Sir Nicholas is now sixty years old, and when he came to the title at thirty, he was regarded certainly as a poor man's friend. He always lived on the estate. He rarely went up to Dublin, except for a fortnight, when the hunting was over, and when he paid his respects to the Lord Lieutenant3. The house at Ballytowngal was said, in those days, to be as well kept up as any mansion4 in County Galway. But the saying came probably from those who were not intimate in the more gloriously maintained mansions5. Sir Nicholas had ￡5000 a year, and though he did manage to pay his bills annually6, spent every shilling of it. He preserved his foxes loyally, and was quite as keen about the fishing of a little river that he owned, and which ran down from his demesne7 into Lough Corrib. He was particular also about his snipe, and would boast that in a little spinney at Ballytowngal were to be met the earliest woodcock found in the West of Ireland. He was a thorough sportsman;—but a Roman Catholic—and as a Roman Catholic he was hardly equal in standing8 to some of his Protestant neighbours. He voted for Major Stackpoole, when Major Stackpoole stood for the county on the Liberal interest, and was once requested to come forward himself, and stand for the City as a Roman Catholic. This he did not do, being a prudent9 man; but at that period, from twenty to thirty years ago, he was certainly regarded as inferior to a Protestant by many of the Protestant gentlemen of the country.
But things are changed now. Sir Nicholas's neighbours, such of them at least that are Protestants, regard Sir Nicholas as equal to themselves. They do not care much for his religion, but they know that he is not a Home-Ruler, or latterly, since the Land League sprang into existence, a Land Leaguer. He is, in fact, one of themselves as a county gentleman, and the question of religion has gone altogether into abeyance10. Had you known the county thirty years ago, and had now heard Sir Nicholas talking of county matters, you would think that he was one of the old Protestants. It was so that the rich people regarded him,—and so also the poor. But Sir Nicholas had not varied11 at all. He liked to get his rents paid, and as long as his tenants12 would pay them, he was at one with them. They had begun now to have opinions of their own upon the subject, and he was at one with them no longer.
Frank Jones had heard in Galway, that there was to be a difficulty about drawing the Ballytowngal coverts14. The hounds were to be allowed to draw the demesne coverts, but beyond that they were to be interrupted. Foxes seldom broke from Ballytowngal, or if they did they ran to Moytubber. At Moytubber the hounds would probably change,—or would do so if allowed to continue their sport in peace. But at Moytubber the row would begin. Knowing this, Frank Jones was anxious to leave his home in time, as he was aware that the hounds would be carried on to Moytubber as quickly as possible. Black Daly had sworn a solemn oath that he would draw Moytubber in the teeth of every Home-Ruler and Land Leaguer in County Galway.
A word or two must be said descriptive of Black Daly, as he was called, the master of the Galway hounds. They used to be called the Galway blazers, but the name had nearly dropped out of fashion since Black Daly had become their master, a quarter of a century since. Who Black Daly was or whence he had come, many men, even in County Galway, did not know. It was not that he had no property, but that his property was so small, as to make it seem improbable that the owner of it should be the master of the county hounds. But in truth Black Daly lived at Daly's Bridge, in the neighbourhood of Castle Blakeney, when he was supposed to be at home. And the house in which he lived he had undoubtedly15 inherited from his father. But he was not often there, and kept his kennels16 at Ahaseragh, five miles away from Daly's Bridge. Much was not therefore known of Mr. Daly, in his own house.
But in the field no man was better known, or more popular, if thorough obedience18 is an element of popularity. The old gentry19 of the county could tell why Mr. Daly had been put into his present situation five-and-twenty years ago; but the manner of his election was not often talked about. He had no money, and very few acres of his own on which to preserve foxes. He had never done anything to earn a shilling since he had been born, unless he may have been said to have earned shillings by his present occupation. As he got his living out of it, he certainly may have been said to have done so. He never borrowed a shilling from any man, and certainly paid his way. But if he told a young man that he ought to buy a horse the young man certainly bought it. And if he told a young man that he must pay a certain price, the young man generally paid it. But if the young man were not ready with his money by the day fixed20, that young man generally had a bad time of it. Young men have been known to be driven not only out of County Galway, but out of Ireland itself, by the tone of Mr. Daly's voice, and by the blackness of his frown. And yet it was said generally that neither young men nor old men were injured in their dealings with Mr. Daly. "That horse won't be much the worse for his splint, and he's worth ￡70 to you, because you can ride him ten stone. You had better give me ￡70 for him." Then the young man would promise the ￡70 in three months' time, and if he kept his word, would swear by Black Daly ever afterwards. In this way Mr. Daly sold a great many horses.
