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Title: The Irish Penny Journal, Vol. 1 No. 21, November 21, 1840

Author: Various

Release date: March 20, 2017 [eBook #54396]

Language: English

Credits: Produced by Brownfox and the Online Distributed Proofreading
        Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from
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                        THE IRISH PENNY JOURNAL.

      NUMBER 21.       SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 21, 1840.       VOLUME I.

[Illustration: THE SOUND AND ISLAND OF DALKEY, COUNTY OF DUBLIN.]

The little rocky island of Dalkey forms the south-eastern extremity of
the Bay of Dublin, as the bold and nearly insulated promontory of Howth
forms its north-eastern termination. It is separated from the mainland of
the parish from which it takes, or to which, perhaps, it gives its name,
by a channel called Dalkey Sound, which is about nine hundred yards long,
three hundred and eight yards wide at its south entrance, and two hundred
and nine yards wide at its north entrance; the soundings in mid-channel
varying from ten to five fathoms. This channel was anciently considered
a tolerably safe and convenient harbour, and was the principal anchorage
for ships frequenting the little castellated seaport town of Dalkey, from
which merchandise was transferred to Dublin, as well by boats as by cars.
Hence also the harbour of Dalkey was frequently used in former times on
state occasions for the embarkation or landing of the Irish viceroys and
other state officers. The Lord Deputy Philip de Courtney landed here
in 1386, and Sir John Stanley, the deputy of the Marquis of Dublin, in
the following year. In 1414, Sir John Talbot, then Lord Furnival, and
afterwards the renowned Earl of Shrewsbury, landed here as Viceroy of
Ireland; and in 1488, Sir Richard Edgecombe embarked at this harbour
for England, after having taken the homage and oaths of fidelity of the
nobility who had espoused the cause of Lambert Simnel. Here also landed
Sir Edward Bellingham, Lord-Lieutenant in 1548, and Sir Anthony St Leger
in 1553; and it was from this harbour that the Earl of Sussex, in 1558,
embarked a large body of forces to oppose the Scottish invaders at the
isle of Rathlin; and lastly, again, it was here that the unfortunate Sir
John Perrot landed as viceroy in 1584. The conversion of this sound into
an asylum harbour was at one time contemplated by government, and a plan
for the purpose was proposed by the Committee of Inland Navigation; but
from certain objections which were made to it, the project was abandoned.
The situation would certainly have been a more imposing and magnificent
one than that ultimately chosen.

The island of Dalkey is of a nearly oval form, having a very irregular
surface, in part rocky, and in part consisting of a fertile salt marsh,
very valuable for the cure of sick cattle, who by feeding on it quickly
recover and fatten. It is five hundred and twenty-eight yards long from
north to south, and three hundred and eight yards wide from east to west,
and comprises about twenty-nine acres of pasture. Its shore is rocky,
and in some parts precipitous, and it commands the most beautiful views
of the bays of Dublin and Killiney. Among several springs of fresh water
on it, one on its south-west side has long been considered to possess
sanative properties, and was formerly much resorted to for the cure of
scurvy and other diseases. On the same side there are the roofless walls
of an ancient church dedicated to St Benet or Benedict, the patron of
the parish; and at its south-eastern extremity there is a battery, and a
Martello tower which differs from all the other structures of this class
erected on the Irish coast, in having its entrance not at the side but
on its top. It is traditionally stated that during the remarkable plague
which visited Dublin in 1575, many of the citizens fled to this island
for safety.

Dalkey island has several smaller ones contiguous to it, one of which,
denominated Lamb Island, is covered with grass, while the others present
a surface of bare granite. Of the latter islets one is called Clare Rock,
and another the Maiden Rock, an appellation derived from a tradition said
to be of twelve hundred years’ antiquity, that twelve young maidens from
Bullock and Dalkey having gone over to this rock to gather _duilisk_,
they were overtaken by a sudden storm so violent as to prohibit
assistance from the larger island, and all miserably perished. To the
north of these islands is situated the group of rocks called the Muglins,
extending one hundred and thirty-two yards in length, and seventy-one in
width. On those rocks, in 1765, the pirates Mac Kinley and Gidley were
hanged in chains for the murder of Captain Glass.

Most of the features we have thus noticed, together with a portion of the
adjacent shore of the bay, are exhibited in our prefixed illustration;
and to the older citizens of our metropolis, as well as to many others of
our countrymen, they must, we think, awaken many stirring recollections
of the striking changes in the appearance of the scenery in many
districts adjacent to the city, as well as in the character of the
citizens themselves, which have taken place within the present century.
It does not, indeed, require a very great age for any of us Dublinians
to remember when the country along the southern shore of our beautiful
bay, from Dunleary to the land’s-end on Dalkey common, presented a
nearly uniform character of wildness and solitude--heathy grounds,
broken only by masses of granite rocks, and tufts of blossomy furse,
without culture, and, except in the little walled villages of Bullock
and Dalkey, almost uninhabited. The district known as the Commons of
Dalkey, which extended from the village to the eastern extremity of the
bay, “the Sound,” or channel lying on its north-east, and the rocky hill
of Dalkey on its south--this in particular was a locality of singularly
romantic beauty, a creation of nature in her most sportive mood, and
wholly untouched, as it would appear, by the hand of man. Giant masses of
granite rocks, sometimes forming detached groups, and at others arranged
into semicircular and even circular ledges, gave the greatest variety and
inequalities of surface, and formed numerous dells of the greenest sward,
so singularly wild and secluded that the elves themselves might justly
claim them as their own. To these natural features should be added those
of the rocky iron-bound coast, with its little coves, commanding from its
cliffs the most delightful views of Killiney Bay, the Sound, the Island
of Dalkey, and the Bay of Dublin. These latter features still remain,
and can never change; but of all the others which we have noticed, what
is there left? Scarcely a vestige that would remind the spectator of
what the locality had been. The rocks have been nearly all removed, or
converted into building materials for an assemblage of houses of all
kinds of fantastic construction, surrounded for the most part by high and
unsightly stone walls; and, except in the views obtained from some spots
in it, the picturesque beauty of Dalkey common is gone for ever.

The common of Dalkey is now a place of life--a suburb, as we might
say, of the city; but at the period to which we have alluded, it was
ordinarily a scene of the most desert solitude. A few cottages stretching
from the village along its southern boundary, and a solitary cabin
originally built by miners, and which still remains, were the only
habitations to be seen. But though thus uninhabited, it was not at all
times a scene of loneliness. On Sundays and other holidays its rocks and
dells were peopled with numerous pic-nic or sod parties of the middle
class of the citizens. The song went round, and the echoes were startled
by the merry notes of the fiddle or the flute, to which the several
groups of happy dancers footed the Irish jig and country dance. Nor
were such pic-nics confined exclusively to the citizens of the middle
class--the sporters of jaunting cars and jingles. Parties of the higher
ranks occasionally assembled here on week days, and had their rural fetes
on a larger and more magnificent scale. It was our own good fortune to be
an invited guest to one of these, of which we may be permitted to give
some account, as an example of a state of manners and usages of society
in Ireland now no longer to be found in persons of the class to which we
refer. It was a pic-nic party given by the Alexanders, the Armits, and
the present popular and deservedly honoured veteran the Commander of the
Forces in Ireland--then lieutenant-colonel of the 18th or Royal Irish
Fusileers, which were at the time quartered in Dublin. On the morning of
as beautiful a day in June as ever came, the inhabitants of the leading
thoroughfares of the city, and those along the road side from Dublin to
Dunleary, were surprised by the unusual crowds of open carriages of all
kinds conveying the youth and beauty of the aristocracy of the metropolis
to the chosen scene; and when the fine band of the Fusileers, in their
magnificent full-dress uniforms of blue and gold, were seen to pass along
on the same route, innumerable parties of the inferior ranks of the
inhabitants of the city and south-eastern suburbs were hastily formed to
follow in their wake. At noon, or a little after, not only the majority
of the original party were assembled in a beautiful and extensive
green amphitheatre, surrounded by rocky cliffs, but those cliffs were
themselves covered by a crowd of smaller parties--tributary stars around
the more splendid galaxy that occupied the centre of the brilliant scene.

