^mmll Wimvmii^ | 
 
 Sibwg 
 
 PROM THE INCOME OF THE | 
 
 FISKE ENDOWMENT 
 
 FUND 
 
 THE BEQUEST OF 
 
 
 ^a^tHarek IPiskc 
 
 
 lyibrarian of the University 
 
 1 868-1883 
 
 1905 
 
 
Cornell University Library 
 
 PR5006.C3 1911 
 
 Celt and Saxon. 
 
 3 1924 013 523 745 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tiiis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013523745 
 
THE WORKS OF 
 
 GEORGE MEREDITH 
 
 CELT AND SAXON 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 GEORGE MEREDITH 
 
 LONDON 
 
 CONSTABLE AND COMPANY LTD 
 
 10 ORANGE STREET, LEICESTER SQUARE 
 
 1911 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 I. Wherein an Excursion is made in a Celtic 
 Mind, .... 
 
 II. Mr. Adister, .... 
 
 III. Caroline, .... 
 
 IV. The Princess, 
 V. At the Piano, chiefly without Music, 
 
 Page 
 1 
 
 8 
 14 
 27 
 34 
 
 VI. A Consultation : with Opinions upon 
 
 Welshwomen and the Cambrian Race, 40 
 
 VII. The Miniature, . . . .54 
 
 VIII. Captain Con and Mrs. Adister O'Donnell, 68 
 
 IX. The Captain's Cabin, . . . 84 
 
 X. The Brothers, . . . .98 
 
 XI. Introducing a New Character, . . 105 
 
 XII. Miss Mattock, . . . .116 
 
 ix 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Page 
 
 XIII. The Dinner-Party, . .124 
 
 XIV. Of Rockney, . . . .139 
 
 XV. The Mattock Family, . . .159 
 
 XVI. Of the great Mr. Bull and the Celtic 
 and Saxon view of him: and some- 
 thing of Richard Rockney, - . 182 
 
 XVII. Crossing the Rubicon, . . . 204 
 
 XVIII. Captain Con's Letter, . . .221 
 
 XIX. Mars Convalescent, . . . 233 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 ( Unfinished) 
 
 2>5—b 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 Wherein an Excursion is made in a 
 Celtic Mind 
 
 A young Irish gentleman of the numerous clan 
 O'Donnells, and a Patrick, hardly a distinction of him 
 until we know him, had bound himself, by purchase of 
 a railway ticket, to travel direct to the borders of 
 North Wales, on a visit to a notable landowner of 
 those marches, the Squire Adister, whose family-seat 
 was where the hills begin to lift and spy into the 
 heart of black mountains. Examining his ticket with 
 an apparent curiosity, the son of a greener island 
 debated whether it would not be better for him to 
 follow his inclinations, now that he had gone so far as 
 to pay for the journey, and stay. But his inclinations 
 were also subject to question, upon his considering 
 that he had expended pounds English for the privilege 
 of making the journey in this very train. He asked 
 himself earnestly what was the nature of the power 
 which forced him to do it — a bad genius or a good : 
 and it seemed to him a sort of answer, inasmuch as it 
 silenced the contending parties, that he had been the 
 victim of an impetus. True ; still his present position 
 35— A 1 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER involved a certain outlay of money simply, not at all 
 
 Wherein an ^^^ bondage to the instrument it had procured for 
 
 Excursion is him, and that was true ; nevertheless, to buy a ticket 
 
 ceUiVMind *o shy it away is an incident so uncommon, that if we 
 
 can but pause to dwell on the singularity of the act, 
 
 we are unlikely to abjure our fellowship with them 
 
 who would not be guilty of it ; and therefore, by the 
 
 aid of his reflections and a remainder of the impetus, 
 
 Mr. Patrick O'Donnell stepped into a carriage of the 
 
 train like any ordinary English traveller, between 
 
 whom and his destination there is an agreement to 
 
 meet if they can. 
 
 It is an experience of hesitating minds, be they 
 Saxon or others, that when we have submitted our 
 persons to the charge of public companies, immediately, 
 as if the renouncing of our independence into their 
 hands had given us a taste of a will of our own, we 
 are eager for the performance of their contract to do 
 what we are only half inclined to ; the train cannot go 
 fast enough to please us, though we could excuse it 
 for breaking down; stoppages at stations are imper- 
 tinences, and the delivery of us at last on the platform 
 is an astonishment, for it is not we who have done it 
 — we have not even desired it. To be imperfectly in 
 accord with the velocity precipitating us upon a 
 certain point, is to be going without our heads, which 
 have so much the habit of supposing it must be 
 whither we intend, when we go in a determined 
 manner, that a doubt of it distracts the understanding 
 — decapitates us; suddenly to alight, moreover, and 
 find ourselves dropped at the heels of flying Time, 
 like an unconsidered bundle, is anything but a recon- 
 struction of the edifice. The natural revelry of the 
 2 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 blood in speed suffers a violent shock, not to speak of chapter 
 our notion of being left behind, quite isolated and whereL an 
 unsound. Or, if you insist, the condition shall be Excursion is 
 said to belong exclusively to Celtic nature, seeing that ceitiVjiind 
 it had been drawn directly from a scion of one of 
 those tribes. 
 
 Young Patrick jumped from the train as headless as 
 good St. Denis. He was a juvenile thinker, and to 
 discover himself here, where he both wished and 
 wished not to be, now deeming the negative sternly in 
 the ascendant, flicked his imagination with awe of the 
 influence of the railway service upon the destinies of 
 man. Settling a mental debate about a backward 
 flight, he drove across the land so foreign to his eyes 
 and affections, and breasted a strong tide of wishes 
 that it were in a contrary direction. He would rather 
 have looked upon the desert under a sand-storm, or 
 upon a London suburb : yet he looked thirstingly. 
 Each variation of landscape of the curved highway 
 offered him in a moment decisive features : he fitted 
 them to a story he knew : the whole circle was 
 animated by a couple of pale mounted figures beneath 
 no happy light. For this was the air once breathed 
 by Adiante Adister, his elder brother Philip's love and 
 lost love : here she had been to Philip flame along the 
 hill-ridges, his rose -world in the dust-world, the 
 saintly in his earthly. And how had she rewarded 
 him for that reverential love of her? She had for- 
 borne to kill him. The bitter sylph of the mountain 
 lures men to climb till she winds them in vapour and 
 leaves them groping, innocent of the red crags below. 
 The delicate thing had not picked his bones : Patrick 
 admitted it; he had seen his brother hale and stout 
 
 3 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 
 I 
 Wherein an 
 Excursion is 
 made in a 
 Celtic Mind 
 
 not long back. But oh ! she was merciless, she was a 
 witch. If ever queen-witch was, she was the crowned 
 one! 
 
 For a personal proof, now : he had her all round 
 him in a strange district though he had never cast eye 
 on her. Yonder bare hill she came racing up with a 
 plume in the wind : she was over the long brown 
 moor, look where he would : and vividly was she 
 beside the hurrying beck where it made edges and 
 chattered white. He had not seen, he could not 
 imagine her face : angelic dashed with demon beauty, 
 was his idea of the woman, and there is little of a 
 portrait in that; but he was of a world where the 
 elemental is more individual than the concrete, and 
 unconceived of sight she was a recognised presence 
 for the green-island brain of a youth whose manner of 
 hating was to conjure her spirit from the air and let 
 fly his own in pursuit of her. 
 
 It has to be stated that the object of the youngster's 
 expedition to Earlsfont was perfectly simple in his 
 mind, however much it went against his nature to 
 perform it. He came for the purpose of obtaining 
 Miss Adister's Continental address; to gather what he 
 could of her from her relatives, and then forthwith to 
 proceed in search of her, that he might plead with her 
 on behalf of his brother Philip, after a four years' 
 division of the lovers. Could anything be simpler? 
 He had familiarised himself with the thought of his 
 advocacy during those four years. His reluctance to 
 come would have been accountable to the Adisters by 
 a sentiment of shame at his family's dealings with 
 theirs: in fact, a military captain of the O'Donnells 
 had in old days played the adventurer and charmed a 
 4 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 maid of a certain age into yielding her hand to him ; chapter 
 and the lady was the squire of Earlsfont's only sister : wherein an 
 she possessed funded property. Shortly after the Excursion is 
 union, as one that has achieved the goal of enterprise, ceiuc Mind 
 the gallant officer retired from the service : nor did 
 north-western England put much to his credit the 
 declaration of his wife's pronouncing him to be the 
 best of husbands. She naturally said it of him in 
 eulogy; his own relatives accepted it in some con- 
 tempt, mixed with a relish of his hospitality: his 
 wife's were constant in citing his gain by the marriage. 
 Could he possibly have been less than that? they 
 exclaimed. An excellent husband, who might easily 
 have been less than that, he was the most devoted of 
 cousins, and the liberal expenditure of his native 
 eloquence for the furtherance of Philip's love-suit was 
 the principal cause of the misfortune, if misfortune it 
 could subsequently be called to lose an Adiante. 
 
 The Adister family were not gifted to read into the 
 heart of a young man of a fanciful turn. Patrick had 
 not a thought of shame devolving on him from a kins- 
 man that had shot at a mark and hit it. Who sees the 
 shame of taking an apple from a garden of the Hes- 
 perides? And as England cultivates those golden, if 
 sometimes wrinkled, fruits, it would have seemed to 
 him, in thinking about it, an entirely lucky thing for 
 the finder ; while a question of blood would have fired 
 his veins to rival heat of self-assertion, very loftily 
 towering; there were Kings in Ireland ; cry for one of 
 them in Uladh and you will hear his name, and he has 
 descendants yet ! But the youth was not disposed 
 unnecessarily to blazon his princeliness. He kept it 
 in modest reserve, as common gentlemen keep their 
 
 5 
 
CHAPTER 
 I 
 Wherein an 
 Excursion is 
 made in a 
 Celtic Mind 
 
 CELT AND SAXON 
 
 physical strength. His reluctance to look on Earls- 
 font sprang from the same source as unacknowledged 
 craving to see the place, which had precipitated him 
 thus far upon his road: he had a horror of scenes 
 where a faithless girl had betrayed her lover. Love 
 was his visionary temple, and his idea of love was the 
 solitary light in it, painfully susceptible to cold-air 
 currents from the stories of love abroad over the 
 world. Faithlessness he conceived to be obnoxious 
 to nature ; it stained the earth and was excommuni- 
 cated ; there could be no pardon of the crime, barely 
 any for repentance. He conceived it in the feminine ; 
 for men are not those holy creatures whose conduct 
 strikes on the soul with direct edge ; a faithless man 
 is but a general villain or funny monster, a subject 
 rejected of poets, taking no hue in the flat chronicle 
 of history: but a faithless woman, how shall we 
 speak of her ! Women, sacredly endowed with beauty 
 and the wonderful vibrating note about the very 
 mention of them, are criminal to hideousness when 
 they betray. Cry, False ! on them, and there is an 
 instant echo of bleeding males in many circles, like 
 the poor quavering flute-howl of transformed beasts, 
 which at some remembering touch bewail their higher 
 state. Those women are sovereignly attractive, too, 
 loathsomely. Therein you may detect the fiend. 
 
 Our moralist had for some time been glancing at a 
 broad, handsome old country mansion on the top of a 
 wooded hill backed by a swarm of mountain heads all 
 purple-dark under clouds flying thick to shallow, as 
 from a brush of sepia. The dim silver of half-lighted 
 lake-water shot along below the terrace. He knew 
 the kind of sky, having oftener seen that than any 
 6 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 other, and he knew the house before it was named to chapter 
 him and he had flung a discolouring thought across it. ^^„J„ ^^ 
 He contemplated it placably and studiously, perhaps Excursion is 
 because the shower-folding armies of the fields above cemViiind 
 likened its shadowed stillness to that of his Irish 
 home. There had this woman lived ! At the name of 
 Earlsfont she became this witch, snake, deception. 
 Earlsfont was the title and summary of her black 
 story : the reverberation of the word shook up all the 
 chapters to pour out their poison. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 Mr. Adister 
 
 Mr. Patrick O'Donnell drove up to the gates of Earls- 
 font notwithstanding these emotions, upon which 
 light matter it is the habit of men of his blood too 
 much to brood ; though it is for our better future to 
 have a capacity for them, and the insensible race is 
 the oxenish. 
 
 But if he did so when alone, the second man residing 
 in the Celt put that fellow by and at once assumed 
 the social character on his being requested to follow 
 his card into Mr. Adister's library. He took his im- 
 pression of the hall that had heard her voice, the stairs 
 she had descended, the door she had passed through, 
 and the globes she had perchance laid hand on, and 
 the old mappemonde, and the severely-shining orderly 
 regiment of books breathing of her whether she had 
 opened them or not, as he bowed to his host, and in 
 reply to, ' So, sir ! I am glad to see you,' said swim- 
 mingly that Earlsfont was the first house he had 
 visited in this country : and the scenery reminded him 
 of his part of Ireland : and on landing at Holyhead he 
 had gone off straight to the metropolis by appointment 
 to meet his brother Philip, just returned from Canada 
 a full captain, who heartily despatched his compli- 
 8 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 ments and respects, and hoped to hear of perfect chapter 
 health in this quarter of the world. And Captain Con ^r. Xdister 
 the same, and he was very flourishing. 
 
 Patrick's opening speech concluded on the sound of 
 a short laugh coming from Mr. Adister. 
 
 It struck the young Irishman's ear as injurious and 
 scornful in relation to Captain Con ; but the remark 
 ensuing calmed him : 
 
 * He has no children.' 
 
 *No, sir; Captain Con wasn't born to increase the 
 number of our clan,' Patrick rejoined; and thought: 
 By heaven ! I get a likeness of her out of you, with a 
 dash of the mother mayhap somewhere. This was his 
 Puck-manner of pulling a girdle round about from what 
 was foremost in his head to the secret of his host's 
 quiet observation; for, guessing that such features as 
 he beheld would be slumped on a handsome family, he 
 was led by the splendid severity of their lines to 
 perceive an illimitable pride in the man likely to 
 punish him in his offspring, who would inherit that as 
 well ; so, as is the way with the livelier races, whether 
 they seize first or second the matter or the spirit of 
 what they hear, the vivid indulgence of his own ideas 
 helped him to catch the right meaning by the tail, and 
 he was enlightened upon a domestic unhappiness, 
 although Mr. Adister had not spoken miserably. The 
 * dash of the mother ' was thrown in to make Adiante 
 softer, and leave a loophole for her relenting. 
 
 The master of Earlsfont stood for a promise of 
 beauty in his issue, requiring to be softened at the 
 mouth and along the brows, even in men. He was 
 tall, and had clear Greek outlines: the lips were 
 locked metal, thin as edges of steel, and his eyes, 
 
 9 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER when he directed them on the person he addressed or 
 Mr Adister *^® person Speaking, were as little varied by motion 
 of the lids as eyeballs of a stone bust. If they ex- 
 pressed more, because they were not sculptured eyes, 
 it was the expression of his high and frigid nature 
 rather than any of the diversities pertaining to senti- 
 ment and shades of meaning. 
 
 Patrick watched him for signs of that unknown 
 Adiante. 
 
 'You have had the bequest of an estate,' Mr. Adister 
 said, to compliment him by touching on his affairs. 
 
 'A small one; not a quarter of a county,' said 
 Patrick. 
 
 'Productive, sir?' 
 
 "Tis a tramp of discovery, sir, to where bog ends 
 and cultivation begins.' 
 
 'Bequeathed to you exclusively over the head of 
 your elder brother, I understand.' 
 
 Patrick nodded assent. ' But my purse is Philip's, 
 and my house, and my horses.' 
 
 ' Not bequeathed by a member of your family ? ' 
 
 'By a distant cousin, chancing to have been one of 
 my godmothers.' 
 
 'Women do these things,' Mr. Adister said, not in 
 perfect approbation of their doings. 
 
 'And I think too, it might have gone to the elder,' 
 Patrick replied to his tone. 
 
 ' It is not your intention to be an idle gentleman ? ' 
 
 'No, nor a vagrant Irishman, sir.' 
 
 ' You propose to sit down over there ? ' 
 
 'When I've more brains to be of service to them 
 and the land, I do.' 
 
 Mr. Adister pulled the arm of his chair. 'The pro- 
 10 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 fessions are crammed. An Irish gentleman owning chapter 
 land might do worse. I am in favour of some degree „ ", , 
 
 " Mr. Adister 
 
 of military training for all gentlemen. You hunt? ' 
 
 Patrick's look was, ' Give me a chance ' ; and Mr. 
 Adister continued : ' Good runs are to be had here ; 
 you shall try them. You are something of a shot, I 
 suppose. We hear of gentlemen now who neither 
 hunt nor shoot. You fence ? ' 
 
 ' That 's to say, I 've had lessons in the art.' 
 
 * I am not aware that there is now an art of fencing 
 taught in Ireland.' 
 
 'Nor am I,' said Patrick; 'though there's no know- 
 ing what goes on in the cabins.' 
 
 Mr. Adister appeared to acquiesce. Observations of 
 sly import went by him like the whispering wind. 
 
 ' Your priests should know,' he said. 
 
 To this Patrick thought it well not to reply. After 
 a pause between them, he referred to the fencing. 
 
 ' I was taught by a Parisian master of the art, sir.' 
 
 ' You have been to Paris ? ' 
 
 'I was educated in Paris.' 
 
 ' How ? Ah ! ' Mr. Adister corrected himself in the 
 higher notes of recollection. ' I think I have heard 
 something of a Jesuit seminary.' 
 
 'The Fathers did me the service to knock all I 
 know into me, and call it education, by courtesy,' said 
 Patrick, basking in the unobscured frown of his host. 
 
 ' Then you are accustomed to speak French ? ' The 
 interrogation was put to extract some balm from the 
 circumstance. 
 
 Patrick tried his art of fence with the absurdity by 
 saying : ' All but like a native.' 
 
 ' These Jesuits taught you the use of the foils ? ' 
 
 11 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER ' They allowed me the privilege of learning, sir.' 
 Mr. Adister After meditation, Mr. Adister said : ' You don't 
 dance ? ' He said it speculating on the kind of gentle- 
 man produced in Paris by the disciples of Loyola. 
 
 * Pardon me, sir, you hit on another of my accom- 
 plishments.' 
 
 ' These Jesuits encourage dancing? ' 
 
 ' The square dance — short of the embracing : the 
 valse is under interdict.' 
 
 Mr. Adister peered into his brows profoundly for a 
 glimpse of the devilry in that exclusion of the valse. 
 
 What object had those people in encouraging the 
 young fellow to be a perfect fencer and dancer, so that 
 he should be of the school of the polite world, and yet 
 subservient to them ? 
 
 ' Thanks to the Jesuits, then, you are almost a 
 Parisian,' he remarked; provoking the retort: 
 
 ' Thanks to them, I 've stored a little, and Paris is 
 to me as pure a place as four whitewashed walls ' : 
 Patrick added : ' without a shadow of a monk on them.' 
 Perhaps it was thrown in for the comfort of mundane 
 ears afflicted sorely, and no point of principle pertained 
 to the slur on a monk. 
 
 Mr. Adister could have exclaimed. That shadow of 
 the monk ! had he been in an exclamatory mood. He 
 said: 'They have not made a monk of you, then.' 
 
 Patrick was minded to explain how that the Jesuits 
 are a religious order exercising worldly weapons. The 
 lack of precise words admonished him of the virtue of 
 silence, and he retreated with a quiet negative : ' They 
 have not.' 
 
 'Then, you are no Jesuit?' he was asked. 
 
 Thinking it scarcely required a response, he shrugged. 
 12 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 'You would not change your religion, sir? ' said Mr. chapter 
 Adister in seeming anger, „,. "j,3t„ 
 
 Patrick thought he would have to rise : he half 
 fancied himself summoned to change his religion or 
 depart from the house. 
 
 'Not I,' said he. 
 
 ' Not for the title of Prince ? ' he was further pressed, 
 and he replied : 
 
 ' I don't happen to have an ambition for the title of 
 Prince.' 
 
 ' Or any title ! ' interjected Mr. Adister, ' or whatever 
 the devil can offer! — or,' he spoke more pointedly, 
 ' for what fools call a brilliant marriage ? ' 
 
 ' My religion ? ' Patrick now treated the question 
 seriously and raised his head : ' I 'd not suffer myself 
 to be asked twice.' 
 
 The sceptical northern-blue eyes of his host dwelt 
 on him with their full repellent stare. 
 
 The young Catholic gentleman expected he might 
 hear a frenetic zealot roar out : Be off ! 
 
 He was not immediately reassured by the words : 
 * Dead or alive, then, you have a father ! ' 
 
 The spectacle of a state of excitement without a 
 show of feeling was novel to Patrick. He began to 
 see that he was not implicated in a wrath that referred 
 to some great offender, and Mr. Adister soon confirmed 
 his view by saying : ' You are no disgrace to your 
 begetting, sir ! ' 
 
 With that he quitted his chair, and hospitably 
 proposed to conduct his guest over the house and 
 grounds. 
 
 13 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 Caroline 
 
 Men of the Adister family having taken to themselves 
 brides of a very dusty pedigree from the Principality, 
 there were curious rough heirlooms to be seen about the 
 house, shields on the armoury walls and hunting-horns, 
 and drinking-horns, and spears, and chain-belts bearing 
 clasps of heads of beasts ; old gold ornaments, torques, 
 blue-stone necklaces, under glass-cases, were in the 
 library ; huge rings that must have given the wearers 
 fearful fists ; a shirt of coarse linen with a pale brown 
 spot on the breast, like a fallen beech-leaf; and many 
 sealed parchment-skins, very precious, for an inspection 
 of which, as Patrick was bidden to understand. History 
 humbly knocked at the Earlsfont hall-doors ; and the 
 proud muse made her transcripts of them kneeling. He 
 would have been affected by these wonders had any relic 
 of Adiante appeased his thirst. Or had there been one 
 mention of her, it would have disengaged him from the 
 incessant speculations regarding the daughter of the 
 house, of whom not a word was uttered. No portrait 
 of her was shown. Why was she absent from her home 
 so long? where was she? How could her name be 
 started? And was it she who was the sinner in her 
 father's mind ? But the idolatrous love between Adiante 
 14 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 and her father was once a legend : they could not have chapter 
 been cut asunder. She had offered up her love of Philip Caroline 
 as a sacrifice to it : Patrick recollected that, and now 
 with a softer gloom on his brooding he released her from 
 the burden of his grand charge of unfaithfulness to the 
 truest of lovers, by acknowledging that he was in the 
 presence of the sole rival of his brother. Glorious girl 
 that she was, her betrayal of Philip had nothing of a 
 woman's base caprice to make it infamous : she had 
 sacrificed him to her reading of duty; and that was 
 duty to her father ; and the point of duty was in this 
 instance rather a sacred one. He heard voices murmur 
 that she might be praised. He remonstrated with 
 them, assuring them, as one who knew, that a woman's 
 first duty is her duty to her lover ; her parents are her 
 second thought. Her lover, in the consideration of a 
 real soul among the shifty creatures, is her husband ; 
 and have we not the word of heaven directing her to 
 submit herself to him who is her husband before all 
 others ? That peerless Adiante had grievously erred in 
 the upper sphere where she received her condemnation, 
 but such a sphere is ladder and ladder and silver ladder 
 high above your hair-splitting pates, you children of 
 earth, and it is not for you to act on the verdict in 
 decrying her: rather 'tis for you to raise hymns of 
 worship to a saint ! 
 
 Thus did the ingenious Patrick change his ground 
 and gain his argument with the celerity of one who wins 
 a game by playing it without an adversary. Mr. Adister 
 had sprung a new sense in him on the subject of the 
 renunciation of the religion. No thought of a possible 
 apostasy had ever occurred to the youth, and as he was 
 aware that the difference of their faith had been the 
 
 15 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER main cause of the division of Adiante and Philip, he could 
 Caroline ^* least coDsent to think well of her down here, that is, 
 on our flat surface of earth. Up there, among the im- 
 mortals, he was compelled to shake his head at her still, 
 and more than sadly in certain moods of exaltation, 
 reprovingly; though she interested him beyond all her 
 sisterhood above, it had to be confessed. 
 
 They traversed a banqueting-hall hung with portraits, 
 to two or three of which the master of Earlsfont carelessly 
 pointed, for his guest to be interested in them or not as 
 he might please. A reception-hall flung folding-doors on a 
 grand drawing-room, where the fires in the grates went 
 through the ceremony of warming nobody, and made 
 a show of keeping the house alive. A modern steel 
 cuirass, helmet and plume at a corner of the armoury 
 reminded Mr. Adister to say that he had worn the uniform 
 in his day. He cast an odd look at the old shell con- 
 taining him when he was a brilliant youth. Patrick 
 was marched on to Colonel Arthur's rooms, and to 
 Captain David's, the sailor. Their father talked of his 
 two sons. They appeared to satisfy him. If that was 
 the case, they could hardly have thrown off their religion. 
 Already Patrick had a dread of naming the daughter. 
 An idea struck him that she might be the person who 
 had been guilty of it over there on the Continent. What 
 if she had done it, upon a review of her treatment of her 
 lover, and gone into a convent to wait for Philip to come 
 and claim her? — saying, 'Philip, I've put the knife 
 to my father's love of me; love me double'; and so 
 she just half swoons, enough to show how the dear 
 angel looks in her sleep: a trick of kindness these 
 heavenly women have, that we heathen may get a 
 peep of their secret rose-enfolded selves; and dream's 
 16 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 no word, nor drunken, for the blessed mischief it chapter 
 
 works with us. CaroUne 
 
 Supposing it so, it accounted for everything : for her 
 absence, and her father's abstention from a mention of 
 her, and the pretty good sort of welcome Patrick had 
 received : for as yet it was unknown that she did it all 
 for an O'Donnell. 
 
 These being his reflections, he at once accepted a view 
 of her that so agreeably quieted his perplexity, and he 
 leapt out of his tangle into the happy open spaces where 
 the romantic things of life are as natural as the sun that 
 rises and sets. There you imagine what you will ; you 
 live what you imagine. An Adiante meets her lover : 
 another Adiante, the phantom likeness of her, similar to 
 the finger-tips, hovers to a meeting with some one whose 
 heart shakes your manful frame at but a thought of it. 
 But this other Adiante is altogether a secondary con- 
 ception, barely descried, and chased by you that she 
 may interpret the mystical nature of the happiness of 
 those two, close-linked to eternity, in advance. You 
 would learn it, if she would expound it ; you are ready 
 to learn it, for the sake of knowledge ; and if you link 
 yourself to her and do as those two are doing, it is 
 chiefly in a spirit of imitation, in sympathy with the 
 darting couple ahead. . . . 
 
 Meanwhile he conversed, and seemed, to a gentle- 
 man unaware of the vaporous activities of his brain, 
 a young fellow of a certain practical sense. 
 
 ' We have not much to teach you in horseflesh,' Mr. 
 Adister said, quitting the stables to proceed to the 
 gardens. 
 
 ' We must look alive to keep up our breed, sir,' said 
 Patrick. ' We 're breeding too fine : and soon we shan 't 
 35— B 17 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 
 III 
 
 Caroline 
 
 be able to horse our troopers. I call that the land for 
 horses where the cavalry 's well mounted on a native 
 breed.' 
 
 * You have your brother's notions of cavalry, have 
 you!' 
 
 ' I leave it to Philip to boast what cavalry can do 
 on the field. He knows : but he knows that troopers 
 must be mounted : and we 're flneing more and more 
 from bone: — with the sales to foreigners! and the only 
 chance of their not beating us is that they '11 be so good 
 as follow our bad example. Prussia 's well horsed, and 
 for the work it's intended to do, the Austrian light 
 cavalry's a model. So I'm told. I'll see for myself. 
 Then we sit our horses too heavy. The Saxon trooper 
 runs headlong to flesh. 'Tis the beer that fattens 
 and swells him. Properly to speak, we've no light 
 cavalry. The French are studying it, and when they 
 take to studying, they come to the fore. I'll pay 
 a visit to their breeding establishments. We've no 
 studying here, and not a scrap of system that I see. 
 All the country seems armed for bullying the facts, 
 till the periodical panic arrives, and then it 's for 
 lying flat and roaring — and we '11 drop the curtain, if 
 you please.' 
 
 'You say we,' returned Mr. Adister. 'I hear you 
 launched at us English by the captain, your cousin, 
 who has apparently yet to learn that we are one 
 people.' 
 
 ' We 're held together and a trifle intermixed ; I fancy 
 it 's we with him and with me when we 're talking of 
 army or navy,' said Patrick. ' But Captain Con 's a 
 bit of a politician : a poor business, when there 's nothing 
 to be done.' 
 18 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 * A very poor business !' Mr. Adister rejoined. chapter 
 'Ifyou'd have the goodness to kindle his enthusiasm, „ '" 
 
 ' CAroline 
 
 he 'd be for the first person plural, with his cap in the 
 air,' said Patrick. 
 
 • I detest enthusiasm.' 
 
 'You're not obliged to adore it to give it a 
 wakener.' 
 
 ' Pray, what does that mean ? ' 
 
 Patrick cast about to reply to the formal challenge 
 for an explanation. 
 
 He began on it as it surged up to him : ' Well, sir, 
 the country that 's got hold of us, if we 're not to get 
 loose. We don't count many millions in Europe, and 
 there 's no shame in submitting to force majeure, if a 
 stand was once made ; and we 're mixed up, 'tis true, 
 well or ill; and we're stronger, both of us, united 
 than tearing to strips : and so, there, for the past ! so 
 long as we can set our eyes upon something to admire, 
 instead of a bundle squatting fat on a pile of posses- 
 sions and vowing she won't budge ; and taking kicks 
 from a big foot across the Atlantic, and shaking 
 bayonets out of her mob-cap for a little one's cock of 
 the eye at her: and she's all for the fleshpots, and 
 calls the rest of mankind fools because they're not 
 the same : and so long as she can trim her ribands 
 and have her hot toast and tea, with a suspicion of a 
 dram in it, she doesn't mind how heavy she sits : nor 
 that 's not the point, nor 's the land question, nor the 
 potato crop, if only she wore the right sort of face to 
 look at, with a bit of brightness about it, to show an 
 idea inside striking a light from the day that 's not yet 
 nodding at us, as the tops of big mountains do : or if 
 she were only braced and gallant, and cried, Ready, 
 
 19 
 
CHAPTER 
 
 III 
 Caroline 
 
 CELT AND SAXON 
 
 though I haven't much outlook! We'd be satisfied 
 with her for a handsome figure. I don't know whether 
 we wouldn't be satisfied with her for politeness in her 
 manners. We 'd like her better for a spice of devotion 
 to a light higher up in politics and religion. But the 
 key of the difficulty's a sparkle of enthusiasm. It's 
 part business, and the greater part sentiment. We 
 want a rousing in the heart of us ; or else we 'd be 
 pleased v/ith her for sitting so as not to overlap us 
 entirely : we 'd feel more at home, and behold her 
 more respectfully. We 'd see the policy of an honour- 
 able union, and be joined to you by more than a 
 telegraphic cable. That 's Captain Con, I think, and 
 many like him.' 
 
 Patrick finished his airy sketch of the Irish case in 
 a key signifying that he might be one among the many, 
 but unobtrusive. 
 
 ' Stick to horses ! ' observed Mr. Adister. 
 
 It was pronounced as the termination to sheer 
 maundering. 
 
 Patrick talked on the uppermost topic for the re- 
 mainder of their stroll. 
 
 He noticed that his host occasionally allowed 
 himself to say, ' You Irish ' : and he reflected that 
 the saying, 'You English,' had been hinted as an 
 offence. 
 
 He forgot to think that he had possibly provoked 
 this alienation in a scornfully proud spirit. The lan- 
 guage of metaphor was to Mr. Adister fool's froth. 
 He conceded the use of it to the Irish and the Welsh 
 as a right that stamped them for what they were by 
 adopting it; and they might look on a country as a 
 'she,' if it amused them: so long as they were not 
 20 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 recalcitrant, they were to be tolerated, they were a chapter 
 part of us ; doubtless the nether part, yet not the less caroune 
 a part for which we are bound to exercise a specially 
 considerate care, or else we suffer, for we are sensitive 
 there: this is justice: but the indications by fiddle- 
 faddle verbiage of anything objectionable to the whole 
 in the part aroused an irritability that speedily endued 
 him with the sense of sanity opposing lunacy ; when, 
 not having a wide command of the undecorated plain 
 speech which enjoyed his approval, he withdrew into 
 the entrenchments of contempt. 
 
 Patrick heard enough to let him understand why 
 the lord of Earlsfont and Captain Con were not on the 
 best of terms. Once or twice he had a twinge or 
 suspicion of a sting from the tone of his host, though 
 he was not political and was of a mood to pity the 
 poor gentleman's melancholy state of solitariness, 
 with all his children absent, his wife dead, only a niece, 
 a young lady of twenty, to lend an air of grace and 
 warmth to his home. 
 
 She was a Caroline, and as he had never taken a 
 liking to a Caroline, he classed her in the tribe of 
 Carolines. To a Kathleen, an Eveleen, a Nora, or a 
 Bessy, or an Alicia, he would have bowed more 
 cordially on his introduction to her, for these were 
 names with portraits and vistas beyond, that shook 
 leaves of recollection of the happiest of life — the sweet 
 things dreamed undesiringly in opening youth. A 
 Caroline awakened no soft association of fancies, 
 no mysterious heaven and earth. The others had 
 variously tinted skies above them; their features 
 wooed the dream, led it on as the wooded glen leads 
 the eye till we are deep in richness. Nor would he 
 
 21 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER have throbbed had one of any of his favourite names 
 ca/oHne appeared in the place of Caroline Adister. They had 
 not moved his heart, they had only stirred the sources 
 of wonder. An Eveleen had carried him farthest to 
 imagine the splendours of an Adiante, and the 
 announcement of the coming of an Eveleen would 
 perchance have sped a little wild fire, to which what 
 the world calls curiosity is frozenly akin, through his 
 veins. 
 
 Mr. Adister had spoken of his niece Caroline. A 
 lacquey, receiving orders from his master, mentioned 
 Miss Adister. There was but one Miss Adister for 
 Patrick. Against reason, he was raised to anticipate 
 the possible beholding of her, and Caroline's entrance 
 into the drawing-room brought him to the ground. 
 Disappointment is a poor term for the descent from 
 an immoderate height, but the acknowledgment that 
 we have shot up irrationally reconciles even un- 
 philosophical youth to the necessity of the fall, though 
 we must continue sensible of a shock. She was the 
 Miss Adister; and how, and why? No one else 
 accompanied them on their march to the dinner-table. 
 Patrick pursued his double task of hunting his thousand 
 speculations and conversing fluently, so that it is not 
 astonishing if, when he retired to his room, the im- 
 pression made on him by this young Caroline was 
 inefficient to distinguish her from the horde of her 
 baptismal sisters. And she had a pleasant face: he 
 was able to see that, and some individuality in the 
 look of it, the next morning ; and then he remembered 
 the niceness of her manners. He supposed her to 
 have been educated where the interfusion of a natural 
 liveliness with a veiling retenue gives the title of 
 22 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 lady. She had enjoyed the advantage of having an chapter 
 estimable French lady for her governess, she in- caroune 
 formed him, as they sauntered together on the 
 terrace. 
 
 'A Protestant, of course,' Patrick spoke as he 
 thought. 
 
 ' Madame Dugu^ is a Catholic of Catholics, and the 
 most honourable of women.' 
 
 'That I'll believe; and wasn't for proselytisms,' 
 said he. 
 
 ' Oh, no : she was faithful to her trust.' 
 
 ' Save for the grand example ! ' 
 
 'That,' said Caroline, 'one could strive to imitate 
 without embracing her faith.' 
 
 ' There 's my mind clear as print ! ' Patrick exclaimed. 
 ' The Faith of my fathers ! and any pattern you like 
 for my conduct, if it 's a good one.' 
 
 Caroline hesitated before she said : ' You have 
 noticed my Uncle Adister's prepossession ; I mean, his 
 extreme sensitiveness on that subject.' 
 
 'He blazed on me, and he seemed to end by a sort 
 of approval.' 
 
 She sighed. ' He has had cause for great unhappi- 
 ness.' 
 
 * Is it the colonel, or the captain ? Forgive me ! ' 
 
 Her head shook. 
 
 ' Is it she ? Is it his daughter ? I must ask ! ' 
 
 ' You have not heard ? ' 
 
 ' Oh ! then, I guessed it,' cried Patrick, with a flash 
 of pride in his arrowy sagacity. ' Not a word have I 
 heard, but I thought it out for myself; because I love 
 my brother, I fancy. And now, if you '11 be so good, 
 Miss Caroline, let me beg, it's just the address, or the 
 
 23 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER city, or the country — where she is, can you tell me ? — 
 Caroline just whcreabouts ! You're surprised: but I want her 
 address, to be off, to see her ; I 'm anxious to speak to 
 her. It 's anywhere she may be in a ring, only show 
 me the ring, I '11 find her, for I 've a load ; and there 's 
 nothing like that for sending you straight, though it 's 
 in the dark ; it acts like an instinct. But you know 
 the clear address, and won't let me be running blind- 
 fold. She 's on the Continent and has been a long 
 time, and it was the capital of Austria, which is a 
 Catholic country, and they 've Irish blood in the 
 service there, or they had. I could drop on my knees 
 to you! ' 
 
 The declaration was fortunately hushed by a suppli- 
 cating ardour, or Mr. Adister would have looked more 
 surprised than his niece. He stepped out of the library 
 window as they were passing, and, evidently with a 
 mind occupied by his own affairs, held up an opened 
 letter for Caroline's perusal. She took a view of the 
 handwriting. 
 
 'Any others?' she said. 
 
 'You will consider that one enough for the day,' 
 was his answer. 
 
 Patrick descended the terrace and strolled by the 
 waterside, grieved at their having bad news, and 
 vexed with himself for being a stranger, unable to 
 console them. 
 
 Half an hour later they were all three riding to the 
 market-town, where Mr. Adister paid a fruitless call 
 on his lawyer. 
 
 'And never is at home! never was known to be at 
 home when wanted ! ' he said, springing back to the 
 saddle. 
 24 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 Caroline murmured some soothing words. They chapter 
 had a perverse effect. caroLe 
 
 ' His partner ! yes, his partner is at home, but I do 
 not communicate upon personal business with his 
 partner; and by and by there will be, I suppose, a 
 third partner. I might as well deposit my family 
 history in the hands of a club. His partner is always 
 visible. It is my belief that Camminy has taken a 
 partner that he may act the independent gentleman at 
 his leisure. I, meantime, must continue to be the 
 mark for these letters. I shall expect soon to hear 
 myself abused as the positive cause of the loss of a 
 Crown ! ' 
 
 'Mr. Camminy will probably appear at the dinner 
 hour,' said Caroline. 
 
 * Claret attracts him : I wish I could say as much of 
 duty,' rejoined her uncle. 
 
 Patrick managed to restrain a bubbling remark on 
 the respective charms of claret and duty, tempting 
 though the occasion was for him to throw in a con- 
 versational word or two. 
 
 He was rewarded for listening devoutly, 
 
 Mr. Adister burst out again: 'And why not come 
 over here to settle this transaction herself? — provided 
 that I am spared the presence of her Schinderhannes ! 
 She could very well come. I have now received three 
 letters bearing on this matter within as many months. 
 Down to the sale of her hereditary jewels! I profess 
 no astonishment. The jewels may well go too, if 
 Crydney and Welvas are to go. Disrooted body and 
 soul ! — for a moonshine title ! — a gaming-table foreign 
 knave ! — Known for a knave ! — A young gentlewoman ? 
 —a wild Welsh . . . ! ' 
 
 25 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER Caroline put her horse to a canter, and the exclama- 
 
 caroune tions ended, leaving Patrick to shuffle them together 
 
 and read the riddle they presented, and toss them to 
 
 the wind, that they might be blown back on him by 
 
 the powers of air in an intelligible form. 
 
 26 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 The Princess 
 
 Dinner, and a little piano-music and a song closed an 
 evening that was not dull to Patrick in spite of 
 prolonged silences. The quiet course of things within 
 the house appeared to him to have a listening ear for 
 big events outside. He dreaded a single step in the 
 wrong direction, and therefore forbore to hang on any 
 of his conjectures; for he might perchance be unjust 
 to the blessedest heroine on the surface of the earth — 
 a truly awful thought! Yet her name would no 
 longer bear the speaking of it to himself. It conjured 
 up a smoky moon under confounding eclipse. 
 
 Who was Schinderhannes ? 
 
 Mr. Adister had said, her Schinderhannes. 
 
 Patrick merely wished to be informed who the man 
 was, and whether he had a title, and was much of a 
 knave : and particularly Patrick would have liked to 
 be informed of the fellow's religion. But asking was 
 not easy. 
 
 It was not possible. And there was a barrel of 
 powder to lay a fiery head on, for a pillow ! 
 
 To confess that he had not the courage to inquire 
 was as good as an acknowledgment that he knew too 
 
 27 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER much for an innocent questioner. And what did he 
 _ '^ know? His brother Philip's fair angel forbade him to 
 
 The Princess '^ ° 
 
 open the door upon what he knew. He took a peep 
 through fancy's keyhole, and delighted himself to 
 think that he had seen nothing. 
 
 After a turbulent night with Schinderhannes, who 
 let him go no earlier than the opening of a December 
 day, Patrick hied away to one of the dusky nooks by 
 the lake for a bracing plunge. He attributed to his 
 desire for it the strange deadness of the atmosphere; 
 and his incapacity to get an idea out of anything he 
 looked on : he had not a sensation of cold till the 
 stinging element gripped him. It is the finest school 
 for the cure of dreamers ; two minutes of stout 
 watery battle, with the enemy close all round, 
 laughing, but not the less inveterate, convinced him 
 that, in winter at least, we have only to jump out of 
 our clothes to feel the reality of things in a trice. 
 The dip was sharpening ; he could say that his 
 prescription was good for him ; his craving to get an 
 idea ceased with it absolutely, and he stood in far 
 better trim to meet his redoubtable adversary of over- 
 night ; but the rascal was a bandit and had robbed 
 him of his purse ; that was a positive fact ; his vision 
 had gone ; he felt himself poor and empty and 
 rejoicing in the keenness of his hunger for breakfast, 
 singularly lean. A youth despoiled of his vision and 
 made sensible by the activity of his physical state 
 that he is a common machine, is eager for meat, for 
 excess of whatsoever you may offer him ; he is on the 
 highroad of recklessness, and had it been the bottle 
 instead of Caroline's coffee-cup Patrick would soon 
 have received a priming for a delivery of views upon 
 28 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 the sex, and upon love, and the fools known as chapter 
 lovers, acrid enough to win the applause of cynics. ^^^^ piTncess 
 
 Boasting was the best relief that a young man not 
 without modesty could find. Mr. Adister compli- 
 mented him on the robustness of his habits, and 
 Patrick 'would like to hear of the temptation that 
 could keep him from his morning swim.' 
 
 Caroline's needle-thrust was provoked : 
 
 ' Would not Arctic weather deter you, Mr. O'Don. 
 nell ? ' 
 
 He hummed, and her eyes filled with the sparkle. 
 
 'Short of Arctic,' he had to say. 'But a gallop, 
 after an Arctic bath, would soon spin the blood — upon 
 an Esquimaux dog, of course,' he pursued, to antici- 
 pate his critic's remark on the absence of horses, with 
 a bow. 
 
 She smiled, accepting the mental alertness he 
 fastened on her. 
 
 We must perforce be critics of these tear-away 
 wits ; which are, moreover, so threadbare to conceal 
 the character! Caroline led him to vaunt his riding 
 and his shooting, and a certain time passed before she 
 perceived that though he responded naturally to her 
 first sly attacks, his gross exaggerations upon them 
 had not been the triumph of absurdity she supposed 
 herself to have evoked. 
 
 Her wish was to divert her uncle. Patrick dis- 
 cerned the intention and aided her. 
 
 * As for entertainment,' he said, in answer to Mr. 
 Adister's courteous regrets that he would have to be a 
 prisoner in the house until his legal adviser thought 
 proper to appear, 'I'll be perfectly happy if Miss 
 Caroline will give me as much of her company as she 
 
 29 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER can spare. It 's amusing to be shot at too, by a lady 
 The Princess ^^^ '^ ^ good marksman ! And birds and hares are 
 always willing to wait for us ; they keep better alive. 
 I forgot to say that I can sing.' 
 
 ♦Then I was in the presence of a connoisseur last 
 night,' said Caroline. 
 
 Mr. Adister consulted his watch and the mantel- 
 piece clock for a minute of difference between them, 
 remarking that he was a prisoner indeed, and for the 
 whole day, unless Camminy should decide to come. 
 ' There is the library,' he said, ' if you care for books ; 
 the best books on agriculture will be found there. 
 You can make your choice in the stables, if you would 
 like to explore the country. I am detained here by a 
 man who seems to think my business of less import- 
 ance than his pleasures. And it is not my business ; 
 it is very much the reverse : but I am compelled to 
 undertake it as my own, when I abhor the business. 
 It is hard for me to speak of it, much more to act a 
 part in it.' 
 
 ' Perhaps,' Caroline interposed hurriedly, ' Mr. 
 O'Donnell would not be unwilling to begin the day 
 with some duets ? ' 
 
 Patrick eagerly put on his shame-face to accept her 
 invitation, protesting that his boldness was entirely 
 due to his delight in music. 
 
 ' But I 've heard,' said he, ' that the best fortification 
 for the exercise of the voice is hearty eating, so I '11 
 pay court again to that game-pie. I 'm one with the 
 pigs for truffles.' 
 
 His host thanked him for spreading the contagion 
 of good appetite, and followed his example. Robust 
 habits and heartiness were signs with him of a 
 30 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 conscience at peace, and he thought the Jesuits chapter 
 particularly forbearing in the amount of harm they ^^^ pHncess 
 had done to this young man. So they were still at 
 table when Mr. Camminy was announced and ushered in. 
 The man of law murmured an excuse or two; he 
 knew his client's eye, and how to thaw it. 
 
 'No, Miss Adister, I have not breakfasted,' he said, 
 taking the chair placed for him. * I was all day 
 yesterday at Windlemont, engaged in assisting to 
 settle the succession. Where estates are not entailed! ' 
 'The expectations of the family are undisciplined 
 and certain not to be satisfied,' Mr. Adister carried on 
 the broken sentence. 'That house will fall! How- 
 ever, you have lost no time this morning. — Mr. 
 Patrick O'Donnell.' 
 
 Mr. Camminy bowed busily somewhere in the direc- 
 tion between Patrick and the sideboard. 
 
 * Our lawyers have us inside out, like our physicians,' 
 Mr. Adister resumed, talking to blunt his impatience 
 for a private discussion with his own. 
 
 ' Surgery 's a little in their practice too, we think in 
 Ireland,' said Patrick. 
 
 Mr. Camminy assented : ' No doubt.' He was hungry, 
 and enjoyed the look of the table, but the look of his 
 client chilled the prospect, considered in its genial 
 appearance as a feast of stages; having luminous 
 extension ; so, to ease his client's mind, he ventured 
 to say : ' I thought it might be urgent.' 
 ' It is urgent,' was the answer. 
 ' Ah : foreign ? domestic ? ' 
 A frown replied. 
 
 Caroline, in haste to have her duties over, that she 
 might escape the dreaded outburst, pressed another 
 
 31 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER cup of tea on Mr. Camminy and groaned to see him 
 ^^ fill his plate. She tried to start a topic with Patrick. 
 
 The Princess 
 
 ' The princess is well, I hope ? ' Mr. Camminy 
 asked in the voice of discretion. 'It concerns her 
 Highness ? ' 
 
 ' It concerns my daughter and her inheritance from 
 her mad grandmother!' Mr. Adister rejoined loudly; 
 and he continued like a retreating thunder : ' A princess 
 with a title as empty as a skull ! At best a princess 
 of swamps, and swine that fight for acorns, and men 
 that fight for swine ! ' 
 
 Patrick caught a glance from Caroline, and the pair 
 rose together. 
 
