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Lady Morgan’s Memoirs
Chapter XXIV
INTRODUCTION & INDEXES
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Preface
Vol. I Contents.
Prefatory Address
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter VI
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Chapter XIII
Chapter XIV
Chapter XV
Chapter XVI
Chapter XVII
Chapter XVIII
Chapter XIX
Chapter XX
Chapter XXI
Chapter XXII
Chapter XXIII
‣ Chapter XXIV
Chapter XXV
Chapter XXVI
Chapter XXVII
Chapter XXVIII
Chapter XXIX
Chapter XXX
Chapter XXXI
Chapter XXXII
Chapter XXXIII
Chapter XXXIV
Chapter XXXV
Chapter XXXVI
Chapter XXXVII
Chapter XXXVIII
Vol. I Index
Vol. II Contents
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter IV
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Chapter XIII
Chapter XIV
Chapter XV
Chapter XVI
Chapter XVII
Chapter XVIII
Chapter XIX
Chapter XX
Chapter XXI
Chapter XXII
Chapter XXIII
Chapter XXIV
Chapter XXV
Chapter XXVI
Chapter XXVII
Chapter XXVIII
Chapter XXIX
Chapter XXX
Chapter XXXI
Chapter XXXII
Chapter XXXIII
Chapter XXXIV
Chapter XXXV
Chapter XXXVI
Chapter XXXVII
Chapter XXXVIII
Chapter XXXIX
Chapter XL
Vol. II Index
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CHAPTER XXIV.
OLD IRISH HOSPITALITY.

During her stay at Longford House, a real old Irish country-house, Miss Owenson saw a great deal of the primitive manners of the old country gentry. She used to give amusing descriptions of the stately grandeur of these remote “ancestral halls” with the mixture of sordid discomfort. The footmen in splendid liveries somewhat tarnished, with “gold lace galore,” coming up to the drawing-room bare-footed—unless it happened to be some high festival. The rollicking plenty streaked with meanness of the old Irish housekeeping, and the mincing delicacy of pronunciation in which some of the superfine ladies tried to disguise their brogue were all dwelt on; Lady Morgan used up her reminiscences in a description of a country festivity, a “Jug Day,” so called from all the county being invited to drink a cask of claret, sent as a present “from a cousin in Bordeaux.” The whole scene is so racy and so evidently a recollection from the life, that the reader who has not read the O’Briens and O’Flaherties
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will be glad to have it in the present chapter, to which in point of time and place it properly belongs:—


THE   MISS   MAC   TAAFS.
THE LADIES OF BOG MOY.

With views as narrow as their sphere of action, and with a sharpness of temperament, concentrated in their own little interests, their eternal expression of their petty grievances and fancied injuries, was humorously contrasted with the remote obscurity of their lives and position. Impressed with the highest sense of their own consequence, full of contempt for all that was not of their own caste, class and sphere, they were yet jealous of the fancied neglect, even of those on whom they looked down, and perpetually at variance with each other. Such as they were, the Ban Tiernas, or fair chieftains of Bog Moy, were strong, but not rare illustrations, of the fallacy of those theories which give to the world every vice, and to solitude every virtue. The distance of their residences was considerable, the ways impassable; nothing, therefore, less than some great family festival, like the “Jug day” sufficed to draw together the representatives of the ancient chiefs of Connemara and Tar Connaught, from their nooks in the mountains, or the courts and castles “on the other side of Galway town.”

By the great Protestant authorities, the Hawkses and the Proudfoots (and their dependents), these ladies were looked upon like other very old Protestant families, as half Papists and whole Jacobites (a race
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in those remote regions even then not quite extinct).

The last of the old pack of cards had now been sent out by “Paddy the Post,” and distributed through the country. No vague apprehension of who would or would not accept the invitations, disturbed the habitual stateliness of the Miss Mac Taafs. The long contemplated “Jug day” arrived. Each of the sisters sailing about with her hands dropped into the depths of her capacious pockets, gave orders for certain “cuttings and cosherings” on the county, which were always exacted upon occasions.