Two splendid marquees were erected at an early hour in the morning--one
for the accommodation of the ladies, the other for the dinner party; and
two beautiful pleasure-yachts which conveyed a portion of the invited
to the scene, rested at anchor in the Sound, and with their white sails
and coloured streamers contributed their share of life and beauty to the
landscape. Let the reader then imagine what a spectacle was presented
when the groups of quadrille-dancers--the beauty and gallantry of the
metropolis and its vicinity--commenced dancing on the greensward to the
music of one of the finest of military bands--what a delight to the happy
multitude of spectators who looked on at the graceful and tempered gaiety
of high life! The mind of the accomplished painter Watteau, in his finest
pictures of the _fetes champetres_ of the French, never conceived any
thing so exquisitely beautiful and romantic.

This party did not disperse till after sunset. After an early dinner,
dancing was again resumed; and it is worthy of remark that throughout
the day there was not a single instance of rudeness or indecorum on the
part of the uninvited spectators--no attempt even to approach beyond the
natural rocky boundary which they had chosen for themselves--and that
the festivities were concluded with mutual pleasure to all the parties
who had participated in them. Alas! of the gay party then assembled--the
gentle maidens in all the bloom of youthful beauty, the frank young
soldiers, the men of fortune, the delighted parents--of all these how
many now lie low! More, reader, than you could possibly imagine! Nor can
we avoid exclaiming again, alas that such scenes of rational pleasure, in
which the higher and the humbler classes came together in healthful and
innocent enjoyment, are not now to be seen in our country as they were
heretofore!

But while our memory with changeful feelings of pleasure and of pain
fondly lingers on the brilliant scene we have attempted to sketch, we
must not forget that our subject requires of us a notice of festivities
of a very different character of which Dalkey was in former times the
scene--when Dublin and its suburbs poured forth their crowds to enjoy
the fun and drolleries of the crowning of Dalkey’s insular king!--when
Dalkey, its Common, its Sound, and its Island, on a June day annually
for several years, presented a spectacle of life, gaiety, good-humour,
and enjoyment, such perhaps as was rarely ever exhibited elsewhere.
What a glorious day was this for the Dunleary, Bullock, and Dalkey
boatmen! Generous fellows! they would take over his majesty’s lieges
to his empire for almost nothing--frequently for nothing; but, being
determined enemies to absenteeism, they would not allow them to depart
on the same terms, but would mulct those with taxes _ad libitum_ who
desired to abandon their country. And again, what a glorious day was
this for the jingle-drivers of the Blackrock, the noddy-drivers, and the
drivers of all other sorts of hired carriages in Dublin! Has it never
occurred to the Railroad people to revive these forgotten frolics? What
a harvest they might reap! But what do we say? The thing is impossible.
The mirthful temperament, the thoughtless gaiety, the wit and humour
that characterised the citizens in those days, are gone for ever. The
Dublinians have become a grave, thoughtful, and serious people--we had
almost said, a dull one. Their faces no longer wear a cheerful and happy
look; the very youths of our metropolis seem to be ignorant of what
merriment is, or at best to suppose that it consists in puffing tobacco
smoke!

Ah! very different were the notions of their predecessors, the nobility
and gentry of his Majesty the King of Dalkey! Smoking would not at all
have suited their mercurial temperament: it would have been the last
thing that they would have thought of to have had their tongues tied and
their mouths contorted into ugliness in the ridiculously serious effort
to hold a cigar between the lips, and look absurdly important! These
fellows thought that mouths were given for a very different purpose--to
sing the manly song, to throw forth, not clouds of tobacco smoke, but
flashes of wit and humour; and we are inclined to think they were right.

We are not about to describe the annual ceremony of the coronation of the
Dalkey king, though we should gladly do so if we had the power, for the
memory of it, as an interesting illustration of the character of Irish
society in days not very remote, should not be allowed to die. We have
indeed been an eye-witness of some of these brilliant follies, but we
were young at the time, and our memory only retains a general impression
of them. We can recollect that the green island figured in our woodcut,
as well as the common, presented one mass of living beings, gaily dressed
and arranged into groups of happy parties, each with its own musicians.
We can recollect also that the dress of the ladies was almost invariably
white, with green silk bonnets--a costume that gave a singularly
brilliant effect to the scene. A large marquee was erected about the
centre of the island for the use of his Majesty and attendant nobles, and
a cordon was drawn around it, within which none others were permitted to
enter. There was a military band in attendance upon the royal party; and
while the noblemen and ladies of the court danced upon the sod within the
bounds, to the music of the state minstrels, the subjects of the monarch
danced outside.

But these were only the evening festivities. The day was devoted to
graver purposes--the landing of his Majesty and nobles from the royal
barge under a salute of twenty-one guns, the band playing “God save
the King,” and the assembled multitude rending the air with their
acclamations! Then the ceremony of his coronation, and afterwards
his journey through his dominions, attended by his nobles! At an
early hour the monarch with his court proceeded in ludicrously solemn
procession from the palace to the church--the roofless ruin figured in
our cut--in which the ceremony was performed with a mock gravity which
was, however thoughtlessly profane, still irresistibly humorous. The
nobles, with painted faces and a profuse display of stars and ribbons,
had their titles and appropriate badges of office. There was the grand
chamberlain, with his bunch of old rusty keys--the archbishop with his
paper mitre and his natural beard of a month’s growth! The very titles
of these great personages were conferred in a spirit of drollery, and
made characteristic of the peculiarities of the individuals who bore
them. Thus there was a Lord of Ireland’s-eye--a grave-looking gentleman
who had lost one of his visual organs; a Lord Posey--a gentleman who
was remarkable for his habit of carrying a bunch of flowers at his
breast; and so on. All the nobility were wits, orators, and generally
first-rate vocalists, and the royal visitors were similarly gifted.
Charles Incledon, the prince of ballad-singers of his time, here sang his
“Black-eyed Susan” and other charming ditties, and John Philpot Curran,
the greatest wit of the world, set the table in a roar with his meteor
flashes. But the prime spirits of the court were his Majesty himself,
Stephen Armitage, his Lord High Admiral Luke Cassidy, and his archbishop
---- Gillespy. The long coronation sermon of the latter was one of the
richest treats of the day, and produced effects such as sermon never
produced before.

