task, he was suddenly interrupted by the inspired Joe reciting aloud, but to himself, the first stanza of a new song:

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"When Cupid first our bosom fires,

And wins our youthful heart!"

"Pish! d-d nonsense," peevishly muttered Humphrey,taking his pen from his mouth and sticking it behind his ear,now I must go up the whole of the column again. Why don't you write to Lord Donoughmore? His letter has remained two days unanswered."

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True, true, my dear fellow!-how the deuce could I have forgotten it?-Jemmy,-addressing an ancient scribe in the office, who wrote officials in the day, and copied madrigals in the evening,-begin a letter to Lord Donoughmore." Joe A. (dictating)—" Dublin, 10th May, 1794." Jemmy-(writing)" Ninety-four."

Joe-" My dear Lud."

Jemmy-Lud,"—(written Lord, however.)

Joe "We have been honoured with your Ludship's letter of the 6th."

Jemmy-"Sixth."

Joe A.-" scribbling away most furiously, without attending to Jemmy, who repeats, "Sixth,' -no answer.)

Jemmy, again, with emphasis, "Let-ter-of-the SIXTH!"

Joe A.-"Hem! hem! We have been honoured with your Ludship's letter of the 6th."

Jemmy-"I have written it, sir."

Joe A.-(soliloquizing)—

"When Cupid first our bosom fires,

And wins our youthful heart--"

-our youthful heart,"-(waving his pen over his head, as if invoking the muses for a rhyme)-our youthful heart-heartdart-part-smart' ****!!!" eried Humphrey in a rage:

"Before heaven, my dear Joe, you're fitter for Bedlam than an office. Here's a week's business in arrear, and your d-d poetry engrosses the whole of your attention."

Joe" My d-d poetry! ha! ha! ha! well, Humphrey, my dear fellow, there's no disputing against taste; my d-d poetry!-excellent!"

Humphrey-" No, my dear Joe, nor is there any getting on in our business unless we attend to it."

Joe to Jemmy-" Give young Mr. Moore all the letters that are marked in the corner; he can make out my scrawl, and we'll soon get through the arrears.'

Thus was I set to work. Joe finished his stanza and went over to Moira House; Humphrey once more attacked and soon

subdued the formidable column; and by dint of the united labours of the veteran scribe and myself, nearly twenty letters were, as the partners were pleased to say, "neatly and skillfully put out of hand," in the course of the morning; not one needing correction, more than the insertion of pounds, shillings, and pence, for which due spaces were left, to be filled up by the clock-work Humphrey, who never made a mistake in his life but once-when, in a fit of abstraction, he found his way to the bedside of an ancient virgin, who was a visiter at his country-house, instead of his own; and was only roused from his lethargy by a salutation he had not been in the habit of receiving from his own good lady; a very amiable and pious woman, but who was, unfortunately, so deaf, that he generally announced his approach to the connubial couch by bawling in her ear—“ It's only me, my dear!"

"And who are you, ruffian?" screamed the affrighted Lucretia of the night; inflicting, at the same moment, one more seam on a face which nature, in the bitterness of her freaks, had already marked like corduroy. A short explanation restored peace in the chamber; the lady slept secure; and Humphrey, (who was the very essence of chastity) repaired to his own bed, determined to write a circumstantial account of the whole adventure, for his wife's information, next morning; for as to a verbal report, he might as well attempt to hold a conversation with the Hill of Howth.

This first specimen of my talents at the desk had nearly rivetted me to it; for every day, for the ensuing fortnight, I was required to attend; and no sooner were the post letters opened and read than they were passed over to " Moore," with a few sentences written on the turned-up corner by Captain A., whose scrawl was at times illegible. However, I contrived to give every day additional satisfaction by my voluntary services; and the kind and hospitable Humphrey would keep me to share his fish and beef, and drink his excellent claret almost daily, rather than allow me to walk three miles to my home. This comfort was not without its drawbacks: in the evening I was regaled with his usual concert in his stable, (to which he was obliged to resort, lest an indictment should be preferred against him for a nuisance,) where perching his rather elderly deaf wife on a corn-bin, he slung his drum, the only instrument whose sound could touch her tympanum, and whistling some popular tune, beat away with all the skill and with all the fierceness of visage of a regular tambour-major. That noisy point of war, "The Grenadier's March," generally concluded the concert, when the indulgent husband, unbracing at once his drum and the rigidity of his features, led, and sometimes carried his good wife to the tea-parlour.

Humphrey was a man who held every moral obligation in such profound respect, that he would have died a martyr to his duty to heaven or man. He was one of the ugliest men in Dublin, and would have been the ugliest, had not Gustavus Nicholls* lived and flourished in the full supremacy of his order. He possessed no great store of worldly wealth, when this amiable woman, highly respectable in family and fortune, bestowed her hand upon him: he vowed to love and cherish her, and if ever man kept that sacred vow with religious strictness, honest Humphrey was that rara avis!

144400

CHAPTER XV.

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"Hark to the drum:

It beats-come, come."