 ' They did that in our mountains a couple of thou- 
 sand years ago,' said Mr. Camminy, ' and the cause 
 was not so bad, to judge by this ham. Men must 
 fight : the law is only a quieter field for them.' 
 
 'And a fatter for the ravens,' Patrick joined in 
 softly, as if carrying on a song. 
 
 'Have at us, Mr. O'Donnell! I'm ashamed of my 
 appetite, Miss Adister, but the morning's drive must 
 be my excuse, and I 'm bounden to you for not forcing 
 me to detain you. Yes, I can finish breakfast at my 
 leisure, and talk of business, which is never par- 
 ticularly interesting to ladies — though,' Mr. Camminy 
 turned to her uncle, 'I know Miss Adister has a head 
 for it.' 
 
 Patrick hummed a bar or two of an air, to hint of 
 his being fanatico per la musica; as a pretext for their 
 departure. 
 
 'If you'll deign to give me a lesson,' said he, as 
 Caroline came away from pressing her lips to her 
 uncle's forehead. 
 32 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 *I may discover that I am about to receive one,' chapter 
 
 said she. The Prtacess 
 
 They quitted the room together. 
 
 Mr. Camminy had seen another Miss Adister duet- 
 ting with a young Irishman and an O'Donnell, with 
 lamentable results to that union of voices, and he 
 permitted himself to be a little astonished at his 
 respected client's defective memory or indifference to 
 the admonition of identical circumstances. 
 
 35— C 33 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 At the Piano, chiefly without Music 
 
 Barely had the door shut behind them when Patrick 
 let his heart out : ' The princess ? ' He had a famished 
 look, and Caroline glided along swiftly with her head 
 bent, like one musing; his tone alarmed her; she 
 lent him her ear, that she might get some understand- 
 ing of his excitement, suddenly as it seemed to have 
 come on him ; but he was all in his hungry interroga- 
 tion, and as she reached her piano and raised the lid, 
 she saw it on tiptoe straining for her answer. 
 
 ' I thought you were aware of my cousin's marriage.' 
 
 ' Was I ? ' said Patrick, asking it of himself, for his 
 conscience would not acknowledge an absolute ignor- 
 ance. ' No : I fought it, I wouldn't have a blot on her 
 be suspected. She 's married ! She 's married to one 
 of their princes ! — married for a title ! — and changed 
 her religion! And Miss Adister, you're speaking of 
 Adiante ? ' 
 
 ' My cousin Adiante.' 
 
 ' Well did I hate the name ! I heard it first over in 
 
 France. Our people wrote to me of her ; and it 's a 
 
 name to set you thinking : Is she tender, or nothing 
 
 like a woman, — a stone? And I put it to my best 
 
 34 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 friend there, Father Clement, who 's a scholar, up in chapter 
 
 everything, and he said it was a name with a pretty j^^ the Piano 
 
 sound and an ill meaning — far from tender ; and a bad chiefly with- 
 
 history too, for she was one of the forty-nine Danaides o"*""*'" 
 
 who killed their husbands for the sake of their father 
 
 and was not likely to be the fiftieth, considering the 
 
 name she bore. It was for her father's sake she 
 
 as good as killed her lover, and the two Adiantes are 
 
 like enough : they 're as like as a pair of hands with 
 
 daggers. So that was my brother Philip's luck! 
 
 She 's married ! It 's done ; it 's over, like death : no 
 
 hope. And this time it's against her father; it's 
 
 against her faith. There 's the end of Philip ! I could 
 
 have prophesied it ; I did ; and when they broke, from 
 
 her casting him off — true to her name! thought I. 
 
 She cast him off, and she couldn't wait for him, and 
 
 there 's his heart broken. And I ready to glorify her 
 
 for a saint ! And now she must have loved the man, 
 
 or his title, to change her religion. She gives him her 
 
 soul! No praise to her for that: but mercy! what a 
 
 love it must be. Or else it 's a spell. But wasn't she 
 
 rather one for flinging spells than melting? Except 
 
 that we 're all of us hit at last, and generally by our 
 
 own weapon. But she loved Philip : she loved him 
 
 down to shipwreck and drowning : she gave battle for 
 
 him, and against her father ; all the place here and the 
 
 country 's alive with their meetings and partings : — 
 
 she can't have married! She wouldn't change her 
 
 religion for her lover : how can she have done it for 
 
 this prince ? Why, it 's to swear false oaths ! — unless 
 
 it 's possible for a woman to slip out of herself and be 
 
 another person after a death like that of a love like 
 
 hers.' 
 
 35 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 CHAPTER Patrick stopped : the idea demanded a scrutiny. 
 Atthe^iano 'She's another person for me,' he said. 'Here's 
 chiefly with- the worst I evcr imagined of her ! — thousands of miles 
 and pits of sulphur beyond the worst and the very 
 worst ! I thought her fickle, I thought her heartless, 
 rather a black fairy, perched above us, not quite among 
 the stars of heaven. I had my ideas. But never that 
 she was a creature to jump herself down into a gulf 
 and be lost for ever. She 's gone, extinguished — there 
 she is, under the penitent's hoodcap with eyeholes, 
 before the faggots ! and that 's what she has married ! 
 — a burning torment, and none of the joys of martyr- 
 dom. Oh ! I 'm not awake. But I never dreamed of 
 such a thing as this — not the hard, bare, lump-of- 
 earth-fact : — and that *s the only thing to tell me I 'm 
 not dreaming now.' 
 
 He subsided again ; then deeply beseeching asked : 
 ' Have you by chance a portrait of the gentleman. Miss 
 Adister ? Is there one anywhere ? ' 
 
 Caroline stood at her piano, turning over the leaves 
 of a music-book, with a pressure on her eyelids. She 
 was near upon being thrilled in spite of an astonish- 
 ment almost petrifying: and she could nearly have 
 smiled, so strange was his fraternal adoption, amount- 
 ing to a viviflcation of his brother's passion. He 
 seemed quite naturally to impersonate Philip. She 
 wondered, too, in the coolness of her alien blood, 
 whether he was a character, or merely an Irish 
 character. As to the unwontedness of the scene, 
 Ireland was chargeable with that; and Ireland also, 
 a little at his expense as a citizen of the polite world, 
 relieved him of the extreme ridicule attached to his 
 phrases and images. 
 36 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 She replied : * We have no portrait.' chapter 
 
 'May I beg to know, have you seen him?' said ^^^^ j,,^ pj^no 
 Patrick. Caroline shook her head. chiefly with- 
 
 ' Is there no telling what he is like, Miss Adister ? ' °"* """" 
 
 ' He is not young.' 
 
 ' An old man ! ' 
 
 She had not said that, and she wished to defend her 
 cousin from the charge of contracting such an alliance, 
 but Patrick's face had brightened out of a gloom of 
 stupefaction ; he assured her he was now ready to try 
 his voice with hers, only she was to excuse a touch of 
 hoarseness ; he felt it slightly in his throat : and could 
 he, she asked him, wonder at it after his morning's 
 bath ? He vindicated the saneness of the bath as well 
 as he was able, showing himself at least a good reader 
 of music. On the whole, he sang pleasantly, particu- 
 larly French songs. She complimented him, with an 
 emphasis on the French. He said, yes, he fancied he 
 did best in French, and he had an idea of settling in 
 France, if he found that he could not live quietly in 
 his own country. 
 
 'And becoming a Frenchman? ' said Caroline. 
 
 'Why not?' said he. 'I'm more at home with 
 French people ; they 're mostly of my creed ; they 're 
 amiable, though they weren't quite kind to poor Lally 
 ToUendal. I like them. Yes, I love France, and when 
 I'm called upon' to fix myself, as I suppose I shall be 
 some day, I shan't have the bother over there that I 
 should find here.' 
 
 She spoke reproachfully : ' Have you no pride in the 
 title of Englishman ? ' 
 
 'I'm an Irishman.' 
 
 'We are one nation.' 
 
 37 
 
out Music 
 
 CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER ' And it 's one family where the dog is pulled by the 
 
 At the Piano, collar.' 
 
 chiefly witn- There was a retort on him : she saw, as it were, the 
 box, but the lid would not open to assist her to it, and 
 she let it go by, thinking in her patriotic derision, that 
 to choose to be likened to the unwilling dog of the 
 family was evidence of a want of saving pride. 
 
 Besides, she could not trust to the glibness of her 
 tongue in a contest with a young gentleman to whom 
 talking was as easy as breathing, even if sometimes 
 his volubility exposed him to attack. A superior posi- 
 tion was offered her by her being silent and critical. 
 She stationed herself on it : still she was grieved to 
 think of him as a renegade from his country, and she 
 forced herself to say : ' Captain O'Donnell talks in 
 that manner.* 
 
 'Captain Con is constitutionally discontented because 
 he 's a bard by nature, and without the right theme for 
 his harp,' said Patrick. 'He has a notion of Erin as 
 the unwilling bride of Mr. Bull, because her lord is not 
 off in heroics enough to please her, and neglects her, 
 and won't let her be mistress of her own household, 
 and she can't forget that he once had the bad trick of 
 beating her: she sees the marks. And you mayn't 
 believe it, but the Captain's temper is to praise and 
 exalt. It is. Irony in him is only eulogy standing on 
 its head : a sort of an upside down ; a perversion : 
 that's our view of him at home. All he desires is to 
 have us on the march, and he'd be perfectly happy 
 marching, never mind the banner, though a bit of 
 green in it would put him in tune, of course. The 
 banner of the Cid was green, Miss Adister: or else it 's 
 his pennon that was. And there's a quantity of 
 38 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 our blood in Spain too. We've watered many chapter 
 lands.' .,,^ ^. 
 
 At the Piano, 
 
 The poor young English lady's brain started wildly chiefly with- 
 on the effort to be with him, and to understand whether ""^ ""*'" 
 she listened to humour or emotion : she reposed her- 
 self as well as she could in ^he contemplation of an 
 electrically-flashing maze, where every line ran losing 
 itself in another. 
 
 He added : * Old Philip ! ' in a visible throb of pity 
 for his brother ; — after the scrupulous dubitation 
 between the banner and the pennon of the Cid ! 
 
 It would have comforted her to laugh. She was 
 closer upon tears, and without any reason for them in 
 her heart. 
 
 Such a position brings the hesitancy which says that 
 the sitting is at an end. 
 
 She feared, as she laid aside her music-books, that 
 there would be more to come about Adiante, but he 
 spared her. He bowed to her departing, and strolled 
 off by himself. 
 
 39 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 A Consultation: with Opinions upon Welsh- 
 women and the Cambrian Race 
 
 Later in the day she heard that he was out scouring 
 the country on one of her uncle's horses. She had too 
 many distressing matters to think of for so singular a 
 young man to have any other place than that which is 
 given to the fantastical in a troubled and serious mind. 
 He danced there like the whimsy sunbeam of a shaken 
 water below. What would be his opinion of Adiante 
 if he knew of her determination to sell the two fair 
 estates she inherited from a grandmother whom she 
 had venerated, that she might furnish arms to her 
 husband to carry out an audacious enterprise likely to 
 involve both of them in blood and ruin? Would he 
 not bound up aloft and quiver still more wildly? She 
 respected, quaint though it was, his imaginative heat 
 of feeling for Adiante sufficiently to associate him 
 with her so far ; and she lent him in fancy her own 
 bewilderment and grief at her cousin's conduct, for 
 the soothing that his exaggeration of them afforded 
 her. She could almost hear his outcry. 
 
 The business of the hour demanded more of her than 
 a seeking for refreshment. She had been invited to 
 join the consultation of her uncle with his lawyer. 
 40 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 Mr. Adister tossed her another letter from Vienna, of chapter 
 
 VI 
 
 that morning's delivery. She read it with composure. ^ consuita- 
 It became her task to pay no heed to his loss of «'<>«>: with 
 
 ... ... . • , • t t Opinionsupon 
 
 patience, and induce him to acquiesce in his legal Welshwomen 
 adviser's view : which was, to temporise further, »'"' '^e 
 
 Cambrian race 
 
 present an array of obstacles, and by all possible 
 suggestions induce the princess to come over to 
 England, where her father's influence with her would 
 have a chance of being established again ; and it might 
 then be hoped that she, who had never when under 
 sharp temptation acted disobediently to his wishes at 
 home, and who certainly would not have dreamed of 
 contracting the abhorred alliance had she been breath- 
 ing the air of common sense peculiar to her native 
 land, would see the prudence, if not the solemn obliga- 
 tion, of retaining to herself these family possessions. 
 Caroline was urgent with her uncle to act on such 
 good counsel. She marvelled at his opposition, 
 though she detected the principal basis of it. 
 
 Mr. Adister had no ground of opposition but his 
 own intemperateness. The Welsh grandmother's 
 legacy of her estates to his girl, overlooking her 
 brothers. Colonel Arthur and Captain David, had 
 excessively vexed him, despite the strong feeling he 
 entertained for Adiante; and not simply because of 
 the blow he received in it unexpectedly from that old 
 lady, as the last and heaviest of the long and open 
 feud between them, but also, chiefly, that it outraged 
 and did permanent injury to his ideas of the proper 
 balance of the sexes. Between himself and Mrs. 
 Winnion Rhys the condition of the balance had been 
 a point of vehement disputation, she insisting to have 
 it finer up to equality, and he that the naturally lighter 
 
 41 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER scale should continue to kick the beam. Behold now 
 A conliita- *^® consc^uencc of the wilful Welshwoman's insanest 
 tion: with of legacics ! The estates were left to Adiante Adister 
 weuhwomen" ^^r her solc use and benefit, making almost a man of 
 and the her, and an unshackled man, owing no dues to pos- 
 
 cambnanrace ^g^jty xhosc estates in the hands of a woman are in 
 the hands of her husband ; and the husband a gambler 
 and a knave, they are in the hands of the Jews — or 
 gone to smoke. Let them go. A devilish malignity 
 bequeathed them : let them go back to their infernal 
 origin. And when they were gone, his girl would 
 soon discover that there was no better place to come 
 to than her home ; she would come without an asking, 
 and alone, and without much prospect of the intrusion 
 of her infamous Hook-nose in pursuit of her at Earls- 
 font. The money wasted, the wife would be at peace. 
 Here she would have leisure to repent of all the steps 
 she had taken since that fatal one of the acceptance of 
 the invitation to the Embassy at Vienna. Mr. Adister 
 had warned her both against her going and against 
 the influence of her friend Lady Wenchester, our 
 Ambassadress there, another Welshwoman, with the 
 weather-vane head of her race. But the girl would 
 accept, and it was not for him to hold out. It appeared 
 to be written that the Welsh, particularly Welsh 
 women, were destined to worry him up to the end of 
 his days. Their women were a composition of wind 
 and fire. They had no reason, nothing solid in their 
 whole nature. Englishmen allied to them had to learn 
 that they were dealing with broomstick witches and 
 irresponsible sprites. Irishwomen were models of 
 propriety beside them : indeed Irishwomen might often 
 be patterns to their English sisterhood. Mr. Adister 
 42 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 described the Cambrian ladies as a kind of daughters chapter 
 of the Fata Morgana, only half human, and deceptive ^ conluita- 
 down to treachery, unless you had them fast by their «on: with 
 spinning fancy. They called it being romantic. It w^gi"^°oJ^^j.°" 
 was the ante-chamber of madness. Mad, was theaniithe 
 word for them. You pleased them you knew not 
 how, and just as little did you know how you dis- 
 pleased them. And you were long hence to be taught 
 that in a certain past year, and a certain month, and 
 on a certain day of the month, not forgetting the hour 
 of the day to the minute of the hour, and attendant 
 circumstances to swear loud witness to it, you had 
 mortally offended them. And you receive your blow : 
 you are sure to get it : the one passion of those women 
 is for vengeance. They taste a wound from the lightest 
 touch, and they nurse the venom for you. Possibly 
 you may in their presence have had occasion to praise 
 the military virtues of the builder of Carnarvon Castle. 
 You are by and by pierced for it as hard as they can 
 thrust. Or you have incidentally compared Welsh 
 mutton with Southdown : — you have not highly 
 esteemed their drunken Bards : — you have asked what 
 the Welsh have done in the world; you are supposed 
 to have slighted some person of their family — a tenth 
 cousin ! — anything turns their blood. Or you have 
 once looked straight at them without speaking, and 
 you discover years after that they have chosen to 
 foist on you their idea of your idea at the moment ; 
 and they have the astounding presumption to account 
 this misreading of your look to the extent of a full 
 justification, nothing short of righteous, for their 
 treachery and your punishment! O those Welsh- 
 women ! 
 
 43 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER The much-suffering lord of Earlsfont stretched forth 
 ACon^iit ^^® open hand, palm upward, for a testifying instru- 
 tion: with ment to the plain truth of his catalogue of charges. 
 Opinions upon jjg dosed it tight and smote the table. ' Like mother 
 
 Welshwomen ° 
 
 and the — and grandmother too — like daughter!' he said, and 
 
 cambrianrace ggngj-^ljggjj again to preserve his dignity: 'They're 
 
 aflame in an instant. You may see them quiet for 
 
 years, but it smoulders. You dropped the spark, and 
 
 they time the explosion.' 
 
 Caroline said to Mr. Camminy : ' You are sure you 
 can give us the day ? ' 
 
 'AH of it,' he replied, apologising for some show of 
 restlessness. ' The fact is, Miss Adister, I married a 
 lady from over the borders, and though I have never 
 had to complain of her yet, she may have a finak 
 in store. It 's true that I love wild Wales.' 
 
 'And so do I.' Caroline raised her eyes to imagined 
 mountains. 
 
 ' You will pardon me, Camminy,' said Mr. Adister. 
 
 The lawyer cracked his back to bow to the great 
 gentleman so magnanimously humiliating himself. 
 'Sir! Sir!' he said. 'Yes, Welsh blood is queer 
 blood, I own. They find it difficult to forgive; and 
 trifles offend; and they are unhappily just as secretive 
 as they are sensitive. The pangs we cause them, 
 without our knowing it, must be horrible. They are 
 born, it would seem, with more than the common 
 allowance of kibes for treading on : a severe mis- 
 fortune for them. Now for their merits : they have 
 poetry in them; they are valiant; they are hospitable 
 to teach the Arab a lesson : I do believe their life 
 is their friend's at need — seriously, they would lay it 
 down for him : or the wherewithal, their money, their 
 44 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 property, excepting the three-stringed harp of three chapter 
 generations back, worth now in current value sixpence ^ con^uita- 
 halfpenny as a curiosity, or three farthings for fire-tion: with 
 wood; that they'll keep against their own desire to ^p\°;°°3„" 
 heap on you everything they have — if they love you, ana the 
 and you at the same time have struck their imagina- <'^*""'"*'""*" 
 tions. Offend them, however, and it's war, declared 
 or covert. And I must admit that their best friend 
 can too easily offend them. I have lost excellent 
 clients, I have never understood why; yet I respect 
 the remains of their literature, I study their language, 
 I attend their gatherings and subscribe the expenses ; 
 I consume Welsh mutton with relish ; I enjoy the 
 Triads, and can come down on them with a quotation 
 from Catwg the Wise : but it so chanced that I trod 
 on a kibe, and I had to pay the penalty. There 's an 
 Arabian tale. Miss Adister, of a peaceful traveller who 
 ate a date in the desert and flung away the stone, 
 which hit an invisible son of a genie in the eye, and 
 the poor traveller suffered for it. Well, you commit 
 these mortal injuries to the invisible among the Welsh. 
 Some of them are hurt if you call them Welsh. They 
 scout it as the original Saxon title for them. No, 
 they are Cymry, Cambrians ! They have forgiven the 
 Romans. Saxon and Norman are still their enemies. 
 If you stir their hearts you find it so. And, by the 
 way, if King Edward had not trampled them into the 
 mire so thoroughly, we should hear of it at times even 
 now. Instead of penillions and englyns, there would 
 be days for fiery triplets. Say the worst of them, they 
 are sound-headed. They have a ready comprehension 
 for great thoughts. The Princess Nikolas, I remember, 
 had a special fondness for the words of Catwg the Wise.' 
 
 45 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 'Adiante,' had murmured Caroline, to correct his 
 
 A conliita- indiscrction. 
 
 tion: with She was too late. 
 
 mrshwomea" ' Nikolas ! ' Mr. Adister thundered. ' Hold back that 
 
 and the name in this house, title and all, if you speak of my 
 
 am nanrace j^ygjj^^gj. J refusc admission to it here. She has 
 given up my name, and she must be known by the one 
 her feather-brained grandmother proposed for her, to 
 satisfy her pleasure in a fine sound. English Christian 
 names are my preference. I conceded Arthur to her 
 without difficulty. She had a voice in David, I recol- 
 lect ; with very little profit to either of the boys. I 
 had no voice in Adiante; but I stood at my girl's 
 baptism, and Adiante let her be. At least I saved the 
 girl from the addition of Arianrod. It was to have 
 been Adiante Arianrod. Can you credit it? Prince 
 — pah ! Nikolas ? Have you a notion of the sort of 
 prince that makes an English lady of the best blood of 
 England his princess? ' 
 
 The lawyer had a precise notion of the sort of 
 prince appearing to Mr. Adister in the person of his 
 foreign son-in-law. Prince Nikolas had been described 
 to him before, with graphic touches upon the quality 
 of the reputation he bore at the courts and in the 
 gambling-saloons of Europe. Dreading lest his client's 
 angry heat should precipitate him on the prince again, 
 to the confusion of a lady's ears, Mr. Camminy gave 
 an emphatic and short affirmative. 
 
 'You know what he is like? ' said Mr. Adister, with 
 a face of disgust reflected from the bare thought of the 
 hideous likeness. 
 
 Mr. Camminy assured him that the description of 
 the prince's lineaments would not be new. It was, as 
 46 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 he was aware, derived from a miniature of her hus- chapter 
 band, transmitted by the princess, on its flight out of ^ conMita- 
 her father's loathing hand to the hearthstone and tion: with 
 under his heel. ^^ZZT 
 
 Assisted by Caroline, he managed to check the^"''*'"* 
 famous delineation of the adventurer prince in which *" 
 a not very worthy gentleman's chronic fever of abomi- 
 nation made him really eloquent, quick to unburden 
 himself in the teeth of decorum. 
 
 'And my son-in-law! My son-in-law!' ejaculated 
 Mr. Adister, tossing his head higher, and so he stimu- 
 lated his amazement and abhorrence of the portrait he 
 rather wondered at them for not desiring to have 
 sketched for their execration of it, alluringly foul as it 
 was: while they in concert drew him back to the 
 discussion of his daughter's business, reiterating 
 prudent counsel, with a knowledge that they had only 
 to wait for the ebbing of his temper. 
 
 * Let her be informed, sir, that by coming to England 
 she can settle the business according to her wishes in 
 one quarter of the time it would take a Commission 
 sent out to her — if we should be authorised to send 
 out one,' said Mr. Camminy. 'By committing the 
 business to you, I fancy I perceive your daughter's 
 disposition to consider your feelings: possibly to 
 a reluctance to do the deed unsanctioned by her 
 father. It would appear so to a cool observer, 
 notwithstanding her inattention to your remon- 
 strances.' 
 
 The reply was : * Dine here and sleep here. I shall 
 be having more of these letters,' Mr. Adister added, 
 profoundly sighing. 
 
 Caroline slipped away to mark a conclusion to the 
 
 47 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER debate ; and Mr. Camminy saw his client redden fast 
 AConliita- and frown. 
 
 tion: with * Besidcs,' he spoke in a husky voice, descending 
 
 w'e'iThwom^en" upon a subjcct hatcful, 'she tells me to-day she is not 
 and the in a State to travel ! Do you hear ? Make what you 
 
 Cambrianrace n .. , 
 
 can of it.' 
 
 The proud and injured gentleman had the aspect of 
 one who receives a blow that it is impossible for him 
 to resent. He could not speak the shame he felt : it 
 was literally in his flesh. But the cause had been 
 sufficiently hinted to set the lawyer staring as men do 
 when they encounter situations of grisly humour, 
 where certain of the passions of man's developed 
 nature are seen armed and furious against our mild 
 prevailing ancient mother nature ; and the contrast is 
 between our utter wrath and her simple exposition of 
 the circumstances and consequences forming her laws. 
 There are situations which pass beyond the lightly 
 stirred perceptive wits to the quiet court of the intel- 
 lect, to be received there as an addition to our acquaint- 
 ance with mankind. We know not of what substance 
 to name them. Humour in its intense strain has a 
 seat somewhere about the mouth of tragedy, giving it 
 the enigmatical faint wry pull at a corner visible at 
 times upon the dreadful mask. 
 
 That Mr. Adister should be astonished at such a 
 communication from the princess, after a year of her 
 marriage : and that he should take it for a further 
 outrage of his paternal sentiments, should actually 
 redden and be hoarse in alluding to it: the revelation 
 of such points in our human character set the humane 
 old lawyer staring at the reserve space within himself 
 apart from his legal being, whereon he by fits com- 
 48 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 pared his own constitution with that of the individuals chapter 
 revealed to him by their acts and confidential utter- ^ co„^i,ta. 
 ances. For him, he decided that he would have tion: with 
 rejoiced at the news. ^^^^0^" 
 
 Granting the prince a monster, however, as Mr. ^"^ t^e 
 Adister unforcedly considered him, it was not so **" "'""^*" 
 cheering a piece of intelligence that involved him yet 
 closer with that man's rank blood : it curdled his own. 
 The marriage had shocked and stricken him, cleaving, 
 in his love for his daughter, a goodly tree and wither- 
 ing many flowers. Still the marriage was but Adiante's 
 gulf: he might be called father-in-law of her spangled 
 ruffian ; son-in-law, the desperado-rascal would never 
 be called by him." But the result of the marriage 
 dragged him bodily into the gulf: he became one of 
 four, numbering the beast twice among them. The 
 subtlety of his hatred so reckoned it ; for he could not 
 deny his daughter in the father's child ; he could not 
 exclude its unhallowed father in the mother's : and of 
 this man's child he must know and own himself the 
 grandfather. If ever he saw the child, if drawn to it 
 to fondle it, some part of the little animal not his 
 daughter's would partake of his embrace. And if 
 neither of his boys married, and his girl gave birth to 
 a son ! darkness rolled upon that avenue of vision. A 
 trespasser and usurper — one of the demon's brood 
 chased his very name out of Earlsfont ! 
 
 'Camminy, you must try to amuse yourself,' he 
 said briskly. 'Anything you may be wanting at 
 home shall be sent for. I must have you here to make 
 sure that I am acting under good advice. You 
 can take one of the keepers for an hour or two 
 of shooting. I may join you in the afternoon. 
 35— D 49 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER You will find occupation for your gun in the north 
 
 AConlilta- COVCrS.' 
 
 tion: with He Wandered about the house, looking into several 
 
 w''ei"'hwom''en" rooHis, and Only partially at rest when he discovered 
 and the Caroline in one, engaged upon some of her aquarelle 
 
 sketches. He asked where the young Irishman was. 
 
 'Are you in search of him?' said she. 'You like 
 him, uncle ? He is out riding, they tell me.' 
 
 ' The youngster is used to south-western showers in 
 that climate of his,' Mr. Adister replied. ' I dare say 
 we could find the Jesuit in him somewhere. There's 
 the seed. His cousin Con O'Donnell has filled him 
 with stuff about Ireland and England : the man has no 
 better to do than to train a parrot. What do you 
 think of him, my love ? ' 
 
 The judgement was not easily formed for expres- 
 sion. ' He is not quite like what I remember of his 
 brother Philip. He talks much more, does he not ? 
 He seems more Irish than his brother. He is very 
 strange. His feelings are strong; he has not an idea 
 of concealing them. For a young man educated by 
 the Jesuits, he is remarkably open.' 
 
 'The Jesuits might be of service to me just now! ' 
 Mr. Adister addressed his troubled soul, and spoke 
 upon another conception of them : ' How has he 
 shown his feelings ? ' 
 
 Caroline answered quickly: 'His love of his brother. 
 Anything that concerns his brother moves him ; it is 
 like a touch on a musical instrument. Perhaps I 
 should say a native one.' 
 
 ' Concerns his brother ? ' Mr Adister inquired, and 
 his look requesting enlightenment told her she might 
 speak. 
 50 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 ' Adiante,' she said softly. She coloured. chapter 
 
 Her uncle mused awhile in a half-somnolent gloom. ^ consuita- 
 
 * He talks of this at this present day ? ' ««»: ""•• 
 
 ' It is not dead to him. He really appears to have w^euhwom^en" 
 hoped ... he is extraordinary. He had not heard ^'"•*''« 
 
 ■; . . Cambrian race 
 
 before of her marriage. I was a witness of the most 
 singular scene this morning, at the piano. He gathered 
 it from what he had heard. He was overwhelmed by it. 
 I could not exaggerate. It was impossible to help being 
 a little touched, though it was curious, very strange.' 
 
 Her uncle's attentiveness incited her to describe the 
 scene, and as it visibly relieved his melancholy, she 
 did it with a few vivid indications of the quaint young 
 Irishman's manner of speech. She concluded: 'At 
 last he begged to see a portrait of her husband.' 
 
 ' Not of her ? ' said Mr. Adister abruptly, 
 
 ' No ; only of her husband.' 
 
 ' Show him her portrait.' 
 
 A shade of surprise was on Caroline's forehead. 
 
 * Shall I?' She had a dim momentary thought that the 
 sight of the beautiful face would not be good for Patrick. 
 
 ' Yes ; let him see the woman who could throw 
 herself away on that branded villain called a prince, 
 abjuring her Church for a little fouler than hangman 
 to me and every gentleman alive. I desire that he 
 should see it. Submission to the demands of her 
 husband's policy required it of her, she says ! Show 
 it him when he returns ; you have her miniature in 
 your keeping. And to-morrow take him to look at 
 the full-length of her before she left England and 
 ceased to be a lady of our country. I will order it to 
 be placed in the armoury. Let him see the miniature 
 of her this day.' 
 
 51 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER Mr. Adister resolved at the same time that Patrick 
 A c nluita should havc his portrait of the prince for a set-off to 
 tion: with the face of his daughter. He craved the relief it would 
 fP'°V'°^"P°" be to him to lay his colours on the prince for the 
 
 Welshwomen ■' '^ 
 
 and the Sparkling amazement of one whom, according to Caro- 
 
 cambrianrace ijjjg.g description, he could cxpcct to feel with him 
 acutely, which neither his niece nor his lawyer had 
 done : they never did when he painted the prince. He 
 was unstrung, heavily plunged in the matter of his 
 chagrin and grief: his unhealed wound had been 
 scraped and strewn with salt by his daughter's letter ; 
 he had a thirst for the kind of sympathy he supposed 
 he would find in the young Irishman's horror at the 
 husband of the incomparable beauty now past redemp- 
 tion degraded by her hideous choice ; lost to England 
 and to her father and to common respect. For none, 
 having once had the picture of the man, could dis- 
 sociate them ; they were like heaven and its reverse, 
 everlastingly coupled in the mind by their opposition 
 of characters and aspects. Her father could not, and 
 he judged of others by himself. He had been all but 
 utterly solitary since her marriage, brooded on it until 
 it saturated him ; too proud to speak of the thing in 
 sadness, or claim condolence for this wound inflicted 
 on him by the daughter he had idolised other than 
 through the indirect method of causing people to won- 
 der at her chosen yoke-fellow. Their stupefaction 
 refreshed him. Yet he was a gentleman capable of 
 apprehending simultaneously that he sinned against 
 his pride in the means he adopted to comfort his 
 nature. But the wound was a perpetual sickness 
 needing soul-medicine. Proud as he was, and unbend- 
 ing, he was not stronger than his malady, and he 
 52 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 could disguise, he could not contain, the cry of immo- chapter 
 derate grief. Adiante had been to him something ^ ^^^J^^^^ 
 beyond a creature beloved; she had with her glorious tion: with 
 beauty and great-heartedness been the sole object ^"^i^^^^'^X"" 
 which had ever inspirited his imagination. He could and the 
 have thought no man, not the most illustrious, worthy c*"''"*"™" 
 of her. And there she was, voluntarily in the hands 
 of a monster ! ' Husband ! ' Mr. Adister broke away 
 from Caroline, muttering : ' Her husband's policy ! ' 
 
 She was used to his interjections; she sat thinking 
 more of the strange request to her to show Mr. O'Don- 
 nell the miniature of Adiante. She had often thought 
 that her uncle regretted his rejection of Philip. It 
 appeared so to her now, though not by any consecu- 
 tive process of reasoning. She went to fetch the 
 miniature, and gazing on it, she tried to guess at Mr. 
 O'Donnell's thoughts when doing the same ; for who 
 so inflammable as he? And who, woman or man, 
 could behold this lighted face, with the dark raised 
 eyes and abounding auburn tresses, where the con- 
 trast of colours was in itself thrilling, and not admire, 
 or more, half worship, or wholly worship ? She pitied 
 the youth : she fancied that he would not continue 
 so ingenuously true to his brother's love of Adiante 
 after seeing it ; unless one might hope that the light 
 above beauty distinguishing its noble classic lines, 
 and the energy of radiance, like a morning of chival- 
 rous promise, in the eyes, would subdue him to distant 
 admiration. These were her flitting thoughts under 
 the spell of her queenly cousin's visage. She shut 
 up the miniature-case, and waited to hand it to young 
 Mr. O'Donnell. 
 
 53 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 The Miniature 
 
 Patrick returned to Earlsfont very late ; he had but 
 ten minutes to dress for dinner ; a short allowance 
 after a heated ride across miry tracks, though he 
 would have expended some of them, in spite of his 
 punctilious respect for the bell of the house enter- 
 taining him, if Miss Adister had been anywhere on the 
 stairs or corridors as he rushed away to his room. 
 He had things to tell ; he had not been out over the 
 country for nothing. 
 
 Fortunately for his good social principles, the 
 butler at Earlsfont was a wary supervisor of his man ; 
 great guest or little guest ; Patrick's linen was 
 prepared for him properly studded ; he had only to 
 spring out of one suit into another; and still more 
 fortunately the urgency for a rapid execution of the 
 manoeuvre prevented his noticing a large square 
 envelope posted against the looking-glass of his 
 toilette-table. He caught sight of it first when pulling 
 down his shirt-cuffs with an air of recovered ease, not 
 to say genial triumph, to think that the feat of 
 grooming himself, washing, dressing and stripping, the 
 accustomed persuasive final sweep of the brush to his 
 hair-crop, was done before the bell had rung. His 
 54 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 name was on the envelope; and under his name, in chapter 
 smaller letters, TheM^Lure 
 
 Adiante. 
 
 ' Shall I ? ' said he, doing the thing he asked himself 
 about doing, tearing open the paper cover of the 
 portrait of her who had flitted in his head for years 
 unseen. And there she was, remote but present. 
 
 His underlip dropped ; he had the look of those who 
 bate breath and swarm their wits to catch a sound. 
 At last he remembered that the summoning bell had 
 been in his ears a long time back, without his having 
 been sensible of any meaning in it. He started to and 
 fro. The treasure he held declined to enter the 
 breast-pocket of his coat, and the other pockets he 
 perhaps, if sentimentally, justly discarded as being 
 beneath the honour of serving for a temporary casket. 
 He locked it up, with a vow to come early to rest. 
 Even then he had thoughts whether it might be safe. 
 
 Who spoke, and what they uttered at the repast, 
 and his own remarks, he was unaware of. He turned 
 right and left a brilliant countenance that had the 
 glitter of frost-light ; it sparkled and was unreceptive. 
 No wonder Miss Adister deemed him wilder and 
 stranger than ever. She necessarily supposed the 
 excess of his peculiarities to be an eifect of the 
 portrait, and would have had him, according to her 
 ideas of a young man of some depth of feeling, 
 dreamier. On the contrary, he talked sheer common- 
 place. He had ridden to the spur of the mountains, 
 and had put oip the mare, and groomed and fed her, 
 not permitting another hand to touch her: all very 
 well, and his praises of the mare likewise, but he had 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER not a syllable for the sublime of the mountains. He 
 The j«niature ^8^* ^^^6 Careered over midland flats for any 
 susceptibility that he betrayed to the grandeur of the 
 scenery she loved. Ultimately she fancied the minia- 
 ture had been overlooked in his hurry to dress, and 
 that he was now merely excited by his lively gallop 
 to a certain degree of hard brightness noticeable in 
 hunting men at their dinner. 
 
 The elixir in Patrick carried him higher than 
 mountain crests. Adiante illumined an expanded 
 world for him, miraculous, yet the real one, only 
 wanting such light to show its riches. She lifted it 
 out of darkness with swift throbs of her heavenliness 
 as she swam to his eyelids, vanished and dazzled 
 anew, and made these gleams of her and the dark 
 intervals his dream of the winged earth on her flight 
 from splendour to splendour, secresy to secresy; — 
 follow you that can, the youth whose heart is an 
 opened mine, whose head is an irradiated sky, under 
 the spell of imagined magical beauty. She was bugle, 
 banner, sunrise, of his inmost ambition and rapture. 
 
 And without a warning, she fled ; her features were 
 lost ; his power of imagining them wrestled with 
 vapour; the effort contracted his outlook. But if she 
 left him blind of her, she left him with no lessened 
 bigness of heart. He frankly believed in her revela- 
 tion of a greater world and a livelier earth, a flying 
 earth and a world wealthier than grouped history in 
 heroic marvels : he fell back on the exultation of his 
 having seen her, and on the hope for the speedy 
 coming of midnight, when the fountain of her in the 
 miniature would be seen and drunk off at his full 
 leisure, and his glorious elation of thrice man almost 
 56 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 up to mounting spirit would be restored to make him chapter 
 
 vu 
 
 The Miniature 
 
 worthy of the vision. ^" 
 
 Meanwhile Caroline had withdrawn and the lord of 
 Earlsfont was fretting at his theme. He had decided 
 not to be a party in the sale of either of his daughter's 
 estates : let her choose other agents : if the iniquity 
 was committed, his hands would be clean of it. Mr. 
 Adister spoke by way of prelude to the sketch of * this 
 prince ' whose title was a lurid delusion. Patrick 
 heard of a sexagenarian rake and Danube adventurer, 
 in person a description of falcon-Caliban, containing 
 his shagginess in a frogged hussar-jacket and crimson 
 pantaloons, with hook-nose, fox-eyes, grizzled billow 
 of frowsy moustache, and chin of a beast of prey. 
 This fellow, habitually one of the dogs lining the 
 green tables of the foreign Baths, snapping for gold all 
 day and half the night, to spend their winnings in 
 debauchery and howl threats of suicide, never fulfilled 
 early enough, when they lost, claimed his princedom 
 on the strength of his father's murder of a reigning 
 prince and sitting in his place for six months, till a 
 merited shot from another pretender sent him to his 
 account. ' What do you say to such a nest of 
 assassins, and one of them, an outcast and blackleg, 
 asking an English gentleman to acknowledge him as 
 a member of his family ! I have,' said Mr. Adister, 
 direct information that this gibbet-bird is conspiring 
 to dethrone — they call it — the present reigning prince, 
 and the proceeds of my daughter's estates are, by her 
 desire — if she has not written under compulsion of 
 the scoundrel — intended to speed their blood-monger- 
 ing. There goes a Welshwoman's legacy to the sea, 
 with a herd of swine with devils in them ! ' 
 
 57 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER Mr. Camminy kept his head bent, his hand on his 
 The ffiniature S^^ss of port. Patrick stared, and the working of his 
 troubled brows gave the unhappy gentleman such 
 lean comfort as he was capable of taking. Patrick in 
 sooth was engaged in the hard attempt at the same 
 time to do two of the most difficult things which can 
 be proposed to the ingenuity of sensational youth : he 
 was trying to excuse a respected senior for conduct 
 that he could not approve, while he did inward battle 
 to reconcile his feelings with the frightful addition to 
 his hoard of knowledge: in other words, he sought 
 strenuously to mix the sketch of the prince with the 
 dregs of the elixir coming from the portrait of 
 Adiante ; and now she sank into obscurity behind the 
 blackest of brushes, representing her incredible hus- 
 band ; and now by force of some natural light she 
 broke through the ugly mist and gave her adored the 
 sweet lines and colours of the features he had lost. 
 There was an ebb and flow of the struggle, until, able 
 to say to himself that he saw her clearly as though 
 the portrait was in the palm of his hand, the battle of 
 the imagination ceased and she was fairer for him 
 than if her foot had continued pure of its erratic step : 
 fairer, owing to the eyes he saw with ; he had shaken 
 himself free of the exacting senses which consent to 
 the worship of women upon the condition of their 
 possessing all the precious and the miraculous quali- 
 ties ; among others, the gift of an exquisite fragility 
 that cannot break ; — in short, upon terms flattering to 
 the individual devotee. Without knowing it he had 
 done it and got some of the upholding strength of 
 those noblest of honest men who not merely give 
 souls to women — an extraordinary endowment of 
 58 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 them — but also discourse to them with their chapter 
 souls ^" 
 
 """"• The Miniature 
 
 Patrick accepted Adiante's husband : the man was 
 her husband. Hideous (for there was no combating 
 her father's painting of him), he was almost interest- 
 ing through his alliance: — an example of how much 
 earth the worshipper can swallow when he is quite 
 sincere. Instead of his going under eclipse, the beauty 
 of his lady eclipsed her monster. He believed in her 
 right to choose according to her pleasure since her 
 lover was denied her. Sitting alone by his fire, he 
 gazed at her for hours, and bled for Philip. There 
 was a riddle to be answered in her cutting herself 
 away from Philip ; he could not answer it ; her face 
 was the vindication and the grief. The usual traverses 
 besetting true lovers were suggested to him, enemies 
 and slanders and intercepted letters. He rejected 
 them in the presence of the beautiful inscrutable. 
 Small marvel that Philip had loved her, ' Poor fellow ! ' 
 Patrick cried aloud, and drooped on a fit of tears. 
 
 The sleep he had was urgently dream-ridden to 
 goals that eluded him and broadened to fresh races 
 and chases waving something to be won which never 
 was won, albeit untiringly pursued amid a series of 
 adventures, tragic episodes ; wild enthusiasm. The 
 whole of it was featureless, a shifting agitation ; yet 
 he must have been endowed to extricate a particular 
 meaning applied to himself out of the mass of tumbled 
 events, and closely in relation to realities, for he 
 quitted his bed passionately regretting that he had not 
 gone through a course of drill and study of the military 
 art. He remembered Mr. Adister's having said that 
 military training was good for all gentlemen. 
 
 59 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER ' I could joiii the French Foreign Legion,' he thought. 
 The Miniature Adiante was as beautiful by day as by night. He 
 looked. The riddle of her was more burdensome in 
 the daylight. 
 
 He sighed, and on another surging of his admiration 
 launched the resolve that he would serve her blindly, 
 without one question. How, when, where, and the 
 means and the aim, he did not think of. There was 
 she, and here was he, and heaven and a great heart 
 would show the way. 
 
 Adiante at eighteen, the full length of her, fresh in 
 her love of Philip, was not the same person to him, 
 she had not the same secret ; she was beautiful differ- 
 ently. By right he should have loved the portrait 
 best: but he had not seen it first; he had already 
 lived through a life of emotions with the miniature, 
 and could besides clasp the frame ; and moreover he 
 fondled an absurd notion that the miniature would be 
 entrusted to him for a time, and was almost a posses- 
 sion. The pain of the thought of relinquishing it was 
 the origin of this foolishness. And again, if it be fair 
 to prove him so deeply, true to his brother though he 
 was (admiration of a woman does thus influence the 
 tides of our blood to render the noblest of us guilty of 
 some unconscious wavering of our loyalty), Patrick 
 dedicated the full-length of Adiante to Philip, and 
 reserved the other, her face and neck, for himself. 
 
 Obediently to Mr. Adister's order, the portrait had 
 been taken from one of his private rooms and placed 
 in the armoury, the veil covering the canvas of late 
 removed. Guns and spears and swords overhead and 
 about, the youthful figure of Adiante was ominously 
 encompassed. Caroline stood with Patrick before the 
 60 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 portrait of her cousin; she expected him to show a chapter 
 sign of appreciation. He asked her to tell him the ^^^ mniature 
 Church whose forms of faith the princess had embraced. 
 She answered that it was the Greek Church. 'The 
 Greek,' said he, gazing harder at the portrait. Presently 
 she said: 'It was a perfect likeness.' She named the 
 famous artist who had painted it. Patrick's * Ah ' was 
 unsatisfactory. 
 
 ' We,' said she, ' think it a living image of her as she 
 was then.' 
 
 He would not be instigated to speak. 
 
 ' You do not admire it, Mr. O'Donnell ? ' she 
 cried. 
 
 'Oh, but I do. That's how she looked when she 
 was drawing on her gloves with good will to go out 
 to meet him. You can't see her there and not be sure 
 she had a heart. She part smiles; she keeps her 
 mouth shut, but there 's the dimple, and it means a 
 thought, like a bubble bursting up from the heart in 
 her breast. She 's tall. She carries herself like a 
 great French lady, and nothing beats that. It's the 
 same colour, dark eyebrows and fair hair. And not 
 thinking of her pride. She thinks of her walk, and the 
 end of it, where he 's waiting. The eyes are not the 
 same.' 
 
 ' The same ? ' said Caroline. 
 
 ' As this.' He tapped on the left side. She did not 
 understand it at all. 
 
 'The bit of work done in Vienna,' said he. 
 
 She blushed. ' Do you admire that so much ? ' 
 
 'I do.' 
 
 ' We consider it not to be compared to this.' 
 
 ' Perhaps not. I like it better.' 
 
 61 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 'But why do you like that better?' said Caroline, 
 
 VII 
 
 The Miniature 
 
 ^" deeming it his wilfulness. 
 
 Patrick put out a finger. 'The eyes there don't seem 
 to say, "I'm yours to make a hero of you." But 
 look,' he drew forth from under his waistcoat the 
 miniature, 'what don't they say here! It's a bright 
 day for the Austrian capital that has her by the river 
 Danube. Yours has a landscape ; I 've made acquaint- 
 ance with the country, I caught the print of it on my 
 ride yesterday; and those are your mountains. But 
 mine has her all to herself while she 's thinking undis- 
 turbed in her boudoir. I have her and her thoughts ; 
 that's next to her soul. I've an idea it ought to be 
 given to Philip.' He craned his head round to woo 
 some shadow of assent to the daring suggestion- 
 - Just to break the shock 'twill be to my brother. Miss 
 Adister. If I could hand him this, and say, "Keep it, 
 for you'll get nothing more of her; and that's worth 
 a kingdom." ' 
 
 Caroline faltered : ' Your brother does not know ? ' 
 
 'Pity him. His blow's to come. He can't or he'd 
 have spoken of it to me. I was with him a couple of 
 hours and he never mentioned a word of it, nor did 
 Captain Con. We talked of Ireland, and the service, 
 and some French cousins we have.' 
 
 ' Ladies ? ' Caroline inquired by instinct. 
 
 'And charming,' said Patrick, ' real dear girls. Philip 
 might have one, if he would, and half my property, to 
 make it right with her parents. There 'd be little use 
 in proposing it. He was dead struck when the shaft 
 struck him. That 's love ! So I determined the night 
 after I'd shaken his hand I'd be off to Earlsfont and 
 try my hardest for him. It 's hopeless now. Only he 
 62 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 might have the miniature for his bride. I can tell him chapter 
 a trifle to help him over his agony. She would have ^^^ j^niature 
 had him, she would, Miss Adister, if she hadn't feared 
 he 'd be talked of as Captain Con has been — about the 
 neighbourhood, I mean, because he,' Patrick added 
 hurriedly, ' he married an heiress and sank his ambi- 
 tion for distinction like a man who has finished his 
 dinner. I 'm certain she would. I have it on authority.' 
 
 ' What authority ? ' said Caroline coldly. 
 
 ' Her own old nurse.' 
 
 ' Jenny Williams ? ' 
 
 ' The one ! I had it from her. And how she loves 
 her darling Miss Adiante! She won't hear of "prin- 
 cess." She hates that marriage. She was all for my 
 brother Philip. She calls him " Our handsome 
 lieutenant." She '11 keep the poor fellow a subaltern 
 all his life.' 
 