Tributary poultry and tributary fish came teeming in from tenants on sea and land, in kreels and Irishes, with guiggard trout from Lough Corrib, butchers’ meat from St. Grellan, and whiskey from every still in the barony. Linen was drawn forth from chests and coffers, which for colour and antiquity resembled the “Singe du Sorbonne;” and mould candles were prepared by the indefatigable Grannie-my-Joyce, which might have come within the meaning of the bye-laws of the town, directed against “candelles that give ne light ne sight.”

Cadgers came crowding to the back way, and beggars to the bawn. Pipers and harpers assembled from all parts; and the pipe of claret (in honour of which the feast was given) and which occupied the withdrawing-room, that had long served the purposes of a cellar, was crowned with branches, and raised on a lofty bier within view of the guests. As the “Jug day” intimated an invitation of twenty-four hours at
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least, no particular time was fixed for the dinner. The guests, well aware that they could not come too early nor remain too late, poured in, as their own convenience, distance of residence, &c., dictated. Some came by the coast road, the “tide being out,” and others on the coast dependant on high water, sailed at an earlier hour into the creek of Bog Moy; but the greater number, male and female, rode single or double over moor and mountain, “the bog being dry,” (an event frequently announced in the invitation), a spigot was given to the holy keeping of Father Festus, for tapping the pipe and filling the first jug.

The gradual “coming in” of the “mere Irish” as they descended from brake or hill, on saddle or pillion, or on low-backed cars, which upon such occasions as the present had a feather-bed and counterpane spread over it, for the double purpose of state and ease, such a vehicle has often transported as much beauty and even diamonds to the seat of rural festivity, as might grace the dinners of the British metropolis.

The women on horseback were nearly all clothed in the same costume, enormous full-plaited cloth shirts, capotes and calashes.

As the fallen roof of “th’ ould withdrawing-room” had not been restored, and the floor of the new one (now the cellar) had never been laid down,—as the dining-room was strictly appropriated on the “Jug day” to its purpose,—the best bed-room, which opened into the dining-room, was constituted into a salon de réception for the time being. The room being rarely inhabited, required a fire to render it endurable, and
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the swallows of Bog Moy, not contented with the chimneys of the Brigadier’s tower, had made a considerable lodgment in this room; and on opening the door a sudden gush of smoke rushed down into the chamber, and scattered the ashes in such dark thick clouds, that nothing could be distinctly seen but that the room was crowded to suffocation. “Weary on the smoke,” said Miss Mac Taaf. One “dissonant consonant” name followed another, with genealogical illustrations, as unpronounceable as those of the Hebrews; cousinships, twenty times removed, were claimed and acknowledged (a ceremony which seemed to have no end). Several ladies were seated chatting and laughing upon “the best bed,” every seat in the room being occupied by the fair portion of the guests, while the men stood in groups in the centre and near the door, all talked gaily and unreservedly—no rustic bashfulness, no awkward reserve. Good stories, bons mots and sallies of humour, were plentifully poured forth to enliven the details of country and local topics. As the smoke passed off, it was discoverable that the slough of overall cloth petticoats and capotes had been cast off, like columbine’s, and a display of French silks and point lace, of fashions from Bordeaux, and flowers from Oporto, was exhibited, which might have put the petites-maîtresses of the capital to the blush, and which proved that the intercourse kept up between the Connaught gentry and their exiled kindred, and commercial correspondents on the continent, was still in considerable activity. Every eye beamed life, and every countenance was full of intelligence, and though
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the brogue of many was sufficiently obvious, and the prettiest lips made weavers rhyme to savours, meat to fate, and mean to gain, (as Swift did long after he had associated with the Harleys and the Bolingbrokes) yet to voices as soft as the smiles that accompanied them, much might be forgiven on the score of mere pronunciation. At last, James Kelly, maître d’hotel and major domo of the establishment, in a most stentorian voice announced, that “the dinner was dished,” and the gentlemen, according to order, were bid to “Lade out Lady O’Flaherty, of Limon Field, who, I believe, now that the Moycullens are not to the fore, is the greatest lady in the county; for it’s a rule at Bog Moy, that the Milesians ever take the wall of the Strongbownians, and no disrespect meant, neither to the English by descent nor to the thirteen tribes, no, nor the half tribes, since all here are gentry bred and born, and not a Cromwellian nor a Williamite in the whole party, I’ll engage.”

