第18章 Volume 1(18)

The funeral was conducted almost with splendour.The body,having been conveyed,in compliance with Sir Robert's last directions,to Dublin,was there laid within the ancient walls of St.Audoen's Church --where I have read the epitaph,telling the age and titles of the departed dust.

Neither painted escutcheon,nor marble slab,have served to rescue from oblivion the story of the dead,whose very name will ere long moulder from their tracery 'Et sunt sua fata sepulchris.'

The events which I have recorded are not imaginary.They are FACTS;and there lives one whose authority none would venture to question,who could vindicate the accuracy of every statement which Ihave set down,and that,too,with all the circumstantiality of an eye-witness.

Being a third Extract from the legacy of the late Francis Purcell,P.P.of Drumcoolagh.

There is something in the decay of ancient grandeur to interest even the most unconcerned spectator--the evidences of greatness,of power,and of pride that survive the wreck of time,proving,in mournful contrast with present desolation and decay,what WAS in other days,appeal,with a resistless power,to the sympathies of our nature.And when,as we gaze on the scion of some ruined family,the first impulse of nature that bids us regard his fate with interest and respect is justified by the recollection of great exertions and self-devotion and sacrifices in the cause of a lost country and of a despised religion--sacrifices and efforts made with all the motives of faithfulness and of honour,and terminating in ruin--in such a case respect becomes veneration,and the interest we feel amounts almost to a passion.

It is this feeling which has thrown the magic veil of romance over every roofless castle and ruined turret throughout our country;it is this feeling that,so long as a tower remains above the level of the soil,so long as one scion of a prostrate and impoverished family survives,will never suffer Ireland to yield to the stranger more than the 'mouth honour'which fear compels.Iwho have conversed viva voce et propria persona with those whose recollections could run back so far as the times previous to the confiscations which followed the Revolution of 1688--whose memory could repeople halls long roofless and desolate,and point out the places where greatness once had been,may feel all this more strongly,and with a more vivid interest,than can those whose sympathies are awakened by the feebler influence of what may be called the PICTURESQUE effects of ruin and decay.

There do,indeed,still exist some fragments of the ancient Catholic families of Ireland;but,alas!what VERY fragments!

They linger like the remnants of her aboriginal forests,reft indeed of their strength and greatness,but proud even in decay.Every winter thins their ranks,and strews the ground with the wreck of their loftiest branches;they are at best but tolerated in the land which gave them birth--objects of curiosity,perhaps of pity,to one class,but of veneration to another.

The O'Connors,of Castle Connor,were an ancient Irish family.The name recurs frequently in our history,and is generally to be found in a prominent place whenever periods of tumult or of peril called forth the courage and the enterprise of this country.After the accession of William III.,the storm of confiscation which swept over the land made woeful havoc in their broad domains.Some fragments of property,however,did remain to them,and with it the building which had for ages formed the family residence.

About the year 17--,my uncle,a Catholic priest,became acquainted with the inmates of Castle Connor,and after a time introduced me,then a lad of about fifteen,full of spirits,and little dreaming that a profession so grave as his should ever become mine.

The family at that time consisted of but two members,a widow lady and her only son,a young man aged about eighteen.In our early days the progress from acquaintance to intimacy,and from intimacy to friendship is proverbially rapid;and young O'Connor and I became,in less than a month,close and confidential companions--an intercourse which ripened gradually into an attachment ardent,deep,and devoted--such as I believe young hearts only are capable of forming.

He had been left early fatherless,and the representative and heir of his family.

His mother's affection for him was intense in proportion as there existed no other object to divide it--indeed--such love as that she bore him I have never seen elsewhere.Her love was better bestowed than that of mothers generally is,for young O'Connor,not without some of the faults,had certainly many of the most engaging qualities of youth.He had all the frankness and gaiety which attract,and the generosity of heart which confirms friendship;indeed,I never saw a person so universally popular;his very faults seemed to recommend him;he was wild,extravagant,thoughtless,and fearlessly adventurous--defects of character which,among the peasantry of Ireland,are honoured as virtues.The combination of these qualities,and the position which O'Connor occupied as representative of an ancient Irish Catholic family--a peculiarly interesting one to me,one of the old faith--endeared him to me so much that I have never felt the pangs of parting more keenly than when it became necessary,for the finishing of his education,that he should go abroad.