Algiers who have refused constitutions promised to their people-who have massacred men, in Italy, for attempting to frame a free government-and who have looked with criminal passiveness on the tortures and extermination of Christians in Greece, whom they could have saved by a word of their breath. To Napoleon's memory we can do nothing worse than to compare his most arbitrary acts and intentions with theirs; but to institute any comparison between their intellects and his, would be a mean and absurd insult to his ashes. BRIDAL CUSTOMS OF THE IRISH. And everilk man put on his nuptial gown." Quod R. M. of Ledington Knycht. WITHIN the recollection of the oldest inhabitants of a small town in Tipperary, a woman of prepossessing deportment, with a beautiful infant at her bosom, was discovered on a cold autumnal morning crouching in the belfry of the deserted and ruinous parish-church. She was pale, silent, and totally abstracted from every earthly object but the sleeping little beauty in her arms. The hospitable inhabitants of the town brought her food and raiment, and warmly tendered her a shelter from the rude inclemency of the time beneath their homely roofs. She preferred, however, abiding in the solitude of the old belfry, and her woes were for ever buried in her own heart. At midnight she was often heard singing some strange melody in a low plaintive tone, as she walked with hurried steps across the mouldering parapet of the little tower. The child grew up and prospered, and at the age of sixteen was said to be a wonder of beauty by those who had accidentally seen her when gazing on the passengers, who daily forded the river that laved one side of the grey and dilapidated church. Her rigid, but loving mother, never suffered her to descend the winding steps which led to the grass-covered chancel. She deemed her too fair to be exposed to the rude gaze of the daring young men who dwelt in the environs, and the maid passed her childhood and youth without once straying from the brink of the old belfry. Young Mary's beauty was her bane. She bemoaned her fate, and earnestly implored her careful mother to bless her with a single hour's liberty, to wander among the fair fields and green woods that smiled around her desolate habitation. But the solitary woman was inexorable. She wept while she denied the prayers her child, and spoke of the world's crimes, from which she said they were happily set apart, until her heart overflowed with the remembrance of her past griefs, and Mary forgot her own desires in assuaging the mental anguish of her beloved mother. of At length a young man, who was the pride of the flourishing family of the Strahans, saw young Mary at the little casement of the belfry, and was so charmed with the beauty of her countenance, that in the warmth of his heart he vowed to win her love, and woo her from her dismal abode, in spite of every impediment. By dint of continual and most acute watching he at length attracted her wandering gaze, and the interest he seemed to feel for the innocent and kind-hearted maiden produced a strange but delightful sensation in her heart. They soon understood the full extent of each other's hopes and fears, and mutually endeavoured to invent some plan whereby they might obtain a parley. The wary mother observed an alteration in young Mary's manner, and watched her more narrowly, and confined her more closely, if it were possible, than before. But the most simple woman in love is an overmatch for the wisest and most crafty of parents. Mary contrived to elude the suspicious eye of her mother, and by the aid of a stout rope which she fixed to the stone bars of the casement, Strahan ascended nightly to its verge. Their young hearts were soon linked to each other by the strongest ties of pure, unjaded, youthful love. The maid thought of nothing but Strahan during the day, and he lingered about the weeds and brambles that waved over the tombs of the old ailes, happy to be near his love, and listening in anxious expectation for the usual melodious signal which summoned him to the base of the tower. The affair could not long remain in this state. One night the mother detected Strahan in the act of ascending to the belfry by his usual contrivance, and to his infinite alarm thrust out a rusty sword-blade above his head when he was within a few yards of the window, and at an immense distance from the ground. She interrogated him as to his motives and desires, and insisted, as he valued his life, on a full and unequivocal reply. The young man honestly confessed his name and intentions, and moreover avowed that he had communed with the maiden at the casement for many preceding nights. The mother's blood flowed rapidly to her heart as he spoke. She feared the worst, and fiercely brandishing the sword-blade above the youth's grasp, threatened in a tone of stern resolution to cut the cord asunder unless he solemnly swore by the most holy vow, and upon the cross in his bosom, to marry her child at day-break. The youth joyfully assented; and at his pressing request, the weeping and terrified Mary approached the casement, and there contracted herself to him by the most sacred ceremony of breaking bread and parting silver together. The next day a priest pronounced the nuptial benediction upon them, and the old woman soon after died in the belfry, without imparting a single particular of her history even to her child. Various were the surmises in which the curious neighbours indulged; but whatever they thought of the mother, Mary was idolized by all. She was waning in years, and the parent of seven beautiful girls when I first