This exordium being pronounced and followed by a general applause, the lady, the venerable subject of many of Carolan’s inspirations, moved slowly on, followed by the O’Maillies (of Achille), the Joyces (of Joyce’s country), and others of the great aboriginal families of Connemara and Mayo. Then came the Darcys, the Dalys, the Skirrets, and the Ffrenches, with the Burkes, Blakes, Bells, and Bodkins, and all that filled up the list of tribes and half tribes of Galway, of those who could, and those who could not, claim cousinship. The Protestant clergyman of the parish of Bog Moy (a parish without a congregation),
OLD IRISH HOSPITALITY.301
bowed out Father Festus (the priest of a congregation without a church), and the Provost of St. Grellan gave the pas to the Mayor of Galway. Sixty persons to be seated! The horse-shoe table, the side-board, side-tables, and window-stools, which, with “a plate on the knee,” and “a bit in the corner,” at last providing for all. Grace being said, Miss Mac Taaf stood up, and, with a cordial welcome in her “ye,” said aloud, “Much good may it do ye all;” to which all bowed their heads. The striking up of the pipes and harps (outside of the door) announced that the “hour of attack” had arrived. Rounds of beef, which none resisted, haunches of venison and legs of mutton were entrées and entremets, that required no substitution, and a dormant of a creel of potatoes and a bowl of fresh butter, left no wish for more brilliant or less substantial fare, while a vacant place was left for the soup, which was always served last. Jorums of punch were stationed round the capacious hearth, port and sherry were ranged along the tables, and the door opening into the withdrawing room, disclosed to view the cask of claret. The idol to which such sacrifices were to be made, on altars so well attended and so devoutly served—and before the palate was blunted by the coarser contact of port or sherry, the new tap was tasted, and it required no skill in augury to divine that the claret would be out before the company.

“Jeemes, is it on the Persia carpet ye lave them dishes; what are the cheers for man?”

James Kelly in vain sought a vacant chair for the dish he was replacing with a tureen of soup.

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Before the cloth was removed, one of the party was asked by Miss Mac Taaf (who was passionately fond of music) “Might we take the liberty of troubling you, Meejor, for a song; may be you’d feavor us with ‘Molly Astore?’”

The “Meejor,” with looks of conscious merit and anticipated success, cleared his voice, and took another glass of claret, pulled up his stock, and fluttered out his hair, and running through a few modulations at last began,
“Had I a heart for falsehood framed,” &c., &c., &c.

Applause, loud and long, followed this beautiful air, which, being sung with true Irish pathos and the finest possible voice, produced an enthusiastic effect upon organs the best adapted to respond to such an influence.

“Cousin O’Mailly, I’ll take a glass of wine with you, and to your health and song.”

“With the greatest of pleasures, madam.”

The cloth being removed, James Kelly announced to Miss Mac Taaf, that “the tay was wet, and the griddle cake and Sally Lun buttered an sarved.” She arose and gave “The King,” after which, the ladies they withdrew to the “best bedrome,” amidst many prayers and supplications to remain—always expected as a matter of form from the gentlemen. On the ladies retiring, the claret jugs were again replenished, the punch was placed by Father Festus on the table, and the company continued their joyous orgies till midnight, when the hall was cleared out for the ball.
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As many as had preserved their centre of gravity were now busied in looking for partners for jigs and country dances.

Miss Mac Taaf consented to move a minuet with Mr. Joyce (a custom of theirs for the last thirty years on similar occasions). Jigs, danced with a grace and spirit that gave the lovely, animated performers, another “renown” than that acquired by simply “tiring each other down.” A supper, plenteous as the dinner, was served up as the morning sun shone upon the unwearied votaries of pleasure celebrating the last rites of the “Jug Day” over a “raking pot of tay,” which assembled as many of the party who had not found it absolutely necessary to avail themselves of Miss Mac Taafs barrack beds and shake-downs. Horses, carriages, cars, &c., then filled the bawn, while sails were hoisted in the creek; and of the merits of the claret there could be no doubt, for not a drop was left in the cask.


Miss Owenson’s letters to Mrs. Lefanu, always tell more of her own personal feelings than those to any of her other friends.