During this august and imposing ceremony, the church was not only
crowded to excess, and its ruined walls covered with human beings, but
it was also surrounded with a dense mass of anxious listeners. As to his
Majesty himself, he was at times the gravest and at times the merriest
of monarchs, much of his humour consisting in the whimsical uncertainty
of his movements, for there never was a crowned head more capricious
or changeable in disposition than the King of Dalkey. He would set
out attended by his court on a journey to some distant region of his
dominions, change his mind in a minute and alter his route elsewhere, and
again change it within a few minutes; and all these mutations of purpose
were most loyally approved of and sympathised in by his majesty’s nobles
and subjects. Another trait in King Stephen’s character was his love for
song; and when the word ran through his empire that at the royal banquet
his majesty had commenced or was about to commence his favourite “Love is
my passion and glory,” there was scarcely one of his subjects, male or
female, who did not make a rush to get within earshot of him. Peace be
with thee, Stephen! thou wert a king “of infinite jest, of most excellent
fancy;” and though thy reign was short and thy dominions small, thou
madest more of thy subjects truly happy than many monarchs whose reigns
were as much longer as their possessions were more extensive!

Imperfect as these recollections of the Dalkey festivities are, they will
perhaps convey to many who have not hitherto heard of them some slight
idea of their character; and they will, we trust, excite some surviving
actor in them to preserve their memory in a fuller and more graphic
record. They were, it will be seen, a sort of extemporaneous acted drama
of the Tom Thumb kind, admirably preserving the unities of time and
place--the time being one day, and the place--his majesty’s empire! As to
the theatre on which it was acted, it was most admirably adapted for the
spectacle, and had the most abundant accommodation for the audience. The
scenery too was real scenery--not painted canvass, that required distance
to give it the effect of reality: the greensward, the blue sky and bluer
sea, the rocky islands, the distant hills and mountains, were painted
by the hand of the greatest of all Artists; and the theatre, instead of
miserable foot-lights, had its illumination from the glorious sun, the
greatest of all His visible works!

It may be supposed that these annual festivities must have been
productive of scenes of drunkenness and quarrelling, and we cannot state
of our own knowledge whether they were so or not: but we have been
informed that they did not lead to such results; and the statement would
seem true, from the fact that no accident ever occurred to any of those
engaged in them--a singular circumstance, if we consider the dangers to
which so many persons were exposed in consequence of having to cross the
sound in crowded boats at a late hour in the evening.

                                                                       P.

       *       *       *       *       *

It was not till after the preceding article had been in type that we were
informed that a notice of the Dalkey festivities had recently appeared
in the preface to the first volume of the beautiful edition of the poems
of our own national poet, Moore, just published; and as it adds some
interesting facts to those furnished by our own recollections, we gladly
present them to our readers, in the perfect confidence that they will be
read with that intense pleasure which his writings have rarely failed to
afford.

“It was in the year 1794, or about the beginning of the next, that I
remember having for the first time tried my hand at political satire. In
their very worst times of slavery and suffering the happy disposition of
my countrymen had kept their cheerfulness still unbroken and buoyant;
and at the period of which I am speaking the hope of a brighter day
dawning upon Ireland had given to the society of the middle class in
Dublin a more than usual flow of hilarity and life. Among other gay
results of this festive spirit, a club or society was instituted by some
of our most convivial citizens, one of whose objects was to burlesque,
good-humouredly, the forms and pomps of royalty. With this view they
established a sort of mock kingdom, of which Dalkey, a small island
near Dublin, was made the seat; and an eminent pawnbroker named Stephen
Armitage, much renowned for his agreeable singing, was the chosen and
popular monarch.

Before public affairs had become too serious for such pastimes, it
was usual to celebrate yearly at Dalkey the day of this sovereign’s
accession; and among the gay scenes that still live in my memory, there
are few it recalls with more freshness than this celebration on a
fine Sunday in summer of one of these anniversaries of King Stephen’s
coronation. The picturesque sea views of that spot, the gay crowds along
the shores, the innumerable boats full of life floating about, and
above all, the true spirit of mirth which the Irish temperament never
fails to lend to such meetings, rendered the whole a scene not easily
forgotten. The state ceremonies of the day were performed with all due
gravity within the ruins of an ancient church that stands on the island,
where his mock majesty bestowed the order of knighthood upon certain
favoured personages, and among others I recollect upon Incledon the
celebrated singer, who rose from under the touch of the royal sword with
the appropriate title of Sir Charles Melody. There was also selected
for the favours of the crown on that day a lady of no ordinary poetic
talent, Mrs Battier, who had gained much fame by some spirited satires
in the manner of Churchill, and whose kind encouragement of my early
attempts in versification were to me a source of much pride. This lady,
as was officially announced in the course of the day, had been appointed
his Majesty’s Poetess Laureate, under the style and title of Henrietta
Countess of Laurel.

There could hardly be devised a more apt vehicle for lively political
satire than this gay travestie of monarchical power and its showy
appurtenances so temptingly supplied. The very day indeed after this
commemoration there appeared in the usual record of Dalkey state
intelligence, an amusing proclamation from the king, offering a large
reward in _cronebanes_ (Irish halfpence) to the finder or finders of his
Majesty’s crown, which, owing to his ‘having measured both sides of the
road’ in his pedestrian progress from Dalkey on the preceding night, had
unluckily fallen from the royal brow.”




IRISH SUPERSTITIONS--GHOSTS AND FAIRIES.

BY WILLIAM CARLETON.

(First Article.)


We have met and conversed with every possible representative of the
various classes that compose general society, from the sweep to the peer,
and we feel ourselves bound to say that in no instance have we ever met
any individual, no matter what his class or rank in life, who was really
indifferent to the subject of dreams, fairies, and apparitions. They are
topics that interest the imagination in all; and the hoary head of age is
inclined with as much interest to a ghost-story, as the young and eager
ear of youth, wrought up by all the nimble and apprehensive powers of
early fancy. It is true the belief in ghosts is fast disappearing, and
that of fairies is already almost gone; but with what new wonders they
shall be replaced, it is difficult to say. The physical and natural we
suppose will give us enough of the marvellous, without having recourse
to the spiritual and supernatural. Steam and gas, if Science advance for
another half century at the same rate as she has done in the last, will
give sufficient exercise to all our faculties for wondering. We know a
man who travelled eighty miles to see whether or not it was a fact that
light could be conveyed for miles in a pipe under ground; and this man to
our own knowledge possessed the organ of marvellousness to a surprising
degree. It is singular, too, that his fear of ghosts was in proportion to
this capacious propensity to wonder, as was his disposition when snug in
a chimney corner to talk incessantly of such topics as were calculated to
excite it.