But he had been put into his present position because he hunted the hounds, during the illness of a distant cousin, who was the then master. The master had died, but the county had the best sport that winter that it had ever enjoyed. "I don't see why I should not do it, as well as another," Tom Daly had said. He was then known as Tom Daly. "You've got no money," his cousin had said, the son of the old gentleman who was just dead. It was well understood that the cousin wished to have the hounds, but that he was thought not to have all the necessary attributes. "I suppose the county means to pay for all sport," said Tom. Then the hat went round, and an annual sum of ￡900 a year was voted. Since that the hounds have gone on, and the bills have been paid; and Tom has raised the number of days' hunting to four a week, or has lowered it to two, according to the amount of money given. He makes no proposition now, but declares what he means to do. "Things are dearer," he said last year, "and you won't have above five days a fortnight, unless you can make the money up to ￡1,200. I want ￡400 a day, and ￡400 I must have." The county had then voted him the money in the plenitude of its power, and Daly had hunted seven days a fortnight. But all the Galway world felt that there was about to be a fall.
Black Daly was a man quite as dark as his sobriquet21 described him. He was tall, but very thin and bony, and seemed not to have an ounce of flesh about his face or body. He had large, black whiskers,—coarse and jet black,—which did not quite meet beneath his chin. And he wore no other beard, no tuft, no imperial, no moustachios; but when he was seen before shaving on a morning, he would seem to be black all over, and his hair was black, short, and harsh; and though black, round about his ears it was beginning to be tinged22 with grey. He was now over fifty years of age; but the hair on his head was as thick as it had been when he first undertook the hounds. He had great dark eyes in his head, deep down, so that they seemed to glitter at you out of caverns23. And above them were great, bushy eyebrows24, every hair of which seemed to be black, and harsh, and hard. His nose was well-formed and prominent; but of cheeks he had apparently25 none. Between his whiskers and his nose, and the corners of his mouth, there was nothing but two hollow cavities. He was somewhat over six feet high, but from his extraordinary thinness gave the appearance of much greater height. His arms were long, and the waistcoat which he wore was always long; his breeches were very long; and his boots seemed the longest thing about him—unless his spurs seemed longer. He had no flesh about him, and it was boasted of him that, in spite of his length, and in spite of his height, he could ride under twelve stone. Of himself, and of his doings, he never talked. They were secrets of his own, of which he might have to make money. And no one had a right to ask him questions. He did not conceive that it would be necessary for a gentleman to declare his weight unless he were about to ride a race. Now it was understood that for the last ten years Black Daly had ridden no races.
He was a man of whom it might be said that he never joked. Though his life was devoted26 in a peculiar27 manner to sport, and there may be thought to be something akin28 between the amusements and the lightness of life, it was all serious to him. Though he was bitter over it, or happy; triumphant29, or occasionally in despair—as when the money was not forthcoming—he never laughed. It was all serious to him, and apparently sad, from the first note of a hound in the early covert13, down to the tidings that a poor fox had been found poisoned near his earth. He had much to do to find sport for the county on such limited means, and he was always doing it.
He not only knew every hound in his pack, but he knew their ages, their sires, and their dams; and the sires and the dams of most of their sires and dams. He knew the constitution of each, and to what extent their noses were to be trusted. "It's a very heavy scent31 to-day," he would say, "because Gaylap carries it over the plough. It's only a catching32 scent because the drops don't hang on the bushes." His lore33 on all such matters was incredible, but he would never listen to any argument. A man had a right to his own opinion; but then the man who differed from him knew nothing. He gave out his little laws to favoured individuals; not by way of conversation, for which he cared nothing, but because it might be well that the favoured individual should know the truth on that occasion.
As a man to ride he was a complete master of his art. There was nothing which a horse could do with a man on his back, which Daly could not make him do; and when he had ridden a horse he would know exactly what was within his power. But there was no desire with him for the showing off of a horse. He often rode to sell a horse, but he never seemed to do so. He never rode at difficult places unless driven to do so by the exigencies34 of the moment. He was always quiet in the field, unless when driven to express himself as to the faults of some young man. Then he could blaze forth30 in his anger with great power. He was constantly to be seen trotting35 along a road when hounds were running, because he had no desire to achieve for himself a character for hard riding. But he was always with his hounds when he was wanted, and it was boasted of him that he had ridden four days a week through the season on three horses, and had never lamed36 one of them. He was rarely known to have a second horse out, and when he did so, it was for some purpose peculiar to the day's work. On such days he had generally a horse to sell.