 ' You went to Jenny's inn ? ' 
 
 ' The Earlsfont Arms, I went to. And Mrs. Jenny 
 at the door, watching the rain. Destiny directed me. 
 She caught the likeness to Philip on a lift of her eye, 
 and very soon we sat conversing like old friends. We 
 were soon playing at old cronies over past times. I 
 saw the way to bring her out, so I set to work, and 
 she was up in defence of her darling, ready to tell me 
 anything to get me to think well of her. And that 
 was the main reason, she said, why Miss Adiante broke 
 with him and went abroad: her dear child wouldn't 
 have Mr. Philip abused for fortune-hunting. As for 
 the religion, they could each have practised their 
 own : her father would have consented to the fact, 
 when it came on him in that undeniable shape of two 
 made one. She says. Miss Adiante has a mighty 
 
 63 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER soul ; shc has brave ideas. Miss Deenly, she calls 
 The Miniature ^®'*- ^y' ^^^ ^° ^^^ Philip: though the worst is, 
 they're likely to drive him out of the army into 
 politics and Parliament ; and an Irishman there is a 
 barrow trolling a load of grievances. Ah, but she 
 would have kept him straight. Not a soldier alive 
 knows the use of cavalry better than my brother. He 
 wanted just that English wife to steady him and pour 
 drops of universal fire into him ; to keep him face to 
 face with the world, I mean ; letting him be true to 
 his country in a fair degree, but not an old rainpipe 
 and spout. She would have held him to his pro- 
 fession. And, Oh dear ! She 's a friend worth having, 
 lost to Ireland. I see what she could have done there. 
 Something bigger than an island, too, has to be served 
 in our days : that is, if we don't forget our duty at 
 home. Poor Paddy, and his pig, and his bit of earth ! 
 If you knew what we feel for him ! I 'm a landlord, 
 but I 'm one with my people about evictions. We 
 Irish take strong root. And honest rent paid over to 
 absentees, through an agent, if you think of it, seems 
 like flinging the money that 's the sweat of the brow 
 into a stone conduit to roll away to a giant maw 
 hungry as the sea. It 's the bleeding to death of our 
 land! Transactions from hand to hand of warm 
 human flesh — nothing else will do : I mean, for men of 
 our blood. Ah ! she would have kept my brother 
 temperate in his notions and his plans. And why 
 absentees, Miss Adister? Because we've no centre of 
 home life : the core has been taken out of us ; our 
 country has no hearth-fire. I 'm for union ; only there 
 should be justice, and a little knowledge to make 
 allowance for the natural cravings of a different kind. 
 64 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 of people. Well, then, and I suppose that inter- chapter 
 
 VII 
 
 ' The Miniature 
 
 marriages are good for both. But here comes a man, , ^" 
 
 the boldest and handsomest of his race, and he offers 
 himself to the handsomest and sweetest of yours, and 
 she leans to him, and the family won't have him. 
 For he 's an Irishman and a Catholic. Who is it then 
 opposed the proper union of the two islands? Not 
 Philip. He did his best ; and if he does worse now 
 he 's not entirely to blame. The misfortune is, that 
 when he learns the total loss of her on that rock- 
 promontory, he '11 be dashing himself upon rocks sure 
 to shiver him. There 's my fear. If I might take him 
 this . . . ? ' Patrick pleaded with the miniature raised 
 like the figure of his interrogation. 
 
 Caroline's inward smile threw a soft light of humour 
 over her features at the simple cunning of his wind-up 
 to the lecture on his country's case, which led her to 
 perceive a similar cunning simplicity in his identifica- 
 tion of it with Philip's. It startled her to surprise, 
 for the reason that she 'd been reviewing his freakish 
 hops from Philip to Ireland and to Adiante, and 
 wondering, in a different kind of surprise, how and by 
 what profitless ingenuity he contrived to weave them 
 together. Nor was she unmoved, notwithstanding 
 her fancied perception of his Jesuitry : his look and 
 his voice were persuasive ; his love of his brother was 
 deep ; his change of sentiment toward Adiante after 
 the tale told him by her old nurse Jenny, stood for 
 proof of a generous manliness. 
 
 Before she had replied, her uncle entered the 
 armoury, and Patrick was pleading still, and she felt 
 herself to be a piece of damask, a very fiery 
 dye. 
 
 35— E 65 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER To disentangle herself, she said on an impulse, 
 The Miniature desperately : 
 
 'Mr. O'Donnell begs to have the miniature for his 
 brother.' 
 
 Patrick swung instantly to Mr. Adister. 'I presumed 
 to ask for it, sir, to carry it to Philip. He is ignorant 
 about the princess as yet: he would like to have a 
 bit of the wreck. I shan't be a pleasant messenger to 
 him. I should be glad to take him something. It 
 could be returned after a time. She was a great deal 
 to Philip — three parts of his life. He has nothing of 
 her to call his own.' 
 
 * That ! ' said Mr. Adister. He turned to the virgin 
 Adiante, sat down and shut his eyes, fetching a breath. 
 He looked vacantly at Patrick. 
 
 * When you find a man purely destructive, you think 
 him a devil, don't you?' he said. 
 
 'A good first cousin to one,' Patrick replied, watch- 
 ful for a hint to seize the connection. 
 
 * If you think of hunting to-day, we have not many 
 minutes to spare before we mount. The meet is at 
 eleven, five miles distant. Go and choose your horse. 
 Caroline will drive there.' 
 
 Patrick consulted her on a glance for counsel. ' I 
 shall be glad to join you, sir, for to-morrow I must be 
 off to my brother.' 
 
 'Take it,' Mr. Adister waved his hand hastily. He 
 gazed at his idol of untouched eighteen. ' Keep it safe,' 
 he said, discarding the sight of the princess. ' Old 
 houses are doomed to burnings, and a devil in the 
 family may bring us to ashes. And some day . . . ! ' 
 he could not continue his thought upon what he 
 might be destined to wish for, and ran it on to, 
 66 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 ' Some day I shall be happy to welcome your brother, chapter 
 
 VII 
 The Miniature 
 
 when it pleases him to visit me.' ^" 
 
 Patrick bowed, oppressed by the mighty gift. 'I 
 haven't the word to thank you with, sir.' 
 
 Mr. Adister did not wait for it. 
 
 * I owe this to you, Miss Adister,' said Patrick. 
 
 Her voice shook : * My uncle loves those who loved 
 her.' 
 
 He could see she was trembling. When he was 
 alone his ardour of gratefulness enabled him to see 
 into her uncle's breast : the inflexible frigidity ; lasting 
 regrets and remorse; the compassion for Philip in 
 kinship of grief and loss; the angry dignity; the 
 stately generosity. 
 
 He saw too, for he was clear-eyed when his feelings 
 were not over-active, the narrow pedestal whereon 
 the stiff figure of a man of iron pride must accommo- 
 date itself to stand in despite of tempests without and 
 within; and how the statue rocks there, how much 
 more pitiably than the common sons of earth who 
 have the broad common field to fall down on and our 
 good mother's milk to set them on their legs again. 
 
 67 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 Captain Con and Mrs. Adister O'Donnell 
 
 Riding homeward from the hunt at the leisurely trot 
 of men who have steamed their mounts pretty well, 
 Mr. Adister questioned Patrick familiarly about his 
 family, and his estate, and his brother's prospects in 
 the army, and whither he intended first to direct his 
 travels : questions which Patrick understood to be 
 kindly put for the sake of promoting conversation 
 with a companion of unripe age by a gentleman who 
 had wholesomely excited his blood to run. They 
 were answered, except the last one. Patrick had no 
 immediate destination in view. 
 
 'Leave Europe behind you,' said Mr. Adister warm- 
 ing, to advise him, and checking the trot of his horse. 
 ' Try South America.' The lordly gentleman plotted 
 out a scheme of colonisation and conquest in that 
 region with the coolness of a practised freebooter. 
 'No young man is worth a job,' he said, 'who does 
 not mean to be a leader, and as leader to have dominion. 
 Here we are fettered by ancestry and antecedents. 
 Had I to recommence without those encumbrances, 
 I would try my fortune yonder. I stood condemned 
 to waste my youth in idle parades, and hunting the 
 68 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 bear and buffalo. The estate you have inherited is chapter 
 not binding on you. You can realise it, and begin by captai" con 
 taking over two or three hundred picked Irish and and Mrs. 
 English — have both races capable of handling spade o?Do^^ei, 
 and musket ; purchasing some thousands of acres to 
 establish a legal footing there. You increase your 
 colony from the mother country in the ratio of your 
 prosperity, until your power is respected, and there is 
 a necessity for the extension of your territory. When 
 you are feared you will be on your mettle. They will 
 favour you with provocation. I should not doubt the 
 result, supposing myself to have under my sole com- 
 mand a trained body of men of English blood — and 
 Irish.' 
 
 'Owners of the soil,' rejoined Patrick, much mar- 
 velling. 
 
 'Undoubtedly, owners of the soil, but owing you 
 service.' 
 
 ' They fight, sir.' 
 
 'It is hardly to be specified in the calculation, know- 
 ing them. Soldiers who have served their term, parti- 
 cularly old artillerymen, would be my choice : young 
 fellows and boys among them. Women would have 
 to be taken. Half-breeds are the ruin of colonists. 
 Our men are born for conquest. We were conquerors 
 here, and it is want of action and going physically 
 forward that makes us a rusty people. There are ' — 
 Mr. Adister's intonation told of his proposing a wretched 
 alternative, — 'the Pacific Islands, but they will soon 
 be snapped up by the European and North American 
 Governments, and a single one of them does not offer 
 space. It would require money and a navy.' He 
 mused. ' South America is the quarter I should decide 
 
 69 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 vm 
 
 Captain Con 
 and Mrs. 
 Adlster 
 O'Donnell 
 
 for, as a young man. You are a judge of horses; you 
 ride well; you would have splendid pastures over 
 there; you might raise a famous breed. The air is 
 fine; it would suit our English stock. We are on 
 ground, Mr. O'Donnell, which my forefathers contested 
 sharply and did not yield.' 
 
 ' The owners of the soil had to do that,' said Patrick. 
 * I can show the same in my country, with a difference.' 
 
 * Considerably to your benefit.' 
 
 •Everything has been crushed there barring the 
 contrary opinion.' 
 
 ' I could expect such a remark from a rebel.' 
 
 'I 'm only interpreting the people, sir.' 
 
 'Jump out of that tinder-box as soon as you can. 
 When I was in South America, it astonished me that 
 no Englishman had cast an eye on so inviting a land. 
 Australia is not comparable with it. And where 
 colonisations have begun without system, and with- 
 out hard fighting to teach the settlers to value good 
 leadership and respect their chiefs, they tumble into 
 Republics.' 
 
 Patrick would have liked to fling in a word about 
 the Englishman's cast of his eye upon inviting lands, 
 but the trot was resumed, the lord of Earlsfont having 
 delivered his mind, and a minute made it happily too 
 late for the sarcastic bolt. Glad that his tongue had 
 been kept from wagging, he trotted along beside his 
 host in the dusky evening over the once contested 
 land where the gentleman's forefathers had done their 
 deeds and firmly fixed their descendants. A remainder 
 of dull red fire prolonged the half-day above the 
 mountain strongholds of the former owners of the 
 soil, upon which prince and bard and priest, and 
 70 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 grappling natives never wanting for fierceness, roared chapter 
 to-arms in the beacon-flames from ridge to peak : and capta" con 
 down they poured, and back they were pushed by the and Mrs. 
 inveterate coloniser — stationing at threatened points o^Donneii 
 his old * artillerymen ' of those days : and so it ends, 
 that bard and priest and prince; holy poetry, and 
 divine prescription, and a righteous holding; are as 
 naught against him. They go, like yonder embers 
 of the winter sunset before advancing night : and to- 
 morrow the beacon-heaps are ashes, the conqueror's 
 foot stamps on them, the wind scatters them ; strangest 
 of all, you hear victorious lawlessness appealing 
 solemnly to God the law. 
 
 Patrick was too young to philosophise upon his 
 ideas ; or else the series of pictures projected by the 
 troops of sensations running through him were not of 
 a solidity to support any structure of philosophy. He 
 reverted, though rather in name than in spirit, to the 
 abstractions, justice, consistency, right. They were 
 too hard to think of, so he abandoned the puzzle of 
 fitting them to men's acts and their consciences, and 
 he put them aside as mere titles employed for the uses 
 of a police and a tribunal to lend an appearance of 
 legitimacy to the decrees of them that have got the 
 upper hand. An insurrectionary rising of his breast 
 on behalf of his country was the consequence. He 
 kept it down by turning the whole hubbub within him 
 to the practical contemplation of a visionary South 
 America as the region for him and a fighting tenantry. 
 With a woman, to crown her queen there, the prospect 
 was fair. But where dwelt the woman possessing 
 majesty suitable to such a dream in her heart or 
 her head? The best he had known in Ireland and 
 
 71 
 
CHAPTER 
 VIII 
 Captain Con 
 and Mrs. 
 Adister 
 O'Donnell 
 
 CELT AND SAXON 
 
 in France, preferred the charms of society to bold 
 adventure. 
 
 All the same, thought he, it's queer counsel, that 
 we should set to work by buying a bit of land to win 
 a clean footing to rob our neighbours : and his brains 
 took another shot at Mr. Adister, this time without 
 penetrating. He could very well have seen the matter 
 he disliked in a man that he disliked ; but the father 
 of Adiante had touched him with the gift of the 
 miniature. 
 
 Patrick was not asked to postpone his departure 
 from Earlsfont, nor was he invited to come again. 
 Mr. Adister drove him to the station in the early 
 morning, and gave him a single nod from the phaeton- 
 box for a good-bye. Had not Caroline assured him at 
 the leave-taking between them that he had done her 
 uncle great good by his visit, the blank of the usual 
 ceremonial phrases would have caused him to fancy 
 himself an intruder courteously dismissed, never more 
 to enter the grand old Hall. He was further comforted 
 by hearing the stationmaster's exclamation of astonish- 
 ment and pleasure at the sight of the squire 'in his 
 place ' handling the reins, which had not been wit- 
 nessed for many a day : and so it appeared that the 
 recent guest had been exceptionally complimented. 
 ' But why not a warm word, instead of turning me 
 off to decipher a bit of Egyptian on baked brick,' he 
 thought, incurably Celtic as he was. 
 
 From the moment when he beheld Mr. Adister's 
 phaeton mounting a hill that took the first leap for 
 the Cambrian highlands, up to his arrival in London, 
 scarcely one of his 'ideas' darted out before Patrick, 
 as they were in the habit of doing, like the enchanted 
 72 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 hares of fairyland, tempting him to pursue, and chapter 
 changing into the form of woman ever, at some captain con 
 turn of the chase. For as he had travelled down to »>"? ^rs. 
 Earlsfont in the state of ignorance and hopefulness, o'Donneii 
 bearing the liquid brains of that young condition, so 
 did his acquisition of a particular fact destructive of 
 hope solidify them about it as he travelled back : in 
 other words, they were digesting what they had taken 
 in. Imagination would not have stirred for a thousand 
 fleeting hares: and principally, it may be, because he 
 was conscious that no form of woman would any- 
 where come of them. Woman was married ; she had 
 the ring on her finger ! He could at his option look 
 on her in the miniature, he could think of her as being 
 in the city where she had been painted ; but he could 
 not conjure her out of space; she was nowhere in the 
 ambient air. Secretly she was a feeling that lay half 
 slumbering very deep down within him, and he kept 
 the secret, choosing to be poor rather than call her 
 forth. He was in truth digesting with difficulty, as 
 must be the case when it is allotted to the brains to 
 absorb what the soul abhors. 
 
 'Poor old Philip!' was his perpetual refrain. — 
 ' Philip, the girl you love is married ; and here 's her 
 portrait taken in her last blush ; and the man who 
 has her hasn't a share in that ! ' Thus, throwing in 
 the ghost of a sigh for sympathy, it seemed to Patrick 
 that the intelligence would have to be communicated. 
 Bang is better, thought he, for bad news than snap- 
 ping fire and feinting, when you 're bound half to kill a 
 fellow, and a manly fellow. 
 
 Determined that bang it should be, he hurried from 
 the terminus to Philip's hotel, where he had left him, 
 
 73 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 and Mrs. 
 
 Adister 
 
 O'Donnell 
 
 CHAPTER and was thence despatched to the house of Captain 
 capt^n Con ^^'^ O'Donncll, where he created a joyful confusion, 
 slightly dashed with rigour on the part of the regnant 
 lady; which is not to be wondered at, considering 
 that both the gentlemen attending her, Philip and 
 her husband, quitted her table with shouts at the 
 announcement of his name, and her husband hauled 
 him in unwashed before her, crying that the lost was 
 found, the errant returned, the Prodigal Pat recovered 
 by his kinsman ! and she had to submit to the intro- 
 duction of the disturber : and a bedchamber had to be 
 thought of for the unexpected guest, and the dinner to 
 be delayed in middle course, and her husband corrected 
 between the discussions concerning the bedchamber, 
 and either the guest permitted to appear at her table 
 in sooty day-garb, or else a great gap commanded in 
 the service of her dishes, vexatious extreme for a lady 
 composed of orderliness. She acknowledged Patrick's 
 profound salute and his excuses with just so many 
 degrees in the inclining of her head as the polite deem 
 a duty to themselves when the ruffling world has 
 disarranged them. 
 
 'Con!' she called to her chattering husband, 'we 
 are in England, if you please.' 
 
 ' To be sure, madam,' said the captain, ' and so 's 
 Patrick, thanks to the stars. We fancied him gone, 
 kidnapped, burned, made a meal of and swallowed up, 
 under the earth or the water ; for he forgot to give us 
 his address in town ; he stood before us for an hour 
 or so, and then the fellow vanished. We've waited 
 for him gaping. With your permission I'll venture 
 an opinion that he'll go and dabble his hands and 
 sit with us as he is, for the once, as it happens.' 
 74 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 'Let it be so,' she rejoined, not pacified beneath her chapter 
 dignity. She named the bedchamber to a footman. captJi" con 
 
 'And I'll accompany the boy to hurry him on,' said and Mrs. 
 the captain, hurrying Patrick on as he spoke, till he o^Donneii 
 had him out of the dining-room, when he whispered : 
 ' Out with your key, and if we can scramble you into 
 your evening-suit quick we shall heal the breach in 
 the dinner. You dip your hands and face, I'll have 
 out the dress. You've the right style for her, my 
 boy: and mind, she is an excellent good woman, 
 worthy of all respect : but formality 's the flattery she 
 likes : a good bow and short speech. Here we are, 
 and the room 's lighted. Off to the basin, give me the 
 key ; and here 's hot water in tripping Mary's hands. 
 The portmanteau opens easy. Quick ! the door 's 
 shut on rosy Mary. The race is for domestic peace, 
 my boy. I sacrifice everything I can for it, in decency. 
 'Tis the secret of my happiness.' 
 
 Patrick's transformation was rapid enough to satisfy 
 the impatient captain, who said : ' You'll tell her you 
 couldn't sit down in her presence undressed. I married 
 her at forty, you know, when a woman has reached 
 her perfect development, and leans a trifle more to 
 ceremonies than to substance. And where have you 
 been the while ? ' 
 
 ' I '11 tell you by and by,' said Patrick. 
 
 ' Tell me now, and don't be smirking at the glass ; 
 your necktie 's as neat as a lady's company-smile, 
 equal at both ends, and warranted not to relax before 
 the evening's over. And mind you don't set me off 
 talking overmuch downstairs. I talk in her presence 
 like the usher of the Court to the judge. 'Tis the 
 secret of my happiness.' 
 
 75 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 
 VIII 
 
 Captain Con 
 and Mrs. 
 Adlster 
 O'Donnell 
 
 'Where are those rascally dress-boots of mine?' 
 cried Patrick. 
 
 Captain Con pitched the contents of the portmanteau 
 right and left. ' Never mind the boots, my boy. Your 
 legs will be under the table during dinner, and we '11 
 institute a rummage up here between that and the 
 procession to the drawing-room, where you'll be 
 examined head to foot, devil a doubt of it. But say, 
 where have you been? She'll be asking, and we 're 
 in a mess already, and may as well have a place to 
 name to her, somewhere, to excuse the gash you've 
 made in her dinner. Here they are, both of 'm, rolled 
 in a dirty shirt ! ' 
 
 Patrick seized the boots and tugged them on, say- 
 ing: 'Earlsfont, then.' 
 
 'You've been visiting Earlsfont? Whack! but 
 that 's the saving of us ! Talk to her of her brother : — 
 he sends her his love. Talk to her of the ancestral 
 hall : — it stands as it was on the day of its foundation. 
 Just wait about five minutes to let her punish us, 
 before you out with it. 'Twill come best from you. 
 What did you go down there for? But don't stand 
 answering questions ; come along. Don't heed her 
 countenance at the going in : we 've got the talisman. 
 As to the dressing, it 's a perfect trick of harlequinade, 
 and she '11 own it after a dose of Earlsfont. And, by 
 the way, she's not Mrs. Con, remember; she's Mrs. 
 Adister O'Donnell: and that's best rolled out to 
 Mistress. She's a worthy woman, but she was 
 married at forty, and I had to take her shaped as she 
 was, for moulding her at all was out of the question, 
 and the soft parts of me had to be the sufferers, to 
 effect a conjunction, for where one won't and can't, 
 76 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 poor t' other must, or the union 's a mockery. She chapter 
 was cast in bronze at her birth, if she wasn't cut in captain Con 
 bog-root. Anyhow, you'll study her. Consider her and Mrs. 
 for my sake. Madam, it should be — madam, call her, o'Donneii 
 addressing her, madam. She hasn't a taste for jokes, 
 and she chastises absurdities, and England 's the fore- 
 most country of the globe, in direct communication 
 with heaven, and only to be connected with such a 
 country by the tail of it is a special distinction and a 
 comfort for us ; we 're that part of the kite ! — but, 
 Patrick, she 's a charitable soul ; she 's a virtuous 
 woman and an affectionate wife, and doesn't frown to 
 see me turn off to my place of worship while she 
 drum-majors it away to her own; she entertains 
 Father Boyle heartily, like the good woman she is to 
 good men ; and unfortunate females too have a friend 
 in her, a real friend — that they have ; and that 's a 
 wonder in a woman chaste as ice. I do respect her ; 
 and I'd like to see the man to favour me with an 
 opportunity of proving it on him ! So you '11 not 
 forget, my boy ; and prepare for a cold bath the first 
 five minutes. Out with Earlsfont early after that. 
 All these things are trifles to an unmarried man. I 
 have to attend to 'm, I have to be politic and give her 
 elbow-room for her natural angles. 'Tis the secret of 
 my happiness.' 
 
 Priming his kinsman thus up to the door of the 
 dining-room, Captain Con thrust him in. 
 
 Mistress Adister O'Donnell's head rounded as by slow 
 attraction to the clock. Her disciplined husband signi- 
 fied an equal mixture of contrition and astonishment 
 at the passing of time. He fell to work upon his plate 
 in obedience to the immediate policy dictated to him. 
 
 77 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 
 VIII 
 Captain Con 
 and Mrs. 
 Adlster 
 O'Donnell 
 
 The unbending English lady contrasted with her 
 husband so signally that the oddly united couple 
 appeared yoked in a common harness for a perpetual 
 display of the opposition of the races. She resembled 
 her brother, the lord of Earlsfont, in her remarkable 
 height and her calm air of authority and self-sustain- 
 ment. From beneath a head-dress built of white curls 
 and costly lace, half enclosing her high narrow fore- 
 head, a pale, thin, straight bridge of nose descended 
 prominently over her sunken cheeks to thin locked 
 lips. Her aspect suggested the repose of a winter 
 landscape, enjoyable in pictures, or on skates, other- 
 wise nipping. Mental directness, of no greater breadth 
 than her principal feature, was the character it ex- 
 pressed ; and candour of spirit shone through the 
 transparency she was, if that mild taper could be said 
 to shine in proof of a vitality rarely notified to the 
 outer world by the opening of her mouth ; chiefly then, 
 though not malevolently to command : as the portal 
 of some snow-bound monastery opens to the outcast, 
 bidding it be known that the light across the wolds 
 was not deceptive and a glimmer of life subsists 
 among the silent within. The life sufficed to her. 
 She was like a marble effigy seated upright, requiring 
 but to be laid at her length for transport to the cover 
 of the tomb. 
 
 Now Captain Con was by nature ruddy as an Indian 
 summer flushed in all its leaves. The corners of his 
 face had everywhere a frank ambush, or child's hiding- 
 place, for languages and laughter. He could worm 
 with a smile quite his own the humour out of men 
 possessing any ; and even under rigorous law, and it 
 could not be disputed that there was rigour in the 
 78 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 beneficent laws imposed upon him by his wife, his chapter 
 genius for humour and passion for sly independence captai" con 
 came up and curled away like the smoke of the illicit and Mrs. 
 still, wherein the fanciful discern fine sprites indulging oT>o*nne)i 
 in luxurious grimaces at a government long-nosed to 
 no purpose. Perhaps, as Patrick said of him to Caro- 
 line Adister, he was a bard without a theme. He 
 certainly was a man of speech, and the having fear- 
 fully to contain himself for the greater number of the 
 hours of the day, for the preservation of the domestic 
 felicity he had learnt to value, fathered the sentiment 
 of revolt in his bosom. 
 
 By this time, long after five minutes had elapsed, 
 the frost presiding at the table was fast withering 
 Captain Con : and he was irritable to hear why Patrick 
 had gone off to Earlsfont, and what he had done there, 
 and the adventures he had tasted on the road ; any- 
 thing for warmth. His efforts to fish the word out of 
 Patrick produced deeper crevasses in the conversa- 
 tion, and he cried to himself: Hats and crape-bands! 
 mightily struck by an idea that he and his cousins 
 were a party of hired mourners over the meat they 
 consumed. Patrick was endeavouring to spare his 
 brother a mention of Earlsfont before they had private 
 talk together. He answered neither to a dip of the 
 hook nor to a pull. 
 
 ' The desert where you 've come from 's good,' said 
 the captain, sharply nodding. 
 
 Mrs. Adister O'Donnell ejaculated: 'Wine!' for a 
 heavy comment upon one of his topics, and crushed it. 
 
 Philip saw that Patrick had no desire to spread, and 
 did not trouble him. 
 
 ' Good horses in the stable too,' said the captain. 
 
 79 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 
 Via 
 
 Captain Con 
 and Mrs. 
 Adister 
 O'Donnell 
 
 Patrick addressed Mrs. Adister: 'I have hardly 
 excused myself to you, madam.' 
 
 Her head was aloft in dumb apostrophe of weariful, 
 ness over another of her husband's topics. 
 
 'Do not excuse yourself at all,' she said. 
 
 The captain shivered. He overhauled his plotting 
 soul publicly : ' Why don't you out with it yourself! ' 
 and it was wonderful why he had not done so, save 
 that he was prone to petty conspiracy, and had thought 
 reasonably that the revelation would be damp gun- 
 powder, coming from him. And therein he was right, 
 for when he added : ' The boy 's fresh from Earlsfont ; 
 he went down to look at the brave old house of the 
 Adisters, and was nobly welcomed and entertained, 
 and made a vast impression,' his wife sedately re- 
 marked to Patrick, 'You have seen my brother 
 Edward.' 
 
 ' And brings a message of his love to you, my dear,' 
 the captain bit his nail harder. 
 
 'You have a message for me?' she asked; and 
 Patrick replied : ' The captain is giving a free transla- 
 tion. I was down there, and I took the liberty of calling 
 on Mr. Adister, and I had a very kind reception. We 
 hunted, we had a good day with the hounds. I think 
 I remember hearing that you go there at Christmas, 
 madam.' 
 
 ' Our last Christmas at Earlsfont was a sad meeting 
 for the family. My brother Edward is well ? ' 
 
 'I had the happiness to be told that I had been of a 
 little service in cheering him.' 
 
 'I can believe it,' said Mrs. Adister, letting her eyes 
 dwell on the young man ; and he was moved by the 
 silvery tremulousness of her voice. 
 80 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 She resumed: 'You have the art of dressing in a chapter 
 surprisingly short time.' captaTcon 
 
 ' There ! ' exclaimed Captain Con : for no man can and Mrs. 
 hear the words which prove him a prophet without o'Donneii 
 showing excitement. ' Didn't I say so ? Patrick 's a 
 hero for love or war, my dear. He stood neat and 
 trim from the silk socks to the sprig of necktie in six 
 minutes by my watch. And that 's witness to me that 
 you may count on him for what the great Napoleon 
 called two-o'clock-in-the-morning courage; not too 
 common even in his immortal army : — when it 's pitch 
 black and frosty cold, and you 're buried within in a 
 dream of home, and the trumpet springs you to your 
 legs in a trice, boots and trowsers, coat and sword- 
 belt and shako, and one twirl to the whiskers, and 
 away before a second snap of the fingers to where the 
 great big bursting end of all things for you lies crouch- 
 ing like a Java-Tiger — a ferocious beast painted under- 
 taker's colour — for a leap at you in particular out of 
 the dark ; — never waiting an instant to ask what 's the 
 matter and pretend you don't know. That's rare, 
 Philip; that's bravery; Napoleon knew the thing; 
 and Patrick has it ; my hand 's on the boy's back for 
 that.' 
 
 The captain was permitted to discourse as he 
 pleased: his wife was wholly given to the recent 
 visitor to Earlsfont, whom she informed that Caroline 
 was the youngest daughter of General Adister, her 
 second brother, and an excellent maiden, her dear 
 Edward's mainstay in his grief. At last she rose, and 
 was escorted to the door by all present. But Captain 
 Con rather shamefacedly explained to Patrick that it 
 was a sham departure ; they had to follow without a 
 35— F 81 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 
 VIII 
 Captain Con 
 and Mrs. 
 Adister 
 O'Donnell 
 
 single spin to the claret-jug : he closed the door merely 
 to state his position ; how at half-past ten he would be 
 a free man, according to the convention, to which his 
 wife honourably adhered, so he had to do likewise, as 
 regarded his share of it. Thereupon he apologised to 
 the brothers, bitterly regretting that, with good wine 
 in the cellar, his could be no house for claret; and 
 promising them they should sit in their shirts and 
 stretch their legs, and toast the old country and open 
 their hearts, no later than the minute pointing to the 
 time for his deliverance. 
 
 Mrs. Adister accepted her husband's proffered arm 
 unhesitatingly at the appointed stroke of the clock. 
 She said : ' Yes,' in agreement with him, as if she had 
 never heard him previously enunciate the formula, 
 upon his pious vociferation that there should be no 
 trifling with her hours of rest. 
 
 ' You can find your way to my cabin,' he said to 
 Philip over his shoulder, full of solicitude for the steps 
 of the admirable lady now positively departing. 
 
 As soon as the brothers were alone, Philip laid his 
 hand on Patrick, asking him, ' What does it mean? ' 
 
 Patrick fired his cannon-shot : ' She 's married ! ' 
 Consulting his feelings immediately after, he hated 
 himself for his bluntness. 
 
 Philip tossed his head. ' But why did you go down 
 there ? ' 
 
 ' I went,' said Patrick, * well, I went. ... I thought 
 you looked wretched, and I went with an idea of learn- 
 ing where she was, and seeing if I couldn't do some- 
 thing. It 's too late now ; all 's over.' 
 
 ♦ My dear boy, I 've worse than that to think of.' 
 
 'You don't mind it?' 
 82 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 ' That 's old news, Patrick.' chapter 
 
 ' You don't care for her any more, Philip ? ' cap J" con 
 
 ' You wouldn't have me caring for a married woman? ' and Mrs. 
 ' She has a perfect beast for a husband.' o^Donneii 
 
 * I 'm sorry she didn't make a better choice.' 
 
 * He 's a prince.' 
 ' So I hear.' 
 
 * Ah ! And what worse, Philip, can you be having 
 to think of? ' 
 
 'Affairs,' Philip replied, and made his way to the 
 cabin of Captain Con, followed in wonderment by 
 Patrick, who would hardly have been his dupe to 
 suppose him indifferent and his love of Adiante dead, 
 had not the thought flashed on him a prospect of 
 retaining the miniature for his own, or for long in his 
 custody. 
 
 83 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 The Captain's Cabin 
 
 Patrick left his brother at the second flight of stairs 
 to run and fling on a shooting-jacket, into which he 
 stuffed his treasure, after one peep that eclipsed his 
 little dream of being allowed to keep it; and so he 
 saw through Philip. 
 
 The captain's cabin was the crown of his house-top, 
 a builder's addition to the roof, where the detestable 
 deeds he revelled in, calling them liberty, could be 
 practised, according to the convention, and no one 
 save rosy Mary, in her sense of smell, when she 
 came upon her morning business to clean and sweep, 
 be any the wiser of them, because, as it is known to 
 the whole world, smoke ascends, and he was up 
 among the chimneys. Here, he would say to his 
 friends and fellow-sinners, you can unfold, unbosom, 
 explode, do all you like, except caper, and there 's a 
 small square of lead between the tiles outside for that, 
 if the spirit of the jig comes upon you with violence, 
 and I have had it on me, and eased myself mightily 
 there, to my own music ; and the capital of the British 
 Empire below me. Here we take our indemnity for 
 subjection to the tyrannical female ear, and talk 
 like copious rivers meandering at their own sweet 
 84 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 will. Here we roll like dogs in carrion, and no one to chapter 
 
 IX 
 
 sniff at our coats. Here we sing treason, here we j,,^ captain's 
 flout reason, night is out season at half-past ten ! cawn 
 
 This introductory ode to Freedom was his throwing 
 off of steam, the foretaste of what he contained. He 
 rejoined his cousins, chirping variations on it, and 
 attired in a green silken suit of airy Ottoman volume, 
 full of incitement to the legs and arms to swing and 
 set him up for a Sultan. 'Now Phil, now Pat,' he 
 cried, after tenderly pulling the door to and making 
 sure it was shut, ' any tale you 've a mind for — infam- 
 ous and audacious ! You 're licensed by the gods up 
 here, and may laugh at them too, and their mothers 
 and grandmothers, if the fit seizes ye, and the heartier 
 it is the greater the exemption. We 're pots that 
 knock the lid and must pour out or boil over and 
 destroy the furniture. My praties are ready for 
 peelin', if ever they were in this world ! Chuck wigs 
 from sconces, and off with your buckram. Decency 's 
 a dirty petticoat in the Garden of Innocence. Naked 
 we stand, boys ! we 're not afraid of nature. You 're 
 in the annexe of Erin, Pat, and devil a constable at 
 the keyhole; no rats; I'll say that for the Govern- 
 ment, though it 's a despotism with an iron bridle on 
 the tongue outside to a foot of the door. Arctic to 
 freeze the boldest bud of liberty ! I 'd like a French 
 chanson from ye, Pat, to put us in tune, with a right 
 revolutionary hurling chorus, that pitches Kings' 
 heads into the basket like autumn apples. Or one of 
 your hymns in Gaelic sung ferociously to sound as 
 horrid to the Saxon, the wretch. His reign 's not for 
 ever ; he can't enter here. You 're in the stronghold 
 defying him. And now cigars, boys, pipes ; there are 
 
 85 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER the boxes, there are the bowls. I can't smoke till I 
 
 IX 
 
 The Captains ^^^® ^°"® Steaming. I '11 sit awhile silently for the 
 Cabin operation. Christendom hasn't such a man as your 
 cousin Con for feeling himself a pig-possessed all the 
 blessed day, acting the part of somebody else, till it 
 takes me a quarter of an hour of my enfranchisement 
 and restoration of my natural man to know myself 
 again. For the moment, I 'm froth, scum, horrid 
 boiling hissing dew of the agony of transformation; 
 I am ; I 'm that pig disgorging the spirit of wickedness 
 from his poor stomach.' 
 
 The captain drooped to represent the state of the 
 self-relieving victim of the evil one ; but fearful lest 
 either of his cousins should usurp the chair and thwart 
 his chance of delivering himself, he rattled away sym- 
 pathetically with his posture in melancholy : ' Ay, 
 we 're poor creatures ; pigs and prophets, princes and 
 people, victors and vanquished, we're waves of the 
 sea, rolling over and over, and calling it life! There 's 
 no life save the eternal. Father Boyle 's got the truth. 
 Flesh is less than grass, my sons; 'tis the shadow that 
 crosses the grass. I love the grass. I could sit and 
 watch grass-blades for hours. I love an old turf- 
 mound, where the grey grass nods and seems to know 
 the wind and have a whisper with it, of ancient times 
 maybe and most like ; about the big chief lying under- 
 neath in the last must of his bones that a breath of 
 air would scatter. They just keep their skeleton 
 shape as they are ; for the turf-mound protects them 
 from troubles : 'tis the nurse to that delicate old 
 infant ! — Waves of the sea, did I say ? We 're wash in 
 a hog-trough for Father Saturn to devour; big chief 
 and suckling babe, we all go into it, calling it life ! 
 86 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 And what hope have we of reading the mystery ? All chapter 
 we can see is the straining of the old fellow's hams to ^he ca^tain-i 
 push his old snout deeper into the gobble, and the cabin 
 ridiculous curl of a tail totally devoid of expression ! 
 You '11 observe that gluttons have no feature ; they 're 
 jaws and hindquarters; which is the beginning and 
 end of 'm ; and so you may say to Time for his deal, 
 ing with us : so let it be a lesson to you not to bother 
 your wits, but leave the puzzle to the priest. He 
 understands it, and why? — because he was told. 
 There 's harmony in his elocution, and there 's none 
 in the modern drivel about where we 're going and 
 what we came out of. No wonder they call it an age 
 of despair, when you see the big wigs filing up and 
 down the thoroughfares with a great advertisement 
 board on their shoulders, proclaiming no information 
 to the multitude, but a blank note of interrogation 
 addressed to Providence, as if an answer from above 
 would be vouchsafed to their impudence ! They haven't 
 the first principles of good manners. And some of 'm 
 in a rage bawl the answer for themselves. Hear that ! 
 No, Phil ; No, Pat, no : devotion 's good policy. — 
 You 're not drinking ! Are you both of ye asleep ? 
 why do ye leave me to drone away like this, when 
 it's conversation I want, as in the days of our first 
 parents, before the fig-leaf? — and you might have that 
 for scroll and figure on the social banner of the hypo- 
 critical Saxon, who 's a gormandising animal behind 
 his decency, and nearer to the Archdevourer Time 
 than anything I can imagine : except that with a little 
 exertion you can elude him. The whisky you 've got 
 between you's virgin of the excise. I'll pay double 
 for freepeaty any day. Or are you for claret, my 
 
 87 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER lads ? No ? I 'm fortified up here to stand a siege in 
 The Captain's ™y ^^'^ round-towcr, like the son of Eremon that I 
 Cabin am. Lavra Con! Con speaks at last! I don't ask 
 you, Pat, whether you remember Maen, who was born 
 dumb, and had for his tutors Ferkelne the bard and 
 Crafting the harper, at pleasant Dinree : he was grand- 
 son of Leary Lore who was basely murdered by his 
 brother Cova, and Cova spared the dumb boy, thinking 
 a man without a tongue harmless, as fools do : being 
 one of their savings-bank tricks, to be repaid them, 
 their heirs, executors, administrators, and assigns at 
 compound interest, have no fear. So one day Maen 
 had an insult put on him ; and 'twas this for certain : 
 a ruffian fellow of the Court swore he couldn't mention 
 the name of his father ; and in a thundering fury Maen 
 burst his tongue-tie, and the Court shouted, Lavra 
 Maen ! and he had to go into exile, where he married 
 in the middle of delicious love-adventures the beautiful 
 Moira through the cunning of Craftine the harper. 
 There 's been no harper in my instance, but plenty of 
 ruffians to swear I 'm too comfortable to think of my 
 country.' The captain holloaed. 'Do they hear that? 
 Lord ! but wouldn't our old Celtic fill the world with 
 poetry if only we were a free people to give our minds 
 to 't, instead of to the itch on our backs from the 
 Saxon horsehair shirt we 're forced to wear. For, Pat, 
 as you know, we're a loving people, we're a loyal 
 people, we burn to be enthusiastic, but when our skins 
 are eternally irritated, how can we sing ? In a freer 
 Erin I 'd be the bard of the land, never doubt it. What 
 am I here but a discontented idle lout crooning over 
 the empty glories of our isle of Saints ! You feel them, 
 Pat. Phil's all for his British army, his capabilities 
 88 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 of British light cavalry. Write me the history of the chapter 
 Eaniskillens. I '11 read it. Aha, my boy, when they 're ^^^ captain's 
 off at the charge ! And you '11 oblige me with the tale cabin 
 of Fontenoy. Why, Phil has an opportunity stretch- 
 ing forth a hand to him now more than halfway that 
 comes to a young Irishman but once in a century: 
 backed by the entire body of the priesthood of Ireland 
 too ! and if only he was a quarter as full of the old 
 country as you and I, his hair would stand up in fire 
 for the splendid gallop at our head that 's proposed to 
 him. His country 's gathered up like a crested billow 
 to roll him into Parliament; and I say, let him be 
 there, he 's the very man to hurl his gauntlet, and tell 
 'm. Parliament, so long as you are parliamentary, 
 which means the speaking of our minds, but if you 
 won't have it, then — and it's on your heads before 
 Europe and the two Americas. We 're dying like a 
 nun that 'd be out of her cloister, we 're panting like 
 the wife who hears of her husband coming home to 
 her from the field of honour, for that young man. 
 And there he is ; or there he seems to be ; but he 's 
 dead : and the fisherman off the west coast after 
 dreaming of a magical haul, gets more fish than dis- 
 appointment in comparison with us when we cast the 
 net for Philip. Bring tears of vexation at the empti- 
 ness we pull back for our pains. Oh, Phil! and to 
 think of your youth ! We had you then. At least we 
 had your heart. And we should have had the length 
 and strength of you, only for a woman fatal to us as 
 the daughter of Rhys ap Tudor, the beautiful Nesta : — 
 and beautiful she was to match the mother of the 
 curses trooping over to Ireland under Strongbow, that 
 I'll grant you. But she reined you in when you were 
 
 89 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 CHAPTER a real warhorse ramping and snorting flame from your 
 The Captain's "ostrils, Challenging any other to a race for Ireland ; 
 Cabin ay, a Cuchullin you were, Philip, Culann's chain-hound : 
 but she unmanned you. She soaked the woman into 
 you and squeezed the hero out of you. All for Adiante ! 
 or a country left to slavery ! that 's the tale. And what 
 are you now? A paltry captain of hussars on the 
 General's staff ! One O'Donnell in a thousand ! And 
 what is she ? — You needn't frown, Phil ; I 'm her relative 
 by marriage, and she 's a lady. More than that, she 
 shot a dart or two into my breast in those days, she 
 did, I '11 own it : I had the catch of the breath that 
 warns us of convulsions. She was the morning star 
 for beauty, between night and day, and the best colour 
 of both. Welshmen and Irishmen and Englishmen 
 tumbled into the pit, which seeing her was, and there 
 we jostled for a glimpse quite companionably ; we 
 were too hungry for quarrelling ; and to say, I was one 
 of 'm, is a title to subsequent friendship. True; only 
 mark me, Philip, and you, Patrick : they say she has 
 married a prince, and I say no; she's took to herself 
 a husband in her cradle; she's married ambition, I 
 tell you, and this prince of hers is only a step she has 
 taken, and if he chases her first mate from her bosom, 
 he '11 prove himself cleverer than she, and I dare him 
 to the trial. For she 's that fiery dragon, a beautiful 
 woman with brains — which Helen of Troy hadn't, 
 combustible as we know her to have been : but brains 
 are bombshells in comparison with your old-fashioned 
 pine-brands for kindling men and cities. Ambition 's 
 the husband of Adiante Adister, and all who come 
 nigh her are steps to her aim. She never consulted 
 her father about Prince Nikolas ; she had begun her 
 90 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 march and she didn't mean to be arrested. She simply chapter 
 announced her approaching union ; and as she couldn't ^^^ captain's 
 have a scion of one of the Royal House of Europe, she caWn 
 put her foot on Prince Nikolas. And he's not to 
 fancy he 's in for a peaceful existence ; he 's a stone in 
 a sling, and probably mistaken the rocking that 's to 
 launch him through the air for a condition of remark- 
 able ease, perfectly remarkable in its lullaby motion ; 
 ha! well, and I've not heard of ambition that didn't 
 kill its votary : somehow it will ; 'tis sure to. There 
 she lies ! ' 
 
 The prophetic captain pointed at the spot. He then 
 said: 'And now I'm for my pipe, and the blackest 
 clay of the party, with your permission. I '11 just go 
 to the window to see if the stars are out overhead. 
 They 're my blessed guardian angels.' 
 
 There was a pause. Philip broke from a brown 
 study to glance at his brother. Patrick made a queer 
 face. 
 
 'Fun and good-fellowship to-night, Con,' said Philip, 
 as the captain sadly reported no star visible. 
 
 'Have I ever flown a signal to the contrary?' re- 
 torted the captain. 
 
 'No politics, and I'll thank you,' said Philip: 'none 
 of your early recollections. Be jovial.' 
 
 'You should have seen me here the other night 
 about a month ago ; I smuggled up an old country- 
 woman of ours, with the connivance of rosy Mary,' 
 said Captain Con, suffused in the merriest of grins. 
 * She sells apples at a stall at a corner of a street hard 
 by, and I saw her sitting pulling at her old pipe in the 
 cold October fog morning and evening for comfort, 
 and was overwhelmed with compassion and fraternal 
 
 91 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER sentiment ; and so I invited her to be at the door of 
 The c^tajn's *^® housc at half-past ten, just to have a roll with her 
 Cabin in Irish mud, and mend her torn soul with a stitch or 
 two of rejoicing. She told me stories ; and one was 
 pretty good, of a relative of hers, or somebody's — I 
 should say, a century old, but she told it with a be- 
 coming air of appropriation that made it family history, 
 for she's come down in the world, and this fellow had 
 a stain of red upon him, and wanted cleaning ; and, 
 * What ! ' says the good father, ' Mika ! you did it in 
 cold blood?' And says Mika, 'Not I, your Riverence. 
 I got myself into a passion 'fore I let loose.' I believe 
 she smoked this identical pipe. She acknowledged 
 the merits of my whisky, as poets do hearing fine 
 verses, never clapping hands, but with the expressive- 
 ness of grave absorption. That 's the way to make 
 good things a part of you. She was a treat. I got 
 her out and off at midnight, rosy Mary sneaking her 
 down, and the old girl quiet as a mouse for the 
 fun's sake. The whole intrigue was exquisitely 
 managed.' 
 
 ' You run great risks,' Philip observed. 
 
 ' I do,' said the captain. 
 
 He called on the brothers to admire the ' martial and 
 fumial' decorations of his round-tower, buzzing over 
 the display of implements, while Patrick examined 
 guns and Philip unsheathed swords. An ancient clay 
 pipe from the bed of the Thames and one from the bed 
 of the Boyne were laid side by side, and strange to 
 relate, the Irish pipe and English immediately, by the 
 mere fact of their being proximate, entered into 
 rivalry; they all but leapt upon one another. The 
 captain judicially decided the case against the English 
 92 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 pipe, as a newer pipe of grosser manufacture, not so chapter 
 curious by any means. ^^^ JJt^,„.^ 
 
 'This,' Philip held up the reputed Irish pipe, and cabin 
 scanned as he twirled it on his thumb, 'This was 
 dropped in Boyne Water by one of William's troopers. 
 It is an Orange pipe. I take it to be of English make.' 
 
 'If I thought that, I'd stamp my heel on the humbug 
 the neighbour minute,' said Captain Con. ' Where 's 
 the sign of English marks ? ' 
 
 ' The pipes resemble one another,' said Philip, ' like 
 tails of Shannon-bred retrievers.' 
 
 ' Maybe they 're both Irish, then ? ' the captain caught 
 at analogy to rescue his favourite from reproach. 
 
 'Both of them are Saxon.' 
 
 'Not a bit of it!' 
 
 ' Look at the clay.' 
 