In our opinion, ghosts and fairies will be seen wherever they are much
talked of, and a belief in their existence cultivated and nourished.
So long as the powers of the imagination are kept warm and active by
exercise, they will create for themselves such images as they are in the
habit of conceiving or dwelling upon; and these, when the individual
happens to be in the appropriate position, will even by the mere force of
association engender the particular Eidolon which is predominant in the
mind. As an illustration of this I shall mention two cases of apparition
which occurred in my native parish, one of which was that of a ghost, and
the other of the fairies. To those who have read my “Traits and Stories
of the Irish Peasantry,” the first which I shall narrate may possess some
interest, as being that upon which I founded the tale of the “Midnight
Mass.” The circumstances are simply these:--

There lived a man named M’Kenna at the hip of one of the mountainous
hills which divide the county of Tyrone from that of Monaghan. This
M’Kenna had two sons, one of whom was in the habit of tracing hares of
a Sunday, whenever there happened to be a fall of snow. His father it
seems had frequently remonstrated with him upon what he considered to
be a violation of the Lord’s day, as well as for his general neglect of
mass. The young man, however, though otherwise harmless and inoffensive,
was in this matter quite insensible to paternal reproof, and continued to
trace whenever the avocations of labour would allow him. It so happened
that upon a Christmas morning, I think in the year 1814, there was a
deep fall of snow, and young M’Kenna, instead of going to mass, got down
his cock-stick--which is a staff much heavier at one end than at the
other--and prepared to set out on his favourite amusement. His father
seeing this, reproved him seriously, and insisted that he should attend
prayers. His enthusiasm for the sport, however, was stronger than his
love of religion, for he refused to be guided by his father’s advice.
The old man during the altercation got warm; and on finding that the son
obstinately scorned his authority, he knelt down and prayed that if the
boy persisted in following his own will, he might never return from
the mountains unless as a corpse. The imprecation, which was certainly
as harsh as it was impious and senseless, might have startled many a
mind from a purpose which was, to say the least of it, at variance with
religion and the respect due to a father. It had no effect, however, upon
the son, who is said to have replied, that whether he ever returned or
not, he was determined on going; and go accordingly he did. He was not,
however, alone, for it appears that three or four of the neighbouring
young men accompanied him. Whether their sport was good or otherwise, is
not to the purpose, neither am I able to say; but the story goes that
towards the latter part of the day they started a larger and darker hare
than any they had ever seen, and that she kept dodging on before them
bit by bit, leading them to suppose that every succeeding cast of the
cock-stick would bring her down. It was observed afterwards that she
also led them into the recesses of the mountains, and that although they
tried to turn her course homewards, they could not succeed in doing so.
As evening advanced, the companions of M’Kenna began to feel the folly of
pursuing her farther, and to perceive the danger of losing their way in
the mountains should night or a snow-storm come upon them. They therefore
proposed to give over the chase and return home; but M’Kenna would not
hear of it. “If you wish to go home, you may,” said he; “as for me, I’ll
never leave the hills till I have her with me.” They begged and entreated
him to desist and return, but all to no purpose: he appeared to be what
the Scotch call _fey_--that is, to act as if he were moved by some
impulse that leads to death, and from the influence of which a man cannot
withdraw himself. At length, on finding him invincibly obstinate, they
left him pursuing the hare directly into the heart of the mountains, and
returned to their respective homes.

In the mean time, one of the most terrible snow-storms ever remembered
in that part of the country came on, and the consequence was, that the
self-willed young man, who had equally trampled on the sanctions of
religion and parental authority, was given over for lost. As soon as the
tempest became still, the neighbours assembled in a body and proceeded
to look for him. The snow, however, had fallen so heavily that not a
single mark of a footstep could be seen. Nothing but one wide waste of
white undulating hills met the eye wherever it turned, and of M’Kenna no
trace whatever was visible or could be found. His father now remembering
the unnatural character of his imprecation, was nearly distracted;
for although the body had not yet been found, still by every one who
witnessed the sudden rage of the storm and who knew the mountains, escape
or survival was felt to be impossible. Every day for about a week large
parties were out among the hill-ranges seeking him, but to no purpose.
At length there came a thaw, and his body was found on a snow-wreath,
lying in a supine posture within a circle which he had drawn around him
with his cock-stick. His prayer-book lay opened upon his mouth, and his
hat was pulled down so as to cover it and his face. It is unnecessary to
say that the rumour of his death, and of the circumstances under which
he left home, created a most extraordinary sensation in the country--a
sensation that was the greater in proportion to the uncertainty
occasioned by his not having been found either alive or dead. Some
affirmed that he had crossed the mountains, and was seen in Monaghan;
others, that he had been seen in Clones, in Emyvale, in Fivemiletown;
but despite of all these agreeable reports, the melancholy truth was at
length made clear by the appearance of the body as just stated.

Now, it so happened that the house nearest the spot where he lay
was inhabited by a man named Daly, I think--but of the name I am
not certain--who was a herd or care-taker to Dr Porter, then Bishop
of Clogher. The situation of this house was the most lonely and
desolate-looking that could be imagined. It was at least two miles
distant from any human habitation, being surrounded by one wide and
dreary waste of dark moor. By this house lay the route of those who had
found the corpse, and I believe the door was borrowed for the purpose of
conveying it home. Be this as it may, the family witnessed the melancholy
procession as it passed slowly through the mountains, and when the place
and circumstances are all considered, we may admit that to ignorant and
superstitious people, whose minds even under ordinary occasions were
strongly affected by such matters, it was a sight calculated to leave
behind it a deep, if not a terrible impression. Time soon proved that it
did so.

An incident is said to have occurred at the funeral which I have alluded
to in the “Midnight Mass,” and which is certainly in fine keeping with
the wild spirit of the whole melancholy event. When the procession had
advanced to a place called Mullaghtinny, a large dark-coloured hare,
which was instantly recognised, by those who had been out with him on the
hills, as the identical one that led him to his fate, is said to have
crossed the road about twenty yards or so before the coffin. The story
goes, that a man struck it on the side with a stone, and that the blow,
which would have killed any ordinary hare, not only did it no injury, but
occasioned a sound to proceed from the body resembling the hollow one
emitted by an empty barrel when struck.

In the meantime the interment took place, and the sensation began like
every other to die away in the natural progress of time, when, behold,
a report ran about like wildfire that, to use the language of the
people, “Frank M’Kenna was _appearing_!” Seldom indeed was the rumour
of an apparition composed of materials so strongly calculated to win
popular assent or to baffle rational investigation. As every man is not
a Hibbert or a Nicolai, so will many, until such circumstances are made
properly intelligible, continue to yield credence to testimony which
would convince the judgment on any other subject. The case in question
furnished as fine a specimen of a true ghost-story, freed from any
suspicion of imposture or design, as could be submitted to a philosopher;
and yet, notwithstanding the array of apparent facts connected with it,
nothing in the world is simpler or of easier solution.

One night, about a fortnight after his funeral, the daughter of Daly,
the herd, a girl about fourteen, while lying in bed saw what appeared
to be the likeness of M’Kenna, who had been lost. She screamed out, and
covering her head with the bed-clothes, told her father and mother that
Frank M’Kenna was in the house. This alarming intelligence naturally
produced great terror; still, Daly, who notwithstanding his belief in
such matters possessed a good deal of moral courage, was cool enough to
rise and examine the house, which consisted of only one apartment. This
gave the daughter some courage, who, on finding that her father could
not see him, ventured to look out, and she _then_ could see nothing of
him herself. She very soon fell asleep, and her father attributed what
she saw to fear, or some accidental combination of shadows proceeding
from the furniture, for it was a clear moonlight night. The light of
the following day dispelled a great deal of their apprehensions, and
comparatively little was thought of it until evening again advanced, when
the fears of the daughter began to return. They appeared to be prophetic,
for she said when night came that she knew he would appear again; and
accordingly at the same hour he did so. This was repeated for several
successive nights, until the girl, from the very hardihood of terror,
began to become so far familiarised to the spectre as to venture to
address it.

