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CHAPTER XVII.
The Irish year is almost as full of holidays as the Italian one; and from the same cause—the arrangements of the Roman Church. To work during any of these tabooed portions of time is a venial sin, only expiated by penance imposed after confession. No matter how favourable the weather for seed-time or reaping, (in a climate proverbially fickle,) the peasant dares not use spade or sickle on Lady-day in spring, or Lady-day in harvest, or a score of other equally sacred seasons; whereas, if the Sabbath happens to suit for saving hay or stacking oats or pitting potatoes, he takes God’s day without a thought of wrong. In fact, any secular employment is right for him after he “has got mass” on a Sunday.
On such an idle saint’s day, occuring not long after the outrage on poor Colman the fisherman, several of his relatives had gathered to his cabin for a talk. It was avowedly a council of persuasion, to induce him to give up his Testament and submit to the priest. But during his illness that book had become dearer to him than ever. The Manuscript Man had been almost constantly with him, administering balm from the word Divine. He had been given grace to recieve it as the very mind of God his heavenly Father; he was percieving somewhat of the goodness and glory of Jesus Christ our Lord. Angry feelings had died away; the “power of an endless life” was beginning to govern his soul.
And so Colman was tolerably steadfast against the assaults of his relations. They had all been coming to see him, off and on, some coaxing, some disposed to threaten, and the women apt to cry. It did not conduce to his recovery from the low fever which had siezed him. But at last he was better; so much better as to be sitting outside his cabin on a rushen chair, while his visitors assumed various positions of ease on the earthen fence of the haggart and on the grass beside it.
“Them potatoes is flowerin’ nicely,” remarked a brother-in-law, looking down upon the ridges. “I’m tould that Protestant Phil found some spots afther the misty night last week.”
This was a subject of such interest that every one had an opinion or a rumor.
“At all events ‘tis no matter to Pat Colman if the blight comes itself; he’s purvided for, be all accounts,” said the brother-in-law, turning round from his inspection of the rude little garden.
“Why, then, how’s that?” asked the weakened voice of the fisherman.
“Come now, Pat, honor bright,” and he winked at the rest with a jocular expression of face, “tell us how much the Major’s givin’ you for turnin’ souper?”
“Never did the Major spake a single word to me,” was the answer: “an’ I’m as sure he won’t gie me the value of a brass farden.”
“And I’m tould he gev orders for a fine stout canoe to be built at Foley’s, in Roonard; an’ what’s more, I hear yer to have the cabin rint-free for evermore.”
“Don’t b’lieve a word of it. The Major isn’t a briber of that sort;” yet without doubt the mention of a new canoe stirred a pleasurable emotion in the poor man’s mind. “An’ to show you it’s not true about the rent, I can show you my restate (reciept) up to last Lady-day itself; for not knowin’ what might happen, afther we got the money for the bream, Katty added it to the little we had, an’ went to the agint at once.”
“Troth an’ ye wor the fool,” quoth the brother-in-law, with a short laugh; “an’ it’s I that wouldn’t pay a gale of rint till the very day an’ hour I couldn’t help it no longer. It’s next November I’ll be thinkin’ of makin’ up what’s due to last Lady-day in spring, an’ no sooner, I promise you; nor then itself, only for ‘fraid I’d be turned out.”
All present seemed to think this declaration quite right; there was only one dissentient voice.
“Well, I’ve read in the book, ‘owe no man any thin’;’ an why shouldn’ that mane the landlord?” asked Colman.
“O, no wondher the Major give the Bible to his tinants, if it wud make ‘em like to pay the rint,” observed the other, dislodging a pebble with his iron heel. “Troth an’ ‘twould be a mighty strong book would have that effect on meself, I’m thinkin’;” and there followed a general laugh.
“It tells you to do every thin’ that’s right,” said Colman. “Sure, John, it’s purely dishonest to keep back what’s due whin you have the manes of payin’—“
“Dishonest, mor-yah!” repeated his brother-in-law, in a tone which lent the utmost scorn to the latter untranslateable interjection, expressive of contemptuous doubt that the foregoing speaker is sincere. “Rints is robbery, that’s the whole of it; an’ I’ll be bound Father Peter puts no pinance worth mintionin’ for any little lies or dodges against the landlord. He knows the differ, does his reverence.”
Yes, for there exists in the Church of Rome a science called casuistry, which may be briefly defined as the art of doing what one likes in defiance of the Ten Commandments, and of graduating away the shades of sin till no guilt remains. And especially has this science committed havoc on the first principles of honesty.
“But we weren’t spakin’ of landlords,” said a man, who had lit his pipe, and sat on the wall, clasping one stalwart leg stockinged in iron-gray hose and knee-bands with yellow bone-buttons. “I’m married to yer mother’s first cousin, Pat, an’ has a right to see you don’t disgrace a dacent name that was always well thought of in the counthry-side by going afther these jumpers.”