 'I look, and I tell you, Philip, it's of a piece with 
 your lukewarmness for the country, or you wouldn't 
 talk like that.' 
 
 ' There is no record of pipe manufactories in Ireland 
 at the period you name.' 
 
 'There is: and the jealousy of rulers caused them 
 to be destroyed by decrees, if you want historical 
 evidence.' 
 
 ' Your opposition to the Saxon would rob him of his 
 pipe, Con ! ' 
 
 ' Let him go to the deuce with as many pipes as he 
 can carry ; but he shan't have this one.' 
 
 'Not a toss-up of difference is to be seen in the 
 pair.' 
 
 ' Use your eyes. The Irish bowl is broken, and the 
 English has an inch longer stem ! ' 
 
 ' O the Irish bowl is broken ! ' Philip sang. 
 
 93 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER * You 've the heart of a renegade-foreigner not to see 
 Tfc n^, ■ ■ it ! ' cried the captain. 
 
 The Captain s *^ 
 
 Cabin Patrick intervened saying : * I suspect they 're 
 
 Dutch.' 
 
 'Well, and that's possible.' Captain Con scruti- 
 nised them to calm his temper: 'there's a Dutchiness 
 in the shape.' 
 
 He offered Philip the compromise of ' Dutch ' rather 
 plaintively, but it was not accepted, and the pipes 
 would have mingled their fragments on the hearth- 
 stone if Patrick had not stayed his arm, saying : ' Don't 
 hurt them.' 
 
 ' And I won't,' the captain shook his hand gratefully. 
 
 <But will Philip O'Donnell tell me that Ireland 
 should lie down with England on the terms of a 
 traveller obliged to take a bedfellow? Come! He 
 hasn't an answer. Put it to him, and you pose him. 
 But he '11 not stir, though he admits the antagonism. 
 And Ireland is asked to lie down with England on a 
 couch blessed by the priest ! Not she. Wipe out our 
 grievances, and then we '11 begin to talk of policy. 
 Good Lord! — love? The love of Ireland for the con- 
 quering country will be the celebrated ceremony in the 
 concluding chapter previous to the inauguration of the 
 millennium. Thousands of us are in a starving state at 
 home this winter, Patrick. And it 's not the fault of 
 England ? — landlordism 's not ? Who caused the ruin 
 of all Ireland's industries? You might as well say 
 that it 's the fault of the poor beggar to go limping and 
 hungry because his cruel master struck him a blow to 
 cripple him. We don't want half and half doctoring, 
 and it 's too late in the day for half and half oratory. 
 We want freedom, and we'll have it, and we won't 
 94 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 leave it to the Saxon to think about giving it. And if chapter 
 your brother Philip won't accept this blazing fine j^e Captain'! 
 offer, then I will, and you'll behold me in a new cabin 
 attitude. The fellow yawns ! You don't know me 
 yet, Philip. They tell us over here we ought to be 
 satisfied. Fall upon our list of wrongs, and they set 
 to work yawning. You can only move them by 
 popping at them over hedges and roaring on platforms. 
 They're incapable of understanding a complaint a 
 yard beyond their noses. The Englishman has an 
 island mind, and when he 's out of it he 's at sea.' 
 
 ' Mad, you mean,' said Philip. 
 
 * I repeat my words. Captain Philip O'Donnell, late 
 of the staff of the General commanding in Canada.' 
 
 'The Irishman too has an island mind, and when 
 he 's out of it he 's at sea, and unable to manage his 
 craft,' said Philip. 
 
 ' You '11 find more craft in him when he 's buffeted 
 than you reckoned on,' his cousin flung back. ' And 
 if that isn't the speech of a traitor sold to the enemy, 
 and now throwing off the mask, traitors never did 
 mischief in Ireland ! Why, what can you discover to 
 admire in these people ? Isn't their army such a com- 
 bination of colours in the uniforms, with their yellow 
 facings on red jackets, I never saw out of a doll-shop, 
 and never saw there. And their Horse Guards, weedy 
 to a man ! fit for a doll-shop they are, by my faith ! 
 And their Foot Guards: Have ye met the fellows 
 marching ? with their feet turned out, flat as my 
 laundress's irons, and the muscles of their calves 
 depending on the joints to get 'm along, for elasticity 
 never gave those bones of theirs a springing touch ; 
 and their bearskins heeling behind on their polls ; like 
 
 95 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER pot-house churls daring the dursn't to come on. Of 
 The c^itain's coursc they can fight. Who said no ? But they 're not 
 Cabin the Only ones : and they 'II miss their ranks before 
 they can march like our Irish lads. The look of their 
 men in line is for all the world to us what lack-lustre 
 is to the eye. The drill they 've had hasn't driven 
 Hodge out of them, it has only stiffened the dolt ; 
 and dolt won't do any longer; the military machine 
 requires intelligence in all ranks now. Ay, the time 
 for the Celt is dawning : I see it, and I don't often spy 
 a spark where there isn't soon a blaze. Solidity and 
 stupidity have had their innings : a precious long 
 innings it has been ; and now they 're shoved aside 
 like clods of earth from the rising flower. Off with 
 our shackles ! We 've only to determine it to be free, 
 and we'll bloom again; and I'll be the first to speak 
 the word and mount the colours. Follow me ! Will 
 ye join in the toast to the emblem of Erin — the sham- 
 rock, Phil and Pat ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, certainly,' said Philip. * What 's that row 
 going on ? ' Patrick also called attention to the 
 singular noise in the room. ' I fancy the time for the 
 Celt is not dawning, but setting,' said Philip, with a 
 sharp smile ; and Patrick wore an artful locJk. 
 
 A corner of the room was guilty of the incessant 
 alarum. Captain Con gazed in that direction incredu- 
 lously and with remonstrance. 'The tinkler it is!' 
 he sighed. 'But it can't be midnight yet?' Watches 
 were examined. Time stood at half-past the midnight. 
 He groaned: 'I must go. I haven't heard the tinkler 
 for months. It signifies she's cold in her bed. The 
 thing called circulation 's unknown to her save by 
 the aid of outward application, and I'm the warming. 
 96 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 pan, as legitimately I should be, I 'm her husband and chapter 
 
 her Harvey in one. Good-bye to my hop and skip, I j^e captain-s 
 
 ought by rights to have been down beside her at cabin 
 
 midnight. She's the worthiest woman alive, and I 
 
 don't shirk my duty. Be quiet ! ' he bellowed at the 
 
 alarum ; * I 'm coming. Don't be in such a fright, my 
 
 dear,' he admonished it as his wife, politely. * Your 
 
 hand '11 take an hour to warm if you keep it out on 
 
 the spring that sets the creature going.' He turned 
 
 and informed his company: 'Her hand '11 take an 
 
 hour to warm. Dear! how she runs ahead: d'ye 
 
 hear ? That 's the female tongue, and once off it 
 
 won't stop. And this contrivance for fetching me 
 
 from my tower to her bed was my own suggestion, in 
 
 a fit of generosity ! Ireland all over ! I must hurry 
 
 and wash my hair, for she can't bear a perfume to kill 
 
 a stink; she carries her charitable heart that far. 
 
 Good-night, I '11 be thinking of ye while I 'm warming 
 
 her. Sit still, I can't wait; 'tis the secret of my 
 
 happiness.' He fled. Patrick struck his knee on 
 
 hearing the exo|cted ballad-burden recur. 
 
 35— G 97 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 The Brothers 
 
 * Con has learnt one secret,' said Philip, quitting his 
 chair. 
 
 Patrick went up to him, and, * Give us a hug,' he 
 said, and the hug was given. 
 
 They were of an equal height, tall young men, alert, 
 nervously braced from head to foot, with the diifer- 
 ences between soldier and civilian marked by the 
 succinctly military bearing of the elder brother, 
 whose movements were precise and prompt, and 
 whose frame was leopard-like in indolence. Beside 
 him Patrick seemed cubbish, though beside another he 
 would not have appeared so. His features were not 
 so brilliantly regular, but were a fanciful sketch of the 
 same design, showing a wider pattern of the long 
 square head qnd the forehead, a wavering at the dip of 
 the nose, livelier nostrils : the nostrils dilated and 
 contracted, and were exceeding alive. His eyelids had 
 to do with the look of his eyes, and were often seen 
 cutting the ball. Philip's eyes were large on the pent 
 of his brows, open, liquid, and quick with the fire in 
 him. Eyes of that quality are the visible mind, 
 animated both to speak it and to render it what 
 comes within their scope. They were full, unshaded 
 98 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 direct, the man himself, in action. Patrick's mouth chapter 
 had to be studied for an additional index to the xne Brothers 
 character. To symbolise them, they were as sword- 
 blade lying beside book. 
 
 Men would have thought Patrick the slippery one of 
 the two : women would have inclined to confide in 
 him the more thoroughly; they bring feeling to the 
 test, and do not so much read a print as read the 
 imprinting on themselves ; and the report that a 
 certain one of us is true as steel, must be unanimous 
 at a propitious hour to assure them completely that 
 the steel is not two-edged in the fully formed nature 
 of a man whom they have not tried. They are more 
 at home with the unformed, which lends itself to 
 feeling and imagination. Besides Patrick came nearer 
 to them; he showed sensibility. They have it, and 
 they deem it auspicious of goodness, or of the 
 gentleness acceptable as an equivalent. Not the less 
 was Philip the one to inspire the deeper and the 
 wilder passion. 
 
 ' So you 've been down there ? ' said Philip. ' Tell 
 us of your welcome. Never mind why you went: I 
 think I see. You're the Patrick of fourteen, who 
 tramped across Connaught for young Dermot to have 
 a sight of you before he died, poor lad. How did Mr. 
 Adister receive you ? ' 
 
 Patrick described the first interview. 
 
 Philip mused over it. ' Yes, those are some of his 
 ideas: gentlemen are to excel in the knightly exer- 
 cises. He used to fence excellently, and he was a 
 good horseman. The Jesuit seminary would have 
 been hard for him to swallow once. The house is a 
 fine old house : lonely, I suppose.' 
 
 99 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER Patrick spoke of Caroline Adister and pursued his 
 The Brothers narrative. Philip was lost in thought. At the 
 conclusion, relating to South America, he raised his 
 head and said : ' Not so foolish as it struck you, 
 Patrick. You and I might do that, — without the 
 design upon the original owner of the soil ! Irishmen 
 are better out of Europe, unless they enter one of the 
 Continental services.' 
 
 'What is it Con O'Donnell proposes to you?' 
 Patrick asked him earnestly. 
 
 ' To be a speaking-trumpet in Parliament. And to 
 put it first among the objections, I haven't an 
 independence ; not above two hundred a year.' 
 
 ' I '11 make it a thousand,' said Patrick, ' that is, if 
 my people can pay.' 
 
 ' Secondly, I don't want to give up my profession. 
 Thirdly, fourthly, fifthly, once there, I should be boil- 
 ing with the rest. I never could go half way. This 
 idea of a commencement gives me a view of the finish. 
 Would you care to try it? ' 
 
 'If I'm no wiser after two or three years of the 
 world I mean to make a better acquaintance with,' 
 Patrick replied. ' Over there at home one catches 
 the fever, you know. They have my feelings, and 
 part of my judgement, and whether that 's the weaker 
 part I can't at present decide. My taste is for quiet 
 farming and breeding.' 
 
 'Friendship, as far as possible; union, if the terms 
 are fair,' said Philip. ' It s only the name of union 
 now; supposing it a concession that is asked of them; 
 say, sacrifice ; it might be made for the sake of what 
 our people would do to strengthen the nation. But 
 they won't try to understand our people. Their laws, 
 
 too 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 and their rules, their systems are forced on a race of chapter 
 an opposite temper, who would get on well enough, jhe Brothers 
 and thrive, if they were properly consulted. Ireland's 
 the sore place of England, and I 'm sorry for it. We 
 ought to be a solid square, with Europe in this pickle. 
 So I say, sitting here. What should I be saying in 
 Parliament ? ' 
 
 ' Is Con at all likely, do you think, Philip ? ' 
 
 ' He might : and become the burlesque Irishman of 
 the House. There must be one, and the lot would be 
 safe to fall on him.' 
 
 ' Isn't he serious about it ? ' 
 
 ' Quite, I fancy ; and that will be the fun. A serious 
 fellow talking nonsense with lively illustrations, is 
 just the man for House of Commons clown. Your 
 humorous rogue is not half so taking. Con would be 
 the porpoise in a fish-tank there, inscrutably busy on 
 his errand and watched for his tumblings. Better I 
 than he ; and I should make a worse mess of it — at 
 least for myself.' 
 
 * Wouldn't the secret of his happiness interfere ? ' 
 
 ' If he has the secret inside his common sense. The 
 bulk of it I suspect to be, that he enjoys his luxuries 
 and is ashamed of his laziness; and so the secret pulls 
 both ways. One day a fit of pride may have him, or 
 one of his warm impulses, and if he 's taken in the tide 
 of it, I shall grieve for the secret.' 
 
 ' You like his wife, Philip ? ' 
 
 'I respect her. They came together, I suppose, 
 because they were near together, like the two islands, 
 in spite of the rolling waves between. I would not 
 willingly see the union disturbed. He warms her, and 
 she houses him. And he has to control the hot blood 
 
 101 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER that does the warming, and she to moderate the sever- 
 The sfothers ^*y ^^ ^^^ principles, which are an essential part of the 
 housing. Oh ! shiver politics, Patrice. I wish I had 
 been bred in France: a couple of years with your Pere 
 Clement, and I could have met Irishmen and felt to 
 them as an Irishman, whether they were disaffected 
 or not. I wish I did. When I landed the other day, I 
 thought myself passably cured, and could have said 
 that rhetoric is the fire-water of our country, and clap- 
 trap the spring-board to send us diving into it. I like 
 my comrades-in-arms, I like the character of British 
 officers, and the men too— I get on well with them. I 
 declare to you, Patrice, I burn to live in brotherhood 
 with them, not a rift of division at heart ! I never 
 show them that there is one. But our early training 
 has us ; it comes on us again ; three or four days with 
 Con have stirred me ; I don't let him see it, but they 
 always do: these tales of starvation and shootings, all 
 the old work just as when I left, act on me like a 
 smell of powder. I was dipped in "Ireland for the 
 Irish"; and a contented Irishman scarcely seems my 
 countryman.' 
 
 ' I suppose it 's like what I hear of as digesting with 
 difficulty,' Patrick referred to the state described by 
 his brother. 
 
 * And not the most agreeable of food,' Philip added. 
 
 *It would be the secret of our happiness to discover 
 how to make the best of it, if we had to pay penance 
 for the discovery by living in an Esquimaux shanty,' 
 said Patrick. 
 
 ' With a frozen fish of admirable principles for wife,' 
 said Philip. 
 
 ' Ah, you give me shudders ! ' 
 102 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 ' And it 's her guest who talks of her in that style ! chapter 
 and I hope to be thought a gentleman ! ' Philip pulled The Brothers 
 himself up. 'We may be all in the wrong. The way 
 to begin to think so, is to do them an injury and forget 
 it. The sensation's not unpleasant when it's other 
 than a question of good taste. But politics to bed, 
 Patrice. My chief is right — soldiers have nothing to 
 do with them. What are you fiddling at in your coat 
 there ? ' 
 
 * Something for you, my dear Philip.' Patrick brought 
 out the miniature. He held it for his brother to look. 
 ' It was the only thing I could get. Mr. Adister sends 
 it. The young lady, Miss Caroline, seconded me. They 
 think more of the big portrait : I don't. And it 's to 
 be kept carefully, in case of the other one getting 
 damaged. That 's only fair.' 
 
 Philip drank in the face upon a swift shot of his eyes. 
 
 *Mr. Adister sends it?' His tone implied wonder at 
 such a change in Adiante's father. 
 
 'And an invitation to you to visit him when you 
 please.' 
 
 ' That he might do,' said Philip : it was a lesser 
 thing than to send her likeness to him. 
 
 Patrick could not help dropping his voice : ' Isn't it 
 very like?' For an answer the miniature had to be 
 inspected closely. 
 
 Philip was a Spartan for keeping his feelings under. 
 
 'Yes,' he said, after an interval quick with fiery 
 touches on the history of that face and his life. ' Older, 
 of course. They are the features, of course. The like- 
 ness is not bad. I suppose it resembles her as she is 
 now, or was when it was painted. You're an odd 
 fellow to have asked for it.' 
 
 103 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER ' I thought you would wish to have it, Philip.' 
 The Brothers ' ^ou 're a good boy, Patrice. Light those candles : 
 we '11 go to bed. I want a cool head for such brains 
 as I have, and bumping the pillow all night is not 
 exactly wholesome. We'll cross the Channel in a 
 few days, and see the nest, and the mother, and the 
 girls.' 
 
 'Not St. George's Channel. Mother would rather 
 you would go to France and visit the De Reuils. She 
 and the girls hope you will keep out of Ireland for a 
 time: it's hot. Judge if they're anxious, when it's 
 to stop them from seeing you, Philip ! ' 
 
 ' Good-night, dear boy.' Philip checked the depart- 
 ing Patrick. 'You can leave that.' He made a sign 
 for the miniature to be left on the table. 
 
 Patrick laid it there. His brother had not touched 
 it, and he could have defended himself for having for- 
 gotten to leave it, on the plea that it might prevent 
 his brother from having his proper share of sleep ; 
 and also, that Philip had no great pleasure in the pos- 
 session of it. The two pleas, however, did not make 
 one harmonious apology, and he went straight to the 
 door in an odd silence, with the step of a decorous 
 office-clerk, keeping his shoulders turned on Philip to 
 conceal his look of destitution. 
 
 104 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 Introducing a New Character 
 
 Letters and telegrams and morning journals lay on 
 the breakfast-table, awaiting the members of the 
 household with combustible matter. Bad news from 
 Ireland came upon ominous news from India. Philip 
 had ten words of mandate from his commanding 
 officer, and they signified action, uncertain where. 
 He was the soldier at once, buckled tight and buttoned 
 up over his private sentiments. Vienna shot a line to 
 Mrs. Adister O'Donnell. She communicated it : ' The 
 Princess Nikolas has a son ! ' Captain Con tossed his 
 newspaper to the floor, crying : ' To-day the city '11 be 
 a chimney on fire, with the blacks in everybody's 
 faces ; but I must go down. It 's hen and chicks with 
 the director of a City Company. I must go.' 
 
 'Did you say, madam?' Patrick inquired. 
 
 'A son,' said Mrs. Adister. 
 
 ' And the military holloaing for reinforcements,' ex- 
 claimed Con. ' Pheu ! Phil ! ' 
 
 'That's what it comes to,' was Philip's answer. 
 
 ' Precautionary measures, eh ? ' 
 
 ' You can make them provocative.' 
 
 ' Will you beg for India ? ' 
 
 ' I shall hear in an hour.' 
 
 105 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 
 XI 
 
 Introducing 
 
 a New 
 
 Character 
 
 * Have we got men ? ' 
 'Always the question with us ! ' 
 
 * What a country ! ' sighed the captain. ' I 'd compose 
 ye a song of old Drowsylid, except that it does no 
 good to be singing it at the only time when you can 
 show her the consequences of her sluggery. A 
 country of compromise goes to pieces at the first 
 cannon-shot of the advance, and while she 's fighting 
 on it 's her poor business to be putting herself together 
 again : so she makes a mess of the beginning, to a 
 certainty. If it weren't that she had the army of 
 Neptune about her! The worst is she may some day 
 start awake to discover that her protecting deity 's 
 been napping too. — A boy or girl did you say, my 
 dear? ' 
 
 His wife replied : ' A son.' 
 
 'Ah! more births.' The captain appeared to be 
 computing. 'But this one's out of England: and it's 
 a prince I suppose they '11 call him : and princes don't 
 count in the population for more than finishing 
 touches, like the crossing of t's and dotting of 
 i's, though true they 're the costliest, like some 
 flowers and feathers, and they add to the lump on 
 Barney's back. But who has any compassion for a 
 burdened donkey? unless when you see him standing 
 immortal meek ! Well, and a child of some sort must 
 have been expected? Because it's no miracle after 
 marriage : worse luck for the crowded earth ! ' 
 
 ' Things may not be expected which are profoundly 
 distasteful,' Mrs. Adister remarked. 
 
 'True,' said her sympathetic husband. "Tis like 
 reading the list of the dead after a battle where you 've 
 not had the best of it — each name 's a startling new 
 106 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 blow. I'd oifer to run to Earlsfont, but here's my chapter 
 
 • XI 
 
 company you would have me join for the directonng introducing 
 of it, you know, my dear, to ballast me, as you pretty a New ^ 
 clearly hinted ; and all 's in the city to-day like a loaf 
 with bad yeast, thick as lead, and sour to boot. And 
 a howl and growl coming off the wilds of Old Ireland ! 
 We 're smitten to-day in our hearts and our pockets, 
 and it's a question where we ought to feel it most, 
 for the sake of our families.' 
 
 'Do you not observe that your cousins are not 
 eating?' said his wife, adding, to Patrick: *I entertain 
 the opinion that a sound breakfast-appetite testifies to 
 the proper vigour of men.' 
 
 'Better than a doctor's pass: and to their habits 
 likewise.' Captain Con winked at his guests, begging 
 them to steal ten minutes out of the fray for the 
 inward fortification of them. 
 
 Eggs in the shell, and masses of eggs, bacon 
 delicately thin and curling like Apollo's locks at his 
 temples, and cutlets, caviar, anchovies in the state of 
 oil, were pressed with the captain's fervid illustrations 
 upon the brothers, both meditatively nibbling toast 
 and indifferent to the similes he drew and applied to 
 life from the little fish which had their sharpness 
 corrected but not cancelled by the improved liquid 
 they swam in. ' Like an Isishman in clover,' he said 
 to his wife to pay her a compliment and coax an 
 acknowledgement : 'just the flavour of the salt of him.' 
 
 Her mind was on her brother Edward, and she could 
 not look sweet-oily, as her husband wooed her to do, 
 with impulse to act the thing he was imagining. 
 
 ' And there is to-morrow's dinner-party to the Mat- 
 tocks : I cannot travel to Earlsfont,' she said. 
 
 107 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 
 XI 
 
 Introducing 
 
 a New 
 
 Character 
 
 ' Patrick is a disengaged young verderer, and knows 
 the route, and has a welcome face there, and he might 
 go, if you 're for having it performed by word of mouth. 
 But, trust me, my dear, bad news is best communicated 
 by telegraph, which gives us no stupid articles and 
 particles to quarrel with. "Boy born Vienna doctor 
 smiling nurse laughing." That tells it all, straight to 
 the understanding, without any sickly circumlocutory 
 stuff; and there's nothing more offensive to us when 
 we 're hurt at intelligence. For the same reason, 
 Colonel Arthur couldn't go, since you '11 want him to 
 meet the Mattocks? ' 
 
 Captain Con's underlip shone with a roguish thin- 
 ness. 
 
 ' Arthur must be here,' said Mrs. Adister. ' I cannot 
 bring myself to write it. I disapprove of telegrams.' 
 
 She was asking to be assisted, so her husband said : 
 
 ' Take Patrick for a secretary. Dictate. He has 
 a bold free hand and '11 supply all the fiorituri and 
 arabesques necessary to the occasion running.' 
 
 She gazed at Patrick as if to intimate that he might 
 be enlisted, and said: 'It will be to Caroline. She 
 will break it to her uncle.' 
 
 ' Right, madam, on the part of a lady I 've never 
 known to be wrong ! And so, my dear, I must take 
 leave of you, to hurry down to the tormented intes- 
 tines of that poor racked city, where the winds of 
 panic are violently engaged in occupying the vacuum 
 created by knocking over what the disaster left stand- 
 ing; and it'll much resemble a colliery accident there, 
 I suspect, and a rescue of dead bodies. Adieu, my 
 dear.' He pressed his lips on her thin fingers. 
 
 Patrick placed himself at Mrs. Adister's disposal as 
 108 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 her secretary. She nodded a gracious acceptance of chapter 
 
 him ^^ 
 
 "^"'* lotroducing 
 
 ' I recommended the telegraph because it 's my wife's a New 
 own style, and comes better from wires,' said the *^''"^°*" 
 captain, as they were putting on their overcoats in the 
 hall. 'You must know the family. "Deeds not 
 words" would serve for their motto. She hates 
 writing, and doesn't love talking. Pat '11 lengthen her 
 sentences for her. She 's fond of Adiante, and she 
 sympathises with her brother Edward made a grand- 
 father through the instrumentality of that foreign 
 hook-nose; and Patrick must turn the two dagger 
 sentiments to a sort of love-knot and there's the task 
 he '11 have to work out in his letter to Miss Caroline. 
 It 's fun about Colonel Arthur not going. He 's to 
 meet the burning Miss Mattock, who has gold on her 
 crown and a lot on her treasury, Phil, my boy ! but 
 I 'm bound in honour not to propose it. And a nice 
 girl, a prize ; a fresh healthy girl ; and brains : the 
 very girl ! But she 's dotted down for the Adisters, if 
 Colonel Arthur can look lower than his nose and wag 
 his tongue a bit. She 's one to be a mother of stout 
 ones that won't run up big doctors' bills or ask assist- 
 ance in growing. Her name 's plain Jane, and she 's a 
 girl to breed conquerors ; and the same you may say 
 of her brother John, who 's a mighty fit man, good at 
 most things, though he counts his fortune in millions, 
 which I've heard is lighter for a beggar to perform 
 than in pounds, but he can count seven, and beat any 
 of us easy by showing them millions ! We might do 
 something for them at home with a million or two, 
 Phil. It all came from the wedding of a railway con- 
 tractor, who sprang from the wedding of a spade and 
 
 109 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER a clod — and probably called himself Mattock at his 
 
 XI 
 
 Introducing ^^'^^' "» s^amc to him.' 
 a New < You 're for the city,' said Philip, after they had 
 
 aracter ^^jj^^j (jown the Street. 
 
 'Not I,' said Con. 'Let them play Vesuvius down 
 there. I've got another in me: and I can't stop their 
 eruption, and they wouldn't relish mine. I know a 
 little of Dick Martin, who called on the people to 
 resist, and housed the man Liffey after his firing the 
 shot, and I 'm off to Peter M'Christy, his brother-in- 
 law. I'll see Distell too. I must know if it signifies 
 the trigger, or I'm agitated about nothing. Dr. 
 Forbery'll be able to tell how far they mean going 
 for a patriotic song. " For we march in ranks to the 
 laurelled banks, On the bright horizon shining. 
 Though the fields between run red on the green, 
 And many a wife goes pining." Will you come, 
 Phil ? • 
 
 'I'm under orders.' 
 
 'You won't engage yourself by coming.' 
 ' I 'm in for the pull if I join hands.' 
 'And why not? — inside the law, of course.' 
 'While your Barney skirmishes outside ! ' 
 ' And when the poor fellow's cranium 's cracking to 
 fling his cap in the air, and physician and politician 
 are agreed it's good for him to do it, or he'll go mad 
 and be a dangerous lunatic ! Phil, it must be a blow 
 now and then for these people over here, else there 's 
 no teaching their imaginations you're in earnest; 
 for they've got heads that open only to hard raps, 
 these English ; and where injustice rules, and you 'd 
 spread a light of justice, a certain lot of us must give 
 up the ghost — naturally on both sides. Law 's law, 
 110 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 and life's life, so long as you admit that the law is chapter 
 bad; and in that case, it's big misery and chronic introducing 
 disease to let it be, and at worst a jump and tumble a New 
 into the next world, of a score or two of us if We have "*° " 
 a wrestle with him. But shake the old villain ; hang 
 on him and shake him. Bother his wig, if he calls 
 himself Law. That 's how we dust the corruption out 
 of him for a bite or two in return. Such is humanity, 
 Phil : and you must allow for the roundabout way of 
 moving to get into the straight road at last. And I 
 see what you 're for saying : a roundabout eye won't find 
 it ! You 're wrong where there are dozens of corners. 
 Logic like yours, my boy, would have you go on 
 picking at the Gordian Knot till it became a jackasses' 
 race between you and the rope which was to fall to 
 pieces last. — There 's my old girl at the stall, poor 
 soul ! See her ! ' 
 
 Philip had signalled a cabman to stop. He stood 
 facing his cousin with a close-lipped smile that sum- 
 marised his opinion and made it readable. 
 
 'I have no time for an introduction to her this 
 morning,' he said. 
 
 'You won't drop in on Distell to hear the latest 
 brewing? And, by the by, Phil, tell us, could you 
 give us a hint for packing five or six hundred rifles 
 and a couple of pieces of cannon ? ' 
 
 Philip stared; he bent a lowering frown on his 
 cousin, with a twitch at his mouth. 
 
 ' Oh ! easy ! ' Con answered the look ; ' it 's for 
 another place and harder to get at.' 
 
 He was eyed suspiciously and he vowed the military 
 weapons were for another destination entirely, the 
 opposite Pole. 
 
 Ill 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER <No, you Wouldn't be in for a crazy villainy like 
 
 IntroTuoiag that!' Said Philip. 
 
 a New 'No, nor wink to it,' said Con. 'But it's a question 
 
 about packing cannon and small arms ; and you might 
 be useful in dropping a hint or two. The matter 's 
 innocent. It 's not even a substitution of one form 
 of Government for another : only a change of despots, 
 I suspect. And here 's Mr. John Mattock himself, 
 who '11 corroborate me, as far as we can let you into 
 the secret before we 've consulted together. And he 's 
 an Englishman and a member of Parliament, and a 
 Liberal though a landlord, a thorough stout Briton 
 and bulldog for the national integrity, not likely to 
 play at arms and ammunition where his country's 
 prosperity 's concerned. How d' ye do, Mr. Mattock — 
 and opportunely, since it 's my cousin. Captain Philip 
 O'Donnell, aide-de-camp to Sir Charles, fresh from 
 Canada, of whom you ve heard, I 'd like to make you 
 acquainted with, previous to your meeting at my wife's 
 table to-morrow evening.' 
 
 Philip bowed to a man whose notion of the ceremony 
 was to nod. 
 
 Con took him two steps aside and did all the talk- 
 ing. Mr. Mattock listened attentively the first half- 
 minute, after which it could be perceived that the 
 orator was besieging a post, or in other words a 
 Saxon's mind made up on a point of common sense. 
 His appearance was redolently marine ; his pilot coat, 
 flying necktie and wideish trowsers, a general airiness 
 of style on a solid frame, spoke of the element his 
 blue eyes had dipped their fancy in, from hereditary 
 inclination. The colour of a sandpit was given him 
 by hair and whiskers of yellow-red on a ruddy face. 
 112 
 
Character 
 
 CELT AND SAXON 
 
 No one could express a negative more emphatically chapter 
 without wording it, though he neither frowned nor introducing 
 gesticulated to that effect. a New 
 
 ' Ah ! ' said Con, abruptly coming to an end after an 
 eloquent appeal. ' And I think I 'm of your opinion : 
 and the sea no longer dashes at the rock, but makes 
 itself a mirror to the same. She '11 keep her money 
 and nurse her babe, and not be trying risky adventures 
 to turn him into a reigning prince. Only this : you '11 
 have to persuade her the thing is impossible. She 'U 
 not take it from any of us. She looks on you as 
 Wisdom in the uniform of a great commander, and if 
 you say a thing can be done it 's done.' 
 
 ' The reserve too, I hope,' said Mr. Mattock, nodding 
 and passing on his way. 
 
 ' That I am not so sure of,' Con remarked to himself. 
 ' There 's a change in a man through a change in his 
 position! Six months or so back, Phil, that man 
 came from Vienna, the devoted slave of the Princess 
 Nikolas. He'd been there on his father's business 
 about one of the Danube railways, and he was ready 
 to fill the place of the prince at the head of his 
 phantom body of horse and foot and elsewhere. We 
 talked of his selling her estates for the purchase of 
 arms and the enemy — as many as she had money for. 
 We discussed it as a matter of business. She had 
 bewitched him : and would again, I don't doubt, if she 
 were here to repeat the dose. But in the interim his 
 father dies, he inherits ; and he enters Parliament, 
 and now, mind you, the man who solemnly calculated 
 her chances and speculates on the transmission of 
 rifled arms of the best manufacture and latest inven- 
 tion by his yacht and with his loads of rails, under the 
 35— H 113 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 
 XI 
 
 Introducing 
 
 a New 
 
 Character 
 
 noses of the authorities, like a master rebel, and a 
 chivalrous gentleman to boot, pooh poohs the whole 
 affair. You saw him. Grave as an owl, the dead 
 contrary of his former self! ' 
 
 'I thought I heard you approve him,' said 
 Philip. 
 
 'And I do. But the poor girl has ordered her 
 estates to be sold to cast the die, and I 'm taking the 
 view of her disappointment, for she believes he can do 
 anything ; and if I know the witch, her sole comfort 
 lying in the straw is the prospect of a bloody venture 
 for a throne. The truth is, to my thinking, it 's the 
 only thing she has to help her to stomach her 
 husband.' 
 
 'But it's rank idiocy to suppose she can smuggle 
 cannon ! ' cried Philip. 
 
 ' But that man Mattock 's not an idiot and he thought 
 she could. And it 's proof he was under a spell. She 
 can work one.' 
 
 * The country hasn't a port.' 
 
 'Round the Euxine and up the Danube, with the 
 British flag at the stern. I could rather enjoy the 
 adventure. And her prince is called for. He 's pro- 
 mised a good reception when he drops down the river, 
 they say. A bit of a scrimmage on the landing-pier 
 may be, and the first field or two, and then he sits 
 himself, and he waits his turn. The people change 
 their sovereigns as rapidly as a London purse. Two 
 pieces of artillery and two or three hundred men and 
 a trumpet alter the face of the land there. Sometimes 
 a trumpet blown by impudence does it alone. They 're 
 enthusiastic for any new prince. He 's their Weekly 
 Journal or Monthly Magazine. Let them make ac- 
 114 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 quaintance with Adiante Adister, I'd not swear she chapter 
 
 wouldn't lay fast hold of them.' i„tro^uci«g 
 
 Philip signalled to his driver, and Captain Con sang » New 
 
 out his dinner-hour for a reminder to punctuality, *"° " 
 thoughtful of the feelings of his wife. 
 
 115 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 Miss Mattock 
 
 Mrs. Adister O'Donnell, in common with her family, 
 had an extreme dislike of the task of composing 
 epistles, due to the circumstance that she was unable, 
 unaided, to conceive an idea disconnected with the 
 main theme of her communication, and regarded, as 
 an art of conjuring, the use of words independent of 
 ideas. Her native superiority caused her to despise 
 the art, but the necessity for employing it at intervals 
 subjected her to fits of admiration of the conjurer, it 
 being then evident that a serviceable piece of work, 
 beyond her capacity to do, was lightly performed by 
 another. The lady's practical intelligence admitted 
 the service, and at the same time her addiction to the 
 practical provoked disdain of so flimsy a genius, which 
 was identified by her with the genius of the Irish race. 
 If Irishmen had not been notoriously fighters, famous 
 for their chivalry, she would have looked on them 
 as a kind of footmen hired to talk and write, whose 
 volubility might be encouraged and their affectionate- 
 ness deserved by liberal wages. The promptitude of 
 Irish blood to deliver the war-cry either upon a glove 
 flung down or taken up, raised them to a first place in 
 her esteem : and she was a peaceful woman abhorring 
 116 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 sanguinary contention ; but it was in her own blood chapter 
 to love such a disposition against her principles. Miss^attock 
 
 She led Patrick to her private room, where they 
 both took seats and he selected a pen. Mr. Patrick 
 supposed that his business would be to listen and put 
 her words to paper ; a mechanical occupation permit- 
 ting the indulgence of personal phantasies ; and he was 
 flying high on them until the extraordinary delicacy 
 of the mind seeking to deliver itself forced him to prick 
 up all his apprehensiveness. She wished to convey 
 that she was pleased with the news from Vienna, and 
 desired her gratification to be imparted to her niece 
 Caroline, yet not so as to be opposed to the peculiar 
 feelings of her brother Edward, which had her fullest 
 sympathy; and yet Caroline must by no means be 
 requested to alter a sentence referring to Adiante, for 
 that would commit her and the writer jointly to an 
 insincerity. 
 
 'It must be the whole truth, madam,' said Patrick, 
 and he wrote: 'My dear Caroline,' to get the start. 
 At once a magnificently clear course for the com- 
 plicated letter was distinguished by him. ' Can I write 
 on and read it to you afterward ? I have the view,' 
 he said. 
 
 Mrs. Adister waved to him to write on. 
 
 Patrick followed his ' My dear Caroline ' with greet- 
 ings very warm, founded on a report of her flourishing 
 good looks. The decision of Government to send re- 
 inforcements to Ireland was mentioned as a prelude 
 to the information from Vienna of the birth of a son 
 to the Princess Nikolas : and then; haV^ing conjoined 
 the two entirely heterogeneous pieces of intelligence, 
 the composer adroitly interfused them by a careless 
 
 117 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER transposition of the prelude and the burden that en- 
 M.ss Mattock ^^^^^ ^^"^ *<* P^^y '^'^ libitum on regrets and rejoicings; 
 by which device the lord of Earlsfont might be offered 
 condolences while the lady could express her strong 
 contentment, inasmuch as he deplored the state of 
 affairs in the sister island, and she was glad of a crisis 
 concluding a term of suspense : thus the foreign-born 
 baby was denounced and welcomed, the circumstances 
 lamented and the mother congratulated, in a breath, 
 all under cover of the happiest misunderstanding, as 
 effective as the cabalism of Prospero's wand among 
 the Neapolitan mariners, by the skilful Irish develop- 
 ment on a grand scale of the rhetorical figure ana- 
 strophe, or a turning about and about. 
 
 He read it out to her, enjoying his composition and 
 pleased with his reconcilement of differences. 'So 
 you say what you feel yourself, madam, and allow for 
 the feelings on the other side,' he remarked. 'Shall 
 I fold it ? ' 
 
 There was a smoothness in the letter particularly 
 agreeable to her troubled wits, but with an awful taste. 
 She hesitated to assent : it seemed like a drug that 
 she was offered. 
 
 Patrick sketched a series of hooked noses on the 
 blotter. He heard a lady's name announced at the 
 door, and glancing up from his work he beheld a fiery 
 vision. 
 
 Mrs. Adister addressed her affectionately: 'My dear 
 Jane ! ' Patrick was introduced to Miss Mattock. 
 
 His first impression was that the young lady could 
 
 wrestle with him and render it doubtful of his keeping 
 
 his legs. He was next engaged in imagining that she 
 
 would certainly burn and be a light in the dark. After- 
 
 118 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 wards he discovered her feelings to be delicate, her chapter 
 looks pleasant. Thereupon came one of the most j^gg Mattock 
 singular sensations he had ever known : he felt that 
 he was unable to see the way to please her. She 
 confirmed it by her remarks and manner of speaking. 
 Apparently she was conducting a business. 
 
 ' You 're right, my dear Mrs. Adister, I 'm on my way 
 to the Laundry, and I called to get Captain Con to drive 
 there with me and worry the manageress about the 
 linen they turn out: for gentlemen are complaining 
 of their shirt-fronts, and if we get a bad name with 
 them it will ruin us. Women will listen to a man. I 
 hear he has gone down to the city. I must go and do 
 it alone. Our accounts are flourishing, I'm glad to 
 say, though we cannot yet afford to pay for a secretary, 
 and we want one. John and I verified them last night. 
 We 're aiming at steam, you know. In three or four 
 years we may found a steam laundry on our accumu- 
 lated capital. If only we can establish it on a scale to 
 let us give employment to at least as many women as 
 we have working now ! That is what I want to hear 
 of. But if we wait for a great rival steam laundry to 
 start ahead of us, we shall be beaten and have to 
 depend on the charitable sentiments of rich people to 
 support the Institution. And that won't do. So it's 
 a serious question with us to think of taking the 
 initiative : for steam must come. It 's a scandal every 
 day that it doesn't while we have coal. I 'm for grand 
 measures. At the same time we must not be im- 
 prudent: turning off hands, even temporarily, that 
 have to feed infants, would be quite against my policy.' 
 
 Her age struck Patrick as being about twenty- 
 three. 
 
 119 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 CHAPTER ' Could my nephew Arthur be of any use to you ? ' 
 
 Miss Mattock S^>'*M''«-A'»'St«''- 
 
 'Colonel Adister?' Miss Mattock shook her head. 
 'No.' 
 
 ' Arthur can be very energetic, when he takes up a 
 thing.' 
 
 ' Can he ? But, Mrs. Adister, you are looking a little 
 troubled. Sometimes you confide in me. You are so 
 good to us with your subscriptions that I always feel 
 in your debt.' 
 
 Patrick glanced at his hostess for a signal to rise 
 and depart. 
 
 She gave none, but at once unfolded her perplexity, 
 and requested Miss Mattock to peruse the composition 
 of Mr. Patrick O'Donnell and deliver an opinion upon it. 
 
 The young lady took the letter without noticing its 
 author. She read it through, handed it back, and sat 
 with her opinion evidently formed within. 
 
 ' What do you think of it ? ' she was asked. 
 
 ' Rank Jesuitry,' she replied. 
 
 'I feared so!' sighed Mrs. Adister. 'Yet it says 
 everything I wish to have said. It spares my brother 
 and it does not belie me. The effect of a letter is often 
 most important. I cannot but consider this letter very 
 ingenious. But the moment I hear it is Jesuitical I 
 forswear it. But then my dilemma remains. I cannot 
 consent to give pain to my brother Edward : nor will 
 1 speak an untruth, though it be to save him from 
 a wound. I am indeed troubled. Mr. Patrick, I cannot 
 consent to despatch a Jesuitical letter. You are sure 
 of your impression, my dear Jane ? ' 
 
 ' Perfectly,' said Miss Mattock. 
 
 Patrick leaned to her. 'But if the idea in the mind 
 120 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 of the person supposed to be writing the letter is chapter 
 accurately expressed? Does it matter, if we call it miss Mattock 
 Jesuitical, if the emotion at work behind it happens to 
 be a trifle so, according to your definition ? ' 
 
 She rejoined: 'I should say, distinctly it matters.' 
 
 * Then you 'd not express the emotions at all ? ' 
 
 He flashed a comical look of astonishment as he 
 spoke. She was not to be diverted ; she settled into 
 antagonism. 
 
 ' I should write what I felt.' 
 
 ' But it might be like discharging a bullet.' 
 
 ' How ? • 
 
 'If your writing in that way wounded the receiver.' 
 
 * Of course I should endeavour not to wound ! ' 
 'And there the bit of Jesuitry begins. And it's 
 
 innocent while it's no worse than an effort to do a 
 
 disagreeable thing as delicately as you can.' 
 She shrugged as delicately as she could : 
 ' We cannot possibly please everybody in life.' 
 'No: only we may spare them a shock: mayn't 
 
 we?' 
 
 'Sophistries of any description, I detest.' 
 
 'But sometimes you smile to please, don't you?' 
 
 'Do you detect falseness in that?' she answered, 
 
 after the demurest of pauses. 
 
 ' No : but isn't there a soup f on of sophistry in it ? ' 
 ' I should say that it comes under the title of 
 
 common civility.' 
 
 'And on occasions a little extra civility is permitted! ' 
 'Perhaps: when we are not seeking a personal 
 
 advantage.' 
 
 ' On behalf of the Steam Laundry ? ' 
 Miss Mattock grew restless : she was too serious in 
 
 121 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER defending her position to submit to laugh, and his 
 ^" good-humoured face forbade her taking offence. ' Well, 
 
 Miss Mattock ° , r ^,^ ^ ■ • ^, ■ a. i. h j.i. . 
 
 perhaps, for that is in the interest of others. 
 
 ' In the interests of poor and helpless females. And 
 I agree with you with all my heart. But you would 
 not be so considerate for the sore feelings of a father 
 hearing what he hates to hear as to write a round- 
 about word to soften bad news to him?' 
 
 She sought refuge in the reply that nothing excused 
 Jesuitry. 
 
 'Except the necessities of civilisation,' said Patrick. 
 
 ' Politeness is one thing,' she remarked pointedly. 
 
 ' And domestic politeness is quite as needful as 
 popular, you '11 admit. And what more have we done 
 in the letter than to be guilty of that? And people 
 declare it 's rarer : as if we were to be shut up in 
 families to tread on one another's corns ! Dear me ! 
 and after a time we should be having rank Jesuitry 
 advertised as the specific balsam for an unhappy 
 domesticated population treading with hard heels from 
 desperate habit and not the slightest intention to 
 wound.' 
 
 'My dear Jane,' Mrs. Adister interposed while the 
 young lady sat between mildly staring and blinking, 
 ' you have, though still of a tender age, so excellent a 
 head that I could trust to your counsel blindfolded. It 
 is really deep concern for my brother. I am also 
 strongly in sympathy with my niece, the princess, that 
 beautiful Adiante : and my tonscience declines to let 
 me say that I am not.' 
 
 ' We might perhaps presume to beg for Miss Mattock's 
 assistance in the composition of a second letter more 
 to her taste,' Patrick said slyly. 
 122 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 The effect was prompt : she sprang from her seat. chapter 
 
 ' Dear Mrs. Adister ! I leave it to you. I am certain jjj^^ Mattock 
 you and Mr. O'Donnell know best. It 's too difficult 
 and delicate for me. I am horribly blunt. Forgive me 
 if I seemed to pretend to casuistry. I am sure I had 
 no such meaning. I said what I thought. I always 
 do. I never meant that it was not a very clever 
 letter; and if it does exactly what you require it 
 should be satisfactory. To-morrow evening John and 
 I dine with you, and I look forward to plenty of con- 
 troversy and amusement. At present I have only a 
 head for work.' 
 
 'I wish I had that,' said Patrick devoutly. 
 
 She dropped her eyes on him, but without letting 
 him perceive that he was a step nearer to the point of 
 pleasing her. 
 
 123 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 The Dinner-Party 
 
 Miss Mattock ventured on a prediction in her mind : 
 She was sure the letter would go. And there was not 
 much to signify if it did. But the curious fatality that 
 a person of such a native uprightness as Mrs. Adister 
 should have been drawn in among Irishmen, set her 
 thoughts upon the composer of the letter, and upon 
 the contrast of his ingenuous look with the powerful 
 cast of his head. She fancied a certain danger about 
 him ; of what kind she could not quite distinguish, for 
 it had no reference to woman's heart, and he was too 
 young to be much of a politician, and he was not in the 
 priesthood. His transparency was of a totally different 
 order from Captain Con's, which proclaimed itself 
 genuine by the inability to conceal a shoal of subter- 
 fuges. The younger cousin's features carried a some- 
 thing invisible behind them, and she was just per- 
 ceptive enough to spy it, and it excited her suspicions. 
 Irishmen both she and her brother had to learn to like, 
 owing to their bad repute for stability: they are, 
 moreover, Papists: they are not given to ideas: that 
 one of the working for the future has not struck them. 
 In fine, they are not solid, not law-supporting, not dis- 
 posed to be (humbly be it said) beneficent, like the 
 124 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 good English. These were her views, and as she held chapter 
 it a weakness to have to confess that Irishmen are ^^^ 
 socially more fascinating than the good English, she Dinner-p»rty 
 was on her guard against them. 
 
 Of course the letter had gone. She heard of it before 
 the commencement of the dinner, after Mrs. Adister 
 had introduced Captain Philip O'Donnell to her, and 
 while she was exchanging a word or two with Colonel 
 Adister, who stood ready to conduct her to the table. 
 If he addressed any remarks to the lady under his 
 charge. Miss Mattock did not hear him; and she 
 listened — who shall say why ? His unlike likeness to 
 his brother had struck her. Patrick opposite was 
 flowing in speech. But Captain Philip O'Donnell's 
 taciturnity seemed no uncivil gloom : it wore nothing 
 of that look of being beneath the table, which some of 
 our good English are guilty of at their social festivities, 
 or of towering aloof a Matterhorn above it, in the style 
 of Colonel Adister. Her discourse with the latter 
 amused her passing reflections. They started a subject, 
 and he punctuated her observations, or she his, and so 
 they speedily ran to earth. 
 
 ' I think,' says she, ' you were in Egypt this time last 
 winter.' 
 