“In the name of God,” she asked, “what is troubling you, or why do you
appear to me instead of to some of your own family or relations?”

The ghost’s answer alone might settle the question involved in the
authenticity of its appearance, being, as it was, an account of one of
the most ludicrous missions that ever a spirit was dispatched upon.

“I’m not allowed,” said he, “to spake to any of my friends, for I parted
wid them in anger; but I’m come to tell you that they are quarrellin’
about my breeches--a new pair that I got made for Christmas day; an’ as
I was comin’ up to thrace in the mountains, I thought the ould ones ’ud
do betther, an’ of coorse I didn’t put the new pair an me. My raison for
appearin’,” he added, “is, that you may tell my friends that none of them
is to wear them--they must be given in charity.”

This serious and solemn intimation from the ghost was duly communicated
to the family, and it was found that the circumstances were exactly as it
had represented them. This of course was considered as sufficient proof
of the truth of its mission. Their conversations now became not only
frequent, but quite friendly and familiar. The girl became a favourite
with the spectre, and the spectre on the other hand soon lost all his
terrors in her eyes. He told her that whilst his friends were bearing
home his body, the handspikes or poles on which they carried him had
cut his back, and _occasioned him great pain_! The cutting of the back
also was found to be true, and strengthened of course the truth and
authenticity of their dialogues. The whole neighbourhood was now in a
commotion with this story of the apparition, and persons incited by
curiosity began to visit the girl in order to satisfy themselves of the
truth of what they had heard. Every thing, however, was corroborated,
and the child herself, without any symptoms of anxiety or terror,
artlessly related her conversations with the spirit. Hitherto their
interviews had been all nocturnal, but now that the ghost found his
footing made good, he put a hardy face on, and ventured to appear by
daylight. The girl also fell into states of syncope, and while the
fits lasted, long conversations with him upon the subject of God, the
blessed Virgin, and Heaven, took place between them. He was certainly
an excellent moralist, and gave the best advice. Swearing, drunkenness,
theft, and every evil propensity of our nature, were declaimed against
with a degree of spectral eloquence quite surprising. Common fame had
now a topic dear to her heart, and, never was a ghost made more of
by his best friends, than she made of him. The whole country was in
a tumult, and I well remember the crowds which flocked to the lonely
little cabin in the mountains, now the scene of matters so interesting
and important. Not a single day passed in which I should think from ten
to twenty, thirty, or fifty persons, were not present at these singular
interviews. Nothing else was talked of, thought of, and, as I can well
testify, dreamt of. I would myself have gone to Daly’s were it not for
a confounded misgiving I had, that perhaps the ghost might take such a
fancy of appearing to me, as he had taken to cultivate an intimacy with
the girl; and it so happens, that when I see the face of an individual
nailed down in the coffin--chilling and gloomy operation!--I experience
no particular wish ever to look upon it again.

Many persons might imagine that the herd’s daughter was acting the part
of an impostor, by first originating and then sustaining such a delusion.
If any one, however, was an impostor, it was the ghost, and not the girl,
as her ill health and wasted cheek might well testify. The appearance of
M’Kenna continued to haunt her for months. The reader is aware that he
was lost on Christmas day, or rather on the night of it, and I remember
seeing her in the early part of the following summer, during which time
she was still the victim of a diseased imagination. Every thing in fact
that could be done for her was done. They brought her to a priest named
Donnelly, who lived down at Ballynasaggart, for the purpose of getting
her cured, as he had the reputation of performing cures of that kind.
They brought her also to the doctors, who also did what they could for
her; but all to no purpose. Her fits were longer and of more frequent
occurrence; her appetite left her; and ere four months had elapsed, she
herself looked as like a spectre as the ghost himself could do for the
life of him.

Now, this was a pure case of spectral illusion, and precisely similar to
that detailed so philosophically by Nicolai the German bookseller, and to
others mentioned by Hibbert. The image of M’Kenna not only appeared to
her in daylight at her own house, but subsequently followed her wherever
she went; and what proved this to have been the result of diseased
organization, produced at first by a heated and excited imagination, was,
that, as the story went, she could see him with her eyes shut. Whilst
this state of mental and physical feeling lasted, she was the subject of
the most intense curiosity. No matter where she went, whether to chapel,
to fair, or to market, she was followed by crowds, every one feeling
eager to get a glimpse of the girl who had actually seen, and what was
more, spoken to a ghost--a live ghost.

Now, here was a young girl of an excitable temperament and large
imagination, leading an almost solitary life amidst scenery of a lonely
and desolate character, who, happening to be strongly impressed with
an image of horror--for surely such was the body of a dead man seen
in association with such peculiarly frightful circumstances as filial
disobedience and a father’s curse were calculated to give it--cannot
shake it off, but on the contrary becomes a victim to the disease which
it generates. There is not an image which we see in a fever, or a face
whether of angel or devil, or an uncouth shape of any kind, that is
not occasioned by cerebral excitement, or derangement of the nervous
system, analogous to that under which Daly’s daughter laboured. I saw
her several times, and remember clearly that her pale face, dark eye,
and very intellectual forehead, gave indications of such a temperament
as under her circumstances would be apt to receive strong and fearful
impressions from images calculated to excite terror, especially of the
supernatural. It only now remains for me to mention the simple method of
her cure, which was effected without either priest or doctor. It depended
upon a word or two of advice given to her father by a very sensible man,
who was in the habit of thinking on these matters somewhat above the
superstitious absurdities of the people.

“If you wish your daughter to be cured,” said he to her father, “leave
the house you are now living in. Take her to some part of the country
where she can have companions of her own class and state of life to
mingle with; bring her away from the place altogether; for you may rest
assured that so long as there are objects before her eyes to remind her
of what happened, she will not mend on your hands.”

The father, although he sat rent free, took this excellent advice, even
at a sacrifice of some comfort: for nothing short of the temptation of
easy circumstances could have induced any man to reside in so wild and
remote a solitude. In the course of a few days he removed from it with
his family, and came to reside amidst the cheerful aspect and enlivening
intercourse of human life. The consequences were precisely as the man
had told him. In the course of a few weeks the little girl began to find
that the visits of the spectre were like those of angels, few and far
between. She was sent to school, and what with the confidence derived
from human society, and the substitution of new objects and images, she
soon perfectly recovered, and ere long was thoroughly set free from the
fearful creation of her own brain.

Now, there is scarcely one of the people in my native parish who does
not believe that the spirit of this man came back to the world, and
actually appeared to this little girl. The time, however, is fast coming
when these empty bugbears will altogether disappear, and we shall
entertain more reverend and becoming notions of God than to suppose such
senseless pranks could be played by the soul of a departed being under
his permission. We might as well assert that the imaginary beings which
surround the couch of the madman or hypochondriac have a real existence,
as those that are conjured up by terror, weak nerves, or impure blood.

The spot where the body of M’Kenna was found is now marked by a little
heap of stones, which has been collected since the melancholy event of
his death. Every person who passes it throws a stone upon the heap; but
why this old custom is practised, or what it means, I do not know, unless
it be simply to mark the spot as a visible means of preserving the memory
of the occurrence.