“Sure, I’m goin’ afther nothin’ an’ nobody,” said poor Colman, in reply to this authoritative appeal. “I’m only for doin’ what our blessed Saviour himself tould us to to do—searchin’ the Scriptures.”
“Pat,” asked his sister, who was sitting in the grass with a baby in her arms, “just tell me that one thing isn’t thrue. I heerd yisterday you’ve given up prayin’ wid the padhereens, an’ that you say they’re no manner of good. The blessed beads our mother an’ all our people used always!”
“Look here, Biddy. Supposin’ this child o’ mine”—a little fellow that was playing about his knees—“wanted a piece o’ bread, or a drink o’ milk, an’ come to me bein’ his father, an’ he never axed me for it at all, only repeated a lot of gibberish—“
“O yarra,” exclaimed the woman, who had followed the illustration perfectly, “he’s maning to call the holy languige of the beads gibberish!”
“An’ a blessed friar tould me,” put in another elder woman with a round, simple face, who stood by the fence with her hands folded under he blue check apron, “that the Latin was pleasant in the ears of the Virgin and the saints, because bad spirits don’t understand a word of it, an’ so they can’t stop our prayers.”
“Houl’ yer tongue, Joney,” said the smoker peremptorily, in virtue of his conjugal relation. “Women don’t know nothin’.”
“Or if you wanted a thing from yer landlord (as we was spakin’ o’ landlords awhile ago,) you’d take good care to put it in plain sinsible talk, an’ be quite sure what you wor sayin’,” added Colman. “An’ my book tells me God is a spirit, an’ it’s in our soul and heart we must pray to him an’ worship him, as well as with our words; for he sees into the depth of our heart.”
“There never was a souper yet couldn’t argufy the world an’ all,” observed a man who leaned against the cabin wall, with his hands (and nothing else) in his pockets—Colman’s brother. “But the long an’ short of it is, as I was sayin’ to you before, Pat, you’ll draw down the curse of his reverence if you hould on in ways he don’t like. An’ sure he could turn you into a goat, save the mark!”
The woman with the round, simple face uttered a little scream.
“Come now, Tom,” said Colman, “you don’t b’lieve that, an’ don’t talk nonsense.”
“Well, he’ll darken your life for you so that none of us’ll daur spake to you, or to Katty aither; he’ll make you like a dead man, without kith or kin; an’ what’ll the childher do?”
The sister with the baby began to cry, and rock herself to and fro.
“Haven’t you suffered enough about it?” continued Tom Colman, warming with the subject, and throwing out his fist with an energetic gesture. “Didn’t I see yer little canoe broke in bits before my two eyes, in a manner? To be sure I wasn’t there exactly that minnit whin the boats was blessin’, but sure I see the pitiful remains.”
“An’ ‘tisn’t only himself he’ll destroy,” said a more distant connection in a red cloak, putting her apron to her eyes; “but all his folk an’ family, an’ every one has the misfortin’ to belong to him. Didn’t Bartle say to me only this mornin’, ‘You must go up yerself,’ ses he, ‘as his wife’s yer own second cousin be the father’s side; but don’t ask me to go next nor hear that reprobate of a turncoat, ses he.”
“I’m much obliged to Bartle,” said Colman feeling thoroughly badgered. “Boys, ye needn’t be at me, for I’ve made up my mind it’s better to please Almighty God than any man. An’ Katty thinks the same with me. Katty, woman, where are you? Come out here awhile.”
She was pursuing her ordinary household work indoors; the women had given her no encouragement to sit outside with them in the sunshine; they had already contrived to make her feel like a pariah, in the numerous little ways that women can. Now she came forth with a pale, but composed face, to stand beside her husband, and be his helpmeet.
“Yes, me an’ Pat thinks the same,” she said quietly.
“Then you wants to earn the curse for your innocent childhur, you onnat’ral woman,” began the gentle cousin in the red cloak. “I’m ashamed o’ you, Katty. I expected somethin’ better from a girl of the Foleys. The idee of backin’ up Pat Colman in his headsthrongness, instead of showin’ a proper regard for him by bein’ stiff an’ stout for yer Church—“
And more of the same sort; to which Katty answered not a word, though she could not help shedding tears.
“Mrs. Bartle,” said Katty’s husband, raising himself in the rushen chair, “I might tell you to keep yer scoldin’ for home, an’ not be vexin’ them that never wanted to vex you.”
It was all in a neighbourly way, and as being one of the family, Mrs. Bartle affirmed; but the end of the episode was that she marched away with much dignity, declaring she washed her hands out of them and their concerns. Not a bad way of getting rid of sinking people. At a little distance on the road she passed the Manuscript Man, accompanied by young Cormac Cullen, and deigned not to return his civil salutation.
“Now, Cormac, that straw shows how the wind blows. An’ yer not afeard to walk wid me?”