beheld her. She then resembled a noble ruin; beauty still lingered about some parts of her fine form in spite of the finger of time, her heart was joyous and blithe as ever, and none of the young maidens around her entered into the festal customs of Ireland with more zeal and delight, than the fine spirited dame who had lingered out her childhood in the mouldering turret of Saint James's church. She was an object of curiosity and wonder to the neighbouring peasants; and so much had been talked of her strange history in my hearing, that I gladly accepted a warm invitation to join with a party of my boisterous rustic acquaintances in the revelries of her youngest daughter's wedding, which was celebrated with all the ancient rural pastimes and ceremonies at the house of the bride's hospitable father, the far-famed and venerable O'Donnel Strahan. He dwelt in the centre of a rich vale that basked in the vivifying beams of the noontide sun, a little on the left of a great highway. A strong rivulet flowed through the corn-fields around his abode, which seemed already ripe for the sickle, and bent beneath the weakest breeze that wandered over their yellow surface. Agricultural toil was suspended throughout the farm, the emancipated beasts were reclining beneath the shading hedge-rows, or hovering about the banks of the ponds, longing to quaff the cool liquid they enclosed, but fearful of the tormenting insects that buzzed over the weeds, and shot swiftly along the top of the waters. The birds sat mute beneath the broad leaves of the neighbouring wood, not a sound emanated from its shades, but the occasional bleat of the wandering kid, and the hoarse response of the mother-goat, as she sought out the young ones in the craggy wilderness. A loud burst of merriment at length broke upon our ears as we turned the summit of the last hill, and far below at the entrance of the valley we discerned the jolly host and his boon companions welcoming a group of young damsels in the joyous language of the old carol: "Welcome all of ye! We heard them singing for many minutes as they meandered along the banks of the rivulet towards the brown oaken portal of Strahan, where the whole assemblage of feasters hailed the fair reinforcement with one protracted and undiscriminate shout of delight. The holy bridal ceremony had been performed at any early hour of the day. The meats had been removed, and the merry guests were luxuriating in liquid good cheer when we arrived. A fine looking young priest was seated between the bridegroom and his love, at the centre of the board, rapidly distributing the rich bride-cake among the young men and maidens around him. The polished pewters which bore the spicy luxury to the several guests, were invariably returned with a trifling pecuniary gift. Neither man nor woman failed to drop "the priest's fee" into the plate with one hand, as the bride-cake was eagerly taken out by its fellow; and the aggregate donations soon swelled over the brim of the general receiving goblet in the lap of the bride. As soon as the cake and its accompaniments were disposed of, the girls and sage matrons present were indulged by the good wife's blue-eyed daughters with white peggens of praupeen, whereon they regaled as heartily as their boisterous companions did on the intoxicating potheen, to which the underground still in the neighbouring mountain had most probably given birth. Praupeen is made of the ripening barley, plucked before the general harvest. It is dried upon the griddle over the turf-fire, that burns nightly on the stone hearth of the common kitchen, and after being coarsely ground and well sifted, blended with fine milk; and this simple preparation, although sweet, clammy, and somewhat disgusting to the palate of a stranger, is esteemed by the peasants of Ireland as one of the greatest dainties the earth can afford. A motley group of mendicants, as usual, encircled the immense and well-stored chimney. A stout buchaugh was there "With his horn by his side, likewise his skewer and can, The lean piper, with his brown polished drones and greasy leathern bag, occupied the log-seat on the left; and immediately opposite to him sat a poor scholar with his frieze cap and wallet at his feet, and a well-patched satchel slung around his shoulder by a raw sheepskin belt. A lubberly vacant-looking gossoon basked at full length upon the flags, stirring about the embers of the fire without any apparent motive, and humming the gentle air of "The Moreen" to the manifest delight of a pale young woman, crowned with wheat-ears and wild-flowers, the emblem of quiet innocuous derangement, who gazed upon him over the shoulder of the kind and pitying buchaugh. An old woman with an infant swung in a coarse red cloak at her back, and a black doothien between her thin shrivelled lips, the fire of which she had suffered to die away, while gazing with tears in her rayless eyes upon the happy youths and laughing maidens at the board, stood a few paces apart from the rest. An old mutilated, rough-visaged ballad-maker, in a cocked hat and ragged bradeen (a coarse frieze coat), held the post of honour in the corner of the leather-backed settle nearest the hearth. The patched remains of a regimental coat might be detected through the gaps of his bradeen, and he flourished a burning faggot in bellicose style over his head, as he detailed in passionate terms some exploit of 'his youth in distant climes, to a neatly-arrayed blind woman, who alternately counted the beads on her bosom, and plied the shining needles through the grey-sheep's wool, whereof she was diligently fabricating a pair of