 He supplies her with a comma : ' Rather later.' 
 
 Then he carries on the line. 'Dull enough, if you 
 don't have the right sort of travelling crew in your 
 boat.' 
 
 ' Naturally,' she puts her semicolon, ominous of the 
 full stop. 
 
 'I fancy you have never been in Egypt? ' 
 'No.' 
 
 There it is ; for the tone betrays no curiosity about 
 
 125 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER Egypt and her Nile, and he is led to suppose that she 
 
 XIII 
 
 The 
 
 has a distaste for foreign places. 
 Dinner-Party Condescending to attempt to please, which he has 
 reason to wish to succeed in doing, the task of pursu- 
 ing conversational intercourse devolves upon him : 
 
 * I missed Parlatti last spring. What opinion have 
 you formed of her ? ' 
 
 * I know her only by name at present.' 
 ' Ah, I fancy you are indifferent to Opera.' 
 'Not at all; I enjoy it. I was as busy then as I am 
 
 now.' 
 
 ' Meetings ? Dorcas, so forth.' 
 
 'Not Dorcas, I assure you. You might join if you 
 would.' 
 
 'Your most obliged.' 
 
 A period perfectly rounded. At the same time Miss 
 Mattock exchanged a smile with her hostess, of whose 
 benignant designs in handing her to the entertaining 
 officer she was not conscious. She felt bound to look 
 happy to gratify an excellent lady presiding over the 
 duller half of a table of eighteen. She turned slightly 
 to Captain O'Donnell. He had committed himself to 
 speech at last, without tilting his shoulders to exclude 
 the company by devoting himself to his partner, and 
 as he faced the table Miss Mattock's inclination to 
 listen attracted him. He cast his eyes on her: a 
 quiet look, neither languid nor frigid, seeming to her 
 both open and uninviting. She had the oddest little 
 shiver, due to she knew not what. A scrutiny she 
 could have borne, and she might have read a significa- 
 tion; but the look of those mild clear eyes which 
 appeared to say nothing save that there was fire 
 behind them, hit on some perplexity, or created it; for 
 126 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 she was aware of his unhappy passion for the beauti- chapter 
 ful Miss Adister; the whole story had been poured ™' 
 into her ears ; she had been moved by it. Possibly Dinner-Party 
 she had expected the eyes of such a lover to betray 
 melancholy, and his power of containing the expres- 
 sion where the sentiment is imagined to be most 
 transparent may have surprised her, thrilling her as 
 melancholy orbs would not have done. 
 
 Captain Con could have thumped his platter with 
 vexation. His wife's diplomacy in giving the heiress 
 to Colonel Adister for the evening had received his 
 cordial support while he manoeuvred cleverly to place 
 Philip on the other side of her ; and now not a step 
 did the senseless fellow take, though she offered him 
 his chance, dead sick of her man on the right ; not a 
 word did he have in ordinary civility; he was a 
 burning disgrace to the chivalry of Erin. She would 
 certainly be snapped up by a man merely yawning to 
 take the bite. And there 's another opportunity gone 
 for the old country ! — one's family to boot ! 
 
 Those two were in the middle of the table, and it is 
 beyond mortal, beyond Irish, capacity, from one end 
 of a table of eighteen to whip up the whole body of 
 them into a lively unanimous froth, like a dish of 
 cream fetched out of thickness to the airiest lightness. 
 Politics, in the form of a firebrand or apple of Discord, 
 might knead them together and cut them in batches, 
 only he had pledged his word to his wife to shun 
 politics as the plague, considering Mr. Mattock's 
 presence. And yet it was tempting : the recent Irish 
 news had stung him ; he could say sharp things from 
 the heart, give neat thrusts; and they were fairlj' 
 divided and well matched. There was himself, a 
 
 127 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER giant ; and there was an unrecognised bard of his 
 ^"J country, no other than himself too ; and there was a 
 
 Dinner-Party profound politician, profoundly hidden at present, like 
 powder in a mine — the same person. And opposite 
 to him was Mr. John Mattock, a worthy antagonist, 
 delightful to rouse, for he carried big guns and took 
 the noise of them for the shattering of the enemy, and 
 this champion could be pricked on to a point of 
 assertion sure to fire the phlegm in Philip ; and then 
 young Patrick might be trusted, to warm to the work. 
 Three heroes out skirmishing on our side. Then it 
 begins to grow hot, and seeing them at it in earnest, 
 Forbery glows and couches his gun, the heaviest 
 weight of the Irish light brigade. Gallant deeds ! and 
 now Mr. Marbury Dyke opens on Forbery's flank to 
 support Mattock hard-pressed, and this artillery of 
 English Rockney resounds, with a similar object: the 
 ladies to look on and award the crown of victory, 
 Saxon though they be, excepting Rockney's wife, a 
 sure deserter to the camp of the brave, should fortune 
 frown on them, for a punishment to Rockney for his 
 carrying off to himself a flower of the Green Island 
 and holding inveterate against her native land in his 
 black ingratitude. Oh ! but eloquence upon a good 
 cause will win you the hearts of all women, Saxon or 
 other, never doubt of it. And Jane Mattock there, 
 imbibing forced doses of Arthur Adister, will find her 
 patriotism dissolving in the natural human current; 
 and she and Philip have a pretty wrangle, and like 
 one another none the worse for not agreeing: patrioti- 
 cally speaking, she 's really unrooted by that half- 
 thawed colonel, a creature snow-bound up to his chin; 
 and already she 's leaping to be transplanted. Jane is 
 128 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 one of the first to give her vote for the Irish party, in chapter 
 
 XIII 
 
 spite of her love for her brother John : in common ^^^ 
 justice, she says, and because she hopes for complete Dinner-Pany 
 union between the two islands. And thereupon we 
 debate upon union. On the whole, yes: union, on the 
 understanding that we have justice, before you think 
 of setting to work to sow the land with affection: — 
 and that 's a crop in a clear soil will spring up harvest- 
 thick in a single summer night across St. George's 
 Channel, ladies ! . . . 
 
 Indeed a goodly vision of strife and peace : but, 
 politics forbidden, it was entirely a dream, seeing that 
 politics alone, and a vast amount of blowing even on 
 the topic of politics, will stir these English to enter 
 the arena and try a fall. You cannot, until you say 
 ten times more than you began by meaning, and have 
 heated yourself to fancy you mean more still, get 
 them into any state of fluency at all. Forbery's 
 anecdote now and then serves its turn, but these 
 English won't take it up as a start for fresh pastures ; 
 they lend their ears and laugh a finale to it ; you see 
 them dwelling on the relish, chewing the cud, by way 
 of mental note for their friends to-morrow, as if they 
 were kettles come here merely for boiling purposes, 
 to make tea elsewhere, and putting a damper on the 
 fire that does the business for them. They laugh, but 
 they laugh extinguishingly, and not a bit to spread a 
 general conflagration and illumination. 
 
 The case appeared hopeless to Captain Con, bearing 
 an eye on Philip. He surveyed his inanimate eights 
 right and left, and folded his combative ardour around 
 him, as the soldier's martial cloak when he takes his 
 rest on the field. Mrs. Marbury Dyke, the lady under 
 35—1 129 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER his wing, honoured wife of the chairman of his 
 
 ™' company, imagined that a sigh escaped him, and said 
 
 Dinner-Party in Sympathy: *Is the bad news from India confirmed?' 
 
 He feared it was not bright, and called to Philip for 
 the latest. 
 
 'Nothing that you have not had already in the 
 newspapers,' Philip replied, distinctly from afar, but 
 very bluntly, as through a trumpet. 
 
 Miss Mattock was attentive. She had a look as 
 good as handsome when she kindled. 
 
 The captain persevered to draw his cousin out. 
 
 'Your chief has his orders?' 
 
 ' There 's a rumour to that effect.' 
 
 ' The fellow 's training for diplomacy,' Con groaned. 
 
 Philip spoke to Miss Mattock : he was questioned 
 and he answered, and answered dead as a newspaper 
 telegraphic paragraph, presenting simply the corpse of 
 the fact, and there an end. He was a rival of Arthur 
 Adister for military brevity. 
 
 'Your nephew is quite the diplomatist,' said Mrs. 
 Dyke, admiring Philip's head. 
 
 'Cousin, ma'am. Nephews I might drive to any 
 market to make the most of them. Cousins pretend 
 they 're better than pigs, and diverge bounding from 
 the road at the hint of the stick. You can't get 
 them to grunt more than is exactly agreeable to 
 them.' 
 
 'My belief is that if our cause is just our flag will 
 triumph,' Miss Grace Barrow, Jane Mattock's fellow- 
 worker and particular friend, observed to Dr. 
 Forbery. 
 
 'You may be enjoying an original blessing that we 
 in Ireland missed in the cradle,' said he. 
 130 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 She emphasised : ' I speak of the just cause ; it must chapter 
 succeed.' ™l 
 
 'The stainless flag '11 be in the ascendant in the Dinner-Party 
 long-run,' he assented. 
 
 • Is it the flag of Great Britain you 're speaking of, 
 Forbery ? ' the captain inquired. 
 
 ' There 's a harp or two in it,' he responded pacifi- 
 cally. 
 
 Mrs. Dyke was not pleased with the tone. 'And 
 never will be out of it ! ' she thumped her interjection. 
 
 * Or .where 's your music ? ' said the captain, twink- 
 ling for an adversary among the males, too distant or 
 too dull to distinguish a note of challenge. 'You'd 
 be having to mount your drum and fife in their places, 
 ma'am.' 
 
 She saw no fear of the necessity. 
 
 ' But the fife 's a pretty instrument,' he suggested, 
 and with a candour that seduced the unwary lady to 
 think dubiously whether she quite liked the fife. Miss 
 Barrow pronounced it cheerful. 
 
 ' Oh, and martial ! ' he exclaimed, happy to have 
 caught Rockney's deliberate gaze. 'The eff'ect of it, 
 I 'm told in the provinces is astonishing for promoting 
 enlistment. Hear it any morning in your London 
 parks, at the head of a marching regiment of your 
 giant foot-Guards. Three bangs of the drum, like the 
 famous mountain, and the fife announces himself to be 
 born, and they follow him, left leg and right leg and 
 bearskin. And what if he 's a small one and a trifle 
 squeaky; so's a prince when the attendant dignitaries 
 receive him submissively and hear him informing the 
 nation of his advent. It's the idea that's grand.' 
 
 ' The idea is everything in military affairs,' a solemn 
 
 131 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER dupe, a Mr. Rumford, partly bald, of benevolent aspect, 
 ^j"" and looking more copious than his flow, observed to 
 Dinner-Parfy the lady bcsidc him. 'The flag is only an idea.' 
 
 She protested against the barbarism of war, and he 
 agreed with her, but thought it must be : it had always 
 been : he deplored the fatality. Nevertheless, he 
 esteemed our soldiers, our sailors too. A city man 
 himself and a man of peace, he cordially esteemed and 
 hailed the victories of a military body whose idea was 
 Duty instead of Ambition. 
 
 ' One thing,' said Mrs. Dyke, evading the ambiguous 
 fife, * patriotic as I am, I hope, one thing I confess ; I 
 never have yet brought myself to venerate thoroughly 
 our Royal Standard. I dare say it is because I do not 
 understand it.' 
 
 A strong fraternal impulse moved Mr. Rumford to 
 lean forward and show her the face of one who had 
 long been harassed by the same incapacity to digest 
 that one thing. He guessed it at once, without a 
 doubt of the accuracy of the shot. Ever since he was 
 a child the difficulty had haunted him ; and as no one 
 hitherto had even comprehended his dilemma, he 
 beamed like a man preparing to embrace a recovered 
 sister. 
 
 'The Unicorn! ' he exclaimed. 
 
 ' It is the Unicorn ! ' she sighed. ' The Lion is 
 noble.' 
 
 ' The Unicorn, if I may speak by my own feelings, 
 certainly does not inspire attachment, that is to say, 
 the sense of devotion, which we should always be led 
 to see in national symbols,' Mr. Rumford resumed, and 
 he looked humorously rueful while speaking with 
 some earnestness, to show that he knew the subject 
 132 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 to be of the minor sort, though it was not enough to chapter 
 trip and jar a loyal enthusiasm in the strictly medi- ^h" 
 
 tative. Dinner-party 
 
 ' The Saxon should carry his White Horse, I suppose,' 
 Dr. Forbery said. 
 
 ' But how do we account for the horn on his fore- 
 head ? ' Mr. Rumford sadly queried. 
 
 'Two would have been better for the harmony of 
 the Unicorn's appearance,' Captain Con remarked, 
 desirous to play a floundering fish, and tender to the 
 known simple goodness of the ingenuous man. ' What 
 do you say, Forbery ? The poor brute had a fall on 
 his pate and his horn grew out of it, and it 's to prove 
 that he has got something in his head, and is dangerous 
 both fore and aft, which is not the case with other 
 horses, who 're usually wicked at the heels alone. 
 That 's it, be sure, or near it. And his horn 's there to 
 iile the subject nation's grievances for the Lion to 
 peruse at his leisure. And his colour 's prophetic of 
 the Horse to come, that rides over all.' 
 
 'Lion and Unicorn signify the conquest of the two 
 hemispheres. Matter and Mind,' said Dr. Forbery. 
 ' The Lion there 's no mistake about. The Unicorn 
 sets you thinking. So it's a splendid Standard, and 
 means the more for not being perfectly intelligible at 
 a glance.' 
 
 * But if the Lion, as they 've whispered of late, 
 Forbery, happens to be stuffed with straw or with 
 what's worse, with sawdust, a fellow bearing a 
 pointed horn at close quarters might do him mortal 
 harm ; and it must be a situation trying to the patience 
 of them both. The Lion seems to say " No prancing ! " 
 as if he knew his peril ; and the Unicorn to threaten a 
 
 133 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER playful dig at his flank, as if he understood where he 's 
 
 XIII 
 The 
 
 ticklish.' 
 
 Dinner-Party Mr. Rumford drank some champagne and murmured 
 with a shrug to the acquiescent lady beside him : 
 * Irishmen ! ' implying that the race could not be 
 brought to treat serious themes as befitted the serious- 
 ness of the sentiments they stir in their bosoms. He 
 was personally a little hurt, having unfolded a shy 
 secret of his feelings, which were keenly patriotic in 
 a phlegmatic frame, and he retired within himself, 
 assuring the lady that he accepted our standard in its 
 integrity; his objection was not really an objection; 
 it was, he explained to her, a ridiculous desire to have 
 a perfect comprehension of the idea in the symbol. 
 But where there was no seriousness everything was 
 made absurd. He could, he said, laugh as well as 
 others on the proper occasion. As for the Lion being 
 stuffed, he warned England's enemies for their own 
 sakes not to be deluded by any such patent calumny. 
 The strong can afford to be magnanimous and forbear- 
 ing. Only let not that be mistaken for weakness. A 
 wag of his tail would suffice. 
 
 The lady agreed. But women are volatile. She 
 was the next moment laughing at something she had 
 heard with the largest part of her ear, and she thought 
 the worthy gentleman too simple, though she knew 
 him for one who had amassed wealth. Captain Con 
 and Dr. Forbery had driven the Unicorn to shelter, 
 and were now baiting the Lion. The tremendous 
 import of that wag of his tail among the nations was 
 burlesqued by them, and it came into collision with Mr. 
 Rumford's legendary forefinger threat. She excused 
 herself for laughing : ' They are so preposterous ! ' 
 134 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 ' Yes, yes, I can laugh,' said he, soberly performing chapter 
 the act: and Mr. Rumford covered the wound his ™' 
 delicate sensations had experienced under an apology Dinner-Party 
 for Captain Con, that would redound to the credit of 
 his artfulness were it not notorious our sensations 
 are the creatures and born doctors of art in dis- 
 covering unguents for healing their bruises. ' O'Don- 
 nell has a shrewd head for business. He is sound at 
 heart. There is not a drop of gout in his wine.' 
 
 The lady laughed again, as we do when we are 
 fairly swung by the tide, and underneath her con- 
 vulsion she quietly mused on the preference she 
 would give to the simple English citizen for sound- 
 ness. 
 
 'What can they be discussing down there?' Miss 
 Mattock said to Philip, enviously as poor Londoners 
 in November when they receive letters from the 
 sapphire Riviera. 
 
 ' I will venture to guess at nonsense,' he answered. 
 
 'Nothing political, then.' 
 
 ' That scarcely follows ; but a host at his own table 
 may be trusted to shelve politics.' 
 
 'I should not object.' 
 
 ' To controversy ? ' 
 
 'Temperately conducted.' 
 
 ' One would go a long way to see the exhibition.' 
 
 ' But why cannot men be temperate in their political 
 arguments ? ' 
 
 ' The questions raised are too close about the roots 
 of us.' 
 
 'That sounds very pessimist.' 
 
 'More duels come from politics than from any other 
 source.' 
 
 135 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER «I fear it is true. Then women might set you an 
 The example.' 
 
 Dinner-Party < By avoiding it? ' 
 
 ' I think you have been out of England for some 
 time.' 
 
 ' I have been in America.' 
 
 'We are not exactly on the pattern of the 
 Americans.' 
 
 Philip hinted a bow. He praised the Republican 
 people. 
 
 ' Yes, but in our own way we are working out our 
 own problems over here,* said she. 'We have in- 
 finitely more to contend with : old institutions, mon- 
 strous prejudices, and a slower-minded people, I dare 
 say: much slower, I admit. We are not shining to 
 advantage at present. Still, that is not the fault of 
 English women^ 
 
 ' Are they so spirited ? ' 
 
 Spirited was hardly the word Miss Mattock would 
 have chosen to designate the spirit in them. She 
 hummed a second or two, deliberating; it flashed 
 through her during the pause that he had been guilty 
 of irony, and she reddened : and remembering a fore- 
 going strange sensation she reddened more. She had 
 been in her girlhood a martyr to this malady of 
 youth ; it had tied her to the stake and enveloped her 
 in flames for no accountable reason, causing her to 
 suffer cruelly and feel humiliated. She knew the 
 pangs of it in public, and in private as well. And she 
 had not conquered it yet. She was angered to find 
 herself such a merely physical victim of the rushing 
 blood : which condition of her senses did not immedi- 
 ately restore her natural colour. 
 136 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 'They mean nobly,' she said, to fill an extending ^"^J'J*^'* 
 gap in the conversation under a blush ; and conscious xhe 
 of an ultra-swollen phrase, she snatched at it nervously Dinner-Party 
 to correct it : ' They are becoming alive to the necessity 
 for action.' But she was talking to a soldier! •! 
 mean, their heads are opening.' It sounded ludicrous. 
 'They are educating themselves differently.' Were 
 they ? ' They wish to take their part in the work of 
 the world.' That was nearer the proper tone, though 
 it had a ring of claptrap rhetoric hateful to her : she 
 had read it and shrunk from it in reports of otherwise 
 laudable meetings. 'Well, spirited, yes. I think 
 they are. I believe they are. One has need to hope 
 so.' 
 
 Philip offered a polite affirmative, evidently formal. 
 Not a sign had he shown of noticing her state of 
 scarlet. His grave liquid eyes were unalterable. She 
 might have been grateful, but the reflection that she 
 had made a step to unlock the antechamber of her 
 dearest deepest matters to an ordinary military officer, 
 whose notions of women were probably those of his 
 professional brethren, impelled her to transfer his 
 polished decorousness to the burden of his masculine 
 antagonism — plainly visible. She brought the dialogue 
 to a close. 
 
 Colonel Adister sidled an eye at a three-quarter 
 view of her face. 
 
 'I fancy you're feeling the heat of the room,' he 
 said. 
 
 Jane acknowledged a sensibility to some degree of 
 warmth. 
 
 The colonel was her devoted squire on the instant 
 for any practical service. His appeal to his aunt con- 
 
 137 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER cerning one of the windows was answered by her 
 The appeal to Jane's countenance for a disposition to rise 
 Din ner-Party and leave the gentlemen. Captain Con, holding the 
 door for the passage of his wife and her train of ladies, 
 received the injunction: 'Ten,' from her, and re- 
 marked: 'Minutes,' as he shut it. The shortness of 
 the period of grace proposed dejection to him on the 
 one hand, and on the other a stimulated activity to 
 squeeze it for its juices without any delay. Winding 
 past Dr. Forbery to the vacated seat of the hostess he 
 frowned forbiddingly. 
 
 'It's I, is it!' cried the doctor. Was it ever he 
 that endangered the peace and placability of social 
 gatherings ! 
 
 He sat down prepared rather for a bout with Captain 
 Con than with their common opponents, notwith- 
 standing that he had accurately read the mock thunder 
 of his brows. 
 
 138 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 Of Rockney 
 
 Battles have been won and the streams of History 
 diverted to new channels in the space of ten minutes. 
 Ladies have been won, a fresh posterity founded, and 
 grand financial schemes devised, revolts arranged, a 
 yoke shaken oif, in less of mortal time. Excepting an 
 inspired Epic song and an original Theory of the 
 Heavens, almost anything noteworthy may be accom- 
 plished while old Father Scythe is taking a trot round 
 a courtyard ; and those reservations should allow the 
 splendid conception to pass for the performance, when 
 we bring to mind that the conception is the essential 
 part of it, as a bard poorly known to fame was con- 
 stantly urging. Captain Con had blown his Epic 
 bubbles, not to speak of his projected tuneful narrative 
 of the adventures of the great CuchulHn, and his 
 Preaching of St. Patrick, and other national triumphs. 
 He could own, however, that the world had a right to 
 the inspection of the Epic books before it awarded 
 him his crown. The celestial Theory likewise would 
 have to be worked out to the last figure by the illus- 
 trious astronomers to whom he modestly ranked 
 himself second as a benefactor of his kind, revering 
 
 139 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER him. So that, whatever we may think in our own 
 
 XIV 
 
 Of Rockney hearts, Epic and Theory have to remain the exception. 
 
 Battles indeed have been fought, but when you survey 
 
 the field in preparation for them you are summoned to 
 
 observe the preluding courtesies of civilised warfare 
 
 in a manner becoming a chivalrous gentleman. It 
 
 never was the merely flinging of your leg across a 
 
 frontier, not even with the abrupt Napoleon. You 
 
 have besides to drill your men ; and you have often to 
 
 rouse your foe with a ringing slap, if he's a sleepy 
 
 one or shamming sleepiness. As here, for example: 
 
 and that of itself devours more minutes than ten. 
 
 Rockney and Mattock could be roused; but these 
 
 English, slow to kindle, can't subside in a twinkling; 
 
 they are for preaching on when they have once begun; 
 
 betray the past engagement, and the ladies are chilled, 
 
 and your wife puts you the pungent question : ' Did 
 
 you avoid politics, Con?' in the awful solitude of 
 
 domestic life after a party. Now, if only there had 
 
 been freedom of discourse during the dinner hour, the 
 
 ten disembarrassed minutes allotted to close it would 
 
 have afforded time sufficient for hearty finishing blows 
 
 and a soothing word or so to dear old innocent Mr. 
 
 Rumford, and perhaps a kindly clap of the shoulder to 
 
 John Mattock, no bad fellow at bottom. Rockney too 
 
 was no bad fellow in his way. He wanted no more 
 
 than a beating and a thrashing. He was a journalist, 
 
 a hard-headed rascal, none of your good old-fashioned 
 
 order of regimental scribes who take their cue from 
 
 their colonel, and march this way and that, right 
 
 about face, with as little impediment of principles to 
 
 hamper their twists and turns as the straw he tosses 
 
 aloft at midnight to spy the drift of the wind to- 
 
 140 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 morrow. Quite the contrary ; Rockney was his own chapter 
 colonel; he pretended to think independently, and ofR^cuney 
 tried to be the statesman of a leading article, and 
 showed his intention to stem the current of liberty, 
 and was entirely deficient in sympathy with the 
 oppressed, a fanatical advocate of force; he was an 
 inveterate Saxon, good-hearted and in great need of a 
 drubbing. Certain lines Rockney had written of late 
 about Irish affairs recurred to Captain Con, and the 
 political fires leaped in him ; he sparkled and said : 
 ' Let me beg you to pass the claret over to Mr. Rockney, 
 Mr. Rumford ; I warrant it for the circulating medium 
 of amity, if he '11 try it.' 
 
 * 'Tis the Comet Margaux,' said Dr. Forbery, topping 
 anything Rockney might have had to say, and any- 
 thing would have served. The latter clasped the 
 decanter, poured and drank in silence. 
 
 * 'Tis the doctor's antidote, and best for being ante- 
 dated,' Captain Con rapped his friend's knuckles. 
 
 *As long as you're contented with not dating in 
 double numbers,' retorted the doctor, absolutely 
 scattering the precious minutes to the winds, for he 
 hated a provocation. 
 
 ' There 's a golden mean, is there ! ' 
 
 * There is ; there 's a way between magnums of good 
 wine and gout, and it 's generally discovered too late.' 
 
 * At the physician's door, then ! where the golden 
 mean is generally discovered to be his fee. I've 
 heard of poor souls packed off by him without an 
 obolus to cross the ferry. Stripped they were in all 
 conscience.' 
 
 'You remind me of a fellow in Dublin who called on 
 me for medical advice, and found he 'd forgotten his 
 
 141 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER purse. He offered to execute a deed to bequeath me 
 ofRockney ^*^ body, naked and not ashamed.' 
 
 'You'd a right to cut him up at once, Forbery. 
 Any Jury 'd have pronounced him guilty of giving up 
 the ghost before he called.' 
 
 ' I let him go, body and all. I never saw him again.' 
 
 ' The fellow was not a lunatic. As for your golden 
 
 mean, there 's a saying : Prevention is better than 
 
 cure : and another that caps it : Drink deep or taste 
 
 not.' 
 
 ' That 's the Pierian Spring.' 
 ' And what is the wine on my table, sir ? ' 
 ' Exhaustless if your verses come of it.' 
 ' And pure, you may say of the verses and the 
 fount.' 
 
 'And neither heady nor over-composed; with a 
 blush like Diana confessing her love for the young 
 shepherd :^it's one of your own comparisons.' 
 
 'Oh! ' Con could have roared his own comparisons 
 out of hearing. He was angry with Forbery for his 
 obstructive dulness and would not taste the sneaking 
 compliment. What could Forbery mean by paying 
 compliments and spoiling a game ! The ten minutes 
 were dancing away like harmless wood-nymphs when 
 the Satyr slumbers. His eyes ranged over his guests 
 despondently, and fixed in desperation on Mr. Rum- 
 ford, whom his magnanimous nature would have 
 spared but for the sharp necessity to sacrifice 
 him. 
 
 The wine in Rumford at any rate let loose his 
 original nature, if it failed to unlock the animal in 
 these other unexcitable Saxons. 
 
 ' By the way, now I think of it, Mr. Rumford, the 
 142 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 interpretation of your Royal Standard, which per. chapter 
 plexes you so much, strikes me as easy if you'll ofRockney 
 examine the powerfully different colours of the two 
 beasts in it.' 
 
 Mr. Rumford protested that he had abandoned his 
 inquiry: it was a piece of foolishness: he had no 
 feeling in it whatever, none. 
 
 The man was a perfect snail's horn for coyness. 
 
 The circumstances did not permit of his being 
 suffered to slip away: and his complexion showed 
 that he might already be classed among the roast. 
 
 'Your Lion: — Mr. Rumford, you should know, is 
 discomposed, as a thoughtful patriot, by the inexplic- 
 able presence of the Unicorn in the Royal Standard, 
 and would be glad to account for his one horn and the 
 sickly appearance of the beast. I 'm prepared to say 
 he 's there to represent the fair one half of the popula- 
 tion. Your Lion, my dear sir, may have nothing in his 
 head, but his tawniness tells us he imbibes good sound 
 stuff, worthy of the reputation of a noble brewery. 
 Whereas your Unicorn, true to the character of the 
 numberless hosts he stands for, is manifestly a con- 
 sumer of doctor's drugs. And there you have the 
 symbolism of your country. Right or left of the 
 shield, I forget which, and it is of no importance to 
 the point — you have Grandgosier or Great Turk in all 
 his majesty, mane and tail; and on the other hand, 
 you behold, as the showman says. Dyspepsia. And 
 the pair are intended to indicate that you may see 
 yourselves complete by looking at them separately; 
 and so your Royal Standard is your national mirror ; 
 and when you gaze on it fondly you're playing the 
 part of a certain Mr. Narcissus, who got liker to the 
 
 143 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER Lion than to the Unicorn in the act. Now will that 
 Of Ro'ctaey Satisfy you ? ' 
 
 ' Quite as you please, quite as you please,' Mr. Rum- 
 ford replied. ' One loves the banner of one's country 
 — that is all.' He rubbed his hands. 'I for one am 
 proud of it.' 
 
 ' Far be it from me to blame you, my dear sir. Or 
 there 's the alternative of taking him to stand for your 
 sole great festival holiday, and worshipping him as 
 the personification of your Derbyshire race.' 
 
 A glittering look was in Captain Con's eye to catch 
 Rockney if he would but rise to it. 
 
 That doughty Saxon had been half listening, half 
 chatting to Mr. Mattock, and wore on his drawn eye- 
 lids and slightly drawn upper lip a look of lambent 
 pugnacity awake to the challenge, indifferent to the 
 antagonist, and disdainful of the occasion. 
 
 * We have too little of your enthusiasm for the flag,' 
 Philip said to Mr. Rumford to soothe him, in a form of 
 apology for his relative. 
 
 * Surely no ! not in England ? ' said Mr. Rumford, 
 tempted to open his heart, for he could be a bellicose 
 gentleman by deputy of the flag. He recollected that 
 the speaker was a cousin of Captain Con's, and with- 
 drew into his wound for safety. 'Here and there, 
 perhaps ; not when we are roused ; we want rousing, 
 we greatly prefer to live at peace with the world, if 
 the world will let us.' 
 
 ' Not at any price ? ' Philip fancied his tone too 
 quakerly. 
 
 ' Indeed I am not one of that party ! ' said Mr. Rum- 
 ford, beginning to glow ; but he feared a snare, and his 
 wound dre.w him in again. 
 144 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 'When are you ever at peace!' quoth his host, chapter 
 shocked by the inconsiderate punctuality of Mrs ofRocUney 
 Adister O'Donnell's household, for here was the coffee 
 coming round, and Mattock and Rockney escaping with- 
 out a scratch. ' There 's hardly a day in the year when 
 your scarlet mercenaries are not popping at niggers.' 
 
 Rockney had the flick on the cheek to his manhood 
 now, it might be hoped. 
 
 ' Our what ? ' asked Mr. Rumford, honestly unable to 
 digest the opprobrious term. 
 
 'Paid soldiery, hirelings, executioners, whom you 
 call volunteers, by a charming euphemism, and send 
 abroad to do the work of war while you propound the 
 doctrines of peace at home.' 
 
 Rockney's forehead was exquisitely eruptive, red and 
 swelling. Mattock lurched on his chair. The wine 
 was in them, and the captain commended the spiriting 
 of it, as Prospero his Ariel. 
 
 Who should intervene at this instant but the 
 wretched Philip, pricked on the point of honour as a 
 soldier! Are we inevitably to be thwarted by our 
 own people ? 
 
 ' I suppose we all work for pay,' said he. ' It seems 
 to me a cry of the streets to call us by hard names. 
 The question is what we fight for.' 
 
 He spoke with a witless moderation that was most 
 irritating, considering the latest news from the old 
 country. 
 
 ' You fight to subjugate, to enslave,' said Con, ' that 's 
 what you 're doing, and at the same time your journals 
 are venting their fine irony at the Austrians and the 
 Russians and the Prussians for tearing Poland to strips 
 with their bloody beaks.' 
 
 35— K 145 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER <We obey our orders, and leave you to settle the 
 ofRockney PoHtical busincss,' Philip replied. 
 
 Forbery declined the fray. Patrick was eagerly 
 watchful and dumb. Rockney finished his coffee with 
 a rap of the cup in the saucer, an appeal for the close 
 of the sitting ; and as Dr. Forbery responded to it by 
 pushing back his chair, he did likewise, and the other 
 made a movement. 
 
 The disappointed hero of a fight unfought had to 
 give the signal for rising. Double the number of the 
 ten minutes had elapsed. He sprang up, hearing 
 Rockney say : ' Captain Con O'Donnell is a politician 
 or nothing,' and as he was the most placable of men 
 concerning his personality, he took it lightly, with 
 half a groan that it had not come earlier, and said, ' He 
 thinks and he feels, poor fellow ! ' 
 
 All hope of a general action was over. 
 
 * That shall pass for the epitaph of the living,' said 
 Rockney. 
 
 It was too late to catch at a trifle to strain it to a 
 tussle. Con was obliged to subjoin : ' Inscribe it on the 
 dungeon-door of tyranny.' But the note was peaceful. 
 
 He expressed a wish that the fog had cleared for 
 him to see the stars of heaven before he went to bed, 
 informing Mr. Mattock that a long look in among them 
 was often his prayer at night, and winter a holy 
 season to him, for the reason of its showing them 
 bigger and brighter. 
 
 *I can tell my wife with a conscience we've had a 
 quiet evening, and you 're a witness to it,' he said to 
 Patrick. That consolation remained. 
 
 ' You know the secret of your happiness,' Patrick 
 answered. 
 146 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 'Know you one of the secrets of a young man's chapter 
 fortune in life, and give us a thrilling song at the Qf^ocimey 
 piano, my son,' said Con: 'though we don't happen 
 to have much choice of virgins for ye to-night. Irish 
 or French. Irish are popular. They don't mind having 
 us musically. And if we 'd go on joking to the end 
 we should content them, if only by justifying their 
 opinion that we 're born buffoons.' 
 
 His happy conscience enabled him to court his wife 
 with assiduity and winsomeness, and the ladies were 
 once more elated by seeing how chivalrously lover-like 
 an Irish gentleman can be after years of wedlock. 
 
 Patrick was asked to sing. Miss Mattock accom- 
 panied him at the piano. Then he took her place on 
 the music-stool, and she sang, and with an electrifying 
 splendour of tone and style. 
 
 ' But it 's the very heart of an Italian you sing with ! ' 
 he cried. 
 
 ' It will surprise you perhaps to hear that I prefer 
 German music,' said she. 
 
 ' But where — who had the honour of boasting you 
 his pupil ? ' 
 
 She mentioned a famous master. Patrick had heard 
 of him in Paris. He begged for another song and she 
 complied, accepting the one he selected as the favourite 
 of his brother Philip's, though she said : ' That one ? ' 
 with a superior air. It was a mellifluous love-song 
 from a popular Opera somewhat out of date. ' Well, 
 it 's in Italian ! ' she summed up her impressions of the 
 sickly words while scanning them for delivery. She 
 had no great admiration of the sentimental Sicilian 
 composer, she confessed, yet she sang as if possessed 
 by him. Had she, Patrick thought, been bent upon 
 
 147 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER charming Philip, she could not have thrown more fire 
 Of Rockney '^^^o the notes. And when she had done, after thrilling 
 the room, there was a gesture in her dismissal of the 
 leaves displaying critical loftiness. Patrick noticed it 
 and said, with the thrill of her voice lingering in him : 
 'What is it you do like? I should so like to know.' 
 
 She was answering when Captain Con came up to 
 the piano and remarked in an undertone to Patrick : 
 'How is it you hit on the song Adiante Adister used 
 to sing? ' 
 
 Miss Mattock glanced at Philip. He had applauded 
 her mechanically, and it was not that circumstance 
 which caused the second rush of scarlet over her face. 
 This time she could track it definitely to its origin. A 
 lover's favourite song is one that has been sung by his 
 love. She detected herself now in the full apprehen- 
 sion of the fact before she had sung a bar: it had been 
 a very dim fancy : and she denounced herself guilty of 
 the knowledge that she was giving pain by singing the 
 stuff fervidly, in the same breath that accused her 
 of never feeling things at the right moment vividly. 
 The reminiscences of those pale intuitions made them 
 always affectingly vivid. 
 
 But what vanity in our emotional state in a great 
 jarring world where we are excused for continuing to 
 seek our individual happiness only if we ally it and 
 subordinate it to the well-being of our fellows! The 
 interjection was her customary specific for the cure 
 of these little tricks of her blood. Leaving her friend 
 Miss Barrow at the piano, she took a chair in a corner 
 and said : 'Now, Mr. O'Donnell, you will hear the music 
 that moves me.' 
 
 ' But it 's not to be singing,' said Patrick. ' And how 
 148 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 can^you sing so gloriously what you don't care for ? chapter 
 It puzzles me completely.' ofRockney 
 
 She assured him she was no enigma : she hushed to 
 him to hear. 
 
 He dropped his underlip, keeping on the conversa- 
 tion with his eyes until he was caught by the masterly 
 playing of a sonata by the chief of the poets of sound. 
 
 He was caught by it, but he took the close of the 
 introductory section, an allegro con brio, for the end, 
 and she had to hush at him again, and could not resist 
 smiling at her lullaby to the prattler. Patrick smiled 
 in response. Exchanges of smiles upon an early 
 acquaintance between two young people are peeps 
 through the doorway of intimacy. She lost sight of 
 the Jesuit. Under the influence of good music, too, 
 a not unfavourable inclination towards the person 
 sitting beside us and sharing that sweetness, will 
 soften general prejudices: — if he was Irish, he was 
 boyishly Irish, not like his inscrutable brother; a 
 better, or hopefuller edition of Captain Con ; one with 
 whom something could be done to steady him, direct 
 him, improve him. He might be taught to appreciate 
 Beethoven and work for his fellows. 
 
 ' Now does not that touch you more deeply than the 
 Italian ? ' said she, delicately mouthing : * I, mio tradito 
 amor ! ' 
 
 'Touch, I don't know,' he was honest enough to 
 reply. ' It 's you that haven't given it a fair chance. 
 I 'd like to hear it again. There 's a forest on fire in it.' 
 
 ' There is,' she exclaimed. ' I have often felt it, but 
 never seen it. You exactly describe it. How true ! ' 
 
 ' But any music I could listen to all day and all the 
 night,' said he. 
 
 149 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 
 XIV 
 
 Of Roclcney 
 
 ' And be as proud of yourself the next morning ? ' 
 
 Patrick was rather at sea. What could she mean ? 
 
 Mrs. Adister O'Donnell stepped over to them, with 
 the object of installing Colonel Adister in Patrick's 
 place. 
 
 The object was possibly perceived. Mrs. Adister 
 was' allowed no time to set the manoeuvre in motion. 
 
 ' Mr. O'Donnell is a great enthusiast for music, and 
 could listen to it all day and all night, he tells me,' 
 said Miss Mattock. ' Would he not sicken of it in a 
 week, Mrs. Adister? ' 
 
 • But why should I?' cried Patrick. 'It's a gift of 
 heaven.' 
 
 ' And, like other gifts of heaven, to the idle it would 
 turn to evil.' 
 
 ' I can't believe it.' 
 
 'Work, and you will believe it.' 
 
 ' But, Miss Mattock, I want to work ; I 'm empty- 
 handed. It 's true I want to travel and see a bit of the 
 world to help me in my work by and by. I 'm ready 
 to try anything I can do, though.' 
 
 ' Has it ever struck you that you might try to help 
 the poor?' 
 
 'Arthur is really anxious, and only doubts his 
 ability,' said Mrs. Adister. 
 
 'The doubt throws a shadow on the wish,' said Miss 
 Mattock. ' And can one picture Colonel Adister the 
 secretary of a Laundry Institution, receiving directions 
 from Grace and me ! We should have to release him 
 long before the six months' term, when we have re- 
 solved to incur the expense of a salaried secretary.' 
 
 Mrs. Adister turned her head to the colonel, who 
 was then looking down the features of Mrs. Rockney. 
 150 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 Patrick said : ' I'm ready, for a year, Miss Mattock.' chapter 
 
 She answered him, half jocosely: 'A whole year ofRockney 
 of free service? Reflect on what you are under- 
 taking.' 
 
 ' It 's writing and accounts, no worse ? ' 
 
 'Writing and accounts all day, and music in the 
 evening only now and then.' 
 
 ' I can do it : I will, if you '11 have me.' 
 
 'Do you hear Mr. O'Donnell, Mrs. Adister ? ' 
 
 Captain Con fluttered up to his wife, and heard the 
 story from Miss Mattock. 
 
 He fancied he saw a thread of good luck for Philip 
 in it. ' Our house could be Patrick's home capitally,' 
 he suggested to his wife. She was not a whit less 
 hospitable, only hinting that she thought the refusal 
 of the post was due to Arthur. 
 
 'And if he accepts, imagine him on a stool, my dear 
 madam ; he couldn't sit it ! ' 
 
 Miss Mattock laughed. 'No, that is not to be 
 thought of seriously. And with Mr. O'Donnell it 
 would be probationary for the first fortnight or month. 
 Does he know anything about steam ? ' 
 
 'The rudimentary idea,' said Patrick. 
 
 ' That 's good for a beginning,' said the captain ; and 
 he added: 'Miss Mattock, I'm proud if one of my 
 family can be reckoned worthy of assisting in your 
 noble work.' 
 
 She replied : ' I warn everybody that they shall be 
 taken at their word if they volunteer their services.' 
 
 She was bidden to know by the captain that the 
 word of an Irish gentleman was his bond. 'And not 
 later than to-morrow evening I'll land him at your 
 office. Besides, he'll find countrywomen of his among 
 
 151 
 
CHAPTER 
 XIV 
 
 Of Rockney 
 
 CELT AND SAXON 
 
 you, and there 's that to enliven him. You say they 
 work well, diligently, intelligently.' 
 
 She deliberated. 'Yes, on the whole; when they 
 take to their work. Intelligently certainly compared 
 with our English. We do not get the best of them in 
 London. For that matter, we do not get the best of 
 the English — not the women of the north. We have 
 to put up with the rejected of other and better-paying 
 departments of work. It breaks my heart sometimes 
 to see how near they are to doing well, but for such a 
 little want of ballast.' 
 
 * If they 're Irish,' said Patrick, excited by the break- 
 ing of her heart, ' a whisper of cajolery in season is 
 often the secret.' 
 
 Captain Con backed him for diplomacy. 'You'll 
 learn he has a head. Miss Mattock.' 
 
 ' I am myself naturally blunt, and prefer the straight- 
 forward method,' said she. 
 
 Patrick nodded. 'But where there's an obstruction 
 in the road, it 's permissible to turn a corner.' 
 
 'Take 'em in flank when you can't break their 
 centre,' said Con. 
 
 ' Well, you shall really try whether you can endure 
 the work for a short time if you are in earnest,' Miss 
 Mattock addressed the volunteer. 
 
 'But I am,' he said. 
 
 'We are too poor at present to refuse the smallest 
 help.' 
 
 ' And mine is about the smallest.' 
 
 'I did not mean that, Mr. O'Donnell.' 
 
 ' But you '11 have me ? ' 
 
 ' Gladly.' 
 
 Captain Con applauded the final words between 
 152 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 them. They had the genial ring, though she accepted chapter 
 the wrong young man for but a shadow of the right ofRockney 
 sort of engagement. 
 
 This being settled, by the sudden combination of 
 enthusiastic Irish impulse and benevolent English 
 scheming, she very considerately resigned herself to 
 Mrs. Adister's lead and submitted herself to a further 
 jolting in the unprogressive conversational coach with 
 Colonel Adister, whose fault as a driver was not in 
 avoiding beaten ways, but whipping wooden horses. 
 
 Evidently those two were little adapted to make the 
 journey of life together, though they were remarkably 
 fine likenesses of a pair in the dead midway of the 
 journey. Captain Con reflected, and he could have 
 jumped at the thought of Patrick's cleverness: it was 
 the one bright thing of the evening. There was a clear 
 gain in it somewhere. And if there was none, Jane 
 Mattock was a good soul worth serving. Why not all 
 the benefaction on our side, and a figo for rewards ! 
 Devotees or adventurers, he was ready in imagination 
 to see his cousins play the part of either, as the cross- 
 roads offered, the heavens appeared to decree. We 
 turn to the right or the left, and this way we 're volun- 
 tary drudges, and that way we 're lucky dogs ; it 's all 
 according to the turn, the fate of it. But never forget 
 that old Ireland is weeping ! 
 
 O never forgpet that old Ireland is weeping 
 The bitter salt tears of the mother bereft ! 
 
 He hummed the spontaneous lines. He was accused 
 of singing to himself, and a song was vigorously de- 
 manded of him by the ladies. 
 
 He shook his head. ' I can't,' t® sighed. ' I was 
 
 153 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 
 XIV 
 
 Of Rockney 
 
 plucking the drowned body of a song out of the waters 
 to give it decent burial. And if I sing I shall be 
 charged with casting a firebrand at Mr. Rockney.' 
 
 Rockney assured hinj that he could listen to any- 
 thing in verse. 
 
 * Observe the sneer : — for our verses are smoke,' 
 said Con. 
 
 Miss Mattock pressed him to sing. 
 
 But he had saddened his mind about old Ireland: 
 the Irish news weighed heavily on him, unrelieved by 
 a tussle with Rockney. If he sang, it would be an 
 Irish song, and he would break down in it, he said ; 
 and he hinted at an objection of his wife's to spirited 
 Irish songs of the sort which carry the sons of Erin 
 bounding over the fences of tyranny and the brook of 
 tears. And perhaps Mr. Rockney might hear a tale in 
 verse as hard to bear as he sometimes found Irish 
 prose! — Miss Mattock perceived that his depression 
 was genuine, not less than his desire to please her. 
 ' Then it shall be on another occasion,' she said. 
 
 * Oh ! on another occasion I 'm the lark to the sky, 
 my dear lady.' 
 
 Her carriage was announced. She gave Patrick a 
 look, with a smile, for it was to be a curious experi- 
 ment. He put on the proper gravity of a young man 
 commissioned, without a dimple of a smile. Philip 
 bowed to her stiffly, as we bow to a commanding 
 officer who has insulted us and will hear of it. But 
 for that, Con would have manoeuvred against his wife 
 to send him downstairs at the lady's heels. The fellow 
 was a perfect riddle, hard to read as the zebra lines on 
 the skin of a wild jackass — if Providence intended any 
 meaning when she traced them! and it's a moot 
 154 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 point : as it is whether some of our poets have mean- chapter 
 ing and are not composers of zebra. 'No one knows ofRockney 
 but them above!' he said aloud, apparently to his 
 wife. 
 
 ' What can you be signifying? ' she asked him. She 
 had deputed Colonel Arthur to conduct Miss Mattock 
 and Miss Barrow to their carriage, and she supposed 
 the sentence might have a mysterious reference to the 
 plan she had formed ; therefore it might be a punish- 
 able offence. Her small round eyes were wide-open, 
 her head was up and high. 
 
 She was easily appeased, too easily. 
 
 •The question of rain, madam,' he replied to her 
 repetition of his words. ' I dare say that was what I 
 had in my mind, hearing Mr. Mattock and Mr. Rockney 
 agree to walk in company to their clubs.' 
 
 He proposed to them that they should delay the 
 march on a visit to his cabin near the clouds. They 
 were forced to decline his invitation to the gentle 
 lion's mouth ; as did Mr. Rumford, very briskly and 
 thankfully. Mr. Rockney was taken away by Mr. and 
 Mrs. Marbury Dyke. So the party separated, and the 
 Englishmen were together, and the Irishmen together ; 
 and hardly a syllable relating to the Englishmen did 
 the Irishmen say, beyond an allusion to an accident to 
 John Mattock's yacht off the Irish west-coast last 
 autumn; but the Irishmen were subjected to some 
 remarks by the Englishmen, wherein their qualities as 
 individuals and specimens of a race were critically 
 and neatly packed. Common sense is necessarily 
 critical in its collision with vapours, and the conscious 
 possessors of an exclusive common sense are called 
 on to deliver a summary verdict, nor is it an unjust 
 
 155 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER one either, if the verdict be taken simply for an esti- 
 ofRockney '"^t^ of What is presented upon the plain surface of 
 to-day. Irishmen are queer fellows, never satisfied, 
 thirsting for a shindy. Some of them get along pretty 
 well in America. The air of their Ireland intoxicates 
 them. They require the strong hand: fair legislation, 
 but no show of weakness. Once let them imagine you 
 are afraid of them, and they see perfect independence 
 in their grasp. And what would be the spectacle if 
 they were to cut themselves loose from England? 
 The big ship might be inconvenienced by the loss of 
 the tender ; the tender would fall adrift on the Atlantic, 
 with pilot and captain at sword and pistol, the crew 
 playing Donnybrook freely. Their cooler heads are 
 shrewd enough to see the folly, but it catches the 
 Irish fancy to rush to the extreme, and we have 
 allowed it to be supposed that it frightens us. There 
 is the capital blunder,/o«i et origo. Their leaders now 
 pretend to work upon the Great Scale; they demand 
 everything on the spot upon their own interpretation 
 of equity. Concessions, hazy speeches, and the puling 
 nonsense of our present Government, have encouraged 
 them so far and got us into the mess. Treat them as 
 policemen treat highwaymen : give them the law : and 
 the law must be tightened, like the hold on a rogue 
 by his collar, if they kick at it. Rockney was for 
 sharp measures in repression, fair legislation in due 
 course. 
 