“All bigotry,” said the young schoolmaster, who had come out from Roonard to spend his holiday ostensibly with his own people; but somehow he was mightily attracted to the cabin of the Manuscript Man. “It’s all bigotry and uneducated narrowness.”
“But sure his reverence, that sets it all goin’, is educated out o’ measure,” Clare, for whom the very word “college” had a mysterious charm. “No, no, Cormac, it’s not learnin’, but a spirit like the Lord they want. If once they knew the book they wouldn’t bear it an enmity, but love it as the very lamp of God.”
Cormac in his secret soul thought his friend an enthusiast; all religions seemed much the same to the young fellow’s nascent secularism and half-taught intellect. This natural rebound from the superstitions of Romanism takes place in Ireland, as in other popish countries.
“I wish it was a lamp unto your feet, Cormac.” The eyes of the Manuscript Man rested wistfully upon his companion. “All the learnin’ wont do when we have to die; an’ then it’s a grand thing to know about Him who abolished death.”
The impression made by the first verse of the Bible he ever heard had never faded.
“You don’t read the Irish—more’s the pity; but I’ve a ‘construer’ now.” Thus the English Testaments are called by those who are scholars enough to find advantage and pleasure from comparison of the two versions. “I’ll lend it to you, Cormac, if you’ll read it careful.”
And though the young man said he had read it before, he was fain to accept the loan.
“There’s ways an’ ways of readin’ it,” observed Clare. “There’s readin’ wid the eyes, wid the mind, an’ wid the heart—that’s the way to get good from it, Cormac.”
And he went on to talk of what it had been and was to himself—his soul’s light and comforter. But ere an hour passed Cormac was to distinguish himself on the side of the Bible in an unlooked-for manner, and thus it happened:
Near her own house in Rienvella Mrs. Bartle met with Devlin the clerk, and gave him a high-coloured version of what was going on at Colman’s. He turned his feet thither, with a view of reporting matters to his master; but when he arrived was not well pleased to see Clare before him.
The Manuscript Man had brought Colman a piece of good news: that some of the neighbouring gentlemen, disapproving of the violence to which he had been subjected for conscience’ sake, had subscribed the money to buy him a new canoe.
“Didn’t I tell you I heard it was buildin’ at Roonard?” exclaimed his brother-in-law, with a revulsion of feelings in Colman’s favour. if the gentry were going to take up the renegade, why, it might as well be fair-spoken with him.
But the poor fisherman thought not of the human instrumentality of the gift. He rose up, lifted the old straw hat from his head, and thanked God aloud, while tears ran down his wasted cheeks; and as for Katty, she sobbed unrestrainedly, sitting on the ground.
It was during this pleasing excitement from this intelligence that Devlin the clerk made his appearance, and heard the news also. “Why, then, long life to the Major. But sure we all know he’d make up to you the throuble he’d brought you into himself,” observed Devlin. “An’ indeed, Pat Colman, whatever you may think o’ me, an’ that I left you in the lurch that day o’ blessing the boats, I come now wid a friendly heart to give you a friendly warnin’.”
“Thank you kindly,” responded the fisherman.
“I am in dread Father Devenish is gettin’ mad entirely about this,” continued Devlin, drawing nearer, “for I hear him talkin’ of givin’ out three days’ devotions to the Blessed Heart of the Virgin Mary against heresy. An’ there’s no knowing what he’ll do, afther that.”
“I’m afeard I can’t say other than I said before,” answered Colman.
A discussion about the Bible followed, in which the Manuscript Man bore chief part. The Irish peasant delights in debate and controversy; his quick intelligence sees the main points, and appreciates a clever argument keenly. Devlin (who had private designs on the priesthood) had been making himself up on the Protestant controversy, and presently brought in an argument which silenced even Clare.
“Where do the Protestants get their Bible at all? Isn’t it from the Catholic Church, that’s ages older than the Protestant? An’ if so, isn’t it right the Church should interpret it?”
The Manuscript Man shook his dissatisfied head, but had nothing to say in answer: he was out of his depth. His antagonist indulged in some remarks of a slightly triumphal nature. “The Church has charge of the Bible, that’s the fact. It’s for her to say who’s to read it, and who’s to not, an’ what’s the manin’ of it when it’s read. An’ I defy all the Protestants from this to Jericho—“
“Easy, Mr. Devlin,” said a voice which had not spoken before. “I am no Protestant; but, just for argument’s sake, I’ll show you how fallacious is your reasoning.”
The parish-clerk did not look at all pleased at this fresh importation into the controversy, as he met the clear eyes from under Cormac Cullen’s square brows.
“You might just as well say that none but the Jews were to explain the Old Testament, since it was from them we got it.”
This was the gist of the defeat which rankled so sorely in Mr. Devlin’s memory that he reported Cormac Cullen to his master as becoming a “swaddler” also. While the conversation set Cormac on studying the Bible and its evidences as he had never done before.
