Читать книгу Seventy Years of Irish Life - William Richard le Fanu - Страница 6

Table of Contents

Lord Edward Fitzgerald’s dagger—United Irishmen: the Apologia of John Sheares—Doctor Dobbin’s kind deeds—The story of the Ilchester oak—An outlaw sportsman: his narrow escape and sad ending.

LORD EDWARD’s DAGGER.

To return to my brother:—the tone of those early verses, from which I have given quotations, as well as that of some of his later ballads, was due to his mother, who, as a girl, had been in her heart more or less a rebel. She told him of the hard fate which, in ‘98, befell many of those whom she knew and admired. She told him much of Lord Edward Fitzgerald and the fight he made for his life, and showed him the dagger with which he fought for it. It is many years now since she gave me that dagger, and with it the following written account of how it came into her possession:—

“I was almost a child when I possessed myself of the dagger with which Lord Edward Fitzgerald had defended himself so desperately at the time of his arrest. The circumstances connected with it are these:—Mrs. Swan, wife of Major Swan (Deputy Town Major), was a relative of my mother. Our family constantly visited at her house in North Great George’s Street. My mother often took my younger sister and me there. I often heard Major Swan describe the dreadful struggle in which he had himself received a severe wound from the dagger which he had succeeded in wresting from Lord Edward, and which he took a pleasure in showing as a trophy. The dreadful conflict is described in the Annual Register, and in the journals of the day. The death-wound which Lord Edward received, and the death of Captain Ryan, are known to every one. The character of Lord Edward, the position which he held, and his tragical death, the domestic happiness which he had enjoyed, and the affection in which he held those near to him, I need not describe. When I saw the dagger in the hands with which Lord Edward had striven in the last fatal struggle for life or death, I felt that it was not rightfully his who held it, and wished it were in other hands. Wishes soon changed into plans, and I determined, if possible, to get it. I knew the spot in the front drawing-room where it was laid, and one evening, after tea, when Major Swan and his guests were engaged in conversation in the back drawing-room, I walked into the front drawing-room, to the spot where it was. I seized it and thrust it into my bosom, inside my stays. I returned to the company, where I had to sit for an hour, and then drove home a distance of three miles. As soon as we left the house I told my sister, who was beside me, what I had done. As soon as we got home, I rushed up to the room which my sister and I occupied, and, having secured the door, I opened one of the seams in the feather bed, took out the dagger, and plunged it among the feathers. For upwards of twelve years I lay every night upon the bed which contained my treasure. When I left home I took it with me, and it has been my companion in all the vicissitudes of life. When he missed it Major Swan was greatly incensed, and not without apprehensions that it had been taken to inflict a deadly revenge upon him. Had he taken harsh measures against the servants, whom he might have suspected, I had resolved to confess that I had taken it; but after a time his anger and uneasiness subsided. I have often seen and heard this dagger described as a most extraordinary weapon, and have been ready to laugh when I heard it so described. Moore mentions it in his life of Lord Edward Fitzgerald, as being in the possession of some other family. He is quite mistaken. This is the very dagger, which had not been many months in Major Swan’s hands, when it became mine in the manner above described.

“Emma L. Le Fanc.

“April, 1847.”

It will be seen from this what an enthusiastic admirer of Lord Edward my mother was. There were two other United Irishmen whom she knew well; they were the brothers Sheares, whose base and cruel betrayal by another United Irishman, who was their trusted friend and companion, caused such intense indignation amongst all who knew them. They were barristers and men of good position and means, sons of Henry Sheares, M.P., a banker in Cork, and were friends of my mother’s father, the Rev. Doctor Dobbin. A short time before the capture of Lord Edward Fitzgerald they, with twelve other leaders of the insurrectionary movement, were arrested. The two brothers were tried for high treason and convicted, and were executed on the 14th of July, 1799. Amongst other letters of theirs I have two, which I give below, written, the one just before his sentence, the other the night before his execution, by John, the younger of the brothers. The first is to a Mr. Flemyng, a relative of my grandfather, the second to my grandfather himself.

“July 12, ’98.

“Dear Harry,

“As I well know what will be my fate to-day, I enclose you a letter for my dear sister, which I request you will give her as soon after my execution as you shall think prudent. To such dear friends as you and William are, I know it is unnecessary to recommend my afflicted family, and particularly my ever-revered mother. I will require the performance of Doctor Dobbin’s kind promise as soon as I feel myself fit to receive him. I did intend giving into your hands a short defence relative to some points in which I know I shall be vilely calumniated. But I have not had time, as I prepared every syllable of our defence, and wrote letters, etc., etc. One of you ought to be present at my execution, yet this is too much to ask. No, I must endure misrepresentation—the hearts of my friends will justify me. Farewell, my ever kind, my ever valued friends. I am called to court. Farewell for ever.

“Yours affectionately,

“John Sheares.”

“To the Rev. Doctor Dobbin, D.D.

“Newgate, 12 o’clock at night,

“July 13th, 1798.