hose for the holiday use of her grey-headed host. The old woman who bore the child at her back, eagerly seized the opportunity of a momentary silence (for which the guests looked in each others faces as if at a loss to account), and approaching the young couple, laid a brown bony shrivelled hand upon each, and pronounced a rustic benison upon them. "Bless you, my dear children," said she, may luck and grace attend you both! May you never look upon a black lamb the first of the yeaning time, nor a foal's back before you have seen his innocent face. May you never hear the blithe cuckoo when fasting, nor the ominous corncrake screeching on your left side. May the blue-pinioned raven never croak at your lattice, nor the old crow alight before you in the beaten track of man. May nothing that bodes evil to either of you appear in the dim light of the evening! May your hearths never want the bright-glowing logs, your homestead the stalled ox, your eaves the nest of the lucky swallow, your thatch the green roof-weed that blossoms but once in the life of a man, and augurs prosperity and joy to those who dwell beneath its blessed and fast-clinging roots." The old woman retired at the conclusion of this recapitulation of good and evil omens, evidently pleased with what she had done, and after replenishing her doothien, crouched by the side of the old buchaugh. She was on her road to the far-famed Foundling, whither she had engaged to travel from the heart of a distant county, for the usual fee of a guinea, to deposit the babe of some ruined lass in the blessed cradle of charity. She begged her way from village to village, every door was open to her throughout the land; for although the virtue-loving Milesians abhor the individual who stains the modest repute of the great congregation of Erin's maidens, yet the innocent fruit of her guilt, with its ancient and devoted protectress, is received with open arms at the wicker-gate of every cabin, in the isle. Hospitality with the Irish is not a mere unmeaning word. The poorest peasant among them will joyfully share his meal with the buchaugh, the piper, the poor scholar, the wandering ideot, or the friendless. stranger. They deem it one of the great duties of man, to feed and shelter his brother when in want; and take no glory to themselves in foregoing comforts, so that they may be enabled to confer necessaries on the poor and desolate. "Come and eat," is the never-failing ejaculation that salutes the ear of the weary at an Irish portal. What they have they give cheerfully. There is no reluctant backwardness, no cold repelling tenders of food and lodging, companioned with hints at the inconveniences which will arise through a stranger's tarrying among them. They toss the contents of the iron crock within the boundaryhoop on the clean white board; the little wooden tubs are filled with milk; a truss of new straw is spread upon the floor for his repose, and he is almost forced to partake of their homely cheer.* The barefooted, black-haired scholar next approached the comely bride. He had a small keen hazel eye, the hereditary short nose and open vehement mouth of the unadulterated Irish. His cheek was pale, and his curling black locks streamed negligently over his high and expanded brow. After saluting the priest in tolerable Latin, and uttering a hearty "God save you" to the good man of the house and his noble-looking dame, he burst forth into the first notes of an old nuptial ditty in the pure unalloyed language of Erin. The piper and ballad-maker no sooner heard the melody dearest to their hearts, than suddenly starting from their seats they fell into the tune at the same instant, and with voice and instrument enthusiastically accompanied the animated stripling. The whole assemblage gradually joined in trowling the merry notes, and the younger guests, preceded by the musical triumvirate, led the bride and bridegroom to the inviting spot of smooth turf that lay a few yards distant from the threshold, to witness the ceremony of the "pillow dance," and all the quaint customs observed at a rustic bridal, which the poor scholar loudly recapitulated in his joyous rhymes. I remained a short time with the elders at the board, but one of Strahan's daughters was soon deputed to invite us forth to the carousal on the bawn. We immediately followed her to the green plat before the porch, which we found closely shaven in the centre, encircled with turf-seats, and daintily bestrewed with bansheen lakar or green rushes, on the which the guests were seated in groups, some quaffing their brown shebeen and golden-tinted whiskey, and others evidently in anxious expectation of the signal for dancing from the piper's hoarsevoiced drone. Dick Veogh of Kilcash, one of the most roaring blades between Strongbow's tower and the heart of the province, appeared at one side of the bawn as we entered at the other, bearing the bride's pillow, elevated above his head, and loudly proclaiming his intention of calling forth the tallest and most comely woman on the bawn, to join with him in all the glories of the great pillow-dance. A shout of admiration greeted the entry of the youth, who took his station in the heart At this moment, alas! many of them have nought to give, and Ireland is indebted to the glorious liberality of Englishmen for the lives of many of her sons. The hearty benison of every Irishman is upon them; and may they live to see the sister-country in happier days, and some of them be then tempted to wander about her green hills and valleys, where they may personally experience the warmth and generosity of a true Irishman's heart. |