Page:The Gael Vol XXII January to December 1903.djvu/94

April, 1903.

By George Moore.

E told the doctor he was due in the bar-room at 8 o'clock in the morning. The bar-room in which he worked was in a slum in the Bowery; and he had only been able to keep himself in health by getting up at five o'clock and going for long walks in the fields.

"A sea voyage is what you want," said the doctor. "Why not go to Ireland for two or three months? You will come back a new man."

Lately Bryden had begun to wonder how the people at home were getting on; he had often felt he would like to see Ireland again; the doctor had just told him what he wanted to hear. He thanked him, and three weeks afterwards he landed in Cork.

He had been thirteen years in America; he was now eight-and-twenty; and as he sat in the railway carriage he recalled his native village—he could see the village, and its lake, and then the fields, one by one, and the roads. Stretching out into the winding lake there was a large piece of rocky land—some three or four hundred acres of rocky headland—and upon it the peasantry had been given permission to build their cabins by former owners of the Georgian house, standing on the pleasant green hill. The present owners considered the village a disgrace. However, the villagers paid high rents for their plots of ground, and they bore with it.

The train jogged along all day, and when it stopped at James Bryden's station the Summer sun was setting. And seeing the fine windless evening, Bryden was sorry he did not feel strong enough for the walk. It was fair day at Ballyholly, and he would meet many people going home; he would be sure to meet some whom he had known In his youth, and from them he would find out where he would be able to get a clean lodging. He felt that the sea voyage had done him good, but seven miles was too far for him to walk to-day, and he remembered that the last time he had walked the road he had walked it in an hour and a half though he was earring a heavy bundle on a stick. There was a car waiting in the station; he felt he had better take it, and very soon the carman was asking him about America; but Bryden wanted to hear of those who were still living in the old country, and after some questioning, after hearing the stories of many people he had forgotten, he heard that Mike Scully, who had been away in a situation for many years as coachman in the King's County, had come back and built a house with a fine concrete floor.

The carman told him there was a good loft in the house, and that Mike would be pleased to take in a lodger. Mike Scully had been a groom at the big house on the hill; he had intended to be a jockey, but had suddenly shot up into a fine tall man and had had to become a coachman Instead. Bryden remembered that this was so, and he tried to recall Mike's face, but his recollections of those days were dim, and he was surprised when the driver pointed to a tall man coming through the lodge gates and said: "There is Mike Scully."

Mike had forgotten Bryden even more completely than Bryden had forgotten him, and many aunts and uncles were mentioned before he began to understand.

"You have grown into a fine man, James," he said, looking at James' great breadth of chest. "But you are thin in the cheeks, and you are very sallow in the cheeks, too."

"I haven't been very well lately—that is one of the reasons I have come back! but I wanted to see you all again."

And then James paid the carman, wished him "God-speed," and the two men walked on together. They walked round the lake, for the townland was at the back of the demesne; and while they walked James proposed to pay Mike ten shillings a week for his board and lodging.

Bryden saw great changes in the demesne: he remembered the woods, thick, and well forested; now they were wind-worn, the drains were choked, and the bridge leading across the lake inlet was falling away. Their way led between long fields where herds of cattie were grazing; the road was broken—Bryden wondered how the villagers drove their carts over it. At last they came to the village, and the mud made by last week's rain was not dry there. It looked a desolate place, even on this fine evening, and Bryden thought that the very pigs must feel depressed on a wet day.

It was at once strange and familiar to him to see chickens in the kitchen; and wishing to reknit himself to the old country, he begged of Mrs. Scully