Daly’s house, the scene of the supposed apparition, is now a shapeless
ruin, which could scarcely be seen were it not for the green spot that
was once a garden, and which now shines at a distance like an emerald,
but with no agreeable or pleasing associations. It is a spot which no
solitary schoolboy will ever visit, nor indeed would the unflinching
believer in the popular nonsense of ghosts wish to pass it without a
companion. It is under any circumstances a gloomy and barren place, but
when looked upon in connection with what we have just recited, it is
lonely, desolate, and awful.




Un Ghrain̄eog.--(THE HEDGEHOG.)


Some twenty years ago it was not unusual in the south of Ireland to
see boys assembled about a fire of straw, loudly exulting over a
flame-surrounded victim, whose attempts to escape, rendered nugatory
by a timid retraction as it were into himself, served but to call
forth louder shouts of triumph from his persecutors, who thought they
justified their savage deed by proclaiming its hapless object as a
witch, a robber of orchards, and a sucker of cows. Leaving to our
antiquarian friends to discover whether the cruel act in question was
not a holocaust originating in the mystic rites of Pagan times, it is
for us to vindicate the wronged, and show the absurdity of the charges
by which wrong has been maintained, and at the same time to indicate
such matter as may serve to direct kindness to that innocent victim of
ignorance, the inoffensive Hedgehog. That it is not a witch according to
the old law, may be proved in a court of justice spite of the popular
opinion and in defiance of the authority of Shakspeare, whose witches
in Macbeth are warned that the proper time had come to commence their
infernal incantations by “thrice and once the hedge-pig whined.” We have
no witness that a hedgehog ever rode a broomstick or vomited knives,
skewers, coals of fire, or any such like legal proofs of witchcraft;
neither, perhaps you exclaim, is the writer of so much nonsense a
witch. True it is that the creature so named has its place nowhere in
the classification of a zoologist, yet still an undefined idea of its
existence floats in the imagination of the most ignorant, and it is not
_extraordinary_ that an opinion once universal should still linger in
unenlightened minds. In no way do we consider superstitious prejudices
can better be extinguished than by inducing accuracy of observation of
natural phenomena, which shows that nothing supernatural exists. The
second charge, that the hedgehog is a robber of orchards, is a very old
one. Pliny, as translated by Holland, states--“Hedgehogs make their
provision beforehand of meat for winter in this wise: they wallow and
roll themselves upon apples and such fruit lying under foot, and so catch
them up with their prickles, and one more besides they take in their
mouth, and so carry them into hollow trees.”

Now, this has no foundation in fact. True it is that the hedgehog is
very often found in the neighbourhood of orchards; but then this may be
accounted for by the fact that the fences of such places are usually of
exactly the thick and unfrequented kind the animal best likes to inhabit.
Our repeated experience has never enabled us to discover that a hedgehog
will eat apples; on the contrary, in early youth, when imbued with the
general belief that this fruit was their diet, we have in more than
one or two instances (most cruelly as we now believe) starved to death
unfortunate specimens, which we shut up in a box with an ample supply
of apples, not one of which they ever ate. That a magpie will steal and
hide silver spoons, or a raven silk stockings, we know, and may use it
as an argument that animals steal what they do not want; but that a
hedgehog steals apples in the way stated, experiment will at once prove
to be untrue, for, from the varied position of the points of the spines
when fixed, it is impossible to fasten an apple upon them; and when they
are not fixed, they yield at once to the pressure made in the attempt.
Though domesticated hedgehogs can easily be brought to feed on bread
and milk or dressed vegetables, yet all our observation goes to prove
that in a state of nature, or when permitted to stray in a garden, they
never eat any but animal food. This is at variance with the generally
received opinion, which is supported by the authority of White, who, in
his admirable History of Selborne, complains that hedgehogs injured his
garden by boring with their long snouts under the plantain that grew
in his grass walks, eating off the root upwards, leaving the tufts of
leaves untouched, and defacing his grounds by making unsightly holes.
He then immediately goes on to prove that these identical animals used
beetles as no inconsiderable portion of their food. Now, it strikes us
that his previous observation was not made with his usual accuracy, and
that the hedgehogs did not eat the roots of plantain, but dug up where
they had been to catch the larvæ of beetles that had just devoured
them. Thus rooks have been charged with wantonly plucking up grass,
while the truth is, that they only pull up plants attacked at the root
by the larvæ of the cockchaffer or some other of the _Phytophagous
coleoptera_ (as vegetable-eating beetles are called), catch in the fact
the destructive insect, and so stop its ravages; thus rendering important
services to those who, for lack of accurate observation, falsely accuse
and mischievously shoot them. Trusting we have satisfied you that the
hedgehog does not steal apples, we come to the next charge, that he
sucks cows. To refute this we have the best possible evidence in the
animal’s mouth, the structure of which is completely unsuited to the
accomplishment of such an object. That he will drink milk with avidity
when domesticated, is certain, but this is only a taste he acquires in
common with hundreds of other animals: there is scarcely one that may
not be induced to relish such diet. Having thus cleared our hero (a name
he fully deserves, as he wins battles by passive resistance) from the
charges brought against him, we proceed to give some anecdotes of our
personal knowledge, and shall finish with a few interesting facts in
his history, for the information of those who take pleasure in accurate
acquaintance with nature’s works.

We have before mentioned our starving of hedgehogs by endeavouring
to make them eat apples. In one of these cases we suffered no small
retribution. We were at school in these days, and a practice existed
amongst us called “slating.” It was an innocent imitation of the
murderous attacks made in Dublin by short-sighted combinators on such of
their fellow tradesmen as refused obedience to their mischievous laws.
With us it consisted in waylaying each other in the dark passages, and
striking with the open palms the hats or caps of the surprised over the
eyes. Having been thus treated many times, we bethought ourselves of
turning our starved hedgehog to account, and proceeded to skin him with
the intent of making a cap; so that when again “slated,” the attacking
party would find reason to call out in the words of Chaucer,

    “Like sharpe urchins his hair was growe.”