 ' Fair legislation upon your own interpretation of 
 fair,' said Mattock, whose party opposed Rockney's. 
 ' As to repression, you would have missed that in- 
 structive scene this evening at Con O'Donnell's table, 
 if you had done him the kindness to pick up his glove. 
 156 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 It's wisest to let them exhaust their energies upon chapter 
 one another. Hold off, and they 're soon at work.' ofRockney 
 
 ' What kind of director of a City Company does he 
 make?' said Rockney. 
 
 Mattock bethought him that, on the whole, strange 
 to say, Con O'Donnell comported himself decorously 
 as a director, generally speaking on the reasonable 
 side, not without shrewdness : he seemed to be sobered 
 by the money question. 
 
 ' That wife of his is the salvation of him," Rockney 
 said, to account for the Captain's shrewdness. ' She 
 manages him cleverly. He knows the length of his 
 line. She 's a woman of principle, and barring the 
 marriage, good sense too. His wife keeps him quiet, 
 or we should be hearing of him. Forbery 's a more 
 dangerous man. There 's no intentional mischief in 
 Con O'Donnell; it's only effervescence. I saw his 
 game, and declined to uncork him. He talks of a 
 niece of his wife's : have you ever seen her? — married 
 to some Servian or Roumanian prince.' 
 
 Mattock answered : ' Yes.' 
 
 'Is she such a beauty?' 
 
 Again Mattock answered : ' Yes,' after affecting 
 thoughtfulness. 
 
 * They seem to marry oddly in that family.' 
 
 Mattock let fly a short laugh at the remark, which 
 had the ring of some current phrase. ' They do,' he 
 said. 
 
 Next morning Jane Mattock spoke to her brother of 
 her recruit. He entirely trusted to her discretion ; the 
 idea of a young Irish secretary was rather comical, 
 nevertheless. He had his joke about it, requesting to 
 have a sight of the secretary's books at the expiry of 
 
 157 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER the week, which was the length of time he granted 
 Of Rockne ****^ ardent volunteer for evaporating and vanishing. 
 
 'If it releases poor Grace for a week, it will be 
 useful to us,' Jane said. 'Women are educated so 
 shamefully that we have not yet found one we can 
 rely on as a competent person. And Mr. O'Donnell — 
 did you notice him ? I told you I met him a day or 
 two back — seems willing to be of use. It cannot hurt 
 him to try. Grace has too much on her hands.' 
 
 ' She has a dozen persons.' 
 
 'They are zealous when they are led.' 
 
 ' Beware of letting them suspect that they are led.' 
 
 'They are anxious to help the poor if they can 
 discover how.' 
 
 ' Good men, I don't doubt,' said John Mattock. 'Any 
 proposals from curates recently ? ' 
 
 'Not of late. Captain O'Donnell, the brother of our 
 secretary, is handsomer, but we do not think him so 
 trustworthy. Did you observe him at all ? — he sat by 
 me. He has a conspirator's head.' 
 
 'What is that?' her brother asked her. 
 
 ' Only a notion of mine.' 
 
 She was directed to furnish a compendious report 
 of the sayings, doings, and behaviour of the Irish 
 secretary in the evening. 
 
 ' If I find him there,' she said. 
 
 Her brother was of opiniqn that Mr. Patrick 
 O'Donnell would be as good as his word, and might 
 be expected to appear there while the novelty lasted. 
 
 158 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 The Mattock Family 
 
 That evening's report of the demeanour of the young 
 Irish secretary in harness was not so exhilarating as 
 John Mattock had expected, and he inclined to think 
 his sister guilty of casting her protecting veil over the 
 youth. It appeared that Mr. O'Donnell had been 
 studious of his duties, had spoken upon no other 
 topic, had asked pertinent questions, shown no flip- 
 pancy, indulged in no extravagances. He seemed, 
 Jane said, eager to master details. A certain eagerness 
 of her own in speaking of it sharpened her clear 
 features as if they were cutting through derision. 
 She stated it to propitiate her brother, as it might 
 have done but for the veracious picture of Patrick in 
 the word 'eager,' which pricked the scepticism of a 
 practical man. He locked his mouth, looking at her 
 with a twinkle she refused to notice. ' Determined to 
 master details ' he could have accepted. One may be 
 determined to find a needle in a dust-heap ; one does 
 not with any stiffness of purpose go at a dust-heap 
 eagerly. Hungry men have eaten husks ; they have 
 not betrayed eagerness for such dry stuff. Patrick's 
 voracity after details exhibited a doubtfully genuine 
 appetite, and John deferred his amusement until the 
 
 159 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER termination of the week or month when his dear good 
 The Mlttock ^^^^ would visit the office to behold a vacated seat, 
 Family Or be assailcd by the customary proposal. Irishmen 
 were not likely to be far behind curates in besieging 
 an heiress. For that matter, Jane was her own 
 mistress and could very well take care of herself; he 
 had confidence in her wisdom. 
 
 He was besides of an unsuspicious and an unexact- 
 ing temperament. The things he would strongly 
 object to he did not specify to himself because he was 
 untroubled by any forethought of them. Business, 
 political, commercial and marine, left few vacancies 
 in his mind other than for the pleasures he could 
 command and enjoy. He surveyed his England with 
 a ruddy countenance, and saw the country in the 
 reflection. His England saw much of itself in him. 
 Behind each there was more, behind the country a 
 great deal more, than could be displayed by a glass. 
 The salient features wore a resemblance. Prosperity 
 and heartiness ; a ready hand on, and over, a full 
 purse; a recognised ability of the second-rate order; a 
 stout hold of patent principles ; inherited and embraced, 
 to make the day secure and supply a somniferous 
 pillow for the night ; occasional fits of anxiety about 
 affairs, followed by an illuminating conviction that 
 the world is a changing one and our construction not 
 of granite, nevertheless that a justifiable faith in the 
 ship, joined to a constant study of the chart, will pull 
 us through, as it has done before, despite all assaults 
 and underminings of the common enemy and the 
 particular; these, with the humorous indifference of 
 familiarity and constitutional annoyances, excepting 
 when they grew acute and called for drugs, and with 
 160 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 friendliness to the race of man of both colours, in the chapter 
 belief that our Creator originally composed in black ^j^^ Mattock 
 and white, together with a liking for matters on their Family 
 present footing in slow motion, partly under his con- 
 ductorship, were the prominent characteristics of the 
 grandson of the founder of the house, who had built it 
 from a spade. 
 
 The story of the building was notorious ; popular 
 books for the inciting of young Englishmen to dig to 
 fortune had a place for it among the chapters, where 
 we read of the kind of man and the means by which 
 the country has executed its later giant strides of 
 advancement. The first John Mattock was a repre- 
 sentative of his time ; he moved when the country 
 was moving, and in the right direction, finding himself 
 at the auspicious moment upon a line of rail. Else- 
 where he would have moved, we may suppose, for the 
 spade-like virtues bear their fruits; persistent and 
 thrifty, solid and square, will fetch some sort of yield 
 out of any soil ; but he would not have gone far. The 
 Lord, to whom an old man of a mind totally Hebrew 
 ascribed the plenitude of material success, the Lord 
 and he would have reared a garden in the desert ; in 
 proximity to an oasis, still on the sands, against 
 obstacles. An accumulation of upwards of four hundred 
 thousand pounds required, as the moral of the popular 
 books does not sufficiently indicate, a moving country, 
 an ardent sphere, to produce the sum: and since, 
 where so much was done, we are bound to conceive 
 others at work as well as he, it seems to follow that 
 the exemplar outstripping them vastly must have 
 profited by situation at the start, which is a lucky 
 accident ; and an accident is an indigestible lump in a 
 35— L 161 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER moral tale, real though the story be. It was not 
 ^^ mentioned in the popular books : nor did those worthy 
 
 The Mattock . , , . . . 
 
 Family guidcs to the pursuit of wealth contain any reminder 
 of old John Mattock's dependence upon the conjoint 
 labour of his fellows to push him to his elevation. As 
 little did they think of foretelling a day, generations 
 hence, when the empty heirs of his fellows might 
 prefer a modest claim (confused in statement) to com- 
 pensation against the estate he bequeathed : for such 
 prophecy as that would have hinted at a tenderness 
 for the mass to the detriment of the individual, and 
 such tenderness as that is an element of our religion, 
 not the drift of our teaching. He grumbled at the 
 heavy taxation of his estate during life : yearly this 
 oppressed old man paid thousands of pounds to the 
 Government. It was poor encouragement to shoulder 
 and elbow your way from a hovel to a mansion ! 
 
 He paid the money, dying sour ; a splendid example 
 of energy on the road, a forbidding one at the terminus. 
 And here the moral of the popular books turned aside 
 from him to snatch at humanity for an instance of our 
 frailness and dealt in portentous shadows : — we are, it 
 should be known, not the great creatures we assume 
 ourselves to be. Six months before his death he 
 appeared in the garb of a navvy, humbly soliciting 
 employment at his own house-door. There he appealed 
 to the white calves of his footmen for a day's work, 
 upon the plea that he had never been a democrat. 
 
 The scene had been described with humanely-moral- 
 ising pathos in the various books of stories of Men 
 who have come to Fortune, and it had for a length of 
 seasons an annual position in the foremost rank (on 
 the line, facing the door) in our exhibition of the 
 162 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 chosen artists, where, as our popular words should chapter 
 do, it struck the spectator's eye and his brain simul- ^^^ Mattock 
 taneously with pugilistic force: a reference to the Family 
 picture in the catalogue furnishing a recapitulation of 
 the incident. ' / 've worked a good bit in my time, gentle- 
 men, and I baint done yet ' : — See Professor Summit's 
 ♦Men Who Have Come to Fortune.' There is, we 
 perceive at a glance, a contrast in the bowed master 
 of the Mansion applying to his menials for a day's 
 work at the rate of pay to able-bodied men : — which 
 he is not, but the deception is not disingenuous. The 
 contrast flashed with the rapid exchange of two prize- 
 fighters in a ring, very popularly. The fustian suit 
 and string below the knee, on the one side, and the 
 purple plush breeches and twinkling airy calves 
 (fascinating his attention as he makes his humble 
 request to his own, these domestic knights) to right 
 and left of the doorway and in front, hit straight out 
 of the canvas. And as quickly as you perceive the 
 contrast you swallow the moral. The dreaded thing 
 is down in a trice, to do what salutary work it may 
 within you. That it passed into the blood of England's 
 middle-class population, and set many heads philosophi- 
 cally shaking, and filled the sails of many a sermon, 
 is known to those who lived in days when Art and 
 the classes patronising our Native Art existed happily 
 upon the terms of venerable School-Dame and studious 
 pupils, before the sickly era displacing Exhibitions 
 full of meaning for tricks of colour, monstrous atmo- 
 spherical vagaries that teach nothing, strange experi- 
 ments on the complexion of the human face divine — 
 the feminine hyper-aethereally. Like the first John 
 Mattock, it was formerly of, and yet by dint of sturdy 
 
 163 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER energy, above the people. They learnt from it ; they 
 
 The Mattock ^o'^l^®'! ^o it thirsting and retired from it thoughtful, 
 
 Family with some belief of having drunk of nature in art, as 
 
 you will see the countless troops of urchins about 
 
 the one cow of London, in the Great City's Green 
 
 Park. 
 
 A bequest to the nation of the best of these pictures 
 of Old John, by a very old Yorkshire collector, makes 
 it milk for all time, a perpetual contrast, and a rebuke. 
 Compared with the portrait of Jane Mattock in her 
 fiery aureole of hair on the walls of the breakfast-room, 
 it marks that fatal period of degeneracy for us, which 
 our critics of Literature as well as Art are one voice in 
 denouncing, when the complex overwhelms the simple, 
 and excess of signification is attempted, instead of 
 letting plain nature speak her uncorrupted tongue to 
 the contemplative mind. Degeneracy is the critical 
 history of the Arts. Jane's hair was of a reddish 
 gold-inwoven cast that would, in her grandfather's 
 epoch, have shone unambiguously as carrots. The 
 girl of his day thus adorned by Nature, would have 
 been shown wearing her ridiculous crown with some 
 decent sulkiness; and we should not have had her so 
 unsparingly crowned ; the truth would have been told 
 in a dexterous concealment — a rope of it wound up 
 for a bed of the tortoise-shell comb behind, and a pair 
 of tight cornucopias at the temples. What does our 
 modern artist do but flare it to right and left, lift it 
 wavily over her forehead, revel in the oriental super- 
 abundance, and really seem to swear we shall admire 
 it, against our traditions of the vegetable, as a poetical 
 splendour. The head of the heiress is in a Jovian 
 shower. Marigolds are in her hand. The whole square 
 164 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 of canvas is like a meadow on the borders of June. It chapter 
 causes blinking. ^^^ ^^^^^ 
 
 Her brother also is presented : a fine portrait of him, Family 
 with clipped red locks, in blue array, smiling, wearing 
 the rose of briny breezes, a telescope under his left 
 arm, his right forefinger on a map, a view of Spitz- 
 bergen through a cabin-window : for John had notions 
 about the north-west passage, he had spent a winter 
 in the ice, and if an amateur, was not the less a true 
 sailor. 
 
 With his brass-buttoned blue coat, and his high- 
 coloured cheeks, and his convict hair — a layer of 
 brick-dust — and his air of princely wealth, and the 
 icebergs and hummocks about him, he looks for 
 adventure without a thought of his heroism — the 
 country all over. 
 
 There he stands, a lover of the sea, and a scientific 
 seaman and engineer to boot, practical in every line of 
 his face, defying mankind to suspect that he cherishes 
 a grain of romance. On the wall, just above his 
 shoulder, is a sketch of a Viking putting the lighted 
 brand to his ship in mid sea, and you are to under- 
 stand that his time is come and so should a Viking 
 die: further, if you will, the subject is a modern 
 Viking, ready for the responsibilities of the title. 
 Sketches of our ancient wooden walls and our iron 
 and plated defences line the panellings. These 
 degenerate artists do work hard for their money. 
 
 The portrait of John's father, dated a generation 
 back, is just the man and little else, phantomly the 
 man. His brown coat struggles out of the obscurity 
 of the background, but it is chiefly background cloth- 
 ing him. His features are distinguishable and delicate ; 
 
 165 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER you would supposc him appearing to you under the 
 M^t k ''^^'"^ ^^ ^ common candle, or cottage coaliire — 
 Family ferruginously opaque. The object of the artist (apart 
 from the triumph of tone on the canvas) is to 
 introduce him as an elegant and faded gentleman, 
 rather retiring into darkness than emerging. He is 
 the ghost of the painter's impasto. Yet this is Ezra 
 Mattock, who multiplied the inheritance of the hundreds 
 of thousands into millions, and died, after covering 
 Europe, Asia, and the Americas with iron rails, one of 
 the few Christians that can hold up their heads beside 
 the banking Jew as magnates in the lists of gold. The 
 portrait is clearly no frontispiece of his qualities. He 
 married an accomplished and charitable lady, and she 
 did not spoil the stock in refining it. His life passed 
 quietly; his death shook the country: for though it 
 had been known that he had been one of our poten- 
 tates, how mightily he was one had not entered into 
 the calculations of the public until the will of the late 
 Ezra Mattock, cited in our prints, received comments 
 from various newspaper articles. A chuckle of 
 collateral satisfaction ran through the empire. All 
 England and her dependencies felt the state of cousin- 
 ship with the fruits of energy ; and it was an agreeable 
 sentiment, coming opportunely, as it did, at the tail of 
 articles that had been discussing a curious manifesta- 
 tion of late : to-wit, the awakening energy of the 
 foreigner — a prodigious apparition on our horizon. 
 Others were energetic too ! We were not, the sermon 
 ran, to imagine we were without rivals in the field. 
 We were possessed of certain positive advantages ; 
 we had coal, iron, and an industrious population, but 
 we were, it was to be feared, by no means a thrifty 
 166 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 race, and there was reason for doubt whether in the chapter 
 matter of industry we were quite up to the mark of ^^^ Mattock 
 our forefathers. No deterioration of the stock was Famuy 
 apprehended, still the nation must be accused of a lack 
 of vigilance. We must look round us, and accept the 
 facts as they stood. So accustomed had we become to 
 the predominance of our position that it was difficult 
 at first to realise a position of rivalry that threatened 
 our manufacturing interests in their hitherto undis- 
 puted lead in the world's markets. The tale of our 
 exports for the last five years conveys at once its 
 moral and its warning. Statistics were then cited. 
 
 As when the gloomy pedagogue has concluded his 
 exhortation, statistics birched the land. They were 
 started at our dinner-tables, and scourged the social 
 converse. Not less than in the articles, they were 
 perhaps livelier than in the preface ; they were dis- 
 tressing nevertheless; they led invariably to the 
 question of our decadence. Carthage was named : a 
 great mercantile community absolutely obliterated! 
 Senatorial men were led to propose in their thought- 
 fullest tones that we should turn our attention to Art. 
 Why should we not learn to excel in Art ? We excelled 
 in Poetry. Our Poets were cited : not that there was 
 a notion that poems would pay as an export but to 
 show that if we excel in one of the Arts we may in 
 others of them. The poetry was not cited, nor was it 
 necessary, the object being to inflate the balloon of 
 paradox with a light-flying gas, and prove a poem- 
 producing people to be of their nature born artists ; 
 if they did but know it. The explosion of a particular 
 trade points to your taking up another. Energy is 
 adapted to flourish equally in every branch of labour. 
 
 167 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER It is the genius of the will, commanding all the cross- 
 
 XV 
 
 The Mattock fo^ds. A country breeding hugely must prove its 
 Family energy likewise in the departments of the mind, or it 
 will ultimately be unable to feed its young — nay, to 
 feast its aldermen ! Let us be up and alive. — Such was 
 the exhortation of a profound depression. Outside 
 these dismal assemblies, in the streets, an ancient 
 song of raven recurrence croaked of ' Old England 
 a-going down the hill ' ; for there is a link of electricity 
 between the street-boy and the leading article in days 
 when the Poies exchange salutations. 
 
 Mr. Ezra's legacy of his millions to son and daughter 
 broke like a golden evening on the borders of the rain- 
 cloud. Things could not be so bad when a plain 
 untitled English gentleman bequeathed in the simplest 
 manner possible such giant heaps, a very Pelion upon 
 Ossa, of wealth to his children. The minds of the 
 readers of journals were now directed to think of the 
 hoarded treasures of this favoured country. They 
 might approximately be counted, but even if counted 
 they would be past conception, like the sidereal 
 system. The contemplation of a million stupefies : 
 consider the figures of millions and millions ! Articles 
 were written on Lombard Street, the world's gold- 
 mine, our granary of energy, surpassing all actual 
 and fabulous gold-mines ever spoken of: Aladdin's 
 magician would find his purse contracting and squeak- 
 ing in the comparison. Then, too, the store of jewels 
 held by certain private families called for remark and an 
 allusion to Sindbad the sailor, whose eyes were to dilate 
 wider than they did in the valley of diamonds. Why, 
 we could, if we pleased, lie by and pass two or three 
 decades as jolly cricketers and scullers, and resume 
 168 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 the race for wealth with the rest of mankind, hardly chapter 
 
 XV 
 
 sensible of the holiday in our pockets. Though we ^^^ Mattock 
 were the last people to do it, we were the sole people Famuy 
 that had the option. Our Fortunatus' cap was put to 
 better purposes, but to have the cap, and not to be 
 emasculated by the possession, might excuse a little 
 reasonable pride in ourselves. 
 
 Thus did Optimism and Pessimism have their turn, 
 like the two great parties in the State, and the sub- 
 siding see-saw restored a proper balance, much to the 
 nation's comfort. Unhappily, it was remembered, 
 there are spectators of its method of getting to an 
 equipoise out of the agitation of extremes. The peep 
 at our treasures to regain composure had, we fear, 
 given the foreigner glimpses, and whetted the appetite 
 of our masses. No sooner are we at peace than these 
 are heard uttering low howls, and those are seen 
 enviously glaring. The spectre. Panic, that ever dogs 
 the optimistic feast, warns us of a sack under our 
 beds, and robbers about to try a barely-bolted door. 
 Then do we, who have so sweetly sung our senses to 
 sleep, start up, in their grip, rush to the doctor and 
 the blacksmith, ring alarums, proclaim ourselves 
 intestinally torn, defenceless, a prey to foes within 
 and without. It is discovered to be no worse than an 
 alderman's dream, but the pessimist frenzy of the 
 night has tossed a quieting sop to the Radical, and 
 summoned the volunteers to a review. Laudatory 
 articles upon the soldierly ' march past ' of our 
 volunteers permit of a spell of soft repose, deeper 
 than prudent, at the end of it, India and Ireland con- 
 senting. 
 
 So much for a passing outline of John Bull — the 
 
 169 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER shadow on the wall of John Mattock. The unostenta- 
 The Mattock tious millionaire's legacy to his two children affected 
 Family Mr. Bull thrillingly, pretty nearly as it has here been 
 dotted in lining. That is historical. Could he believe 
 in the existence of a son of his, a master of millions, 
 who had never sighed (and he had only to sigh) to 
 die a peer, or a baronet, or simple Knight? The down- 
 right hard-nailed coffin fact was there ; the wealthiest 
 man in the country had flown away to Shadowland a 
 common Mr.! You see the straight deduction from 
 the circumstances : — we are, say what you will, a 
 Republican people ! Newspaper articles on the watch 
 sympathetically for Mr. Bull's latest view of himself, 
 preached on the theme of our peculiar Republicanism. 
 Soon after he was observed fondling the Crown 
 Insignia. His bards flung out their breezy columns, 
 reverentially monarchial. The Republican was in- 
 formed that they were despised as a blatant minority. 
 A maudlin fit of worship of our nobility had hold of 
 him next, and English aristocracy received the paean. 
 Lectures were addressed to democrats ; our House 
 of Lords was pledged solemnly in reams of print. 
 We were told that ' blood ' may always be betted on 
 to win the race ; blood that is blue will beat the red 
 hollow. Who could pretend to despise the honour 
 of admission to the ranks of the proudest peerage the 
 world has known! Is not a great territorial aristo- 
 cracy the strongest guarantee of national stability? 
 The loudness of the interrogation, like the thunder of 
 Jove, precluded thought of an answer. 
 
 Mr. Bull, though he is not of lucid memory, kept an 
 eye on the owner of those millions. His bards were 
 awake to his anxiety, and celebrated John Mattock's 
 170 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 doings with a trump and flourish somewhat displeas- chapter 
 ing to a quietly-disposed commoner. John's entry ^^^ Mattock 
 into Parliament as a Liberal was taken for sign of FamUy 
 steersman who knew where the tide ran. But your 
 Liberals are sometimes Radicals in their youth, and 
 his choice of parties might not be so much sagacity as 
 an instance of unripe lightheadedness. A young con- 
 servative millionaire is less disturbing. The very 
 wealthy young peer is never wanton in his politics, 
 which seems to admonish us that the heir of vast 
 ■wealth should have it imposed on him to accept a 
 peerage, and be locked up as it were. A coronet 
 steadies the brain. You may let out your heels at the 
 social laws, you are almost expected to do it, but you 
 are to shake that young pate of yours restively under 
 such a splendid encumbrance. Private reports of 
 John, however, gave him credit for sound opinions : 
 he was moderate, merely progressive. When it was 
 added that the man had the habit of taking counsel 
 with his sister, he was at once considered as fast and 
 safe, not because of any public knowledge of the 
 character of Jane Mattock. We pay this homage to 
 the settled common sense of women. Distinctly does 
 she discountenance leaps in the dark, wild driving, 
 and the freaks of Radicalism. 
 
 John, as it happened, had not so grave a respect for 
 the sex as for the individual Jane. He thought women 
 capable of acts of foolishness ; his bright-faced sister 
 he could thoroughly trust for prudent conduct. He 
 gave her a good portion of his heart in confidence, 
 and all of it in affection. There were matters which 
 he excluded from confidence, even from intimate com- 
 munication with himself. These he could not reveal ; 
 
 171 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER nor could she perfectly opea her heart to him, for the 
 Tt. ^\. , same reason. They both had an established ideal of 
 
 The Mattock •' 
 
 Family their personal qualities, not far above the positive, 
 since they were neither of them pretentious, yet it 
 was a trifle higher and fairer than the working pattern ; 
 and albeit they were sincere enough, quite sincere in 
 their mutual intercourse, they had, by what each 
 knew at times of the thumping organ within them, 
 cause for doubting that they were as transparent as 
 the other supposed, and they were separately aware 
 of an inward smile at one another's partial deception ; 
 which did not thwart their honest power of working 
 up to the respected ideal. The stroke of the deeper 
 self-knowledge rarely shook them ; they were able to 
 live with full sensations in the animated picture they 
 were to the eyes best loved by them. This in fact 
 was their life. Anything beside it was a dream, and 
 we do not speak of our dreams — not of every dream. 
 Especially do we reserve our speech concerning the 
 dream in which we had a revelation of the proud 
 frame deprived of a guiding will, flung rudderless on 
 the waves. Ah that abject ! The dismantled ship 
 has the grandeur of the tempest about it, but the soul 
 swayed by passion is ignominiously bare-poled, 
 detected, hooted by its old assumption. If instinct 
 plays fantastical tricks when we are sleeping, let it 
 be ever behind a curtain. We can be held guilty only 
 if we court exposure. The ideal of English gentleman 
 and gentlewoman is closely Roman in the self-repres- 
 sion it exacts, and that it should be but occasionally 
 difficult to them shows an affinity with the type. Do 
 you perchance, O continental observers of the race, 
 call it hypocritical? It is their nature disciplined to 
 172 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 the regimental step of civilisation. Socially these chapter 
 island men and women of a certain middle rank are ^^^ Mattock 
 veterans of an army, and some of the latest enrolled Family 
 are the stoutest defenders of the flag. 
 
 Brother and sister preserved their little secrets of 
 character apart. They could not be expected to un- 
 fold what they declined personally to examine. But 
 they were not so successful with the lady govern- 
 ing the household, their widowed maternal aunt, Mrs. 
 Lackstraw, a woman of decisive penetration, and an 
 insubordinate recruit of the army aforesaid. To her 
 they w|re without a mask ; John was passion's slave, 
 Jane the most romantic of Eve's daughters. She 
 pointed to incidents of their youth ; her vision was 
 acutely retrospective. The wealth of her nephew and 
 niece caused such a view of them to be, as she re- 
 marked, anxious past endurance. She had grounds 
 for fearing that John, who might step to an alliance 
 with any one of the proudest houses in the Kingdom, 
 would marry a beggar-maid. As for Jane, she was 
 the natural prey of a threadbare poet. Mrs. Lackstraw 
 heard of Mr. Patrick O'Donnell, and demanded the 
 right to inspect him. She doubted such perfect dis- 
 interestedness in any young man as that he should 
 slave at account-keeping to that Laundry without a 
 prospect of rich remuneration, and the tale of his 
 going down to the city for a couple of hours each day 
 to learn the art of keeping books was of very dubious 
 import in a cousin of Captain Con O'Donnell. 'Let 
 me see your prodigy,' she said, with the emphasis on 
 each word. 
 
 Patrick was presented at her table. She had steeled 
 herself against an Irish tongue. He spoke little, 
 
 173 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER appeared simple, professed no enthusiasm for the 
 The Mattock Laundry. And he paid no compliments to Jane : of 
 Family the two he was more interested by the elder lady, 
 whose farm and dairy in Surrey he heard her tell of 
 with a shining glance, observing that he liked thick 
 cream : there was a touch of home in it. The inno- 
 cent sensuality in the candid avowal of his tastes 
 inspired confidence. Mrs. Lackstraw fished for some 
 account of his home. He was open to flow on the 
 subject; he dashed a few sketches of mother and 
 sisters, dowerless girls, fresh as trout in the stream, 
 and of his own poor estate, and the peasantry, with 
 whom he was on friendly terms. He was an absentee 
 for his education. Sweet water, pure milk, potatoes 
 and bread, were the things he coveted in plenty for his 
 people and himself, he said, calling forth an echo from 
 Mrs. Lackstraw, and an invitation to come down to 
 her farm in the Spring. ' That is, Mr. O'Donnell, if 
 you are still in London.' 
 
 ' Oh, I 'm bound apprentice for a year,' said he. 
 
 He was asked whether he did not find it tiresome 
 work. 
 
 ' A trifle so,' he confessed. 
 
 Then why did he pursue it, the question was put. 
 
 He was not alive for his own pleasure, and would 
 like to feel he was doing a bit of good, was the 
 answer. 
 
 Could one, Mrs. Lackstraw asked herself, have faith 
 in this young Irishman? He possessed an estate. 
 His brogue rather added to his air of truthfulness. 
 His easy manners and the occasional streak of correct 
 French in his dialogue cast a shadow on it. Yet he 
 might be an ingenuous creature precisely because of 
 174 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 the suspicion roused by his quaint unworldliness that chapter 
 he might be a terrible actor. Why not? — his heart ^he Mattock 
 was evidently much more interested in her pursuits Family 
 than in her niece's. The juvenility of him was catch- 
 ing, if it was indeed the man, and not one of the actor's 
 properties. Mrs. Lackstraw thought it prudent to 
 hint at the latter idea to Jane, while she decided in 
 her generosity to embrace the former. Oh ! if all 
 Irishmen shared his taste for sweet water, pure milk 
 and wholesome bread, what a true Union we should 
 have ! She had always insisted on those three things 
 as most to be desired on earth for the masses, and 
 she reminded Jane of it as a curious fact. Jane 
 acquiesced, having always considered it a curious fact 
 that her aunt should combine the relish of a country 
 life with the intensest social ambition — a passion so 
 sensitive as to make the name her husband had in- 
 flicted on her a pain and a burden. The name of 
 Mattock gave her horrors. She spoke of it openly 
 to prove that Jane must marry a title and John 
 become a peer. Never was there such a name to 
 smell of the soil. She declared her incapacity to die 
 happy until the two had buried Mattock. Her own 
 one fatal step condemned her, owing to the opinion 
 she held upon the sacredness of marriage, as Lack- 
 straw on her tombstone, and to Lackstraw above the 
 earthly martyr would go bearing the designation 
 which marked her to be claimed by him. But for 
 John and Jane the index of Providence pointed a 
 brighter passage through life. They had only to 
 conquer the weakness native to them — the dreadful 
 tendency downward. They had, in the spiritual sense, 
 frail hearts. The girl had been secretive about the 
 
 175 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER early activity of hers, though her aunt knew of two 
 The Mitto k ^^ three adventures wanting in nothing save boldness 
 Family to have put an end to her independence and her 
 prospects : — hence this Laundry business ! a clear sign 
 of some internal disappointment. The boy, however, 
 had betrayed himself in his mother's days, when it 
 required all her influence and his father's authority, 
 with proof positive of the woman's unworthiness, 
 to rescue him from immediate disaster. 
 
 Mrs. Lackstraw's confidences on the theme of the 
 family she watched over were extended to Patrick 
 during their strolls among the ducks and fowls and 
 pheasants at her farm. She dealt them out in ex- 
 clamations, as much as telling him that now they 
 knew him they trusted him, notwithstanding the un- 
 accountable part he played as honorary secretary te 
 that Laundry. The confidences, he was aware, were 
 common property of the visitors one after another, 
 but he had the knowledge of his being trusted as not 
 every Irishman would have been. A service of six 
 months to the secretaryship established his reputation 
 as the strange bird of a queer species : not much less 
 quiet, honest, methodical, than an Englishman, and 
 still impulsive, Irish still; a very strange bird. 
 
 The disposition of the English to love the children 
 of Erin, when not fretted by them, was shown in the 
 treatment Patrick received from the Mattock family. 
 It is a love resembling the affection of the stage-box 
 for a set of favourite performers, and Patrick, a Celt 
 who had schooled his wits to observe and meditate, 
 understood his position with them as one of the 
 gallant and amusing race, as well as the reason why 
 he had won their private esteem. They are not 
 176 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 willingly suspicious : it agitates their minds to be so ; chapter 
 and they are most easily lulled by the flattery of ^^^ Mattock 
 seeing their special virtues grafted on an alien stock : Family 
 for in this admiration of virtues that are so necessary 
 to the stalwart growth of man, they become just 
 sensible of a minor deficiency; — the tree, if we jump 
 out of it to examine its appearance, should not be all 
 trunk. Six months of ungrudging unremunerated ser- 
 vice, showing devotion to the good cause and perfect 
 candour from first to last, was English, and a poetic 
 touch beyond : so that John Mattock, if he had finished 
 the sentence instead of lopping it with an interjection, 
 would have said : ' These Irish fellows, when they 're 
 genuine and first rate! — are pretty well the pick of 
 the land.' Perhaps his pause on the interjection ex- 
 pressed a doubt of our getting them genuine. Mr. 
 O'Donnell was a sort of exceptional Irishman, not 
 devoid of practical ability in a small way — he did his 
 duties of secretary fairly well; apparently sincere — 
 he had refrained from courting Jane ; an odd creature 
 enough, what with his mixture of impulsiveness and 
 discretion ; likeable, pleasant to entertain and talk to ; 
 not one of your lunatics concerning his country — he 
 could listen to an Englishman's opinion on that head, 
 listen composedly to Rockney, merely seeming to 
 take notes ; and Rockney was, as Captain Con termed 
 him, Press Dragoon about Ireland, a trying doctor ' 
 for a child of the patient. 
 
 On the whole, John Mattock could shake his hand 
 heartily when he was leaving our shores. Patrick 
 was released by ^Miss Grace Barrow's discovery at 
 last of a lady capable of filling his place : a circum- 
 stance that he did not pretend to regret. He relin- 
 35— M 177 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER quished his post and stood aside with the air of a 
 The Mattock disciplined soldier. This was at the expiration of 
 Family sevcn months and two weeks of service. Only after 
 he had gone, upon her receiving his first letter from 
 the Continent, did Jane distinguish in herself the 
 warmth of friendliness she felt for him, and know 
 that of all around her she, reproaching every one 
 who had hinted a doubt, had been the most suspicious 
 of his pure simplicity. It was the vice of her con. 
 dition to be suspicious of the honesty of men. She 
 thought of her looks as less attractive than they 
 were ; of her wealth she had reason to think that the 
 scent transformed our sad sex into dogs under various 
 disguises. Remembering her chill once on hearing 
 Patrick in a green lane where they botanised among 
 spring flowers call himself her Irish cousin, as if he 
 had advanced a step and betrayed the hoof, she called 
 him her Irish cousin now in good earnest. Her nation 
 was retrospectively enthusiastic. The cordiality of 
 her letter of reply to the wandering Patrick astonished 
 him on the part of so cool a young lady ; arid Captain 
 Con, when he heard Miss Mattock speak of Patrick 
 to his wife, came to the conclusion that the leery 
 lad had gone a far way toward doing the trick for 
 himself, though Jane said his correspondence was 
 full of the deeds of his brother in India. She quite 
 sparkled in speaking of this boy. 
 
 She and the captain had an interchange of sparklings 
 over absent Patrick, at a discovery made by Miss 
 Colesworth, the lady replacing him, in a nook of the 
 amateur secretary's official desk, under heaps of 
 pamphlets and slips, French and English and Irish 
 journals, not at all bearing upon the business of the 
 178 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 Laundry. It was a blotting-pad stuffed with Patrick's chapter 
 jottings. Jane brought it to Con as to the proper ^^^ Mattock 
 keeper of the reliquary. He persuaded her to join Family 
 him in examining it, and together they bent their 
 heads, turning leaf by leaf, facing, laughing, pursuing 
 the search for more, sometimes freely shouting. Her 
 inspection of the contents had previously been shy; 
 she had just enough to tell her they were funny. 
 Dozens of scraps, insides of torn envelopes, invitation- 
 cards, ends of bills received from home, whatever 
 was handy to him at the moment, had done service 
 for the overflow of Mr. Secretary's private notes and 
 reflections; the blotting-paper as well; though that 
 was devoted chiefly to sketches of the human counten- 
 ance, the same being almost entirely of the fair. 
 Jane fancied she spied herself among the number. 
 Con saw the likeness, but not considering it a com- 
 plimentary one, he whisked over the leaf. Grace 
 Barrow was unmistakeable. Her dimpled cushion 
 features, and very intent eyes gazing out of the knolls 
 and dingles, were given without caricature. Miss 
 Colesworth appeared on the last page, a half-length 
 holding a big key, demure between curls. The key 
 was explained by a cage on a stool, and a bird flying 
 out. She had unlocked the cage for Patrick. 
 
 ' He never seemed anxious to be released while he 
 was at work,' said Jane, after she and the captain had 
 spelt the symboUing in turns. 
 
 'And never thirsted to fly till he flew, I warrant 
 him,' said Con. 
 
 A repeated sketch of some beauty confused them 
 both ; neither of them could guess the proud owner of 
 those lineaments. Con proclaimed it to be merely 
 
 179 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER one of the lad's recollections, perhaps a French face. 
 The Mlttock ^^ thought he might have seen a face rather 
 Family resembling it, but could not call to mind whose face 
 it was. 
 
 'I dare say it's just a youngster's dream on a stool 
 at a desk, as poets write sonnets in their youth to 
 nobody, till they're pierced by somebody, and then 
 there 's a difference in their handwriting,' he said, 
 vexed with Patrick for squandering his opportunity to 
 leave a compliment to the heiress behind him. 
 
 Jane flipped the leaves back to the lady with stormy 
 hair. 
 
 'But you '11 have the whole book, and hand it to him 
 when he returns; it'll come best from you,' said Con. 
 'The man on horseback, out of uniform, 's brother 
 Philip, of course. And man and horse are done to the 
 life. Pray, take it, Miss Mattock. I should lose it to 
 a certainty ; I should ; I can't be trusted. You '11 
 take it ! ' 
 
 He pressed her so warmly to retain the bundle in her 
 custody that she carried it away. 
 
 Strange to say the things she had laughed at had 
 been the things which struck her feelings and sym- 
 pathies. Patrick's notes here and there recalled con. 
 versations he had more listened to than taken part in 
 between herself and Grace Barrow. Who could help 
 laughing at his ideas about women ! But if they were 
 crude, they were shrewd — or so she thought them ; 
 and the jejuneness was, to her mind, chiefly in the dress- 
 ing of them. Grace agreed with her, for Grace had as 
 good a right to inspect the papers as she, and a glance 
 had shown that there was nothing of peculiar personal 
 import in his notes : he did not brood on himself. 
 180 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 Here was one which tickled the ladies and formed a chapter 
 text for discussion. ^^^ ^^^^^^^^ 
 
 ' Women must take the fate of market-fruit till they Family 
 earn their own pennies, and then they '11 regulate the 
 market. It is a tussle for money with them as with us, 
 meaning power. They '11 do it as little by oratory as 
 they have done by millinery, for their oratory, just like 
 their millinery, appeals to a sentiment, and to a weaker; 
 and nothing solid comes of a sentiment. Power is 
 built on work.' 
 
 To this was appended : ' The better for mankind in 
 the developing process, ay, and a bad day for us, boys, 
 when study masks the charming eyes in gig-lamps, and 
 there is no pretty flying before us. Good-night to Cupid, 
 I fear. May be I am not seeing far enough, and am 
 asking for the devil to have the loveliest women as of 
 old. Retro S. M.' 
 
 The youthful eye on their sex, the Irish voice, and 
 the perceptible moral earnestness in the background, 
 made up a quaint mixture. 
 
 181 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 Of the great Mr. Bull and the Celtic and Saxon 
 view of him : and something of Richard 
 Rockney 
 
 Meanwhile India, our lubber giant, had ceased to kick 
 a leg, and Ireland, oiir fever-invalid, wore the aspect of 
 an opiate slumber. The volcano we couch on was quiet, 
 the gritty morsel unabsorbed within us at an armistice 
 with the gastric juices. Once more the personification 
 of the country's prosperity had returned to the humming 
 state of roundness. Trade whipped him merrily, and 
 he spun. 
 
 A fuller sketch of the figure of this remarkable emana- 
 tion of us and object of our worship. Bull, is required 
 that we may breathe the atmosphere of a story dealing 
 with such very different views of the idol, and learn to 
 tolerate plain-speaking about him. 
 
 Fancy yourself delayed by stress of weather at an 
 inn or an excursion, and snapped up by some gossip 
 drone of the district, who hearing whither you are 
 bound, recounts the history and nature of the place, 
 to your ultimate advantage, though you groan for the 
 outer downpour to abate. — Of Bull, then : our image, 
 182 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 before the world : our lord and tyrant, ourself in short chapter 
 — the lower part of us. Coldly worshipped on the ©f the great 
 whole, he can create an enthusiasm when his roast- «'• bu" 
 beef influence mounts up to peaceful skies and the 
 domestic English world spins with him. What he 
 does not like will then be the forbidding law of a most 
 governable people, what he does like the consenting. 
 If it is declared that argument will be inefficacious to 
 move him, he is adored in the form of post. A hint of 
 his willingness in any direction, causes a perilous rush 
 of his devotees. Nor is there reason to suppose we 
 have drawn the fanatical subserviency from the ex- 
 ample of our subject India. We may deem it native ; 
 perhaps of its origin Aryan, but we have made it our 
 own. Some have been so venturesome as to trace the 
 lordliness of Bull to the protecting smiles of the good 
 Neptune, whose arms are about him to encourage the 
 development of a wanton eccentricity. Certain weeds 
 of the human bosom are prompt to flourish where 
 safeness would seem to be guaranteed. Men, for 
 instance, of stoutly independent incomes are prone to 
 the same sort of wilfulness as Bull's, the same abject 
 submission to it which we behold in his tidal bodies of 
 supporters. Neptune has done something. One thinks 
 he has done much, at a rumour of his inefficiency to 
 do the utmost. Spy you insecurity ? — a possibility of 
 invasion? Then indeed the colossal creature, inac- 
 cessible to every argument, is open to any suggestion: 
 the oak-like is a reed, the bull a deer. But as there is 
 no attack on his shores, there is no proof that they 
 are invulnerable. Neptune is appealed to and replies 
 by mouth of the latest passenger across the Channel 
 on a windy night :— Take heart, son John ! They will 
 
 183 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER have poor stomachs for blows who intrude upon you. 
 r>t*?^' * The testification to the Sea-God's watchfulness re- 
 
 Ot the great 
 
 Mr. Bull stores his darling who is immediately as horny to 
 argument as before. Neptune shall have his share 
 of the honours. 
 
 Ideal of his country Bull has none — he hates the 
 word ; it smells of heresy, opposition to his image. 
 It is an exercise of imagination to accept an ideal, and 
 his digestive organs reject it, after the manner of the 
 most beautiful likeness of him conjurable to the mind 
 — that flowering stomach, the sea-anemone, which 
 opens to anything and speedily casts out what it 
 cannot consume. He is a positive shape, a practical 
 corporation, and the best he can see is the mirror held 
 up to him by his bards of the Press and his jester 
 Frank Guffaw. There, begirt by laughing ocean-waves, 
 manifestly blest, he glorifies his handsome roundness, 
 like that other Foam-Born, whom the decorative 
 Graces robed in vestments not so wonderful as printed 
 sheets. Rounder at each inspection, he preaches to 
 mankind from the text of a finger curved upon the 
 pattern spectacles. Your Frenchmen are revolution- 
 ising, wagering on tentative politics ; your Germans 
 ploughing in philosophy, thumbing classics, composing 
 music of a novel order : both are marching, evolution- 
 ising, learning how to kill. Ridiculous Germans ! 
 capricious Frenchmen ! We want nothing new in 
 musical composition and abstract speculation of an 
 indecent mythology, or political contrivances and 
 schemes of Government, and we do not want war. 
 Peace is the Goddess we court for the hand of her 
 daughter Plenty, and we have won that jolly girl, and 
 you are welcome to the marriage-feast; but avaunt 
 184 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 new-fangled theories and bowlings: old tunes, tried chapter 
 systems, for us, my worthy friends. ofth^great 
 
 Roundness admiring the growth of its globe may Mr. buu 
 address majestic invitation to the leaner kine. It can 
 exhibit to the world that Peace is a most desirable 
 mother-in-law ; and it is tempted to dream of capping 
 the pinnacle of wisdom when it squats on a funda- 
 mental truth. Bull's perusal of the Horatian ' carpe 
 diem ' is acute as that of the cattle in fat meads ; he 
 walks like lusty Autumn carrying his garner to drum 
 on, for a sign of his diligent wisdom in seizing the day. 
 He can read the page fronting him; and let it be of 
 dining, drinking, toasting, he will vociferously confute 
 the wiseacre bookworms who would have us believe 
 there is no such thing as a present hour for man. 
 
 In sad fact, the member for England is often intoxi- 
 cate. Often do we have him whirling his rotundity 
 like a Mussulman dervish inflated by the spirit to 
 agitate the shanks, until pangs of a commercial crisis 
 awaken him to perceive an infructuous past and an 
 unsown future, without one bit of tracery on its black 
 breast other than that which his apprehensions pro- 
 ject. As for ;a present hour, it swims, it vanishes, 
 thinner than the phantom banquets of recollection. 
 What has he done for the growth of his globe of 
 brains? — the lesser, but in our rightful posture the 
 upper, and justly the directing globe, through whose 
 directions we do, by feeding on the past to sow the 
 future, create a sensible present composed of both — 
 the present of the good using of our powers. What 
 can he show in the Arts ? What in Arms ? His bards 
 — O faithless ! but they are men — his bards accuse 
 him of sheer cattle-contentedness in the mead, of 
 
 185 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER sterility of brain, drowsihood, nid-noddyism, down- 
 ofthe^great "S^t carcasc-dulncss. They question him to deafen 
 Mr. Bull him of our defences, our intellectual eminence, our 
 material achievements, our poetry, our science ; they 
 sneer at his trust in Neptune, doubt the scaly invul- 
 nerability of the God. They point over to the foreigner, 
 the clean-stepping, braced, self-confident foreigner, 
 good at arms, good at the arts, and eclipsing us in 
 industriousness manual and mental, and some dare to 
 say, in splendour of verse — our supreme accomplish- 
 ment. 
 
 Then with one big bellow, the collapse of pursiness, 
 he abandons his pedestal of universal critic ; prostrate 
 he falls to the foreigner; he is down, he is roaring; 
 he is washing his hands of English performances, 
 lends ear to foreign airs, patronises foreign actors, 
 browses on reports from camps of foreign armies. 
 He drops his head like a smitten ox to all great 
 foreign names, moaning * Shakespeare ! ' internally for 
 a sustaining apostrophe. He wellnigh loves his poets, 
 can almost understand what poetry means. If it does 
 not pay, it brings him fame, respectfulness in times of 
 reverse. Brains, he is reduced to apprehend, brains 
 are the generators of the conquering energies. He is 
 now for brains at all costs, he has gained a conception 
 of them. He is ready to knock knighthood on the 
 heads of men of brains — even literary brains. They 
 shall be knights, an ornamental body. To make them 
 peers, and a legislative, has not struck him, for he has 
 not yet imagined them a stable body. They require 
 petting, to persuade them to flourish and bring him 
 esteem. 
 