“My dear Sir,

“As to-morrow is appointed for the execution of my brother and me, I shall trouble you with a few words on the subject of the writing produced on my trial, importing to be a proclamation. The first observation I have to make is that a considerable part of that scrolled production was suppressed on my trial, from what motive or whether by accident I will not say. Certain it is that the part which has not appeared must have in a great measure shown what the true motives were that caused that writing, if it had been produced. To avoid a posthumous calumny, in addition to the many and gross misrepresentations of my principles, moral and political, I shall state, with the most sacred regard to truth, what my chief objects were in writing, or rather in attempting to write it, for it is but a wretched patched and garbled attempt. It was contained in a sheet of paper, and in one or two pieces more which are not forthcoming.

“The sheet alone has been produced. It is written in very violent revolutionary language, because, as it in the outset imports, after a revolution had taken place could it alone be published. And the occurrence of such an event I thought every day more probable. The first sentence that has produced much misrepresentation is that which mentions that some of the most obnoxious members of Government have already paid the forfeit of their lives. I cannot state the words exactly. From this it is concluded that I countenanced assassination. Gracious God! but I shall simply answer that this sentence was merely supposititious, and founded on the common remark, oftenest made by those who least wished it verified, that if the people had ever recourse to force and succeeded, there were certain persons whom they would most probably destroy. The next most obnoxious sentence, more obnoxious to my feelings, because calculated to misrepresent the real sentiments of my soul, is that which recommends to give no quarter to those who fought against their native country, unless they should speedily join the standard of freedom.[A] With this latter part of the sentence I found two faults, and therefore draw my pen over it as above. The first fault was that the word ‘speedily’ was too vague, and might encourage the sanguinary immediately to deny quarter, which is the very thing the sentence was intended to discountenance and prevent. The next fault was that it required more than ever should be required of any human being, namely, to fight against his opinions from fear. The sentence was intended to prevent the horrid measure of refusing quarter from being adopted by appearing to acquiesce in it at some future period, when the inhuman thirst for it should no longer exist. But as the sentence now stands, in two parts of the sheet, it would appear as if it sought to enforce the measure I most abhor. To prevent it was in fact one of my leading motives for writing the address. But I had also three others, that are expressed in the pieces of paper which made part of the writing, but which, though laid in the same desk, have disappeared. The three objects alluded to are these: the protection of property, preventing the indulgence of revenge, and the strict forbiddance of injuring any person for religious differences. I know it is said that I call on the people to take vengeance on their oppressors, and enumerate some of their oppressions; but this is the very thing that enables me to describe the difference between private revenge and public vengeance. The former has only a retrospective and malignant propensity, while the latter, though animated by a recollection of the past, has ever, and only, in view the removal of the evil and of its possibility of recurrence. Thus the assassin revenges himself, but the patriot avenges his country of its enemies by overthrowing them and depriving them of all power again to hurt it. In the struggle some of their lives may fall, but these are not the objects of his vengeance. In short, the Deity is said, in this sense, to be an avenging Being, but who deems Him revengeful?

“Adieu, my dear sir. Let me entreat you, whenever an opportunity shall occur, that you will justify my principles on these points.

“Believe me,

“Your sincere friend,

“John Sheares.”

[A] In the original a line is drawn with the pen through these words.

The Doctor Dobbin referred to in the first of these letters was my grandfather. He had been a Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin, but he resigned his fellowship in order to take to him a wife (the fellows had then to be celibate). The wife he took was Miss Catherine Coote, of Ash Hill Towers, in the county of Limerick, aunt of the late Sir Charles Coote. She died before I was born, but him I can remember well—a very small man in a full-bottomed wig, knee-breeches, black silk stockings, buckles in his shoes, and in his hand a gold-headed cane. He was long remembered in Dublin and its neighbourhood for his goodness and kindness to the poor, and many stories were told of his simplicity and charity. Once a man was begging at his carriage window; he had no change about him, so he handed the man a guinea, and said to him, “Go, my poor man, get me change of that, and I will give you a shilling.” I need hardly say he saw that beggar’s face no more. Another day his wife, on coming home, found him in the hall with his hands behind his back. She soon perceived that he was hiding something from her, and insisted on knowing what it was. He timidly brought out from behind his back a leg of mutton which had been roasting in the kitchen, and which he had surreptitiously removed from the spit to give to a poor woman who was waiting at the door.

In our earlier days at Abington our favourite haunts for nutting and bird’s-nesting were the Glen and the Old Deer Park of Cappercullen, which now form part of Glenstal, Sir Charles Barrington’s picturesque demesne. In the Old Park there stood, and still stands, the Ilchester oak, one great bough of which stretched just to the edge of the drive, and there came nearly to the ground. Many a time we sat on this great bough, as many a boy and girl had done before, and by touching our feet to the ground, made it spring up and down; it was a perfect spring-board. I did not then know how the old tree had got its name, but many years afterwards I was told this story by my father-in-law, Sir Matthew Barrington:—