Phelim Otoole's Courtship and Other Stories. William Carleton

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ or running.

      “It's well we have him at all,” said his mother; “sure if we hadn't him, we'd be breakin' our hearts, and sayin' if it 'ud plase God to send him back to us, that we'd be happy even wid givin' him his own way.”

      “They say it breaks their strinth, too,” replied his father, “to be crubbin' them in too much, an' snappin' at thim for every hand's turn, an' I'm sure it does too.”

      “Doesn't he become the pock-marks well, the crathur?” said the mdther.

      “Become!” said the father; “but doesn't the droop in his eye set him off all to pieces!”

      “Ay,” observed the mother, “an' how the crathur went round among all the neighbors to show them the 'leather crackers!' To see his little pride out o' the hare-skin cap, too, wid the hare's ears stickin' out of his temples. That an' the droopin: eye undher them makes him look so cunnin' an' ginteel, that one can't help havin' their heart fixed upon him.”

      “He'd look betther still if that ould coat wasn't sweepin' the ground behind him; an' what 'ud you think to put a pair o' martyeens on his legs to hide the mazles! He might go anywhere thin.”

      “Throth he might; but Larry, what in the world wide could be in the Fairy-man's bottle that Phelim took sich a likin' for it. He tould me this mornin' that he'd suffer to have the pock agin, set in case he was cured wid the same bottle.”

      “Well, the Heaven be praised, any how, that we have a son for the half-acre, Sheelah.'

      “Amin! An' let us take good care of him, now that he's spared to us.”

      Phelim's appetite, after his recovery, was anything but a joke to his father. He was now seldom at home, except during meal times; for wherever fun or novelty was to be found, Phelim was present. He became a regular attendant upon all the sportsmen. To such he made himself very useful by his correct knowledge of the best covers for game, and the best pools for fish. He was acquainted with every rood of land in the, parish; knew with astonishing accuracy where coveys were to be sprung, and hares started. No hunt was without him; such was his wind and speed of foot, that to follow a chase and keep up with the horsemen was to him only a matter of sport. When daylight passed, night presented him with amusements suitable to itself. No wake, for instance, could escape him; a dance without young Phelim O'Toole would have been a thing worthy to be remembered. He was zealously devoted to cock-fighting; on Shrove-Tuesday he shouted loudest among the crowd that attended the sport of throwing at cooks tied to a stake; foot-ball and hurling never occurred without him. Bull-baiting—for it was common in his youth—was luxury to him; and, ere he reached fourteen, every one knew Phelim O'Toole as an adept at card-playing. Wherever a sheep, a leg of mutton, a dozen of bread, or a bottle of whiskey was put up in a shebeen house, to be played for by the country gamblers at the five and ten, or spoil'd five, Phelim always took a hand and was generally successful. On these occasions he was frequently charged with an over-refined dexterity; but Phelim usually swore, in vindication of his own innocence, until he got black in the face, as the phrase among such characters goes.

      The reader is to consider him now about fifteen—a stout, overgrown, unwashed cub. His parents' anxiety that he should grow strong, prevented them from training him to any kind of employment. He was eternally going about in quest of diversion; and wherever a knot of idlers was to be found, there was Phelim. He had, up to this period, never worn a shoe, nor a single article of dress that had been made for himself, with the exception of one or two pair of sheepskin small-clothes. In this way he passed his time, bare-legged, without shoes, clothed in an old coat much too large for him, his neck open, and his sooty locks covered with the hare-skin cap, the ears as usual sticking out above his brows. Much of his time was spent in setting the idle boys of the village to fight; and in carrying lying challenges from one to another. He himself was seldom without a broken head or a black eye; for in Ireland, he who is known to be fond of quarrelling, as the people say, usually “gets enough an' lavins of it.” Larry and Sheelah, thinking it now high time that something should be done with Phelim, thought it necessary to give him some share of education. Phelim opposed this bitterly as an unjustifiable encroachment upon his personal liberty; but, by bribing him with the first and only suit of clothes he had yet got, they at length succeeded in prevailing on him to go.

      The school to which he was sent happened to be kept in what is called an inside Kiln. This kind of kiln is usually—but less so now than formerly—annexed to respectable farmers' outhouses, to which, in agricultural districts, it forms a very necessary appendage. It also serves at the same time as a barn, the kiln-pot being sunk in the shape of an inverted cone at one end, but divided from the barn floor by a wall about three feet high. From this wall beams run across the kiln-pot, over which, in a transverse direction, are laid a number of rafters like the joists of a loft, but not fastened. These ribs are covered with straw, over which again is spread a winnow-cloth to keep the grain from being lost. The fire is sunk on a level with the bottom of the kiln-pot, that is, about eight or ten feet below the floor of the barn. The descent to it is by stairs formed at the side wall. We have been thus minute in describing it, because, as the reader will presently perceive, the feats of Phelim render it necessary.

      On the first day of his entering the school he presented himself with a black eye; and as his character was well known to both master and scholars, the former felt no hesitation in giving him a wholesome lecture upon the subject of his future conduct. For at least a year before this time, he had gained the nick-name of “Blessed Phelim,” and “Bouncing,” epithets bestowed on him by an ironical allusion to his patron saint, and his own habits.

      “So, Blessed Phelim,” said the master, “you are comin' to school!!! Well, well! I only say that miracles will never cease. Arrah, Phelim, will you tell us candidly—ah—I beg your pardon; I mean, will you tell us the best lie you can coin upon the cause of your coming to imbibe moral and literary knowledge? Silence, boys, till we hear Blessed Phelim's lie.”

      “You must hear it, masther,” said Phelim. “I'm comin' to larn to read an' write.”

      “Bravo! By the bones of Prosodius, I expected a lie, but not such a thumper as that. And you're comin' wid a black eye to prove it! A black eye, Phelim, is the blackguard's coat of arms; and to do you justice, you are seldom widout your crest.”

      For a few days Phelim attended the school, but learned not a letter. The master usually sent him to be taught by the youngest lads, with a hope of being able to excite a proper spirit of pride and emulation in a mind that required some extraordinary impulse. One day he called him up to ascertain what progress he had actually made; the unsuspecting teacher sat at the time upon the wall which separated the barn-floor from the kiln-pot, with his legs dangling at some distance from the ground. It was summer, any rafters used in drying the grain had been removed. On finding that Blessed Phelim, notwithstanding all the lessons he had received, was still in a state of the purest ignorance, he lost his temper, and brought him over between his knees, that he might give him an occasional cuff for his idleness. The lesson went on, and the master's thumps were thickening about Phelim's ears, much to the worthy youth's displeasure.

      “Phelim,” said the master, “I'll invert you a scarecrow for dunces. I'll lay you against the wall, with your head down and your heels up like a forked carrot.”

      “But how will you manage that?” said Phelim. “What 'ud I be doin' in the mane time?”

      “I'll find a way to manage it,” said the master.

      “To put my head down an' my heels up, is it?” inquired Phelim.

      “You've said it, my worthy,” returned his teacher.

      “If you don't know the way,” replied the pupil, “I'll show СКАЧАТЬ