 This is Mr. Bull, our image before the world, whose 
 186 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 pranks are passed as though the vivid display of them chapter 
 had no bad effect on the nation. Doubtless the per- orthe great 
 petual mirror, the slavish mirror, is to blame, but his Mr. Buii 
 nakedness does not shrink from the mirror, he likes 
 it and he is proud of it. Beneath these exhibitions 
 the sober strong spirit of the country, unfortunately 
 not a prescient one, nor an attractively loveable, albeit 
 of a righteous benevolence, labours on, doing the 
 hourly duties for the sake of conscience, little for pro- 
 spective security, little to win affection. Behold it as 
 the donkey of a tipsy costermonger, obedient to go 
 without the gift of expression. Its behaviour is 
 honourable under a discerning heaven, and there is 
 ever something pathetic in a toilful speechlessness; 
 but it is of dogged attitude in the face of men. Salt 
 is in it to keep our fleshly grass from putrefaction ; 
 poets might proclaim its virtues. They will not ; 
 they are averse. The only voice it has is the Puritan 
 bray, upon which one must philosophise asinically 
 to unveil the charm. So the world is pleased to let 
 it be obscured by the paunch of Bull. We have, 
 however, isolated groups, individuals in all classes, 
 by no means delighting in his representation of them. 
 When such is felt to be the case among a sufficient 
 number, his bards blow him away as a vapour ; we 
 hear that he is a piece of our English humour — we 
 enjoy grotesques and never should agree to paint 
 ourselves handsome: our subtle conceit insists on 
 the reverse. Nevertheless, no sooner are the hours 
 auspicious to fatness than Bull is back on us; he 
 is our family goat, ancestral ghost, the genius of 
 our comfortable sluggishness. And he is at times a 
 mad Bull : a foaming, lashing, trampling, horn-driving, 
 
 187 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER excessive, very parlous Bull. It is in his history that 
 ,^..?^' . frenzies catch him, when to be yoked to him is to 
 
 Of the great ' •' 
 
 Mr. Bull suffer frightful shakings, not to mention a shattering 
 of our timbers. It is but in days of the rousing of the 
 under-spirit of the country, days of storm imprudent 
 to pray the advent of, that we are well rid of him for 
 a while. In the interim he does mischief, serious mis- 
 chief; he does worse than when, a juvenile, he paid 
 the Dannegelt for peace. Englishmen of feeling do 
 not relish him. For men with Irish and Cambrian 
 blood in their veins the rubicund grotesque, with his 
 unimpressionable front and his noisy benevolence of 
 the pocket, his fits of horned ferocity and lapses of 
 hard-heartedness, is a shame and a loathing. You 
 attach small importance to images and symbols ; yet 
 if they seem representative, and they sicken numbers 
 of us, they are important. The hat we wear, though 
 it is not a part of the head, stamps the character of 
 our appearance and has a positive influence on our 
 bearing. Symbolical decorations will stimulate the 
 vacant-minded to act up to them, they encircle and 
 solidify the mass ; they are a sword of division between 
 Celts and Saxons if they are abhorrent to one section. 
 And the Celtic brotherhood are not invariably fools in 
 their sensitiveness. They serve you on the field of 
 Mars, and on other fields to which the world has given 
 glory. These execrate him as the full-grown Golden 
 Calf of heathenish worship. And they are so restive 
 because they are so patriotic. Think a little upon the 
 ideas of unpatriotic Celts regarding him. You have 
 heard them. You tell us they are you : accurately, 
 they affirm, succinctly they see you in his crescent 
 outlines, tame bulk, spasms of alarm and foot on the 
 188 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 weaker; his imperviousness to whatsoever does not chapter 
 confront the sensual eye of him with a cake or a fist, „. P^^ 
 
 . •' ' Of the great 
 
 his religious veneration of his habitual indulgences, Mr.Buu 
 his peculiar forms of nightmare. They swear to his 
 perfect personification of your moods, your Saxon 
 moods, which their inconsiderate spleen would have 
 us take for unmixedly Saxon. They are unjust, but 
 many of them speak with a sense of the foot on their 
 necks, and they are of a blood demanding a worship- 
 worthy idea. And they dislike Bull's bellow of dis- 
 respect for their religion, much bruited in the meadows 
 during his periods of Arcadia. They dislike it, cannot 
 forget the sound : it hangs on the afflicted drum of the 
 ear when they are in another land, perhaps when the 
 old devotion to their priest has expired. For this, as 
 well as for material reasons, they hug the hatred they 
 packed up among their bundles of necessaries and 
 relics, in the flight from home, and they instruct their 
 children to keep it burning. They transmit the senti- 
 ment of the loathing of Bull, as assuredly they would 
 be incapable of doing, even with the will, were a 
 splendid fire-eyed motherly Britannia the figure sitting 
 in the minds of men for our image — a palpitating 
 figure, alive to change, penetrable to thought, and not 
 a stolid concrete of our traditional old yeoman charac- 
 teristic. Verily he lives for the present, all for the 
 present, will be taught in sorrow that there is no life 
 for him but of past and future : his delusion of the 
 existence of a present hour for man will not outlast 
 the season of his eating and drinking abundantly in 
 security. He will perceive that it was no more than 
 the spark shot out from the clash of those two meet- 
 ing forces; and penitently will he gaze back on that 
 
 189 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER misleading spark — the spectral planet it bids wink to 
 
 XVI 
 
 Of the great ^^^ unreceptivc stars — acknowledging him the bare 
 Mr. Bull machine for those two to drive, no instrument of 
 enjoyment. He lives by reading rearward and seeing 
 vanward. He has no actual life save in power of 
 imagination. He has to learn this fact, the great 
 lesson of all men. Furthermore there may be a future 
 closed to him if he has thrown too extreme a task of 
 repairing on that bare machine of his. The sight of a 
 broken-down plough is mournful, but the one thing to 
 do with it is to remove it from the field. 
 
 Among the patriotic of stout English substance, who 
 blew in the trumpet of the country, and were not 
 bards of Bull to celebrate his firmness and vindicate 
 his shiftings, Richard Rockney takes front rank. A 
 journalist altogether given up to his craft, considering 
 the audience he had gained, he was a man of fore- 
 thought besides being a trenchant writer, and he was 
 profoundly, not less than eminently, the lover of Great 
 Britain. He had a manner of utterance quite in the 
 tone of the familiar of the antechamber for proof of 
 his knowing himself to be this person. He did not so 
 much write articles upon the health of his mistress 
 as deliver Orphic sentences. He was in one her 
 physician, her spiritual director, her man-at-arms. 
 Public allusions to her were greeted with his emphatic 
 assent in a measured pitch of the voice, or an instan- 
 taneous flourish of the rapier; and the flourish was 
 no vain show. He meant hard steel to defend the pill 
 he had prescribed for her constitutional state, and the 
 monition for her soul's welfare. Nor did he pretend 
 to special privileges in assuming his militant stand, 
 but simply that he had studied her case, was intimate 
 190 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 with her resources, and loved her hotly, not to say chapter 
 
 inspiredly. Love her as well, you had his cordial of the great 
 
 hand; as wisely, then all his weapons to back you. Mr.Buii 
 
 There were occasions when distinguished officials 
 
 and Parliamentary speakers received the impetus of 
 
 Rockney's approval and not hesitatingly he stepped 
 
 behind them to bestow it. The act, in whatever 
 
 fashion it may have been esteemed by the objects 
 
 propelled, was a sign of his willingness to let the 
 
 shadow of any man adopting his course obscure him, 
 
 and of the simplicity of his attachment. If a bitter 
 
 experience showed that frequently, indeed generally, 
 
 they travelled scarce a tottering stagger farther than 
 
 they were precipitated, the wretched consolation 
 
 afforded by a side glance at a more enlightened 
 
 passion, solitary in its depth, was Rockney's. Others 
 
 perchance might equal his love, none the wisdom of 
 
 it; actually none the vigilant circumspection, the 
 
 shaping forethought. That clear knowledge of the 
 
 right thing for the country was grasped but by fits by 
 
 others. Enough to profit them this way and yonder 
 
 as one best can ! You know the newspaper Press is a 
 
 mighty engine. Still he had no delight in shuffling a 
 
 puppetry; he would have preferred automatic figures. 
 
 His calls for them resounded through the wilderness 
 
 of the wooden. 
 
 Any solid conviction of a capable head of a certainty 
 impressed upon the world, and thus his changes of 
 view were not attributed to a fluctuating devotion ; 
 they passed out of the range of criticism upon in. 
 consistency, notwithstanding that the commencement 
 of his journalistic career smelt of sources entirely 
 opposed to the conclusions upon which it broadened. 
 
 191 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER One secret of the belief in his love of his country was 
 ofth^egreat *^® readiness of Rockney's pen to support our nobler 
 Mr. Bull patriotic impulses, his relish of the bluff besides. His 
 eye was on our commerce, on our courts of Law, on 
 our streets and alleys, our army and navy, our colonies, 
 the vaster than the island England, and still he would 
 be busy picking up needles and threads in the island. 
 Deeds of valour were noted by him, lapses of 
 cowardice : how one man stood against a host for law 
 or humanity, how crowds looked on at the beating of 
 a woman, how a good fight was maintained in some 
 sly ring between two of equal brawn: and manu- 
 facturers were warned of the consequences of their 
 iniquities, Government was lashed for sleeping upon 
 shaky ordinances, colonists were gibbeted for the 
 maltreating of natives: the ring and fervour of the 
 notes on daily events told of Rockney's hand upon the 
 national heart — with a faint, an enforced, reluctant 
 indication of our not being the men we were. 
 
 But after all, the main secret was his art of writing 
 round English, instead of laborious Latinised periods : 
 and the secret of the art was his meaning what he 
 said. It was the personal throb. The fire of a mind 
 was translucent in Press columns where our public 
 had been accustomed to the rhetoric of primed scribes. 
 He did away with the Biscay billow of the leading 
 article — Bull's favourite prose-bardic construction of 
 sentences that roll to the antithetical climax, whose 
 foamy top is offered and gulped as equivalent to an 
 idea. Writing of such a kind as Rockney's was new 
 to a land where the political opinions of Joint Stock 
 Companies had rattled Jovian thunders obedient to the 
 nod of Bull. Though not alone in working the change, 
 192 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 he was the foremost. And he was not devoid of style, chapter 
 
 XVI 
 
 Fervidness is the core of style. He was a tough of the great 
 opponent for his betters in education, struck forcibly, Mr- buii 
 fenced dexterously, was always alert for debate. An 
 encounter between Swift and Johnson, were it imagin- 
 able, would present us probably the most prodigious 
 Gigantomachy in literary polemics. Itis not imaginable 
 among comparative pygmies. But Rockney's combat 
 with his fellow-politicians of the Press partook of the 
 Swiftian against the Johnsonian in form. He was a 
 steam ram that drove straight at the bulky broadside 
 of the enemy. 
 
 Premiers of parties might be Captains of the State 
 for Rockney : Rockney was the premier's pilot, or woe 
 to him. Woe to the country as well, if Rockney's 
 directions for steering were unheeded. He was a man 
 of forethought, the lover of Great Britain : he shouted 
 his directions in the voice of the lover of his mistress, 
 urged to rebuke, sometimes to command, the captain 
 by the prophetic intimations of a holier alliance, a 
 more illumined prescience. Reefs here, shallows there, 
 yonder a foul course: this is the way for you! The 
 refusal of the captain to go this way caused Rockney 
 sincerely to discredit the sobriety of his intellect. It 
 was a drunken captain. Or how if a traitorous ? We 
 point out the danger to him, and if he will run the 
 country on to it, we proclaim him guilty either of 
 inebriety or of treason — the alternatives are named : 
 one or the other has him. Simple unfitness can 
 scarcely be conceived of a captain having our common 
 senses and a warranted pilot at his elbow. 
 
 Had not Rockney been given to a high expression 
 of opinion, plain in fervour, he would often have been 
 35— N 193 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER exposed bare to hostile shafts. Style cast her aegis 
 ««.^^' * over him. He wore an armour in which he could 
 
 Of the great 
 
 Mr. Bull walk, run and leap — a natural style. The ardour of 
 his temperament suffused the directness of his intelli- 
 gence to produce it, and the two qualities made his 
 weakness and strength. Feeling the nerve of strength, 
 the weakness was masked to him, while his opponents 
 were equally insensible to the weakness under the 
 force of his blows. Thus there was nothing to teach 
 him, or reveal him, except Time, whose trick is to 
 turn corners of unanticipated sharpness, and leave the 
 directly seeing and ardent to dash at walls. 
 
 How rigidly should the man of forethought govern 
 himself, question himself! how constantly wrestle 
 with himself! And if he be a writer ebullient by the 
 hour, how snappishly suspect himself, that he may 
 feel in conscience worthy of a hearing and have 
 perpetually a conscience in his charge ! For on what 
 is his forethought founded? Does he try the ring of 
 it with our changed conditions ? But a man of fore- 
 thought who has to be one of our geysers ebullient by 
 the hour must live days of fever. His apprehensions 
 distemper his blood ; the scrawl of them on the dark 
 of the undeveloped dazzles his brain. He sees in 
 time little else ; his very sincereness twists him awry. 
 Such a man has the stuff of the born journalist, and 
 journalism is the food of the age. Ask him, however, 
 midway in his running, what he thinks of quick 
 breathing: he will answer that to be a shepherd on 
 the downs is to be more a man. As to the gobbling 
 age, it really thinks better of him than he of it. 
 
 After a term of prolonged preachification he is com- 
 pelled to lash that he may less despise the age. He has 
 194 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 to do it for his own sake. O gobbling age ! swallow- chapter 
 ing all, digesting nought, us too you have swallowed, oft^e'greati 
 O insensate mechanism ! and we will let you know Mr. buu 
 you have a stomach. Furiously we disagree with you. 
 We are in you to lead you or work you pangs ! 
 
 Rockney could not be a mild sermoniser commenting 
 on events. Rather no journalism at all for him ! He 
 thought the office of the ordinary daily preacher cow- 
 like. His gadfly stung him to warn, dictate, prog- 
 nosticate ; he was the oracle and martyr of superior 
 vision : and as in affairs of business and the weighing 
 of men he was of singularly cool sagacity, hard on the 
 downright, open to the humours of the distinct discri- 
 mination of things in their roughness, the knowledge 
 of the firmly-based materialism of his nature caused 
 him thoroughly to trust to his voice when he delivered 
 it in ardour — a circumstance coming to be of daily 
 recurrence. Great love creates forethoughtfulness, 
 without which incessant journalism is a gabble. He 
 was sure of his love, but who gave ear to his prescience ? 
 Few : the echo of the country now and then, the 
 Government not often. And, dear me! those jog-trot 
 sermonisers, mere commentators upon events, manage 
 somehow to keep up the sale of their journals : adver- 
 tisements do not flow and ebb with them as under the 
 influence of a capricious moon. Ah, what a public ! 
 Serve it honourably, you are in peril of collapsing: 
 show it nothing but the likeness of its dull animal 
 face, you are steadily inflated. These reflections 
 within us ! Might not one almost say that the retreat 
 for the prophet is the wilderness, far from the hustled 
 editor's desk ; and annual should be the uplifting of 
 his voice instead of diurnal, if only to spare his blood 
 
 195 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER the distemper ? A fund of gout was in Rockney's, and 
 
 ofth^great ^® ^^^ bcgun to chum it. Between gouty blood and 
 
 Mr. Bull luminous brain the strife had set in which does not 
 
 conduce to unwavering sobriety of mind, though 
 
 ideas remain closely consecutive and the utterance 
 
 resonant. 
 
 Never had he been an adulator of Bull. His defects 
 as well as his advantages as a politician preserved to 
 him this virtue. Insisting on a future, he could not 
 do homage to the belying simulacrum of the present. 
 In the season of prosperity Rockney lashed the old 
 fellow with the crisis he was breeding for us ; and 
 when prostration ensued no English tongue was loftier 
 in preaching dignity and the means of recovery. Our 
 monumental image of the Misuse of Peace he pointed 
 out unceasingly as at a despot constructed by freemen 
 out of the meanest in their natures to mock the gift 
 of liberty. His articles of foregone years were an 
 extraordinary record of events or conditions foreseen : 
 seductive in the review of them by a writer who has 
 to be still foreseeing: nevertheless, that none of them 
 were bardic of Bull, and that our sound man would 
 have acted wisely in heeding some of the prescriptions, 
 constituted their essential merit, consolatory to think 
 of, though painful. The country has gone the wrong 
 road, but it may yet cross over to the right one, when 
 it perceives that we were prophetic. 
 
 Compared with the bolts discharged at Bull by 
 Rockney's artillery, Captain Con O'Donnell's were 
 popgun-pellets. Only Rockney fired to chasten, Con 
 O'Donnell for a diversion, to appease an animus. The 
 revolutionist in English journalism was too devoutly 
 patriotic to belabour even a pantomime mask that was 
 196 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 taken as representative of us for the disdainful fun of it. chapter 
 Behind the plethoric lamp, now blown with the flesh- of thJgreat 
 pots, now gasping puffs of panic, he saw the well- Mr. buu 
 minded valorous people, issue of glorious grandsires ; 
 a nation under a monstrous defacement, stupefied by 
 the contemplation of the mask : his vision was of the 
 great of old, the possibly great in the graver strife 
 ahead, respecters of life, despisers of death, the real 
 English : whereas an alienated Celtic satirist, through 
 his vivid fancy and his disesteem, saw the country 
 incarnate in Bull, at most a roguish screw-kneed 
 clown to be whipped out of him. Celt and Saxon are 
 much inmixed with us, but the prevalence of Saxon 
 blood is evinced by the public disregard of any Celtic 
 conception of the honourable and the loveable ; so 
 that the Celt anxious to admire is rebutted, and the 
 hatred of a Celt, quick as he is to catch at images, 
 has a figure of hugeous animalism supplied to his 
 malign contempt. Rockney's historic England, and 
 the living heroic England to slip from that dull hide 
 in a time of trial, whether of war or social suffering, 
 he cannot see, nor a people hardening to Spartan 
 lineaments in the fire, iron men to meet disaster, 
 worshippers of a discerned God of Laws, and just 
 men too, thinking to do justice ; he has Bull on the 
 eye, the alternately braggart and poltroon, sweating in 
 labour that he may gorge the fruits, graceless to a 
 scoffer. And this is the creature to whose tail he 
 is tied ! Hereditary hatred is approved by critical 
 disgust. Some spirited brilliancy, some persistent 
 generosity (other than the guzzle's flash of it), might 
 soften him ; something sweeter than the slow animal 
 well-meaningness his placable brethren point his 
 
 197 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER attention to. It is not seen, and though he can under- 
 „, ?^' . stand the perils of a severance, he prefers to rub the 
 
 Of the great ^ ' ^ 
 
 Mr. Bull rawness of his wound and be ready to pitch his cap 
 in the air for it, out of sheer blood-loathing of a con- 
 nection that offers him nothing to admire, nothing 
 to hug to his heart. Both below and above the blind 
 mass of discontent in his island, the repressed senti- 
 ment of admiration — or passion of fealty and thirst 
 to give himself to a visible brighter — is an element 
 of the division : meditative young Patrick O'Donnell 
 early in his reflections had noted that: — and it is 
 partly a result of our daily habit of tossing the straw 
 to the monetary world and doting on ourselves in the 
 mirror, until our habitual doings are viewed in a 
 bemused complacency by us, and the scum-surface 
 of the country is flashed about as its vital being. A 
 man of forethought using the Press to spur Parliament 
 to fitly represent the people, and writing on his daily 
 topics with strenuous original vigour, even though, 
 like Rockney, he sets the teeth of the Celt gnashing at 
 him, goes a step nearer to the bourne of pacification 
 than Press and Parliament reflecting the popular 
 opinion that law must be passed to temper Ireland's 
 eruptiveness ; for that man can be admired, and the 
 Celt, in combating him, will like an able and gallant 
 enemy better than a grudgingly just, lumbersome, 
 dull, politic friend. The material points in a division 
 are always the stronger, but the sentimental are 
 here very strong. Pass the laws ; they may put 
 an extinguisher on the Irish Vesuvian ; yet to be 
 loved you must be a little perceptibly admirable. You 
 may be so self-satisfied as to dispense with an ideal : 
 your yokefellow is not ; it is his particular form of 
 198 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 strength to require one for his proper blooming, and chapter 
 he does bloom beautifully in the rays he courts. ofthegreat 
 
 Ah, then, seek to be loved, and banish Bull. Believe Mr. buu 
 in a future and banish that gross obscuration of you. 
 Decline to let that old-yeoman-turned alderman stand 
 any longer for the national man. Speaking to the 
 brain of the country, one is sure of the power of a 
 resolute sign from it to dismiss the brainless. Banish 
 him your revels and your debatings, prohibit him your 
 Christmas, lend no ear either to his panics or his 
 testiness, especially none to his rages ; do not report 
 him at all, and he will soon subside into his domestic, 
 varied by pothouse, privacy. The brain should lead, 
 if there be a brain. Once free of him, you will know 
 that for half a century you have appeared bottom 
 upward to mankind. And you have wondered at the 
 absence of love for you under so astounding a pre- 
 sentation. Even in a Bull, beneficent as he can dream 
 of being, when his notions are in a similar state of 
 inversion, should be sheepish in hope for love. 
 
 He, too, whom you call the Welshman, and deride 
 for his delight in songful gatherings, harps to wild 
 Wales, his Cambrian highlands, and not to England. 
 You have not yet, though he is orderly and serviceable, 
 allured his imagination to the idea of England. Despite 
 the passion for his mountains and the boon of your 
 raising of the interdict (within a hundred years) upon 
 his pastors to harangue him in his native tongue, he 
 gladly ships himself across the waters traversed by 
 his Prince Madoc of tradition, and becomes contentedly 
 a transatlantic citizen, a member of strange sects — he 
 so inveterate in faithfulness to the hoar and the 
 legendary ! — Anything rather than Anglican. The 
 
 199 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER Cymry bear you no hatred ; their affection likewise is 
 Of thegreat Undefined. But there is reason to think that America 
 Mr. Bull has caught the imagination of the Cambrian Celt: 
 names of Welshmen are numerous in the small army 
 of the States of the Union; and where men take 
 soldier-service they are usually fixed, they and their 
 children. Here is one, not very deeply injured within 
 a century, of ardent temperament, given to be songful 
 and loving ; he leaves you and forgets you. Be certain 
 that the material grounds of division are not all. To 
 pronounce it his childishness provokes the retort 
 upon your presented shape. He cannot admire it. 
 Gaelic Scots wind the same note of repulsion. 
 
 And your poets are in a like predicament. Your 
 poets are the most persuasive of springs to a lively 
 general patriotism. They are in the Celtic dilemma 
 of standing at variance with Bull ; they return him 
 his hearty antipathy, are unable to be epical or lyrical 
 of him, are condemned to expend their genius upon 
 the abstract, the quaint, the picturesque. Nature they 
 read spiritually or sensually, always shrinkingly apart 
 from him. They swell to a resemblance of their patron 
 if they stoop to woo his purse. He has, on hearing 
 how that poets bring praise to nations, as in fact he 
 can now understand his Shakespeare to have done, 
 been seen to thump the midriff and rally them for their 
 shyness of it,, telling them he doubts them true poets 
 while they abstain from singing him to the world — 
 him, and the things refreshing the centre of him. 
 Ineffectual is that encouragement. Were he in the 
 fire, melting to the iron man, the backbone of him, it 
 would be different. At his pleasures he is anti-hymnic, 
 repellent to song. He has perceived the virtues of 
 200 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 Peace, without the brother eye for the need of virtuous- chapter 
 
 XVI 
 
 ness to make good use of them and inspire the poet. oft,,jg„at 
 His own enrolled unrhythmical bardic troops (humor- Mr. buu 
 ous mercenaries when Celts) do his trumpeting best, 
 and offend not the Pierides. 
 
 This interlude, or rather inter-drone, repulsive to 
 write, can hardly be excluded from a theme dramatis- 
 ing Celtic views, and treating of a blood, to which the 
 idea of country must shine resplendently if we would 
 have it running at full tide through the arteries. Pre- 
 serve your worship, if the object fills your optics. 
 Better worship that than nothing, as it is better for 
 flames to be blown out than not to ascend, otherwise 
 it will wreak circular mischief instead of illumining. 
 You are requested simply to recollect that there is 
 another beside you who sees the object obliquely, and 
 then you will not be surprised by his irreverence. 
 What if, in the end, you were conducted to a like point 
 of view ? Self-worship, it has been said, is preferable 
 to no trimming of the faculty, but worship does not 
 necessarily cease with. the extinction of this of the 
 voraciously carnal. An ideal of country, of Great 
 Britain, is conceivable that will be to the taste of Celt 
 and Saxon in common, to wave as a standard over 
 their fraternal marching. Let Bull boo his drumliest 
 at such talk : it is, I protest, the thing we want and 
 can have. He is the obstruction, not the country; 
 and against him, not against the country, the shots 
 are aimed which seem so malignant. Him the gay 
 manipulators propitiate who look at him through 
 Literature and the Press, and across the pulpit- 
 cushions, like airy Macheath at Society, as carrion to 
 batten on. May plumpness be their portion, and they 
 
 201 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER never hanged for it ! But the flattering, tickling, 
 ofthe^great plcasantly pinching of Bull is one of those offices 
 Mr. Bull which the simple starveling piper regards with a fresh 
 access of appetite for the well-picked bone of his 
 virtue. That ghastly apparition of the fleshly present 
 is revealed to him as a dead whale, having the harpoon 
 of the inevitable ^slayer of the merely fleshly in his 
 oils. To humour him, and be his piper for his gifts, is 
 to descend to a carnival deep underneath. While he 
 reigns, thinks this poor starveling, Rome burns, or 
 the explosive powders are being secretly laid. He and 
 his thousand Macheaths are dancing the country the 
 giddy pace, and there will, the wretch dreads, be many 
 a crater of scoria in the island, before he stretches his 
 inanimate length, his parasites upon him. The theme 
 is chosen and must be treated as a piper involved in 
 his virtue conceives it : that is, realistically ; not with 
 Bull's notion of the realism of the butcher's shop and 
 the pendent legs of mutton and blocks of beef painted 
 raw and glaring in their streaks, but with the realism 
 of the active brain and heart conjoined. The reasons 
 for the division of Celt and Saxon, what they think 
 and say of one another, often without knowing that 
 they are divided, and the wherefore of our abusing of 
 ourselves, brave England, our England of the ancient 
 fortitude and the future incarnation, can afford to hear. 
 Why not in a tale? It is he, your all for animal 
 pleasure in the holiday he devours and cannot enjoy, 
 whose example teaches you to shun the plaguey tale 
 that carries fright : and so you find him sour at 
 business and sick of his relaxings, hating both because 
 he harnesses himself in turn bestially to each, growl- 
 ing at the smallest admixture of them, when, if he 
 202 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 would but chirp a little over his work, and allow his chapter 
 
 XVI 
 
 pleasures to inspire a dose of thoughtfulness, he would qj^^^ g^g^t 
 be happier, and — who knows? — become a brighter Mr. buii 
 fellow, one to be rescued from the pole-axe. 
 
 Now the rain is over, your carriage is at the door, 
 the country smiles and the wet highway waves a 
 beckoning hand. We have worn through a cloud with 
 cloudy discourses, but we are in a land of shifting 
 weathers, ' coelum crebris imbribus ac nebulis foedum,' 
 not every chapter can be sunshine. 
 
 203 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 Crossing the Rubicon 
 
 Rough weather on the Irish sea discharged a pallid file 
 of passengers from the boat at Holyhead just as the 
 morning sun struck wave and mountain with one of 
 the sudden sparkling changes which our South-westers 
 have in their folds to tell us after a tumultuous night 
 that we have only been worried by Puck. The scene 
 of frayed waters all rosy-golden, and golden-banded 
 heathery height, with the tinted sand, breaking to 
 flights of blue, was resplendent for those of our recent 
 sea-farers who could lift an eye to enjoy it. Freshness, 
 illumination, then salt air, vivid distances, were a 
 bath for every sense of life. You could believe the 
 breast of the mountain to be heaving, the billows to 
 be kissing fingers to him, the rollers shattered up the 
 cliff to have run to extinction to scale him. He seemed 
 in his clear-edged mass King of this brave new bound- 
 less world built in a minute out of the wreck of the old. 
 An hour back the vessel was labouring through rue- 
 ful chasms under darkness, and then did the tricksy 
 South-west administer grisly slaps to right and left, 
 whizzing spray across the starboard beam, and drench- 
 ing the locks of a young lady who sat cloaked and 
 hooded in frieze to teach her wilfulness a lesson, 
 204 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 because she would keep her place on deck from begin- chapter 
 ning to end of the voyage. Her faith in the capacity of c^o^^" ^^^^ 
 Irish frieze to turn a deluge of the deeps driven by an RuWcon 
 Atlantic gale was shaken by the time she sighted 
 harbour, especially when she shed showers by flapping 
 a batlike wing of the cloak, and had a slight shudder 
 to find herself trickling within. 
 
 ' Dear I and I 'm wet to the skin,' she confided the 
 fact to herself vocally. 
 
 ' You would not be advised,' a gentleman beside her 
 said after a delicate pause to let her impulsive natural- 
 ism of utterance fly by unwounded. 
 
 ' And aren't you the same and worse ? And not 
 liking it either, I fear, sir ! ' she replied, for despite 
 a manful smile his complexion was tell-tale. ' But 
 there 's no harm in salt. But you should have gone 
 down to the cabin with Father Boyle and you would 
 have been sure of not catching cold. But, Oh! the 
 beautiful . . . look at it! And its my first view of 
 England. Well, then, I '11 say it 's a beautiful 
 country.' 
 
 Her companion looked up at the lighted sky, and 
 down at the pools in tarpaulin at his feet. He re- 
 pressed a disposition to shudder, and with the antici- 
 pated ecstasy of soon jumping out of wet clothes into 
 dry, he said : ' I should like to be on the top of that 
 hill now.' 
 
 The young lady's eyes flew to the top. 
 
 'They say he looks on Ireland; I love him; and 
 his name is Caer Gybi ; and it was one of our Saints 
 gave him the name, I 've read in books. I '11 be there 
 before noon.' 
 
 'You want to have a last gaze over to Erin ? ' 
 
 205 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER 'No, it's to Walk and feel the breeze. But I do 
 
 Cros^^n" the though.' 
 
 Rubicon ' Won't you require a little rest ? ' 
 
 ' Sure and I 've had it sitting here all night! ' said she. 
 
 He laughed : the reason for the variation of exercise 
 was conclusive. 
 
 Father Boyle came climbing up the ladder, uncertain 
 of his legs ; he rolled and snatched and tottered on his 
 way to them, and accepted the gentleman's help of an 
 arm, saying : ' Thank ye, thank ye, and good morning, 
 Mr. Colesworth. And my poor child ! what sort of a 
 night has it been above, Kathleen ? ' 
 
 He said it rather twinkling, and she retorted : 
 
 ' What sort of a night has it been below. Father 
 Boyle ? ' Her twinkle was livelier than his, compassion- 
 ate in archness. 
 
 ' Purgatory past is good for contemplation, my dear. 
 'Tis past, and there 's the comfort ! You did well to 
 be out of that herring-barrel, Mr. Colesworth. I hadn't 
 the courage, or I would have burst from it to take a 
 ducking with felicity. I haven't thrown up my soul ; 
 that 's the most I can say. I thought myself nigh on it 
 once or twice. And an amazing kind steward it was, 
 or I 'd have counted the man for some one else. Surely 
 'tis a glorious morning ? ' 
 
 Mr. Colesworth responded heartily in praise of the 
 morning. He was beginning to fancy that he felt the 
 warmth of spring sunshine on his back. He flung up 
 his head and sniffed the air, and was very like a horse 
 fretful for the canter ; so like as to give Miss Kathleen 
 an idea of the comparison. She could have rallied 
 him ; her laughing eyes showed the readiness, but she 
 forbore, she drank the scene. Her face, with the 
 206 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 threaded locks about forehead and cheeks, and the *^"^"^^ 
 dark, the blue, the rosy red of her lips, her eyes, her crossing the 
 hair, was just such a south-western sky as April drove Rubicon 
 above her, the same in colour and quickness ; and 
 much of her spirit was the same, enough to stand for 
 a resemblance. But who describes the spirit ? No one 
 at the gates of the field of youth. When Time goes 
 reaping he will gather us a sheaf, out of which the 
 picture springs. 
 
 ' There 's our last lurch, glory to the breakwater ! ' 
 exclaimed Father Boyle, as the boat pitched finally 
 outside the harbour fence, where a soft calm swell 
 received them with the greeting of civilised sea-nymphs. 
 'The captain '11 have a quieter passage across. You 
 may spy him on the pier. We '11 be meeting him on 
 the landing.' 
 
 ' If he 's not in bed, from watching the stars all night,' 
 said Miss Kathleen. 
 
 * He must have had a fifty-lynx power of sight for 
 that, my dear.' 
 
 ' They did appear, though, and wonderfully bright,' 
 she said. 'I saw them come out and go in. It's not 
 all cloud when the high wind blows.' 
 
 ' You talk like a song, Kathleen.' 
 
 * Couldn't I rattle a throat if I were at home. Father ! ' 
 
 * Ah ! we 're in the enemy's country now.' 
 
 Miss Kathleen said she would go below to get the 
 handbags from the stewardess. 
 
 Mr. Colesworth's brows had a little darkened over 
 the Rev. Gentleman's last remark. He took two or 
 three impatient steps up and down with his head bent. 
 ' Pardon me ; I hoped we had come to a better under- 
 standing,' he said. ' Is it quite fair to the country and 
 
 207 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER , to Miss O'Donnell to impress on her before she knows 
 cros^nl the "s that England is the enemy ? ' 
 Rubicon ' Habit, Mr. Colesworth, habit ! we 've got accus- 
 tomed to the perspective and speak accordingly. 
 There 's a breach visible.' 
 
 * I thought you agreed with me that good efforts are 
 being made on our side to mend the breach.' 
 
 'Sir, you have a noble minority at work, no doubt; 
 and I take you for one of the noblest, as not objecting 
 to stand next to alone.' 
 
 ' I really thought, judging from our conversation at 
 Mrs. O'Donnell' s that evening, that you were going to 
 hold out a hand and lead your flock to the right sort 
 of fellowship with us.' 
 
 'To submission to the laws, Mr. Colesworth; 'tis 
 my duty to do it as pastor and citizen.' 
 
 ' No, to more than that, sir. You spoke with friendly 
 warmth.' 
 
 ' The atmosphere was genial, if you remember the 
 whisky and the fumes of our tobacco at one o'clock ! ' 
 
 'I shall recollect the evening with the utmost 
 pleasure. You were kind enough to instruct me in a 
 good many things I shall be sure to profit by. I wish 
 I could have spent more time in Ireland. As it is, I 
 like Irishmen so well that if the whole land were in 
 revolt I should never call it the enemy's country.' 
 
 ' Excellently spoken, Mr. Colesworth,' said the priest. 
 'We '11 hope your writings may do service to mend the 
 breach. For there is one, as you know, and more 's 
 the pity ; there 's one, and it 's wide and deep. As my 
 friend Captain Con O'Donnell says, it 's plain to the 
 naked eye as a pair of particularly fat laundry drawers 
 hung out to dry and ballooned in extension — if mayhap 
 
 208 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 you 've ever seen the sight of them in that state : — just chapter 
 held together by a narrow neck of thread or button, (.,0^^" ^^^ 
 and stretching away like a corpulent frog in the act of Rnbicon 
 swimming on the wind. His comparison touches the 
 sentiment of disunion, sir.' 
 
 Mr. Colesworth had not ever seen such a pair of 
 laundry drawers inflated to symbolise the breach 
 between Ireland and England; nor probably, if he 
 had, would the sentiment of national disunion have 
 struck his mind : it was difficult to him in the descrip- 
 tion. He considered his Rev. friend to be something 
 of a slippery fish, while Father Boyle's opinion of him 
 likewise referred him to an elemental substance, of 
 slow movement — earth, in short : for he continued to 
 look argumentative after all had been said. 
 
 Or perhaps he threw a coveting eye on sweet Miss 
 Kathleen and had his own idea of mending a stitch of 
 the breach in a quite domestic way. If so, the Holy 
 Father would have a word to say, let alone Kathleen. 
 The maids of his Church do not espouse her foes. 
 For the men it is another matter : that is as the case 
 may be. Temporarily we are in cordial intercourse, 
 Mr. Colesworth. 
 
 Miss Kathleen returned to deck carrying her bags. 
 The gentleman had to descend, and subsequently an 
 amiable dissension arose on the part of the young lady 
 and Mr. Colesworth. She, however, yielded one of 
 her bags, and he, though doubly laden, was happy. 
 All very transparent to pastoral observation, but why 
 should they not be left to their chirruping youthful- 
 ness? The captain was not in view, and Father Boyle 
 wanted to go to bed for refreshment, and Kathleen 
 was an airy gossamer, with a boy running after it, not 
 35—0 209 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER by any means likely to catch it, or to keep it if he did. 
 
 crosltag the Proceed and trip along, you young ones ! 
 Rubicoa At the hotel they heard that Captain Con O'Donnell 
 was a snug sleeper upstairs. This, the captain himself 
 very soon informed them, had not been the kernel of 
 the truth. He had fancied they would not cross the 
 Channel on so rattlesome a night, or Kathleen would 
 have had an Irish kiss to greet her landing in England. 
 But the cousinly salute was little delayed, news of the 
 family in Ireland and England was exchanged, and 
 then Mr. Colesworth and the captain bowed to an 
 introduction ; and the captain, at mention of his name, 
 immediately cried out that Mr. Colesworth might 
 perchance be a relative of the highly intelligent admir- 
 able lady who had undertaken the secretaryship, and 
 by her vast ability got the entire management, of Miss 
 Mattock's benevolent institution, and was conducting 
 it with such success that it was fast becoming a grief 
 to the generous heart of the foundress of the same to 
 find it not only self-paying, but on the road to a 
 fortune, inasmuch as it was already an article in the 
 decrees of fashion among the nobility and gentry of 
 both sexes in the metropolis to have their linen and 
 laces washed at the Mattock laundry. 
 
 Mr. Colesworth said he was the brother of the lady 
 in question, he had also the pleasure of an acquaint- 
 ance with Miss Mattock. He was vehemently con- 
 gratulated on the relationship, which bore witness, 
 the captain affirmed, to a certain hereditary share of 
 brains greatly to be envied: brother of Miss Coles- 
 worth, a title of distinction in itself! He was 
 congratulated not less cordially for his being so fortu- 
 nate as to know Miss Mattock, one of a million. 
 210 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 Captain Con retained the hand of Father Boyle and chapter 
 squeezed it during his eulogies, at the same time Q^^^^g ^^^ 
 dispersing nods and winks and sunny sparkles upon Rubicon 
 Kathleen. Mr. Colesworth went upstairs to his room 
 not unflattered. The flattery enveloped him in the 
 pleasant sense of a somehow now established com- 
 panionship for the day with a pleasant person from 
 whom he did not wish to separate. 
 
 'You made the gentleman's acquaintance, my 
 dear . . . ? ' i^aid Con. 
 
 Kathleen answered: 'He made friends with our 
 Patrick on the Continent, I think it was in Germany, 
 and came to us to study the old country, bearing a 
 letter from Patrick. He means to be one of their 
 writers on the newspapers. He studies everything; 
 he has written books. He called on us coming and 
 called on us going and we came over together,' said 
 Miss Kathleen. ' But tell me : our Philip ? ' 
 
 'Books!' Con exclaimed. 'It's hard to discover a 
 man in these days who hasn't written books. Oh ! 
 Philip ! Ease your heart about Philip. They 're 
 nursing him round. He was invalided at the right 
 moment for him, no fear. I gave him his chance of 
 the last vacant seat up to the last hour, and now the 
 die is cast and this time I 'm off to it. Poor Philip — 
 yes, yes ! we 're sorry to see him flat all his length, 
 we love him; he's a gallant soldier; alive to his duty; 
 and that bludgeon sun of India knocked him down, 
 and that fall from his horse finished the business, and 
 there he lies. But he '11 get up, and he might have 
 accepted the seat and spared me my probation : he 's 
 not married, I am, I have a wife, and Master Philip 
 divides me against my domestic self, he does. But let 
 
 211 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER that be : I serve duty too. Not a word to our friend 
 
 Cros^^g the "P youder. It 's a secret with a time-fuse warranted 
 
 Rubicon to explode safe enough when the minutes are up, and 
 
 make a powerful row when it does. It is all right 
 
 over there, Father Boyle, I suppose ? ' 
 
 ' A walk over ! a pure ceremonial,' said the priest, 
 and he yawned frightfully. 
 
 ' You 're for a nap to recompose you, my dear friend,' 
 remarked the captain. 
 
 'But you haven't confided anything of it to Mrs. 
 Adister ? ' 
 
 ' Not a syllable ; no. That 's to come. There 's my 
 contest ! I had urgent business in Ireland, and she 's 
 a good woman, always willing to let me go. I count 
 on her kindness, there's no mightier compliment to 
 one 's wife. She '11 know it when it 's history. She 's 
 fond of history. Ay, she hates fiction, and so I'm 
 proud to tell her I offer her none. She likes a trifling 
 surprise too, and there she has it. Oh ! we can whip 
 up the business to a nice little bowl of froth-flummery. 
 But it 's when the Parliamentary voting is on comes 
 the connubial pull. She's a good woman, a dear 
 good soul, but she's a savage patriot; and Philip 
 might have saved his kinsman if he had liked. He 
 had only to say the word: I could have done all the 
 business for him, and no contest to follow by my 
 fireside. He's on his couch — Mars convalescent: a 
 more dreadful attraction to the ladies than in his 
 crimson plumes! If the fellow doesn't let slip his 
 opportunity ! with his points of honour and being an 
 Irish Bayard. Why Bayard in the nineteenth century 's 
 a Bedlamite, Irish or no. So I tell him. There he is; 
 you '11 see him, Kathleen : and one of them as big an 
 212 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 heiress as any in England. Philip 's no fool, you '11 chapter 
 
 find.' Crossing the 
 
 ' Then he 's coming all right, is he ? ' said Kathleen. Rubicon 
 ' He 's a soldier, and a good one, but he 's nothing 
 more, and as for patriotic inflammation, doesn't know 
 the sensation.' 
 
 'Oh! but he's coming round, and you'll go and 
 stroke down mother with that,' Kathleen cried. 
 <Her heart's been heavy, with Patrick wandering 
 and Philip on his back. I'll soon be dressed for 
 breakfast.' 
 
 Away she went. 
 
 ' She 's got an appetite, and looks like a strapped bit 
 of steel after the night's tumbling,' said the captain, 
 seeing her trip aloft. ' I 'm young as that too, or not 
 far off it. Stay, I '11 order breakfast for four in a quiet 
 corner where we can converse — which, by the way, 
 won't be possible in the presence of that gaping oyster 
 of a fellow, who looks as if he were waiting the return 
 of the tide.' 
 Father Boyle interposed his hand. 
 'Not for ..." he tried to add ' four.' The attempt at 
 a formation of the word produced a cavernous yawn : 
 a volume of the distressful deep to the beholder. 
 
 'Of course,' Captain Con assented. He proposed 
 bed and a sedative therein, declaring that his experi- 
 ence overnight could pronounce it good, and that it 
 should be hot. So he led his tired old friend to the 
 bedroom, asked dozens of questions, flurried a with- 
 drawal of them, suggested the answers, talked of his 
 Rubicon, praised his wife, delivered a moan on her 
 behalf, and after assisting to half disrobe the scarce 
 animate figure, which lent itself like an artist's lay- 
 
 213 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER model to the operation, departed on his mission of the 
 ^ ^^" sedative. 
 
 Crossing the ^'^"»"'"^- 
 
 Rubicon At the breakfast for three he was able to tell Kath- 
 leen that the worthy Father was warm, and on his 
 way to complete restoration. 
 
 'Full fathom five the Father lies, in the ocean of 
 sleep, by this time,' said Con. 'And 'tis a curious 
 fact that every man in that condition seems enviable 
 to men on their legs. And similarly with death; 
 we 'd rather not, because of a qualm, but the picture 
 of the finish of the leap across is a taking one. These 
 chops are done as if Nature had mellowed their juici- 
 ness.' 
 
 ' They are so nice,' Kathleen said. 
 
 ' You deserve them, if ever girl in this world ! ' 
 
 ' I sat on deck all night, and Mr. Colesworth would 
 keep me company.' 
 
 ' He could hardly do less, having the chance. But 
 that notwithstanding, I 'm under an obligation to your 
 cavalier. And how did you find Ireland, sir? You've 
 made acquaintance with my cousin, young Mr. Patrick 
 O'Donnell, I rejoice to hear.' 
 
 'Yes, through his hearing or seeing my name and 
 suspecting I had a sister,' said Mr. Colesworth, who 
 was no longer in the resemblance of a gaping oyster 
 on the borders of the ebb. ' The country is not 
 disturbed.' 
 
 ' So the doctor thinks his patient is doing favour- 
 ably! And you cottoned to Patrick? And I don't 
 wonder. Where was it? ' 
 
 'We met in Trieste. He was about to start 'by one 
 of the Austrian boats for the East.' 
 
 'Not disturbed! no! with a rotten potato inside it 
 214 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 paralysing digestion ! ' exclaimed Con. ' Now Patrick chapter 
 had been having a peep at Vienna, hadn't he ? ' crossing the 
 
 'He had; he was fresh from Vienna when I met Rubicon 
 him. As to Ireland, the harvest was only middling 
 good last year.' 
 
 ' And that 's the bit of luck we depend on. A cloud 
 too much, and it's drowned,! Had he seen, do you 
 know, anybody in Vienna? — you were not long 
 together at Trieste ? ' 
 
 Mr. Colesworth had sufficient quickness to perceive 
 that the two questions could be answered as one, and 
 saying: 'He was disappointed,' revealed that he and 
 Patrick had been long enough together to come to 
 terms of intimacy. 
 
 'To be sure, he gave you a letter of introduction 
 to his family ! ' said Con. ' And permit me to add, 
 that Patrick's choice of a friend is mine on trust. 
 The lady he was for seeing, Mr. Colesworth, was just 
 then embarking on an adventure of a romantic 
 character, particularly well suited to her nature, and 
 the end of it was a trifle sanguinary, and she suffered 
 a disappointment also, though not perhaps on that 
 account.' 
 
 ' I heard of it in England last year,' said Mr. Coles- 
 worth. ' Did she come through it safely ? ' 
 
 'Without any personal disfigurement: and is in 
 England now, under her father's roof, meditating fresh 
 adventures.' 
 
 Kathleen cried : ' Ye 're talking of the lady who was 
 Miss Adister — I can guess — Ah ! ' She humped her 
 shoulders and sent a shudder up her neck. 
 
 'But she's a grand creature, Mr. Colesworth, and 
 you ought to know her,' said Con. ' That is, if you 'd 
 
 215 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER like to have an idea of a young Catherine or a Semi- 
 Crosstag the ''^^is — minus an army and a country. There 's 
 Rubicon nothing she 's not capable of aiming at. And there 's 
 pretty well nothing and nobody she wouldn't make 
 use of. She has great notions of the power of the 
 British Press and the British purse — each in turn as 
 a key to the other. Now for an egg, Kathleen.' 
 
 ' I think I '11 eat an egg,' Kathleen replied. 
 
 * Bless the honey heart of the girl ! Life 's in you, 
 my dear, and calls for fuel. I 'm glad to see that Mr. 
 Colesworth too can take a sight at the Sea-God after 
 a night of him. It augurs magnificently for a future 
 career. And let me tell you that the Pen demands it 
 of us. The first of the requisites is a stout stomach 
 — before a furnished head! I'd not pass a man to 
 be anything of a writer who couldn't step ashore from 
 a tempest and consume his Titan breakfast.' 
 
 'We are qualifying for the literary craft. Miss 
 O'Donnell,' said Mr. Colesworth. 
 