Sydney Owenson to Mrs. Lefanu.
Longford House, Sligo, 1807.
“Here in cool grot and mossy cell
We rural fauns and fairies dwell.”

It is really supremely ridiculous to think by what shabby circumstances and paltry concerns the best
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intentions of our friends, and the dearest feelings of our hearts, are opposed and circumvented in this time-serving world! For three months back my heart has incessantly addressed itself to you, without your ever knowing a syllable of the matter (except instinct or sympathy favoured the intercourse), and all this for want of knowing how to free a letter or serve your purse the deduction of a seven pence! The mere speculation has so harassed me, that my dear Lady Crofton’s fresh eggs and crammed turkeys have been nearly counteracted in their nutritive effects; and though I do look something more substantial than when I left town, it is like Father Paul, “not feasting but mortification that has blown me up.” Thus impelled by my morale and physique (though you paid the forfeit of a tenpenny bit), I must write to you and prate of your whereabouts.

Well, and how are you, and where are you, belle et bonne maman? Are your great stag-eyes as bright and your arms as white as ever? and do you rise superior to the ridiculous rheumatism, and other contemptible proofs that you are not quite immortal? and are you sitting in your little boudoir in Cuff Street, or in your Cabinet des Fées at Glasnevin, with the little stool near your feet that I have so often usurped? and the little man beside you, I have so often endeavoured to seduce? Wherever you are, from my soul I wish myself there too, though it were only to talk once more over Miss Carter’s poetical homilies (all of which should end with an Amen), and to be treated, as I always am, without any manner of deference to the
OLD IRISH HOSPITALITY.305
red nightcap of authorship, or the bas bleu of literature; for all you seem indeed to care about it, I might as well never have written a book—been cut up in the reviews, and cut down in the papers; but there is no answering for a want of taste! Since we parted, I have run the risk of being taken up on the Vagrant Act, and have been actually beadled about from house to house like a parish pauper. General Brownrigg’s curricle beadled me to Sterling, Mrs. B—̵’s barouche beadled me to Bracklin, Mrs. Featherstone’s carriage to South Hill, Mrs. Tighe’s part of my way to Frybrook, Mrs. Fry’s to Holybrook, whence I was beadled to Longford House, where, like other vagabonds, I am expiating my past heinous offences by hard labour, though not spare diet—in a word, notwithstanding the fatal effects to be expected from the villanies of last winter, “all my original brightness” is not lost, and my “glory, though half obscured,” still sends forth some transient scintillations. I write, and read, and think, seven miles a day, and have only to lament that Helvetius on the Mind, Montesquieu on the Laws, or Smith on the Wealth of Nations, have left me nothing to say on the only subject worthy my talent or attention, so, as a pis-aller, I have begun a very charming novel, with which I mean to delight the world, if the world will not persist in delighting me. What a pity we are never destined mutually to delight each other at the same moment, and that we are still fated to play the respectable parts of two buckets in a well! By-the-bye, a little work of mine will shortly make its appearance
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in this world; it is another sketch of Ireland, and might serve as a—what do you call it?—to the Wild Irish Girl. However, since I sent it two months back, no tidings have ever been heard of it. So Vive la Philosophie, for I lose only two hundred pounds, and, heaven knows, how much fame! Now write by return. I shall calculate the day and hour your letter should come—so no delay; and when you write, tell me how you are, with all the exactitude you would to your family physician (to whom, dear, good, kind saint, my most affectionate regards), and tell me if my dear, long-suffering Bess is quite well, and gay, and wicked as ever; and if the infallible Tom is the same ridiculously-perfect, and provokingly-insensible Sir Chas. Grandison I left him; and if Mr. Lefanu cherishes the same unhappy passion as first assailed him under the shade of a new straw hat; and if Mishter Moses commits the same extortions on people’s approbation, as when he played off his Israelitish tricks upon an unsuspecting crowd; but before you tell me a syllable, present my best love and kisses to the whole dear party without exception; and do you ever see Mr. W. Lefanu, and does he still waste his sweetness on a desert air? By-the-bye, that man has committed a flagrant breach of trust against the confidence of Nature, who never intended him to
Give up to party what was meant for mankind.