Accordingly, having hanged the animal up against a tree, we were
essaying, by pulling, to effect a solution of continuity, as a surgeon
would call it, between his body and skin, when the nail gave way, and
he came down with considerable force on our forehead, accupuncturating
us most awfully. The pain at the time was very great, and considerable
soreness continued for several days, so much so that we were induced
to suspect that some poisonous virus existed. We introduce this story
for the purpose of calling attention to the effects of the spines when
brought into action. Though experience induces us to believe that their
punctures are more painful than those of pins and needles, we have not
been able to ascertain why they should be so. Disabled in our attempt, we
abandoned the skin, and it became common property. It was for some time
used as one of the instruments for initiating the Johnny Newcomes into
the mysteries of school life. Not a few will recollect how, when chilled
by a previous salting or seasoning, as we called it, of snow crammed
into the mouth, eyes, nose, and down the back, their sense of vitality
was aroused, when escaping to bed they threw themselves on its thorny
pre-occupant. Many, doubtless, then heartily wished themselves again
within the zone of mamma’s apron-string; but the affair usually ended by
storing up vengeance for, and the implement for executing it on, the next
comer. A few years afterwards we procured another hedgehog, and provided
him with earthworms, which he munged with great gusto. We mixed a few of
them with bread and milk, and thus initiated him into this new diet. We
tried him with frogs, mice, sparrows, and various other animal matters,
of all of which he partook freely, and he soon became quite domesticated.
We provided him a bed made in an old footstool in the kitchen; in this he
remained during daylight rolled up in a ball of hay, from which it was
quite a troublesome matter to extricate him; he could not be disentangled
from it at all, without picking it carefully from his spines. Yet when
he pleased himself to move, he came forth quite free, and did not drag
a single filament out with him. He soon acquired a habit of making his
appearance when tea was being served; the hissing of the water in the urn
seemed to be his signal that his only meal was ready, for he regularly
followed the servant who bore it into the tea-room, where he was indulged
with a saucer of bread and milk on the rug before the fire. Having eaten
as much as he desired, he commenced trotting about the room, taking
precisely the same course round the legs of chairs and tables each time;
and so he continued without a moment’s cessation to the latest hour
the household remained up. Like the Guinea-pig, he seemed to have the
greatest dislike to running across the room. In the morning he was always
found snug in his bed. At length he disappeared, but previously did good
service by devouring the cockroaches and beetles which infested the
house. The desire of the hedgehog to pursue a beaten track was further
evidenced by one we kept in a garden, which continued for months the
course he first took, though a portion of it consisted in climbing with
difficulty over some tiles, which a few inches on either side would have
avoided. We often put things in his path, and watched his proceedings: he
shrunk at first on finding the obstruction, and then tumbled over it in
the best way he could.

Again we got another, and having heard that he may be at once tamed
by indulging him in whisky, we mixed some in a saucer with sugar, and
dipping his nose into it, he licked his chops, then ventured to make a
lap at the enticing material, and, “startled at the sound himself had
made,” he shrunk in, but came out again presently and lapped away most
eagerly. The spirit soon showed its power, and like other beasts that
indulge in it, he was any thing but himself; and his lacklustre leaden
eye was rendered still less pleasing by its inane drunken expression.
He staggered towards us in a ridiculously get-out-of-my-way sort of
manner; however, he had not gone far before his potation produced all its
effects; he tottered, then fell on his side; he was drunk in the full
sense of the word; he could not even hold by the ground. We could then
pull him about by the feet, open his mouth, twitch his whiskers, &c.:
he was unresisting. There was a strange expression in his face of that
self-confidence which we see in cowards when inspired by drinking. We put
him away, and some twelve hours afterwards found him running about, and,
as was predicted, quite tame, his spines lying so smoothly and regularly
that he could be stroked down the back, and handled freely. We turned him
into the kitchen to kill the cockroaches, and know nothing further of
him.

Having given you so much of his manners, let us turn to his structural
peculiarities. He is a small animal, not much larger than a rat when
stripped of his spines and the muscular apparatus connected with them.
It is this that enables him to roll himself up so as to present a
_chevaux-de-frize_-like defence, impregnable to all ordinary enemies;
and as there is much singularity in it, we will endeavour to describe
it. On the back of the animal, between the skin and ribs, there is a
large oval muscle with thickened edges, partially attached to the skin
and spines. From this spring certain muscular bands, which are fixed
firmly at the other ends to the head, tail, breast, and other parts of
the body. The whole may be likened to a sort of elastic mantle, kept on
the back by straps. When the owner wishes to roll up, he bends his body,
then tightening the straps, he pulls the edge of the elastic mantle
over, which contracting, draws it in as if it were a running string in
a bag; at the same time the spines are fixed rigidly for defence by
the straining of the muscles. There are many other interesting points
in his anatomy. He possesses, as we do, well developed clavicles or
collar-bones, which only exist in a rudimentary form in many quadrupeds.
The peculiarities of his structure have exposed him to much, we will
not say wanton cruelty, as its object was the increase of knowledge;
it therefore should not be heavily censured, while so many unmeaning
barbarities exist under the name of sports. It is stated as a proof of
his endurance, that he has died without a groan under the slow process of
zootomy inflicted upon him while nailed to a table. Such practices are
seldom if ever engaged in at the present time.

The hedgehog is certainly a very apathetic creature, and at a low
temperature becomes torpid; when in this condition he is doubtless
devoid of feeling. Torpidity in many animals seems to stand in the place
of migration in others, as a necessary condition when provision of
food depends on season: in this case the fact seems to argue in favour
of our position--that the hedgehog is in a state of nature strictly
insectivorous; were it not so, torpidity would not seem necessary, as
roots of vegetables could be had with facility as well at one season as
the other. The hedgehog while torpid loses weight rather rapidly, so that
the power of its remaining in this state is limited perhaps to a very few
months.

The French academicians maintained long since that there were two species
of hedgehog in their country. In reference to this, Ray, with his usual
sagacity, after describing the common species, expresses a disbelief of
there being another in Europe; a doubt since fully confirmed: for the
dog and hog urchin, as the supposed species were called, have no more
existence than the dog and hog badgers of our sportsmen have as distinct
animals. Old authors notice several species under the name of hedgehog;
but it appears by more accurate observation that but two of the animals
mentioned by them are entitled to this name, viz. the one in question and
the long-eared urchin of Siberia.

Since 1832, at least three other species have been enrolled in the
records of science. It is said that when hedgehogs are born, their ears
as well as their eyes are closed, and the former circumstance is noticed
as a unique fact; however, another instance of imperforate ears occurred
to us, in the case of a black bear cubbed at the gardens of the Royal
Zoological Society of Ireland: it lived but a few hours. The ear of the
hedgehog, in the structure of its bony parts, presents some peculiarities
strikingly different from most other quadrupeds.

The hedgehog is said to feed occasionally on cantharides; a single beetle
of which would occasion death or serious injury to most animals. If this
be true, it is only another example of what often occurs in nature,
illustrating the old proverb “what is one’s meat is another’s poison.”
In addition to the use of the hedgehog as the destroyer of cockroaches,
his skin was an important monopoly in the time of the Romans, being used
both as a clothes-brush and an instrument for hackling hemp. His calcined
eyes formed part of an ointment which the ancients tell us had such a
wonderful efficacy as to enable persons using it to see in the dark. His
gall was used to take off hair, his fat to put it on, &c.

He is still eaten in the south of Europe; but, judging from his food and
appearance, we would not recommend the practice here. The hedgehog, or
urchin, as he is sometimes called, belongs to the order of Insectivora,
and possesses much of the character and habits of shrews. His scientific
name is Erinaceus Europæus; but we have headed this article with his
Irish appellation, which is perhaps the only one not inserted in our
popular authors.

                                                                       B.




WATERPROOFING OF CLOTH, SILK, &c.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE IRISH PENNY JOURNAL.


SIR--I would feel happy should the few remarks I will at present offer
be found worthy of insertion in your columns--it is on the subject of
waterproofing cloth, or other fabrics, cotton, silk, leather, &c.