 'It's for a walk in the wind up Caer Gybi, and 
 along the coast I mean to go,' said Kathleen. 
 
 ' This morning ? ' the captain asked her. 
 
 She saw his dilemma in his doubtful look. 
 
 ' When I 've done. While you 're discussing matters 
 with Father Boyle. I know you're burning to. 
 Sure it 's yourself knows as well as anybody, Captain 
 Con, that I can walk a day long and take care of my 
 steps. I 've walked the better half of Donegal alone, 
 and this morning I '11 have a protector.' 
 
 Captain Con eyed the protector, approved of him, 
 
 disapproved of himself, thought of Kathleen as a 
 
 daughter of Erin — a privileged and inviolate order 
 
 of woman in the minds of his countrymen — and 
 
 216 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 wriggling internally over a remainder scruple said: chapter 
 ' Mr. Colesworth mayhap has to write a bit in the cros'^hig the 
 
 morning.' Rubicon 
 
 ' I 'm unattached at present,' the latter said. ' I am 
 neither a correspondent nor a reporter, and if I were, 
 the event would be wanting.' 
 
 'That remark, sir, shows you to be eminently a 
 stranger to the official duties,' observed the captain. 
 'Journalism is a maw, and the journalist has to cram 
 it, and like anything else which perpetually distends 
 for matter, it must be filled, for you can't leave it 
 gaping, so when nature and circumstance won't com- 
 bine to produce the stuff, we have recourse to the 
 creative arts. 'Tis the necessity of the profession.' 
 
 * The profession will not impose that necessity 
 upon me,' remarked the young practitioner. 
 
 ' Outside the wheels of the machine, sir, we indulge 
 our hallucination of immunity. I 've been one in the 
 whirr of them, relating what I hadn't quite heard, and 
 capitulating what I didn't think at all, in spite of the 
 cry of my conscience — a poor infant below the waters, 
 casting up ejaculatory bubbles of protestation. And 
 if it is my reproach that I left it to the perils of 
 drowning, it 's my pride that I continued to transmit 
 air enough to carry on the struggle. Not every 
 journalist can say as much. The Press is the voice 
 of the mass, and our private opinion is detected as a 
 discord by the mighty beast, and won't be endured 
 by him.' 
 
 'It's better not to think of him quite as a beast,' 
 said Mr. Colesworth. 
 
 'Infinitely better: and I like your "guile," sir! 
 But wait and tell me what you think of him after 
 
 217 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER tossing him his meat for a certain number of years. 
 
 cro^kig the There 's Rockney. Do you know Rockney ? He 's 
 
 Rubicon the biggest single gun they 've got, and he 's mad for 
 
 this country, but ask him about the public, you'll 
 
 hear the menagerie-keeper's opinion of the brute that 
 
 mauled his loins.' 
 
 ' Rockney,' said Mr. Colesworth, ' has the tone of a 
 man disappointed of the dictatorship.' 
 
 ' Then you do know Rockney ! ' shouted Captain 
 Con. ' That 's the man in a neat bit of drawing. 
 He 's a grand piece of ordnance. But wait for him 
 too, and tell me by and by. If it isn't a woman, 
 you '11 find, that primes him, ay, and points him, and 
 what's more, discharges him, I'm not Irish born. 
 Poor fellow ! I pity him. He had a sweet Irish lady 
 for his wife, and lost her last year, and has been 
 raging astray politically ever since. I suppose it's 
 hardly the poor creature's fault. None the less, you 
 know, we have to fight him. And now he 's nibbling 
 at a bait — it 's fun : the lady I mentioned, with a turn 
 for adventure and enterprise : it 's rare fun : — he 's 
 nibbling, he'll be hooked. You must make her 
 acquaintance, Mr. Colesworth, and hold your own 
 against her, if you can. She 's a niece of my wife's 
 and I'll introduce you. I shall find her in London, 
 or at our lodgings at a Surrey farm we 've taken to 
 nurse my cousin Captain Philip O'Donnell invalided 
 from India — an awful climate ! — on my return, when 
 I hope to renew the acquaintance. She has beauty, 
 she has brains. Resist her, and you '11 make a decent 
 stand against Lucifer. And supposing she rolls you 
 up and pitches you over, her noticing you is a pretty 
 compliment to your pen. That '11 be consoling.' 
 218 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 Mr. Colesworth fancied, he said, that he was proof chapter 
 against feminine blandishments in the direction of his crossing the 
 
 writings. Rubicon 
 
 He spoke as one indicating a thread to suggest a 
 cable. The captain applauded the fancy as a pleasing 
 delusion of the young sprigs of Journalism. 
 
 Upon this, Mr. Colesworth, with all respect for 
 French intelligence, denied the conclusiveness of 
 French generalisations, which ascribed to women 
 universal occult dominion, and traced all great affairs 
 to small intrigues. 
 
 The captain's eyes twinkled on him, thinking how 
 readily he would back smart Miss Kathleen to do the 
 trick, if need were. 
 
 He said to her before she started : ' Don't forget he 
 may be a clever fellow with that pen of his, and useful 
 to our party.' 
 
 ' I '11 not forget,' said she. 
 
 For the good of his party, then. Captain Con per- 
 mitted her to take the walk up Caer Gybi alone with 
 Mr. Colesworth : a memorable walk in the recollections 
 of the scribe, because of the wonderful likeness of the 
 young lady to the breezy weather and the sparklets 
 over the deep, the cloud that frowned, the cloud that 
 glowed, the green of the earth greening out from under 
 wings of shadow, the mountain ranges holding hands 
 about an immensity of space. It was one of our giant 
 days to his emotions, and particularly memorable to 
 him through the circumstance that it insisted on a 
 record in verse, and he was unused to the fetters of 
 metre : and although the verse was never seen by man, 
 his attempt at it confused his ideas of his expressive 
 powers. Oddly too, while scourging the lines with 
 
 219 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER criticism, he had a fondness for them : they stamped 
 Crosses the ^ radiant day in his mind, beyond the resources of 
 Rubicon rhctoric to have done it equally. 
 
 This was the day of Captain Con's crossing the 
 Rubicon between the secret of his happiness and a 
 Parliamentary career. 
 
 220 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 Captain Con's Letter 
 
 Women may be able to tell you why the nursing of a 
 military invalid awakens tenderer anxieties in their 
 bosoms than those called forth by the drab civilian. 
 If we are under sentence of death we are all of us 
 pathetic, of course ; but stretched upon the debateable 
 couch of sickness we are not so touching as the 
 coloured coat : it has the distinction belonging to 
 colour. It smites a deeper nerve, or more than one ; 
 and this, too, where there is no imaginary subjection 
 to the charms of military glory, in minds to which 
 the game of war is lurid as the plumes of the arch- 
 slayer. 
 
 Jane Mattock assisting Mrs. Adister O'Donnell to 
 restore Captain Philip was very singularly affected, 
 like a person shut off on a sudden from her former 
 theories and feelings. Theoretically she despised the 
 soldier's work as much as she shrank abhorrently 
 from bloodshed. She regarded him and his trappings 
 as an ensign of our old barbarism, and could peruse 
 platitudes upon that theme with enthusiasm. The 
 soldier personally, she was accustomed to consider an 
 inferior intelligence : a sort of schoolboy when young, 
 and schoolmaster when mature : a visibly limited 
 
 221 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER creature, not a member of our broader world. With- 
 capuhi Cons °^^ dismissing any of these views she found them 
 Letter put aside for the reception of others of an opposite 
 character ; and in her soul she would have ascribed it 
 to her cares of nursing that she had become thoughtful, 
 doubtful, hopeful, even prayerful, surcharged with zeal 
 to help to save a good sword for the country. If in a 
 world still barbarous we must have soldiers, here was 
 one whom it would be grievous to lose. He had fallen 
 for the country ; and there was a moving story of how 
 he had fallen. She inclined to think more highly of 
 him for having courted exposure on a miserable 
 frontier war where but a poor sheaf of glory could 
 be gathered. And he seemed to estimate his pro- 
 fessional duties apart from an aim at the laurels. A 
 conception of the possibility of a man's being both 
 a soldier and morally a hero edged its way into her 
 understanding. It stood edgeways within, desirous 
 of avoiding a challenge to show every feature. 
 
 The cares of nursing were Jane's almost undividedly, 
 except for the aid she had from her friend Grace 
 Barrow and from Miss Colesworth. Mrs. Adister 
 O'Donnell was a nurse in name only. ' She '11 be seen 
 by Philip like as if she were a nightmare apparition of 
 his undertaker's wraith,' Captain Con said to Jane, 
 when recommending his cousin to her charitable 
 nature, after he had taken lodgings at a farmhouse 
 near Mrs. Lackstraw's model farm Woodside on the 
 hills. 'Barring the dress,' as he added, some such 
 impression of her frigid mournfulness might have 
 struck a recumbent invalid. Jane acknowledged it, 
 and at first induced her aunt to join her in the daily 
 walk of half a mile to sit with him. Mrs. Lackstraw 
 222 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 was a very busy lady at her farm ; she was often chapter 
 summoned to London by her intuition of John's wish ^ato con'i 
 to have her presiding at table for the entertainment of Letter 
 his numerous guests ; she confessed that she super- 
 vised the art of nursing better than she practised it, 
 and supervision can be done at a distance if the 
 subordinate is properly attentive to the rules we lay 
 down, as Jane appeared to be. So Jane was left to 
 him. She loved the country ; Springtide in the 
 country set her singing ; her walk to her patient at 
 Lappett's farm and homeward was an aethereal rap- 
 ture for a heart rocking easy in fulness. There was 
 nothing to trouble it, no hint of wild winds and heavy 
 seas, not even the familiar insinuation from the 
 vigilant monitress, her aunt, to bid her be on her 
 guard, beware of what it is that great heiresses are 
 courted for, steel her heart against serpent speeches, 
 see well to have the woman's precious word No at the 
 sentinel's post, and alert there. Mrs. Lackstraw, the 
 most vigilant and plain-spoken of her sex, had forborne 
 to utter the usual warnings which were to preserve 
 Miss Mattock for her future Earl or Duke : and the 
 reason why she forebore was a double one ; a soldier 
 and Papist could never be thought perilous to a young 
 woman scorning the sons of Mars and slaves of 
 sacerdotalism. The picture of Jane bestowing her 
 hand on a Roman Catholic in military uniform, refused 
 to be raised before the mind. Charitableness, humane- 
 ness, the fact that she was an admirable nurse and 
 liked to exercise her natural gift, perfectly accounted 
 for Jane's trips to Lappett's farm, and the jellies and 
 fresh dairy dainties and neat little dishes she was 
 constantly despatching to the place. A suggestion of 
 
 223 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER possible danger might prove more dangerous than 
 ^ ^y"i . silence, by rendering it attractive. Besides, Jane 
 
 Captain Con s ^ j o ' 
 
 Letter talked of poor Captain Philip as Patrick O'Donnell's 
 brother, whom she was bound to serve in return for 
 Patrick's many services to her ; and of how unlike 
 Patrick he was. Mrs. Lackstraw had been appre- 
 hensive about her fancy for Patrick. Therefore if 
 Captain Philip was unlike him, and strictly a Catholic, 
 according to report, the suspicion of danger dispersed, 
 and she was allowed to enjoy the pleasures of the 
 metropolis as frequently as she chose. The nursing 
 of a man of Letters, or of the neighbour to him, a 
 beggar in rags, would not have been so tolerated. 
 Thus we perceive that wits actively awake inside the 
 ring-fence of prepossessions they have erected may 
 lull themselves with their wakefulness. Who would 
 have thought ! — is the cry when the strongest bulwark 
 of the fence is broken through. 
 
 Jane least of any would have thought what was 
 coming to pass. The pale square-browed young officer, 
 so little Irish and winning in his brevity of speech, did 
 and said nothing to alarm her or strike the smallest 
 light. Grace Barrow noticed certain little changes of 
 mood in Jane : she could scarcely have had a distinct 
 suspicion at the time. After a recent observation of 
 him, on an evening stroll from Lappett's to Woodside, 
 she pronounced him interesting, but hard. 'He has 
 an interesting head ... I should not like to offend 
 him.' They agreed as to his unlikeness to fluid 
 Patrick ; both eulogistic of the absent brother ; and 
 Jane, who could be playful in privacy with friends, 
 clapped a brogue on her tongue to discourse of Patrick 
 and apostrophise him : * Oh ! Pat, Pat, my dear cousin 
 224 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 Pat ! why are you so long away from your desponding chapter 
 Jane ? I '11 take to poetry and write songs, if you captau! con'i 
 don't come home soon. You 've put seas between us, Letter 
 and are behaving to me as an enemy. I know you '11 
 bring home a foreign Princess to break the heart of 
 your faithful. But I '11 always praise you for a dear 
 boy, Pat, and wish you happy, and beg the good gentle- 
 man your brother to give me a diploma as nurse to 
 your first-born. There now ! ' 
 
 She finished smiling brightly, and Grace was a trifle 
 astonished, for her friend's humour was not as a rule 
 dramatic. 
 
 ' You really have caught a twang of it from your 
 friend Captain Con; only you don't rattle the eigh- 
 teenth letter of the alphabet in the middle of words.' 
 
 * I 've tried, and can't persuade my tongue to do it 
 "first off"," as boys say, and my invalid has no brogue 
 whatever to keep me in practice,' Jane replied. ' One 
 wonders what he thinks of as he lies there by the 
 window. He doesn't confide it to his hospital 
 nurse.' 
 
 ' Yes, he would treat her courteously, just in that mili- 
 tary style,' said Grace, realising the hospital attendance. 
 
 'It's the style I like best: — no perpetual personal 
 thankings and allusions to the trouble he gives ! ' Jane 
 exclaimed. ' He shows perfect good sense, and I like 
 that in all things, as you know. A red-haired young 
 woman chooses to wait on him and bring him flowers — 
 he 's brother to Patrick in his love of wild flowers, at all 
 events ! — and he takes it naturally and simply. These 
 officers bear illness well. I suppose it 's the drill.' 
 
 'Still I think it a horrid profession, dear.' 
 
 Grace felt obliged to insist on that : and her ' I think,' 
 35— P 225 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER though it was not stressed, tickled Jane's dormant ear 
 capt^rn con's *» ^o™® drowsy Wakefulness. 
 
 Letter ' I think too much honour is paid to it, certainly. 
 
 But soldiers, of all men, one would expect to be over- 
 whelmed by a feeling of weakness. He has never 
 complained; not once. I doubt if he would have 
 complained if Mrs. Adister had been waiting on him 
 all the while, or not a soul. I can imagine him lying 
 on the battle-field night after night quietly, resolving 
 not to groan.' 
 
 'Too great a power of self-repression sometimes 
 argues the want of any emotional nature,' said Grace. 
 
 Jane shook her head. She knew a story of him 
 contradicting that. 
 
 The story had not recurred to her since she had 
 undertaken her service. It coloured the remainder 
 of an evening walk home through the beechwoods 
 and over the common with Grace, and her walk across 
 the same tracks early in the morning, after Grace had 
 gone to London. Miss Colesworth was coming to her 
 next week, with her brother if he had arrived in 
 England. Jane remembered having once been curious 
 about this adventurous man of Letters who lived by 
 the work of his pen. She remembered comparing him 
 to one who was compelled to swim perpetually with- 
 out a ship to give him rest or land in view. He had 
 made a little money by a book, and was expending it 
 on travels — rather imprudently, she fancied Emma 
 Colesworth to be thinking. He talked well, but for 
 the present she was happier in her prospect of nearly 
 a week of loneliness. The day was one of sunshine, 
 windless, odorous: one of the rare placid days of 
 April when the pettish month assumes a matronly air 
 226 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 of summer and wears it till the end of the day. The chapter 
 beech twigs were strongly embrowned, the larches Q^„^aCoa'i 
 shot up green spires by the borders of woods and on Letter 
 mounds within, deep ditch-banks unrolled profuse 
 tangles of new blades, and sharp eyes might light on 
 a late white violet overlooked by the children; 
 primroses ran along the banks. Jane had a maxim 
 that flowers should be spared to live their life, 
 especially flowers of the wilds ; she had reared her- 
 self on our poets; hence Mrs. Lackstraw's dread of 
 the arrival of one of the minstrel order : and the girl, 
 who could deliberately cut a bouquet from the garden, 
 if requested, would refuse to pluck a wildflower. 
 But now they cried out to her to be plucked in hosts, 
 they claimed the sacrifice, and it seemed to her no 
 violation of her sentiment to gather handfuls making 
 a bunch that would have done honour to the pro- 
 cession of the children's May-day — a day she excused 
 for the slaughter because her idol and prophet among 
 the poets, wild nature's interpreter, was that day on 
 the side of the children. How like a bath of freshness 
 would the thick faintly-fragrant mass stiine to her 
 patient! Only to look at it was medicine! She 
 believed, in her lively healthfulness, that the look 
 would give him a spring to health, and she hurried 
 forward to have them in water — the next sacred 
 obligation to the leaving of them untouched. 
 
 She had reared herself on our poets. If much 
 brooding on them will sometimes create a senti- 
 mentalism of the sentiment they inspire, that also, 
 after our manner of developing, leads to finer civilisa- 
 tion; and as her very delicate feelings were not always 
 tyrants over her clear and accurate judgement, they 
 
 227 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER rather tended to stamp her character than lead her 
 ca toufcon's ^^^° foolishness. Blunt of speech, quick in sensibility, 
 Letter imaginative, yet idealistic, she had the complex 
 character of diverse brain and nerve, and was often 
 a problem to the chief person interested in it. She 
 thought so decisively, felt so shrinkingly; spoke so 
 flatly, brooded so softly ! Such natures, in the pain- 
 ful effort to reconcile apparent antagonism and read 
 themselves, forget that they are not full grown. 
 Longer than others are they young: but meanwhile 
 they are of an age when we are driven abroad to 
 seek and shape our destinies. 
 
 Passing through the garden-gate of Lappett's farm 
 she made her way to the south-western face of the 
 house to beg a bowl of water of the farmer's wife, and 
 had the sweet surprise of seeing her patient lying 
 under swallows' eaves on a chair her brother had 
 been commissioned to send from London for coming 
 uses. He was near the farm-wife's kitchen, but to 
 windward of the cooking-reek, pleasantly warmed, 
 sufficiently shaded, and alone, with open letter on the 
 rug covering his legs. He whistled to Jane's dog 
 Wayland, a retriever, having Newfoundland relation- 
 ships, of smithy redness and ruggedness ; it was the 
 whistle that startled her to turn and see him as she 
 was in the act of handing Mrs. Lappett her primroses. 
 
 'Out? I feared it would be a week. Is it quite 
 prudent?' Jane said, toning down her delight. 
 
 He answered with the half-smile that refers these 
 questions to the settled fact. Air had always brought 
 him round ; now he could feel he was embarked for 
 recovery : and he told her how the farmer and one of 
 his men had lent a shoulder to present him to his old 
 228 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 and surest physician — rather like a crippled ghost, chapter 
 Mrs. Adister was upstairs in bed with one of her captail'con's 
 headaches. Captain Con, then, was attending her, Letter 
 Jane supposed. She spoke of him as the most 
 devoted of husbands. 
 
 A slight hardening of Philip's brows, well known to 
 her by this time, caused her to interrogate his eyes. 
 They were fixed on her in his manner of gazing with 
 strong directness. She read the contrary opinion, and 
 some hieroglyphic matter besides. 
 
 •We all respect him for his single-hearted care of 
 her,' she said. * I have a great liking for him. His 
 tirades about the Saxon tyrant are not worth mention- 
 ing, they mean nothing. He would be one of the first 
 to rush to the standard if there were danger ; I know 
 he would. He is truly chivalrous, I am sure.' 
 
 Philip's broad look at her had not swerved. The 
 bowl of primroses placed beside him on a chair by the 
 farmer's dame diverted it for a moment. 
 
 ' You gathered them ? ' he said. 
 
 Jane drank his look at the flowers. 
 
 ' Yes, on my way,' she replied. ' We can none of us 
 live for ever; and fresh water every day will keep 
 them alive a good long time. They had it from the 
 clouds yesterday. Do they not seem a bath of 
 country happiness ! ' Evidently they did their service 
 in pleasing him. 
 
 Seeing his fingers grope on the rug, she handed him 
 his open letters. 
 
 He selected the second, passing under his inspection, 
 and asked her to read it. 
 
 She took the letter, wondering a little that it should 
 be in Captain Con's handwriting. 
 
 229 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER ' I am to read it through ? ' she said, after a run over 
 capSon-s some lines. 
 
 Letter He nodded. She thought it a sign of his friendli- 
 
 ness in sharing family secrets with her, and read : 
 
 'My dear Philip, — Not a word of these contents, 
 which will be delivered seasonably to the lady chiefly 
 concerned, by the proper person. She hears this 
 morning I 'm off on a hasty visit to Ireland, as I have 
 been preparing her of late to expect I must, and yours 
 the blame, if any, though I will be the last to fling it at 
 you. I meet Father B. and pretty Kitty before I cross. 
 Judging by the wind this morning, the passage will 
 furnish good schooling for a spell of the hustings. 
 But if I am in the nature of things unable to command 
 the waves, trust me for holding a mob in leash ; and 
 they are tolerably alike. My spirits are up. Now 
 the die is cast. My election to the vacancy must be 
 reckoned beforehand. I promise you a sounding 
 report from the Kincora Herald. They will not say of 
 me after that (and read only the speeches reported in 
 the local paper) — " what is the man but an Irish 
 adventurer ! " He is a lover of his country, Philip 
 O'Donnell, and one of millions, we will hope. And 
 that stigmatic title of long standing, more than any- 
 thing earthly, drove him to the step — to the ruin 
 of his domestic felicity perhaps. But we are past 
 sighing. 
 
 Think you, when he crossed the tide, 
 Caius Julius Csesar sighed ? 
 
 ' No, nor thought of his life, nor his wife, but of the 
 thing to be done. Laugh, my boy ! I know what I 
 230 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 am about when I set my mind on a powerful example, chapter 
 As the chameleon gets his colour, we get our character c^pt^^'con-i 
 from the objects we contemplate . . .' Letter 
 
 Jane glanced over the edge of the letter sheet rosily 
 at Philip. 
 
 ' The chameleon,' he remarked. 
 
 His dryness in hitting the laughable point diverted 
 her, and her mind became suffused with a series of 
 pictures of the chameleon captain planted in view of 
 the Roman to become a copy of him, so that she did 
 not peruse the terminating lines with her wakefullest 
 attention : 
 
 ' The liege lady of my heart will be the earliest to 
 hail her hero triumphant, or cherish him beaten — 
 which is not in the prospect. Let Ireland be true to 
 Ireland. We will talk of the consolidation of the 
 Union by and by. You are for that, you say, when 
 certain things are done ; and you are where I leave 
 you, on the highway, though seeming to go at a 
 funeral pace to certain ceremonies leading to the 
 union of the two countries in the solidest fashion, to 
 their mutual benefit, after a shining example. Con 
 sleeps with a corner of the eye open, and you are not 
 the only soldier who is a strategist, and a tactician 
 too, aware of when it is best to be out of the way. 
 Now adieu and pax vobiscum. Reap the rich harvest 
 of your fall to earth. I leave you in the charge of the 
 kindest of nurses, next to the wife of my bosom the 
 best of women. Appreciate her, sir, or perish in my 
 esteem. She is one whom not to love is to be guilty 
 of an offence deserving capital punishment, and a 
 bastinado to season the culprit for his execution. 
 Have I not often informed her myself that a flower 
 
 231 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER from her hand means more than treasures from the 
 capta^"con's h^nds of Others. Expect me absent for a week. The 
 Letter harangues will not be closely reported. I stand by 
 the truth, which is my love of the land of my birth. 
 A wife must come second to that if she would be 
 first in her husband's consideration. Hurrah me on, 
 Philip, now it is action, and let me fancy I hear you 
 shouting it.' 
 
 The drop of the letter to the signature fluttered affec- 
 tionately on a number of cordial adjectives, like the 
 airy bird to his home in the corn. 
 
 232 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 Mars Convalescent 
 
 Jane's face was clear as the sky when she handed the 
 letter back to Philip. In doing so, it struck her that 
 the prolonged directness of his look was peculiar: 
 she attributed it to some effect of the fresh Spring 
 atmosphere on a weakened frame. She was guessing 
 at his reasons for showing her the letter, and they 
 appeared possibly serious. 
 
 ' An election to Parliament ! Perhaps Mrs. Adister 
 should have a hint of it, to soften the shock I fear it 
 may be: but we must wait till her headache has 
 passed,' she said. 
 
 * You read to the end ? ' said Philip. 
 
 'Yes, Captain Con always amuses me, and I am 
 bound to confess I have no positive disrelish of his 
 compliments. But this may prove a desperate step. 
 The secret of his happiness is in extreme jeopardy. 
 Nothing would stop him, I suppose ? ' 
 
 Philip signified that it was too late. He was more- 
 over of opinion, and stated it in his briefest, that it 
 would be advisable to leave the unfolding of the 
 present secret to the captain. 
 
 Jane wondered why the letter had been shown. Her 
 patient might be annoyed and needing sympathy ? 
 
 233 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER * After all,' she said, ' Captain Con may turn out to 
 ^^^^ be a very good sort of member of Parliament in his 
 
 Convalescent Way.' 
 
 Philip's eyebrows lifted, and he let fall a breath, 
 eloquent of his thoughts. 
 
 * My brother says he is a serviceable director of the 
 Company they are associated in.' 
 
 ' He finds himself among reasonable men, and he is 
 a chameleon.' 
 
 ' Parliament may steady him.' 
 
 * Ito is too much of a platform for Con's head.' 
 
 ' Yes, there is more of poet than politician,' said she. 
 ' That is a danger. But he calls himself our friend ; I 
 think he really has a liking for John and me.' 
 
 'For you he has a real love,' said Philip. 
 
 ' Well, then, he may listen to us at times ; he may 
 be trusted not to wound us. I am unmitigatedly for 
 the one country — no divisions. We want all our 
 strength in these days of monstrous armies directed 
 by banditti Councils. England is the nation of the 
 Christian example to nations. Oh! surely it is her 
 aim. At least she strives to be that. I think it, and I 
 see the many faults we have.' 
 
 Her patient's eyelids were down. 
 
 She proposed to send her name up to Mrs. Adister. 
 
 On her return from the poor lady racked with head- 
 ache and lying little conscious of her husband's 
 powder-barrel under the bed, Jane found her patient 
 being worried by his official nurse, a farm-labourer's 
 wife, a bundle of a woman, whose lumbering assidui- 
 ties he fenced with reiterated humorous negatives to 
 every one of her propositions, until she prefaced the 
 last two or three of the list with a ' Deary me ! ' 
 234 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 addressed consolatorily to herself. She went through chapter 
 the same forms each day, at the usual hours of the jj^,g 
 day, and Jane, though she would have felt the convalescent 
 apathetic doltishness of the woman less, felt how hard 
 it must be for him to bear. 
 
 ' Your sister will be with you soon,' she said. ' I am 
 glad, and yet I hope you will not allow her to put me 
 aside altogether ? ' 
 
 'You shall do as you wish,' said Philip. 
 'Is she like Patrick? Her name is Kathleen, 1 
 know.' 
 
 ' She is a raw Irish girl, of good Irish training, but Irish.' 
 'I hope she will be pleased with England. Like 
 Patrick in face, I mean.' 
 
 ' We think her a good-looking girl.' 
 'Does she play? sing?' 
 ' Some of our ballads.' 
 
 ' She will delight my brother. John loves Irish 
 ballads.' 
 
 A silence of long duration fell between them. She 
 fancied he would like to sleep, and gently rose to slip 
 away, that she might consult with Mrs. Lappett about 
 putting up some tent-cover. He asked her if she was 
 going. 'Not home,' she said. His hand moved, but 
 stopped. It seemed to have meant to detain her. She 
 looked at a white fleece that came across the sun, 
 desiring to conjure it to stay and shadow him. It 
 sailed by. She raised her parasol. 
 
 His eyelids were shut, and she thought him asleep. 
 Meditating on her unanswered question of Miss 
 Kathleen's likeness to Patrick, Jane imagined a possibly 
 greater likeness to her patient, and that he did not 
 speak of his family's exclamations on the subject 
 
 235 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER because of Kathleen's being SO good-looking a girl. For 
 
 XIX 
 
 Mars 
 
 if good-looking, a sister must resemble these handsome 
 Convalescent features here, quiescent to inspection in their marble 
 outlines as a corse. So might he lie on the battle-field, 
 with no one to watch over him ! 
 
 While she watched, sitting close beside him to 
 shield his head from the sunbeams, her heart began to 
 throb before she well knew the secret of it. She had 
 sight of a tear that grew big under the lashes of each 
 of his eyelids, and rolled heavily. Her own eyes 
 overflowed. 
 
 The fit of weeping was momentary, April's, a novelty 
 with her. She accused her silly visions of having 
 softened her. A hasty smoothing to right and left 
 removed the traces ; they were unseen ; and when she 
 ventured to look at him again there was no sign of 
 fresh drops falling. His eyelids kept shut. 
 
 The arrival of her diurnal basket of provisions 
 offered a refreshing intervention of the commonplace. 
 Bright air had sharpened his appetite : he said he had 
 been sure it would, and anticipated cheating the doctor 
 of a part of the sentence which condemned him to lie 
 on his back up to the middle of June, a log. Jane was 
 hungry too, and they feasted together gaily, talking of 
 Kathleen on her journey, her strange impressions and 
 her way of proclaiming them, and of Patrick and 
 where he might be now ; ultimately of Captain Con 
 and Mrs. Adister. 
 
 ' He has broken faith with her,' Philip said sternly. 
 ' She will have the right to tell him so. He never can 
 be anything but a comic politician. Still he was 
 bound to consult his wife previous to stepping before 
 the public. He knows that he married a fortune.' 
 236 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 * A good fortune,' said Jane. chapter 
 
 Philip acquiesced. ' She is an excellent woman, a ^^f^ 
 model of uprightness ; she has done him all the good convalescent 
 in the world, and here is he deceiving her, lying — there 
 is no other word : and one lie leads to another. When 
 he married a fortune he was a successful adventurer. 
 The compact was understood. His duty as a man of 
 honour is to be true to his bond and serve the lady. 
 Falseness to his position won't wash him clean of the 
 title.' 
 
 Jane pleaded for Captain Con. 'He is chivalrously 
 attentive to her.' 
 
 ' You have read his letter,' Philip replied. 
 
 He crushed her charitable apologies with references 
 to the letter. 
 
 •We are not certain that Mrs. Adister will object,' 
 said she. 
 
 ' Do you see her reading a speech of her husband's ? " 
 he remarked. Presently with something like a moan : 
 ' And I am her guest ! ' 
 
 ' Oh ! pray, do not think Mrs. Adister will ever allow 
 you to feel the lightest shadow . . .' said Jane. 
 
 ' No ; that makes it worse.' 
 
 Had this been the burden of his thoughts when 
 those two solitary tears forced their passage ? 
 
 Hardly: not even in his physical weakness would 
 he consent to weep for such a cause. 
 
 'I forgot to mention that Mrs. Adister has a letter 
 from her husband telling her he has been called over 
 to Ireland on urgent business,' she said. 
 
 Philip answered : ' He is punctilious.' 
 
 'I wish indeed he had been more candid,' Jane 
 assented to the sarcasm. 
 
 237 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER ' In Ireland he is agreeably surprised by the flatter- 
 ^^^^ ing proposal of a vacant seat, and not having an 
 Convalescent instant to debate on it, assumes the consent of the 
 heavenliest wife in Christendom.' 
 
 Philip delivered the speech with a partial imitation 
 of Captain Con addressing his wife on his return as 
 the elected among the pure Irish party. The effort 
 wearied him. 
 
 She supposed he was regretting his cousin's public 
 prominence in the ranks of the malcontents. * He will 
 listen to you,' she said, while she smiled at his 
 unwonted display of mimicry. 
 
 *A bad mentor for him. Antics are harmless, 
 though they get us laughed at,' said Philip. 
 
 ' You may restrain him from excesses.' 
 
 'Were I in that position, you would consider me 
 guilty of greater than any poor Con is likely to 
 commit.' 
 
 ' Surely you are not for disunion ? ' 
 
 'The reverse. I am for union on juster terms, that 
 will hold it fast.' 
 
 ' But what are the terms ? ' 
 
 He must have desired to paint himself as black to 
 her as possible. He stated the terms, which were 
 hardly less than the affrighting ones blown across the 
 Irish sea by that fierce party. He held them to be 
 just, simply sensible terms. True, he spoke of the 
 granting them as a sure method to rally all Ireland 
 to an ardent love of the British flag. But he praised 
 names of Irish leaders whom she had heard Mr. 
 Rockney denounce for disloyal insolence: he could 
 find excuses for them and their dupes — poor creatures, 
 verily ! And his utterances had a shocking emphasis. 
 238 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 Then she was not wrong in her idea of the conspira- chapter 
 tor's head, her first impression of him ! mars 
 
 She could not quit the theme: doing that would Convalescent 
 have been to be indifferent : something urged her to it. 
 
 ' Are they really your opinions ? ' 
 
 He seemed relieved by declaring that they were. 
 
 ' Patrick is quite free of them,' said she. 
 
 ' We will hope that the Irish fever will spare Patrick. 
 He was at a Jesuit college in France when he was wax. 
 Now he 's taking the world.' 
 
 ' With so little of the Jesuit in him ! ' 
 
 ' Little of the worst : a good deal of the best.' 
 
 ' What is the best ? ' 
 
 'Their training to study. They train you to con- 
 centrate the brain upon the object of study. And they 
 train you to accept service : they fit you for absolute 
 service : they shape you for your duties in the world ; 
 and so long as they don't smelt a man's private con- 
 science, they are model masters. Happily Patrick has 
 held his own. Not the Jesuits would have a chance 
 of keeping a grasp on Patrick ! He '11 always be a 
 natural boy and a thoughtful man.' 
 
 Jane's features implied a gentle shudder. 
 
 ' I shake a scarlet cloak to you ? ' said Philip. 
 
 She was directed by his words to think of the 
 scarlet coat. 'I reflect a little on the substance of 
 things as well,' she said. 'Would not Patrick's 
 counsels have an influence ? ' 
 
 'Hitherto our Patrick has never presumed to 
 counsel his elder brother.' 
 
 * But an officer wearing . . .' 
 
 'The uniform! That would have to be stripped off. 
 There 'd be an end to any professional career.' 
 
 239 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER ' You would not regret it ? ' 
 Mars *^^ sorrow is like a soldier's bidding farewell to 
 
 Convalescent flag and comrades. Happily politics and I have no 
 business together. If the country favours me with 
 active service I 'm satisfied for myself. You asked 
 me for my opinions : I was bound to give them. 
 Generally I let them rest.' 
 
 Could she have had the temerity ? Jane marvelled 
 at herself. 
 
 She doubted that the weighty pair of tears had 
 dropped for the country. Captain Con would have 
 shed them over Erin, and many of them. Captain 
 Philip's tone was too plain and positive : he would 
 be a most practical unhistrionic rebel. 
 
 ' You would countenance a revolt ? ' she said, strik- 
 ing at that extreme to elicit the favourable answer 
 her tones angled for. And it was instantly : 
 
 ' Not in arms.' He tried an explanation by likening 
 the dissension to a wrangle in a civilised family over 
 an unjust division of property. 
 
 And here, as he was marking the case with some 
 nicety and difficulty, an itinerant barrel-organ crashed 
 its tragic tale of music put to torture at the gate. It 
 yelled of London to Jane, throttled the spirits of the 
 woods, threw a smoke over the country sky, befouled 
 the pure air she loved. 
 
 The instrument was one of the number which are 
 packed to suit all English tastes and may be taken for 
 a rough sample of the jumble of them, where a dance- 
 less quadrille-tune succeeds a suicidal Operatic melody 
 and is followed by the weariful hymn, whose last 
 drawl pert polka kicks aside. Thus does the poor 
 Savoyard compel a rich people to pay for their wealth. 
 240 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 Not without pathos in the abstract perhaps do the chapter 
 wretched machines pursue their revolutions of their ^^^ 
 factory life, as incapable of conceiving as of bestowing convalescent 
 pleasure : a bald cry for pennies through the barest 
 pretence to be agreeable : but Jane found it hard to 
 be tolerant of them out of London, and this one affect- 
 ing her invalid and Mrs. Adister must be dismissed. 
 Wayland was growling; he had to be held by the 
 collar. He spied an objectionable animal. A jerky 
 monkey was attached to the organ ; and his coat was 
 red, his kepi was blue ; his tailor had rigged him as 
 a military gentleman. Jane called to the farm-wife. 
 Philip assured her he was not annoyed. Jane observed 
 him listening, and by degrees she distinguished a 
 maundering of the Italian song she had one day sung 
 to Patrick in his brother's presence. 
 
 'I remember your singing that the week before I 
 went to India,' said Philip, and her scarlet blush flooded 
 her face. 
 
 'Can you endure the noise ? ' she asked him. 
 
 'Con would say it shrieks "murder." But I used 
 to like it once.' 
 
 Mrs. Lappett came answering to the call. Her 
 children were seen up the garden setting to one 
 another with squared aprons, responsive to a livelier 
 measure. 
 
 ' Bless me, miss, we think it so cheerful ! ' cried 
 Mrs. Lappett, and glanced at her young ones 
 harmonious and out of mischief. 
 
 'Very well,' said Jane, always considerate for 
 children. She had forgotten the racked Mrs. Adister. 
 
 Now the hymn of Puritanical gloom — the peace- 
 maker with Providence performing devotional exer- 
 35— Q 241 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER cises ID black bile. The leaps of the children were 
 
 ^^^ dashed. A sallow two or three minutes composed 
 
 Convalescent their motioos, and then they jumped again to the 
 
 step for lively legs. The similarity to the regimental 
 
 band heading soldiers on the march from Church 
 
 might have struck Philip. 
 
 ' I wonder when I shall see Patrick ! ' he said, 
 quickened in spite of himself by the sham sounds of 
 music to desire changes and surprises. 
 
 Jane was wondering, whether he could be a man 
 still to brood tearfully over his old love. 
 
 She echoed him. 'And I! Soon, I hope.' 
 
 The appearance of Mrs. Adister with features which 
 were the acutest critical summary of the discord 
 caused toll to be paid instantly, and they beheld a 
 flashing of white teeth and heard Italian accents. 
 The monkey saluted militarily, but with painful 
 suggestions of his foregone drilling in the cere- 
 mony. 
 
 ' We are safe nowhere from these intrusions,' Mrs. 
 Adister said ; ' not on these hills ! — and it must be a 
 trial for the wretched men to climb them, that thing 
 on their backs.' 
 
 ' They are as accustomed to it as mountain smugglers 
 bearing packs of contraband,' said Philip. 
 
 ' Con would have argued him out of hearing before 
 he ground a second note,' she resumed. *I have no 
 idea when Con returns from his unexpected visit to 
 Ireland.' 
 
 'Within a fortnight. Madam.' 
 
 'Let me believe it! You have heard from him? 
 But you are in the air ! exposed ! My head makes me 
 stupid. It is now five o'clock. The air begins to 
 242 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 chill. Con will never forgive me if you catch a cold, chapter 
 and I would not incur his blame.' Mars 
 
 The eyes of Jane and Philip shot an exchange. convalescent 
 
 ' Anything you command, madam,' said Philip. 
 
 He looked up and breathed his heaven of fresh air. 
 Jane pitied, she could not interpose to thwart his act 
 of resignation. The farmer, home for tea, and a foot- 
 man, took him between them, crutched, while Mrs. 
 Adister said to Jane: 'The doctor's orders are positive: 
 — if he is to be a man once more, he must rest his 
 back and not use his legs for months. He was near 
 to being a permanent cripple from that fall. My 
 brother Edward had one like it in his youth. Soldiers 
 are desperate creatures.' 
 
 'I think Mr. Adister had his fall when hunting, was 
 it not ? ' said Jane. 
 
 ' Hunting, my dear.' 
 
 That was rather different from a fall on duty before 
 the enemy, incurred by severe exhaustion after sun- 
 stroke! . . . 
 
 Jane took her leave of Philip beside his couch of 
 imprisonment in his room, promising to return in the 
 early morning. He embraced her old dog Wayland 
 tenderly. Hard men have sometimes a warm affection 
 for dogs. 
 
 Walking homeward she likewise gave Wayland a 
 hug. She called him ' dear old fellow,' and questioned 
 him of his fondness for her, warning him not to be 
 faithless ever to the mistress who loved him. Was 
 not her old Wayland as good a protector as the foot- 
 man Mrs. Adister pressed her to have at her heels? 
 That he was ! 
 
 Captain Con's behaviour grieved her. And it 
 
 243 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER certainly revived an ancient accusation against his 
 ^^^ countrymen. If he cared for her so much, why had 
 Convalescent he not placed confidence in her and commissioned her 
 to speak of his election to his wife? Irishmen will 
 never be quite sincere ! — But why had his cousin 
 exposed him to one whom he greatly esteemed ? 
 However angry he might be with Con O'Donnell in 
 his disapproval of the captain's conduct, it was not 
 very considerate to show the poor man to her in his 
 natural colours. Those words : ' The consolidation 
 of the Union : ' sprang up. She had a dim remem- 
 brance of words ensuing : • ceremonies going at a 
 funeral pace ... on the highway to the solidest kind 
 of union : ' — Yes, he wrote : ' I leave you to . . .' And 
 Captain Philip showed her the letter ! 
 
 She perceived motives beginning to stir. He must 
 have had his intention : and now as to his character! 
 — Jane was of the order of young women possessing 
 active minds instead of figured paste-board fronts, 
 who see what there is to be seen about them and know 
 what may be known instead of decorously waiting for 
 the astonishment of revelations. As soon as she had 
 asked herself the nature of the design of so honour- 
 able a man as Captain Philip in showing her his 
 cousin's letter, her blood spun round and round, 
 waving the reply as a torch ; and the question of his 
 character confirmed it. 
 
 But could he be imagined seeking to put her on her 
 guard? There may be modesty in men well aware of 
 their personal attractions : they can credit individual 
 women with powers of resistance. He was not vain 
 to the degree which stupefies the sense of there being 
 weight or wisdom in others. And he was honour's 
 244 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 own. By these lights of his character she read the chapter 
 act. His intention was . . . and even while she saw mars 
 it accurately, the moment of keen perception was convalescent 
 overclouded by her innate distrust of her claim to 
 feminine charms. For why should he wish her to 
 understand that he was no fortune-hunter and treated 
 heiresses with greater reserve than ordinary women ! 
 How could it matter to him ? — She saw the tears roll. 
 Tears of men sink plummet-deep ; they find their 
 level. The tears of such a man have more of blood 
 than of water in them. — What was she doing when 
 they fell? She was shading his head from the sun. 
 What, then, if those tears came of the repressed desire 
 to thank her with some little warmth. He was 
 honour's own, and warm-hearted Patrick talked of him 
 as a friend whose heart was his friend's. Thrilling to 
 kindness, and, poor soul ! helpless to escape it, he felt 
 perhaps that he had never thanked her, and could not. 
 He lay there, weak and tongue-tied : hence those two 
 bright volumes of his condition of weakness. 
 
 So the pursuit of the mystery ended, as it had com- 
 menced, in confusion, but of a milder sort and partially 
 transparent at one or two of the gates she had touched. 
 A mind capable of seeing was twisted by a nature that 
 would not allow of open eyes ; yet the laden emotions 
 of her nature brought her round by another channel 
 to the stage neighbouring sight, where facts, dimly 
 recognised for such as they may be in truth, are 
 accepted under their disguises, because disguise of 
 them is needed by the bashful spirit which accuses 
 itself of audaciousness in presuming to speculate. 
 Had she asked herself the reason of her extended 
 speculation, her foot would not have stopped more 
 
 245 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER abruptly on the edge of a torrent than she on that 
 ^^^^ strange road of vapours and flying lights. She did 
 Convalescent not ; she sang, she sent her voice through the woods 
 and took the splendid ring of it for an assurance of 
 her peculiarly unshackled state. She loved this liberty. 
 Of the men who had ' done her the honour,' not one 
 had moved her to regret the refusal. She lived in the 
 hope of simply doing good, and could only give her 
 hand to a man able to direct and help her ; one who 
 would bear to be matched with her brother. Who 
 was he ? Not discoverable ; not likely to be. 
 
 Therefore she had her freedom, an absolutely un- 
 flushed freedom, happier than poor Grace Barrow's. 
 Rumour spoke of Emma Colesworth having a wing 
 clipped. How is it that sensible women can be so sus- 
 ceptible ? For, thought Jane, the moment a woman is 
 what is called in love, she can give her heart no 
 longer to the innocent things about her; she is cut 
 away from Nature : that pure well-water is tasteless to 
 her. To me it is wine ! 
 
 The drinking of the pure well-water as wine is 
 among the fatal signs of fire in the cup, showing 
 Nature at work rather to enchain the victim than bid 
 her daughter go. Jane of course meant the poet's 
 ' Nature.' She did not reflect that the strong glow of 
 poetic imagination is wanted to hallow a passionate 
 devotion to the inanimate; for this evokes the 
 spiritual ; and passionateness of any kind in narrower 
 brains should be a proclamation to us of sanguine 
 freshets not coming from a spiritual source. But the 
 heart betraying deluded her. She fancied she had not 
 ever been so wedded to Nature as on that walk 
 through the bursting beechwoods, that sweet lonely 
 246 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 walk, perfect in loneliness, where even a thought of a chapter 
 
 XIX 
 
 Mars 
 
 presence was thrust away as a desecration and images 
 
 of souls in thought were shadowy. convalescent 
 
 Her lust of freedom gave her the towering holiday. 
 She took the delirium in her own pure fashion, in a 
 love of the bankside flowers and the downy edges of 
 the young beech-buds fresh on the sprays. And it 
 was no unreal love, though too intent and forcible to 
 win the spirit from the object. She paid for this 
 indulgence of her mood by losing the spirit entirely. 
 At night she was a spent rocket. What had gone she 
 could not tell : her very soul she almost feared. Her 
 glorious walk through the wood seemed burnt out. 
 She struck a light to try her poet on the shelf of the 
 elect of earth by her bed, and she read, and read flat- 
 ness. Not his the fault ! She revered him too deeply 
 to lay it on him. Whose was it ? She had a vision 
 of the gulfs of bondage. 
 
 Could it be possible that human persons were sub- 
 ject to the spells of persons with tastes, aims, practices, 
 pursuits alien to theirs ? It was a riddle taxing her 
 to solve it for the resistance to a monstrous iniquity 
 of injustice, degrading her conception of our humanity. 
 She attacked it in the abstract, as a volunteer 
 champion of our offended race. And Oh! it could 
 not be. The battle was won without a blow. 
 
 Thereupon came glimpses of the gulfs of bondage, 
 delicious, rose-enfolded, foreign; they were chapters 
 of soft romance, appearing interminable, an endless 
 mystery, an insatiable thirst for the mystery. She 
 heard crashes of the opera-melody, and despising it 
 even more than the wretched engine of the harshness, 
 she was led by it, tyrannically led a captive, like the 
 
 247 
 
CELT AND SAXON 
 
 CHAPTER organ-monkey, until perforce she usurped the note, 
 ^'^ sounded the cloying tune through her frame, passed 
 Convalescent into the Vulgar sugariness, lost herself. 
 
 And saying to herself: This is what moves them! 
 she was moved. One thrill of appreciation drew her 
 on the tide, and once drawn from shore she became 
 submerged. Why am I not beautiful, was her thought. 
 Those voluptuous modulations of melting airs are the 
 natural clothing of beautiful women. Beautiful women 
 may believe themselves beloved. They are privileged 
 to believe, they are born with the faith. 
 
 Printed by T. and A. Constable, Printers to His Majesty 
 at the Edinburgh University Press 
 
THE WORKS OF 
 
 GEORGE MEREDITH 
 
 VOLUME XXXV 
 
 LONDON 
 
 CONSTABLE AND COMPANY LTD 
 
 10 ORANGE STREET, LEICESTER SQUARE 
 
 1911