she, pressing my hand most cordially; and with that we parted. Indeed, I scarce knew she was gone, when I heard the clattering of the horse over the shingle; for she was away in a gallop, dark as the night was. Maybe," added the old lady, with a sigh,--"maybe, I 'd have thought it was all a dream if it was n't that I found that glove of hers on the floor; she dropped it, I suppose, going out."

Young Nelligan took up the glove with a strange feeling of bashful reverence. It was as though he was touching a sacred relic; and he stood gazing on it steadfastly for some seconds.

"I 'll send it over to the house by Biddy, with my compliments, and to know how the family is, in the morning," said Mrs. Nelligan, with the air of one who knew the value of conventional usages.

"And she 'll make some stupid blunder or other," replied Joe, impatiently, "that will cover us all with shame. No, mother, I 'd rather go with it myself than that."

"To be sure, and why not?" said Mrs. Nelligan. "There 's no reason why _you_ should be taking up old quarrels against the Martins; for _my_ part, I never knew the country so pleasant as it used to be long ago, when we used to get leave to go picnicking on the grounds of Cro'

Martin, up to the Hermitage, as they called it; and now the gates are locked and barred like a jail, and n.o.body allowed in without a ticket."

"Yes, I'll go myself with it," said Joe, who heard nothing of his mother's remark, but was following out the tract of his own speculations. As little did he attend to the various suggestions she threw out for his guidance and direction, the several topics to which he might, and those to which he must not, on any account, allude.

"Not a word, for your life, Joe, about the right of pathway to Clune Abbey, and take care you say nothing about the mill-race at Glandaff, nor the shooting in Kyle's Wood. And if by any chance there should be a talk about the tolls at Oughterard, say you never heard of them before.

Make out, in fact," said she, summing up, "as if you never heard of a county where there was so much good-will and kindness between the people; and sure it is n't your fault if it's not true!" And with this philosophic reflection Mrs. Nelligan wished her son good-night, and retired.

CHAPTER III. AN AUTUMN MORNING IN THE WEST

The Osprey's Nest was, I have said, like a direct challenge hurled at the face of western gales and Atlantic storms. With what success, its aspect of dilapidation and decay but too plainly betrayed. The tangled seaweed that hung in dripping festoons over the porch, the sea-sh.e.l.ls that rattled against the window-panes, seemed like an angry denunciation of the attempt to brave the elements by the mere appliances of ease and luxury.

It was better, however, in the inside, where, in a roomy apartment, most comfortably furnished, a lady and gentleman sat at breakfast. The table stood in a little projection of the room, admitting of a wide sea-view over the bay and the distant islands of Lettermullen, but as carefully excluded all prospect of the port,--a locality which held no high place in the esteem of the lady of the house, and which, by ignoring, she half fancied she had annihilated. Wild promontories of rocks, jutting out here and there, broke the coast line, and marked the sh.o.r.e with a foaming stream of white water, as the ever-restless sea dashed over them. The long booming swell of the great ocean bounded into many a rocky cavern, with a loud report like thunder, and issued forth again with a whole cataract of falling stones, that rattled like the crash of small-arms. It was unceasing, deafening clamor in the midst of death-like desolation.

Let me, however, turn once more to the scene within, and present the living elements to my reader. They were both past the prime of life.

The lady might still be called handsome; her features were perfectly regular, and finely cut, bearing the impress of a proud and haughty spirit that never quailed beneath the conflict of a long life, and even yet showed a firm front to fortune. Her hair was white as snow; and as she wore it drawn back, after the fashion of a bygone time, it gave her the air of a fine lady of the old French Court, in all the pomp of powder and pomatum. Nor did her dress correct the impression, since the deep falls of lace that covered her hands, the lengthy stomacher, and trailing folds of her heavy brocade gown, all showed a lurking fondness for the distinctive toilette of that era. Lady Dorothea Martin had been a beauty and an earl's daughter; two facts that not even the seclusion of the wild west could erase from her memory.

Mr. Martin himself was no unworthy "pendant" to this portrait. He was tall and stately, with a lofty forehead, and temples finely and well fashioned; while full, deep-set blue eyes of the very sternest determination, and a mouth, every line of which betrayed firmness, gave the character to a face that also could expand into the most genial good-fellowship, and become at times the symbol of a pleasant and convivial Irish gentleman. In his youth he had been a beau of the Court of Versailles. Scandal had even coupled his name with that of Marie Antoinette; and more truthful narratives connected him with some of the most extravagant adventures of that profligate and brilliant period.

After a career of the wildest dissipation and excess, he had married, late in life, the daughter of the Earl of Exmere, one of the proudest and poorest names in the British Peerage. Two or three attempts to shine in the world of London,--not as successful as they were expected to have proved,--an effort at ascendancy in Irish political life, also a failure, coupled with disappointment on the score of an only brother, who had married beneath him, and was reputed to have "lost himself,"

seemed to have disgusted G.o.dfrey Martin with the world, and he had retired to his lonely mansion in the west, which now for eighteen years he had scarcely quitted for a single day.