When the matter first came before the public, being determined if
possible to ascertain the secret, after many unsuccessful experiments I
found all the requisite properties to consist in a concentrated solution
of acetate of alumina, which can be procured at a cheap and a moderate
rate, by mixing equal quantities of sulphate of alum (common alum) and
acetate of lead (sugar of lead), and dissolving them in water: one pound
of each may be purchased for one shilling, which may be dissolved in
one gallon and a half of boiling water, and well mixed; when cold, the
supernatant liquid should be removed from the sediment, which consists of
sulphates of lead, potash, &c. Any article of dress, no matter how slight
the fabric, if well saturated in it, and allowed to dry slowly, will
bear the action of boiling water, and not permit it to pass through: it
is a remarkable fact, and there are many others connected with the same
solution well worthy of investigation. I should be glad if some of your
learned correspondents would favour us with the reason why the boiling
water will not pass through, and the steam of the water will. Thinking it
a subject not totally unworthy of examination, I remain, Sir, your most
obedient servant,

                                                THOMAS IRWIN,
                                     Apothecary and Chemist, 48 Cuffe St.




A SCENE AT SEA.


    “I saw the ship go dancing on before the favouring gale,
    And like the pinions of a swan was spread each swelling sail;
    But ere again uprose the sun, rose many a shriek and wail;
    Ere morn the gallant ship was gone--vanished the snowy sail!”

        The ship rode far upon the silent main; ’twas night,
        A beautiful, still night; no moon was there,
        But the bright stars were hanging overhead
        In golden clusters; and the breathless sea
        Gave them all back; while the tall vessel seemed
        A fairy home, suspended ’twixt two heavens.
        And there were happy hearts within her then;
        That eve they had descried the distant shore
        Of their own land; and all had gone to rest
        In the dear hope that ere another day
        Their feet would press again their native soil;
        Then the rich merchant dreamed how his gay stores
        Would well reward his exile; and the youth
        Thought of his loved one, and in fancy touch’d
        Already her rose-lips; while the fond sire
        Dreamed of his wife and children, and his hearth
        With their bright faces gathered round, like stars,
        To hearken to the marvels of his voyage.

        …

        There is a stillness over sea and heaven--
        A placid calm, a holy peace; alas!
        Whence is that sudden cry--that rising flame
        That bursts from the fair vessel? ’Tis no fire
        Of heaven, no angry lightning, that hath struck
        And blasted it! A moment, and the scene
        That was so fair is changed; the heavens above
        And still as ever; but the death-fire glows
        Upon the burnished waters! Groans and prayers
        Rise up all vainly! There’s a sudden shriek,
        Like to an earthquake; and the hopes and fears
        Of many hearts, the vessel and its freight,
        Are vanished--scattered into nameless things,
        And all is swallowed up and lost!

                                            --_From the Knickerbocker._

       *       *       *       *       *

TRUE CHARITY.--The lowest order of charity is that which is satisfied
with relieving the immediate pressure of distress in individual cases.
A higher is, that which makes provision on a large scale for the relief
of such distress; as when a nation passes on from common almsgiving to
a general provision for the destitute. A higher still is, when such
provision is made in the way of anticipation, or for distant objects; as
when the civilization of savages, the freeing of slaves, the treatment
of the insane, or the education of the blind and deaf and mutes, is
undertaken. The highest charity of all is, that which aims at the
prevention rather than the alleviation of evil. It is a nobler charity to
prevent destitution, crime, and ignorance, than to relieve individuals
who never ought to have been made destitute, criminal, and ignorant.

       *       *       *       *       *

EMPLOYMENT FOR THE UNHAPPY.--The unhappy are indisposed to employment:
all active occupations are wearisome and disgusting in prospect, at a
time when every thing, life itself, is full of weariness and disgust.
Yet the unhappy must be employed, or they will go mad. Comparatively
blessed are they, if they are set in families, where claims and duties
abound, and cannot be escaped. In the pressure of business there is
present safety and ultimate relief. Harder is the lot of those who have
few necessary occupations, enforced by other claims than their own
harmlessness and profitableness. Reading often fails. Now and then it
may beguile; but much oftener the attention is languid, the thoughts
wander, and associations with the subject of grief are awakened. Women
who find that reading will not do, will obtain no relief from sewing.
Sewing is pleasant enough in moderation to those whose minds are at
ease the while; but it is an employment which is trying to the nerves
when long continued, at the best; and nothing can be worse for the
harassed, and for those who want to escape from themselves. Writing is
bad. The pen hangs idly suspended over the paper, or the sad thoughts
that are alive within write themselves down. The safest and best of all
occupations for such sufferers as are fit for it, is intercourse with
young children. An infant might have beguiled Satan and his peers the
day after they were couched on the lake of fire, if the love of children
had chanced to linger amidst the ruins of their angelic nature. Next to
this comes honest, genuine acquaintanceship among the poor; not mere
charity-visiting, grounded on soup-tickets and blankets, but intercourse
of mind, with real mutual interest between the parties. Gardening is
excellent, because it unites bodily exertion with a sufficient engagement
of the faculties, while sweet, compassionate nature is ministering cure
in every sprouting leaf and scented blossom, and beckoning sleep to draw
nigh, and be ready to follow up her benignant work. Walking is good,
not stepping from shop to shop, or from neighbour to neighbour, but
stretching out far into the country, to the freshest fields, and the
highest ridges, and the quietest lanes. However sullen the imagination
may have been among its griefs at home, here it cheers up and smiles.
However listless the limbs may have been when sustaining a too heavy
heart, here they are braced, and the lagging gait becomes buoyant again.
However perverse the memory may have been in presenting all that was
agonizing, and insisting only on what cannot be retrieved, here it is
first disregarded, and then it sleeps; and the sleep of the memory is
the day in Paradise to the unhappy. The mere breathing of the cool wind
on the face in the commonest highway is rest and comfort which must be
felt at such times to be believed. It is disbelieved in the shortest
intervals between the seasons of enjoyment; and every time the sufferer
has resolution to go forth to meet it, it penetrates to the very heart in
glad surprise. The fields are better still: for there is the lark to fill
up the hours with mirthful music; or, at worst, the robin and the flocks
of fieldfares, to show that the hardest day has its life and hilarity.
But the calmest region is the upland, where human life is spread out
beneath the bodily eye, where the mind roves from the peasant’s nest
to the spiry town, from the schoolhouse to the churchyard, from the
diminished team in the patch of fallow, or the fisherman’s boat in the
cove, to the viaduct that spans the valley, or the fleet that glides
ghostlike on the horizon. This is the perch where the spirit plumes its
ruffled and drooping wings, and makes ready to let itself down any wind
that heaven may send.--_From Deerbrook, a Tale, by Harriet Martineau._

       *       *       *       *       *

CHILDHOOD.--Childhood is like a mirror, catching and reflecting images
from all around it. Remember that an impious or profane thought, uttered
by a parent’s lips, may operate on the young heart like a careless spray
of water thrown upon polished steel, staining it with rust which no after
scouring can efface.

       *       *       *       *       *

    Printed and published every Saturday by GUNN and CAMERON, at
    the Office of the General Advertiser, No. 6, Church Lane,
    College Green, Dublin.--Agents:--R. GROOMBRIDGE, Panyer Alley,
    Paternoster Row, London; SIMMS and DINHAM, Exchange Street,
    Manchester; C. DAVIES, North John Street, Liverpool; J. DRAKE,
    Birmingham; SLOCOMBE & SIMMS, Leeds; FRAZER and CRAWFORD,
    George Street, Edinburgh; and DAVID ROBERTSON, Trongate,
    Glasgow.







*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE IRISH PENNY JOURNAL, VOL. 1 NO. 21, NOVEMBER 21, 1840 ***


    

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