Page:Maria Edgeworth (Zimmern 1883).djvu/137

Rh of those persons in whom native intuition takes the place of instruction, and who of their proper strength are equal to all emergencies. The complications of the story arise from these inward propensities of his nature and the contending influences from without with which he has to grapple. He was an orphan who had been adopted by Sir Ulick O'Shane, but had not been educated because Sir Ulick deemed that there was no use in giving him the education of a landed gentleman when he was not likely to have an estate. An unfortunate difference with Sir Ulick's wife obliged Ormond to leave his guardian's roof and avail himself of the hospitality of a cousin, Cornelius O'Shane, who called himself King of the Black Islands after his estate. More familiarly this original is spoken of as King Corny. Besides being one of the most delightful creations in romantic literature, he is an instructive study towards the comprehension of the Irish character. Macaulay pointed out, in speaking of the aboriginal aristocracy of Ireland, that Miss Edgeworth's King Corny belonged to a later and much more civilized generation, but added that, "whoever has studied that admirable portrait can form some notion of what King Corny's great-grandfather must have been like." King Corny is a most genuine character; there is no nonsense, no false reticence about him; he is hasty and violent at times, but he is not ashamed to show it, neither does he hide his warm, kind heart. His frank and unsuspecting nature makes him adored by all his tenantry, none of whom would wrong their king. There is not a page in which he figures that does not furnish charming reading, and there is not a reader but will resent that King Corny is made to die so early in the book. It is all