Page:Once a Week Jun to Dec 1864.pdf/67

 52 them of even that portion of their native land to which Cromwell had given them a free and undisputed title. To this part of Connaught they felt they had as strong a claim as Protestants and Saxons have to “another place.”

Knowing all this, I must confess I did not feel quite comfortable at the prospect of spending the night beneath the same roof with “Big Joyce” and his large family, notwithstanding the assurances of the driver with respect to the giant’s peaceable disposition.

I had a room to myself, and when it grew dark was provided with a dip candle. I overheard some of the conversation in the kitchen, between Joyce and his wife, and knew, (although they spoke in Irish,) from the frequent use of the term “Sassenach”— which means Protestant, or Englishman, or Irish Protestant of Saxon descent—that I was the subject of their conversation. All this had a “Fee-foe-fum: I-smell-the-blood-of-an-Englishman” sound to my ears. I had not ventured to turn into bed, although the candle was burning low, but was thinking of it, when I heard a step approaching my room door. The latch was raised without knocking, and a red head protruded. It was not that of Big Joyce, but one of the young giants. The face wore a broad grin, which displayed a double row of strong-set teeth.

“Well, what do you want?”

The young fellow entered without replying, and placed an extinguisher on the table, bringing it down with a rap, and giving me a look which said, as plain as look could say, “What do you think of that?”

“What’s that?” I asked, feigning ignorance and surprise, looking down on the extinguisher.

“That is an out-er,” said he, throwing back his head and shoulders with a sense of importance and of the advantages of civilisation.

“A what?”

“An out-er.”

“What is it for?”

He took it up, placed it on the candle, and left us both in the dark.

“Oh! I see,” said I. ‘An out and outer,’ you mean.”

"If you see in the dark your eyes must be better than our black cat’s. But stay, I’ll get yon a light in no time.”

He brought the light and asked for my boots, which I gave him. Had he asked for my watch or purse I should have done the game, and with, perhaps, greater alacrity, for I felt I was in a giant’s castle, from which there was no hope of escaping, even in a pair of “seven-leagued boots.” There I was, trapped, and must take my chance.

I had not courage to use the “out-er,” but before the end of the candle dropped into the hot socket I took off my coat and waistcoat and threw myself on the bed, the sheets of which were as pure and white as snow, and fragrant with thyme and wild heath.

Whether these herbs have soporiferous qualities or not I cannot say, but I soon fell asleep, and awoke in the morning without finding my throat cut, or anything of that kind, and to my utter amazement found my boots not only cleaned but polished. Yes, positively polished, in a district where the parish priest was proud to get his boots well buttered. I often asked myself “where the blacking came from?” for these were days when a jar of “Day and Martin” cost a shilling. There were no half penny cakes of paste-blacking in those days. The gigantic Joyces were a great puzzle to me; they seemed to be in a sort of chrysalis or intermediate state between savage barbarism and advanced civilisation. White sheets, polished boots, and tin extinguishers shone or flashed out curiously amidst the general chaos of nature around me.

I was charged for supper—consisting of bacon, eggs, and potatospotatoes [sic],—bed and breakfast, the moderate sum of half-a-crown, and for a pony, to carry me twelve miles, and a “boy,”—who in Ireland may be of any imaginable size or age,—to carry my bag, another half-crown.

My travelling companion, guide, and bag-bearer was young Joyce, who brought in the “out-er,” and, I suspect, polished my boots. He was much over six feet, though much under his gigantic parent. I found him a very pleasant travelling companion, with a good store of anecdotes respecting the wild district through which we passed, its inhabitants, and occasional tourists.

“There, sir,” said ho, pointing to a fearful chasm in the neighbourhood of Maam, through which a mountain torrent was rushing, “there is Mac Namara’s Leap.”

“And who is Mac Namara?”

“Captain Mac Namara.”

“Army or navy?”

“Not exactly that, sir.”

“Oh, I know; in the merchant service.”

“No, sir; he was a sort of gentleman highwayman.”

“Do you mean a robber?”

“I do.”

“And you call him a gentleman?”

“I do sir, a gentleman bred and born, and he lived in a slate house in Cong—he and his lady.”

“His wife, you mean?”

“Yes, sir, a real lady-one of the Butler family.

“You mean the Ormonde family?”