I wish Mr. and Mrs. Le Bas were comfortably seated in a sledge, driving a pair of rein-deer over the snows of Lapland Hill, like the couple in the magic
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lantern; and that their “superior friend” would give a little of those talents to the world which are so much confined to her fireside. I don’t know how it is, but I feel I am writing myself into a passion! so, before the paroxysm gets strong, adieu, dearest, kindest and best of friends.

S. O.

It is pleasant to find her keeping up her correspondence with her old pupils at Bracklin Castle; for some cause or other, her connection with the family of her second set of pupils at Fort William, had not ripened into a permanent friendship. The Featherstones had never lost the affectionate admiration with which they had from the first regarded her.

Miss Owenson to Miss Featherstone.
Longford House,
October 13th, 1807.

I was so surprised, and, indeed, mortified by your silence, that at a hazard I wrote to South Hill. I had, however, some presentiment that poor, dear mamma’s health was far from being what her friends could have wished. The account you gave me of her danger shocked me very much, for I believe there are not many after her own immediate family that feel a deeper interest in her; indeed, it would be extraordinary and ungrateful were it otherwise, for our know-
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ledge of each other is not a matter of yesterday. Pray present her my most sincere congratulations on her recovery, and assure her I look forward with great pleasure to seeing her well and gay as ever-next November; indeed, more so, for this severe attack has, most probably, cleared her constitution of all her old lingering delicacies.

Here I am writing and reading every day until I am black in the face; and eating, and drinking, and sleeping till I resemble nothing on earth but a full-blown peony. I have, not ten minutes back, broken down poor Sir Malby’s garden chair with my ponderous weight; little Malby insisted on yoking an old ass and a little mule to it, and then insisted on my gracing it with my presence; so, in I got, he mounted the ass, and away we drove towards the mountains, followed by a flock of ragged children; when, lo! in the midst of a pool of water down came my vehicle, the mule broke his traces, and plump I came into the mountain stream, to the great horror and delight of the surrounding multitude. I am now just enjoying the comfort of dry clothes; and while Lady Crofton’s maid is actually in the act of curling my unfortunate hair, I am scribbling to you. So much for my morning’s adventure.

After an age of solitude, during which period a new face would have been a matter of astonishment, we have our house at present pretty full; we have, among others, Mrs. and Miss Dowdell (the latter a very accomplished nice little girl), who seem to know your papa and Uncle John, with Sir Thomas and Captain
OLD IRISH HOSPITALITY.309
Featherstone; I believe, they are intimate; we are now, therefore, jigging away, every night, at an amazing rate; notwithstanding, I long for my old solitude again. I like to live either completely in or out of the world, but a second-hand business, a Birmingham gaiety, is woeful!

I am getting on famously with my new work; there is but one defect in it, namely, I cannot read a line of what I have written,—I wrote in such a furore of authorship! I am sure you will condole with me on the probable loss of my MSS. and bills, for I never have heard a word about them since I saw you. Lady Cunningham’s approbation is worth having, I know her character; she is esteemed a woman of superior taste, and ’tis said, contrived to convince the Emperor Napoleon his heart was not so adamantine but a woman could melt it. I triumph in Mr. Goode’s approbation; as much news of that kind as you will, I can take flattery in any way; lay it on with a shovel or administer it out of a gallon, I can open my mouth and gulp it down—all! I sincerely want to see you all some time in November; but I cannot get dear Lady Crofton to say when she will let me go. Yesterday she said early in November—to-day she talks of Christmas! And I am wholly dependent on her, as she takes me herself to Holy-brook, 120 miles—Connaught miles. I find I shall not be in to Mullingar till eight in the evening; now I greatly fear it will be inconvenient for papa to send any kind of a vehicle for me; pray use no ceremony, I can easily get a chaise there; at all events, I think I had better sleep that night at
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Mullingar—advise me. Well now, bye, bye, dear little gentle Margaret, my love a thousand times to all your fireside, and best compliments and wishes; as well as I can judge, I shall kiss your fair hand about the middle of November, as I am anxious to go to town before the 1st of December; till then and ever

Most affectionately
Yours,
S. O.
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