THE 1st of June, 1794, arrived; and the noon of that day found me on my road to Manor Rawdon, county of Meath, at the head of a respectable recruiting party, bearing the colours of the Loyal Leinster Volunteers, and the French gray of the Rawdon family. I attended the venerable Countess Moira, early that morning, to receive my letters of introduction; and she kept me at her knee for a full hour, giving me her kindest advice for my conduct, and instructions for my proceedings. Beware," she said, "of exposing yourself or party amongst the haunts of the defenders, against whose hostility even the name of my beloved son would not protect you." I shall never forget the kind manner in which she concluded her speech. My child, you are very young, and I have thought it right to commit you to the care of Mr. Robin O'Farrel, an old and faithful servant of our house, to whom this letter is addressed. He is therein ordered to leave you as little as possible by day and night. You must take up your abode at the village inn; it is kept by my son's tenant, a respectable widow, who will show you every kindness. You must listen to advice while there, for it is a wild country, and these are troublesome times. Mr. Newnham and his brother are the nearest magistrates, to whom I have furnished you with letters. They are loyal and

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Captain Gustavus Nicholls, Town-Major of Dublin, commonly called “De Gustibus!” admitted president of the Ugly Club.

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good men, and love my dear son" (here her eyes filled with tears) as he DESERVES to be LOVED!" I was so affected by these proofs of maternal affection, that I could scarcely retain the drop which stood trembling in my eyes. She dismissed me with a most kind, yet dignified farewell; in which the grandeur of the ancient Baroness gained a momentary ascendency over the amiable weakness of the most affectionate of mothers!

Short as was the distance, (less than thirty miles,) it was late in the night ere I reached my recruiting quarters, where my arrival was greeted by the obtruding heads, through the broken casement of the inn-door, of two gigantic dogs, who barked out a horrid welcome. However, Cromwell and Lion, the names of the canine guardians of the hall, were soon called to order; and I had scarcely time to make good my billet by hanging up my sword, &c., ere O'Farrel, the faithful, made his appearance to welcome me with all respect and duty. When he saw his honoured lady's hand-writing, tears of joy coursed each other down his aged cheek, and he looked at it again and again, each time pressing it to his heart, and murmuring a blessing on the writer, ere he opened it and read its

contents.

The first lines were,

"Robin O'Farrel,

"This will be presented to you by Mr. Moore, a young gentleman, who is to be an ensign in my son's regiment."

Robin instantly turned to me, and, with an obsequious bow, said, "Captain, welcome to our poor village!"

“You perceive, Mr. O'Farrel,” I replied, “that I am as yet hardly an ensign." Pursuing the course of the letter, he saw the duty with which he stood charged; and, to assure me that his fidelity and courage were not overrated, he threw back the skirt of his George-the-Second-cut coat, and displayed a buckhandled couteau-de-chasse, half knife, half hanger, something like a Turkish yatagan; and touching the haft, said, "Captain, here's this which has made many a defender and white boy fly!" This I afterwards found was no vain boast. Words of mutual satisfaction were exchanged, and very shortly succeeded by a spatch-cock* and a jorum of whiskey punch, to the first of which my ready appetite did ample justice; while old Robin joined me in flowing bumpers to the health of his honoured lady and her idolized son.

My sergeant, who, with the corporal, four privates, and my fifer, (we had no drum,) were regaling in the lower room or

*Spatch cock: a fowl, whose apprehension, execution, and ultimate dissection on table, seldom oceupy above half an hour: in fact, a DESPATCHED COCK!"

kitchen, was called in, and in the due and erect position of a soldier, tossed off an overflowing tumbler to the "Health of the Noble Earl Moira!" Then, with a touch of his hand to his forehead, retired to praise my punch, and--my condescension.

The alehouse of an insignificant Irish village, not exhibiting one good house, could hardly be expected to abound in luxu ries, yet my portly landlady, the widow Malone, could boast of one bed fit for the noble lions of the lord of the manor himself. Into this I was regularly inducted. The sergeant and party had a well-secured out-house entirely to themselves, in which they found "dry lodging.”

I slept soundly during the few hours of a midsummer night, and was up and fresh by six o'clock. My attentive old guar dian was at his post by seven to take my orders for the day. Amongst my party was an unfortunate debauched hair-dresser from Dublin, who, full of drink and distress, enlisted for a soldier. His name was English; but while with the party in Dublin, he had gained the nickname of "Husho!" For what reason I never inquired; but it was that by which he was best known. On him I fixed as my orderly and servant, and found him, at least, an excellent friz. The arrival of the baggage car afforded me employment in unpacking my stationary, slopclothing, &c.; after which I walked forth with old O'Farrel.

The figure of this venerable man was quite a study for an artist. At the age of seventy-six, he stood full six feet high, and as erect as a poplar; there was at once a blended dignity and solemnity in his carriage, which inspired respect at first sight. His dress was one entire suit of bark-coloured brown; the buttons of the coat continued down the front to the very bottom of the full and ample skirt; the pocket flaps ornamented with three buttons, as were the long and low flaps of the lengthy waistcoat. In the knees of his breeches were curious old silver buckles, a corresponding pattern with the bright and massive pair that shone in his high-quartered shoes; and at the button-hole of his breast hung a small silver horn, the badge of his office, as holding the perpetual deputation of the manors of the Moira family in these parts. There was not a single draw-back to lessen my admiration of his very striking face and figure: his limbs were powerful and finely-shaped; his temperance and habits of exercise had so preserved their strength and elasticity, that this fine old man could walk twenty Irish miles in five hours, with his gun on his arm, over a broken country, without fatigue or halt. He was usually attended by two or three brace of the best dogs in the country, which he, of course, called his "dear lord's," and no man in his district could vie with him as a shot.

The next morning I set apart for delivering my letters of