His only son had joined a cavalry regiment in India a few years before the period our story opens, and which, I may now state, dates for about four or five and twenty years back; but his family included a niece, the only child of his brother, and whose mother had died in giving her birth.

Between Mr. Martin and Lady Dorothea, as they sat at breakfast, little conversation pa.s.sed. He occupied himself with the newly arrived newspapers, and she perused a ma.s.s of letters which had just come by that morning's post; certain sc.r.a.ps of the intelligence gleaned from either of these sources forming the only subjects of conversation between them.

"So they have resolved to have a new Parliament. I knew it would come to that; I always said so; and, as usual, the dissolution finds us unprepared."

"Plantagenet's regiment is ordered to Currachee, wherever that may be,"

said Lady Dorothea, languidly.

"Call him Harry, and we shall save ourselves some trouble in discussing him," replied he, pettishly. "At all events, he cannot possibly be here in time for the contest; and we must, I suppose, give our support to Kilmorris again."

"Do you mean, after his conduct about the harbor, and the shameful way he sneaked out of the Port Martin project?"

"Find anything better, madam; there is the difficulty. Kilmorris is a gentleman, and no Radical; and, as times go, these are rather rare qualities."

"Lady Sarah Upton's match is off," said Lady Dorothea, reading from a note beside her. "Sir Joseph insisted upon the uncontrolled possession of all her Staffordshire property."

"And perfectly right."

"Perfectly wrong to give it to him."

"A fool if he married without it."

"A mean creature she, to accept him on such terms."

"The woman is eight-and-thirty,--if not more. I remember her at Tunbridge. Let me see, what year was it?"

"I detest dates, and abhor chronologies. Reach me the marmalade," said Lady Dorothea, superciliously.

"What's this balderdash here from the 'Galway Indicator'? 'The haughty and insolent, aye, and ignorant aristocracy will have to swallow a bitter draught erelong; and such petty despots as Martin of Cro' Martin will learn that the day is gone by for their ascendancy in this county.'

"They tell me we have a law of libel in the land; and yet see how this scoundrel can dare to drag me by name before the world; and I 'll wager a thousand pounds I 'd fail to get a verdict against him if I prosecuted him to-morrow," said Martin, as he dashed the newspaper to the ground, and stamped his foot upon it. "We are constantly reading diatribes about absentee landlords, and the evils of neglected property; but I ask, what inducements are there held out to any gentleman to reside on his estate, if every petty scribbler of the press can thus attack and a.s.sail him with impunity?"

"Is that Mary I see yonder?" asked Lady Dorothea, languidly, as she lifted her double eye-gla.s.s, and then suffered it to fall from her fingers.

"So it is, by Jove!" cried Martin, springing up, and approaching the window. "I wish she 'd not venture out in that small boat in this treacherous season. What a swell there is, too! The wind is from the sea."

"She's coming in, I fancy," drawled out Lady Dorothea.

"How is she to do it, though?" exclaimed he, hurriedly; "the sea is breaking clear over the piers of the harbor. I can only see one man in the boat. What rashness! what folly! There, look, they're standing out to sea again!" And now, throwing open the window, Martin stepped out on the rocks, over which the white foam flashed by like snow. "What are they at, Peter? What are they trying to do?" cried he to an old fisherman, who, with the coil of a net he was just mending on his arm, had now come down to the sh.o.r.e to watch the boat.

"They 're doing right, your honor," said he, touching his cap respectfully. "'Tis Loony my Lady has in the boat, and there's no better man in trouble! He's just going to beat out a bit, and then he 'll run in under the shelter of the blue rocks. Faix, she 's a fine boat, then, for her size,--look at her now!"

But Martin had covered his eyes with his hand, while his lips murmured and moved rapidly.

"May I never, but they 're letting out the reef!" screamed the old man in terror.

"More sail, and in such a sea!" cried Martin, in a voice of horror.

"Aye, and right, too," said the fisherman, after a pause; "she 's rising lighter over the sea, and steers better, besides. It's Miss Mary has the tiller," added the old fellow, with a smile. "I 'll lay a shilling she 's singing this minute."

"You think so," said Martin, glad to catch at this gleam of confidence.

"I know it well, your honor. I remember one day, off Lettermullen, it was worse than this. Hurrah!" screamed he out suddenly; "she took in a great sea that time!"

"Get out a boat, Peter, at once; what are we standing here for?" cried Martin, angrily. "Man a boat this instant."

"Sure no boat could get out to sea with this wind, sir," remonstrated the old man, mildly; "she'd never leave the surf if she had forty men at her!"

"Then what's to be done?"