It is hardly necessary to say that Black Daly was an unmarried man. No one who knew him could conceive that he should have had a wife. His hounds were his children, and he could have taught no wife to assist him in looking after them, with the constant attention and tender care which was given to them by Barney Smith, his huntsman. A wife, had she seen to the feeding of the numerous babies, would have given them too much to eat, and had she not undertaken this care, she would have been useless at Daly's Bridge. But Barney Smith was invaluable37; double the amount of work got usually from a huntsman was done by him. There was no kennel17 man, no second horseman, no stud-groom at the Ahaseragh kennels. It may be said that Black Daly filled all these positions himself, and that in each Barney Smith was his first lieutenant. Circumstances had given him the use of the Ahaseragh kennels, which had been the property of his cousin, and circumstances had not enabled him to build others at Daly's Bridge. Gradually he had found it easier to move himself than the hounds. And so it had come to pass that two rooms had been prepared for him close to the kennels, and that Mr. Barney Smith gave him such attendance as was necessary. Of strictly38 personal attendance Black Daly wanted very little; but the discomforts39 of that home, while one pair of breeches were supposed to be at Daly's Bridge, and the others at Ahaseragh, were presumed by the world at large to be very grievous.
But the personal appearance of Mr. Daly on hunting mornings, was not a matter of indifference40. It was not that he wore beautiful pink tops, or came out guarded from the dust by little aprons41, or had his cravat42 just out of the bandbox, or his scarlet43 coat always new, and in the latest fashion, nor had his hat just come from the shop in Piccadilly with the newest twist to its rim44. But there was something manly45, and even powerful about his whole apparel. He was always the same, so that by men even in his own county, he would hardly have been known in other garments. The strong, broad brimmed high hat, with the cord passing down his back beneath his coat, that had known the weather of various winters; the dark, red coat, with long swallow tails, which had grown nearly black under many storms; the dark, buff striped waistcoat, with the stripes running downwards46, long, so as to come well down over his breeches; the breeches themselves, which were always of leather, but which had become nearly brown under the hands of Barney Smith or his wife, and the mahogany top-boots, of which the tops seemed to be a foot in length, could none of them have been worn by any but Black Daly. His very spurs must have surely been made for him, they were in length and weight; and general strength of leather, so peculiarly his own. He was unlike other masters of hounds in this, that he never carried a horn; but he spoke47 to his hounds in a loud, indistinct chirruping voice, which all County Galway believed to be understood to every hound in the park.
One other fact must be told respecting Mr. Daly. He was a Protestant—as opposed to a Roman Catholic. No one had ever known him go to church, or speak a word in reference to religion. He was equally civil or uncivil to priest and parson when priest or parson appeared in the field. But on no account would he speak to either of them if he could avoid it. But he had in his heart a thorough conviction that all Roman Catholics ought to be regarded as enemies by all Protestants, and that the feeling was one entirely48 independent of faith and prayerbooks, or crosses and masses. For him fox-hunting—fox-hunting for others—was the work of his life, and he did not care to meddle49 with what he did not understand. But he was a Protestant, and Sir Nicholas Bodkin was a Roman Catholic, and therefore an enemy—as a dog may be supposed to declare himself a dog, and a cat a cat, if called upon to explain the cause for the old family quarrel.
Now there had come a cloud over his spirit in reference to the state of his country. He could see that the quarrel was not entirely one between Protestant and Catholic as it used to be, but still he could not get it out of his mind, but that the old causes were producing in a different way their old effects. Whiteboys, Terryalts, Ribbonmen, Repeaters, Physical-Forcemen, Fenians, Home-Rulers, Professors of Dynamite50, and American-Irish, were, to his thinking, all the same. He never talked much about it, because he did not like to expose his ignorance; but his convictions were not the less formed. It was the business of a Protestant to take rent, and of a Roman Catholic to pay rent. There were certain deviations51 in this ordained52 rule of life, but they were only exceptions. The Roman Catholics had the worst of this position, and the Protestants the best. Therefore the Roman Catholics were of course quarrelling with it, and therefore the Roman Catholics must be kept down. Such had been Mr. Daly's general outlook into life. But now the advancing evil of the time was about to fall even upon himself, and upon his beneficent labours, done for the world at large. It was whispered in County Galway that the people were about to rise and interfere53 with fox-hunting! It may be imagined that on this special day Mr. Daly's heart was low beneath his black-striped waistcoat, as he rode on his way to draw the coverts at Ballytowngal.
At the cross-roads of Monivea he met Peter Bodkin, the eldest54 son of Sir Nicholas. Now Peter Bodkin had quarrelled long and very bitterly with his father. Every acre of the property at Ballytowngal was entailed55 upon him, and Peter had thought that under such circumstances his father was not doing enough for him. The quarrel had been made up, but still the evil rankled56 in Peter's bosom57, who was driven to live with his wife and family on ￡500 a year; and had found himself hardly driven to keep himself out of the hands of the Jews. His father had wished him to follow some profession, but this had been contrary to Peter's idea of what was becoming. But though he had only ￡500 a year, and five children, he did manage to keep two horses, and saw a good deal of hunting.
