Scotland, Ireland and Wales in the XIX Century

The Rivals III.

CHAPTER VII.

In a little opening of the beech wood, strewed with dry leaves and withered branches, and chequered with dancing gleams of sun shine, the young patriot stood, awaiting the arrival of his humble friend, with extreme impatience. He would himself have made any sacrifice, have endured any privation, have braved any danger, rather than do violence to his own sense of whrit was honourable; and his attachments, as a natural consequence, were always doubly strong in proportion to the sacrifices which he made on their account. Without entertaining much doubt, as to the effect which his brief note might produce upon the mind of Esther, his anxiety to learn her answer approached a degree of torture.

And, here, it is fitting that the reader should be made aware of that early cause of quarrel which existed between Richard Lacy and our hero, and which was the immediate occasion of the long exile of the latter.

Several years since, it will be remembered, the south of Ireland was proclaimed to be in a state of disturbance, and a Constabulary force was formed in all the baronies for the purpose of overawing the discontented peasantry. Xo great national good can ever be accomplished without drawing many individual afflictions in its train. So it p.voved on this occasion. The formation of such a body afibrded to those persons (so numerous in Ireland) who turn every public work into what is vulgarly termed a job, a good opportunity for the exercise of their vocation.

Richard Lacy was one of those magistrates who, at the period of which we speak, sought preferment by an emulative display of zeal and activity in the discharge of their duties. He scrupled the exercise of no cruelty which might place him frequently before the eyes of the jjrivy council in the light of a diligent and useful officer, and he succeeded fully in his design. He became an object of terror to the peasantry, and of high favour at the Castle. He filled the gaols and transport ships with victims; he patrolled the country every night from sunset to sun-rise, and earned the applause of his patrons, by rendering himself an object of detestation in his neighbourhood.

Amongst those persons of his own rank who viewed the proceedings of Lacy with feelings of strong disapproval, was his young neighbour, Francis Riordan. Highly gifted, highly educated, patriotic even to a want of wisdom, and disinterested to a chivalrous degree, he stood forward in defence of the oppressed, and showed himself a determined and an able opponent of their oppressor. But a circumstance which occurred, at a time when their mutual hostility had reached its highest point, and which showed indeed but little prudence on the part of Riordan, placed him entirely within the power of his magisterial enemy.

A poor cottager in his neighbourhood had stolen out IjL' fure day-break, for the purpose of taking his oats to market, which was at a considerable distan-ce from his home. He fell into the hands of Lacy's night patrol, was tried before the Special Sessions, and received the customary sentence passed on all who were found absent from their homes between sun-set and sun-rise; namely, seven years' transportation to one of the colonies.

On his way to the Cove of Cork, the prisoner was confined for a few days at the police barrack of ,

within a few miles of his own neighbourhood. It was a fine summer morning; the police were loitering in the sunshine, while their arms were grounded inside the house. Their force was fifteen, including the sergeant and chief. The latter seated on a chair outside the door, with a silk handkerchief tlu'own over his head, to moderate the fervour of the sunshine, was employed in nursing his right foot in his lap, stroking the leg down gently from the knee to the ancle, and inhaling the fumes of a Havana cigar.

On a sudden, a countryman presented himself before the door of the barrack, almost breathless from speetl, and with a face that was flushed and glistening, as after violent exercise. He informed the chief that a number of the country people had detected a notorious disturber of the peace, for whose apprehension a large reward had been held out, and for whom the police had been for a long time on the watch. They were, he said, in the act of dragging him towards the barrack for the purpose of leaving him safe in the custody of the king's servants.