And among all the hunting men in County Galway he was the one who lived on the closest terms of intimacy58 with Black Daly. For, though he was a Roman Catholic, his religion did not trouble him much; and he was undoubtedly on the same side with Daly in the feuds59 that were coming on the country. Indeed, he and Daly had entertained the same feelings for some years; for, in the quarrels which had been rife60 between the father and son, Mr. Daly had taken the son's part, as far as so silent a man can be said to have taken any part at all.
"Well, Peter." "Well, Daly," were the greetings, as the two men met; and then they rode on together in silence for a mile. "Have you heard what the boys are going to do?" asked the master. Peter shook his head. "I suppose there's nothing in it?"
"I fear there is."
"What will they do?" asked Mr. Daly.
"Just prevent your hunting."
"If they touch me, or either of the men, by God! I'll shoot some of them." Then he put his hand into his pocket, as much as to explain a pistol was there. After that the two men rode on in silence till they came to the gates of Ballytowngal.
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1
esteem
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| n.尊敬，尊重；vt.尊重，敬重；把…看作 | |
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2
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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3
lieutenant
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| n.陆军中尉，海军上尉；代理官员，副职官员 | |
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mansion
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| n.大厦，大楼；宅第 | |
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mansions
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| n.宅第，公馆，大厦( mansion的名词复数 ) | |
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annually
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| adv.一年一次，每年 | |
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demesne
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| n.领域，私有土地 | |
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standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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9
prudent
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| adj.谨慎的，有远见的，精打细算的 | |
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10
abeyance
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| n.搁置，缓办，中止，产权未定 | |
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11
varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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12
tenants
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| n.房客( tenant的名词复数 )；佃户；占用者；占有者 | |
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13
covert
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| adj.隐藏的；暗地里的 | |
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coverts
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| n.隐蔽的，不公开的，秘密的( covert的名词复数 )；复羽 | |
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15
undoubtedly
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| adv.确实地，无疑地 | |
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16
kennels
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| n.主人外出时的小动物寄养处，养狗场；狗窝( kennel的名词复数 )；养狗场 | |
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kennel
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| n.狗舍，狗窝 | |
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18
obedience
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| n.服从，顺从 | |
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19
gentry
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| n.绅士阶级，上层阶级 | |
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20
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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sobriquet
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| n.绰号 | |
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tinged
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| v.（使）发丁丁声( ting的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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23
caverns
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| 大山洞，大洞穴( cavern的名词复数 ) | |
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eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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25
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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26
devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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akin
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| adj.同族的，类似的 | |
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29
triumphant
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| adj.胜利的，成功的；狂欢的，喜悦的 | |
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30
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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31
scent
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| n.气味，香味，香水，线索，嗅觉；v.嗅，发觉 | |
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32
catching
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| adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住 | |
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33
lore
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| n.传说；学问，经验，知识 | |
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34
exigencies
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| n.急切需要 | |
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35
trotting
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| 小跑，急走( trot的现在分词 )； 匆匆忙忙地走 | |
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36
lamed
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| 希伯莱语第十二个字母 | |
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37
invaluable
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| adj.无价的，非常宝贵的，极为贵重的 | |
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38
strictly
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| adv.严厉地，严格地；严密地 | |
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39
discomforts
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| n.不舒适( discomfort的名词复数 )；不愉快，苦恼 | |
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40
indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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41
aprons
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| 围裙( apron的名词复数 )； 停机坪，台口（舞台幕前的部份） | |
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42
cravat
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| n.领巾，领结；v.使穿有领结的服装，使结领结 | |
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43
scarlet
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| n.深红色，绯红色，红衣；adj.绯红色的 | |
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44
rim
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| n.(圆物的)边，轮缘；边界 | |
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45
manly
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| adj.有男子气概的；adv.男子般地，果断地 | |
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46
downwards
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| adj./adv.向下的（地），下行的（地） | |
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47
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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48
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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49
meddle
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| v.干预，干涉，插手 | |
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50
dynamite
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| n./vt.(用)炸药(爆破) | |
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51
deviations
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| 背离，偏离( deviation的名词复数 )； 离经叛道的行为 | |
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52
ordained
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| v.任命（某人）为牧师( ordain的过去式和过去分词 )；授予（某人）圣职；（上帝、法律等）命令；判定 | |
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53
interfere
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| v.(in)干涉，干预；(with)妨碍，打扰 | |
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54
eldest
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| adj.最年长的，最年老的 | |
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55
entailed
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| 使…成为必要( entail的过去式和过去分词 )； 需要； 限定继承； 使必需 | |
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56
rankled
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| v.（使）痛苦不已，（使）怨恨不已( rankle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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57
bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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58
intimacy
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| n.熟悉，亲密，密切关系，亲昵的言行 | |
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feuds
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| n.长期不和，世仇( feud的名词复数 ) | |
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rife
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| adj.(指坏事情)充斥的，流行的，普遍的 | |
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