Charles Lever - The Martins Of Cro' Martin, Vol. I (of II)

Joseph Nelligan was a tall, pale young fellow who, though only just passed twenty-two, looked several years older; the serious, thoughtful expression of his face giving the semblance of age. His head was large and massively shaped, and the temples were strong and square, deeply indented at the sides, and throwing the broad, high forehead into greater prominence; dark eyes, shaded by heavy, black eyebrows, lent an almost scowling character to a face which, regular in feature, was singularly calm and impassive-looking. His voice was deep, low, and sonorous, and though strongly impressed with the intonation of his native province, was peculiarly soft, and, to Irish ears, even musical. He was, however, remarkably silent; rarely or never conversed, as his acquaintances understood conversation, and only when roused by some theme that he cared for, or stimulated by some assertion that he dissented from, was he heard to burst forth into a rapid flow of words, uttered as though under the impulse of passion, and of which, when ended, he seemed actually to feel ashamed himself.

He was no favorite with the society of Kilkieran; some thought him downright stupid; others regarded him as a kind of spy upon his neighbors, – an imputation most lavishly thrown out in every circle where there is nothing to detect, and where all the absurdity lies palpable on the surface; and many were heard to remark that he seemed to forget who he was, and that “though he was a college student, he ought to remember he was only Pat Nelligan’s son.”

If he never courted their companionship, he as little resented their estrangement from him. He spent his days and no small share of his nights in study; books supplied to him the place of men, and in their converse he forgot the world. His father’s vanity had entered him as a Fellow-Commoner in the University, and even this served to widen the interval between him and those of his own age; his class-fellows regarded his presence amongst them as an intolerable piece of low-bred presumption. Nor was this unkindly feeling diminished when they saw him, term after term, carry away the prizes of each examination; for equally in science as in classics was he distinguished, till at length it became a current excuse for failure when a man said, “I was in Nelligan’s division.”

It is not impossible that his social isolation contributed much to his success. For him there were none of the amusements which occupy those of his own age. The very fact of his fellow-commoner’s gown separated him as widely from one set of his fellow-students as from the other, and thus was he left alone with his ambition. As time wore on, and his successes obtained wider notoriety, some of those in authority in the University appeared to be disposed to make advances to him; but he retreated modestly from these marks of notice, shrouding himself in his obscurity, and pleading the necessity for study. At length came the crowning act of his college career, in the examination for the gold medal; and although no competitor was bold enough to dispute the prize with him, he was obliged to submit to the ordeal. It is rarely that the public vouchsafes any interest in the details of University honors; but this case proved an exception, and almost every journal of the capital alluded in terms of high paneygric to the splendid display he made on that occasion.

In the very midst of these triumphs, young Nelligan arrived at his father’s house in Oughterard, to enjoy the gratification his success had diffused at home, and rest himself after his severe labors. Little as old Pat Nelligan of his neighbors knew of University honors, or the toil which won them, there was enough in the very publicity of his son’s career to make him a proud man. He at least knew that Joe had beaten them all; that none could hold a candle to him; “that for nigh a century such answering had not been heard on the bench.” This was the expression of a Dublin journal, coupled with the partisan regret that, by the bigoted statutes of the college, genius of such order should be denied the privilege of obtaining a fellowship.

If young Nelligan retired, half in pride, half in bashful-ness, from the notice of society in Dublin, he was assuredly little disposed to enter into the gayeties and dissipations of a small country-town existence. The fulsome adulation of some, the stupid astonishment of others, but, worse than either, the vulgar assumption that his success was a kind of party triumph, – a blow dealt by the plebeian against the patrician, the Papist against the Protestant, – shocked and disgusted him, and he was glad to leave Oughterard and accompany his mother to the seaside. She was an invalid of some years’ standing, – a poor, frail, simple-hearted creature, who, after a long, struggling life of hardship and toil, saw herself in affluence and comfort, and yet could not bring her mind to believe it true. As little could she comprehend the strange fact of Joe’s celebrity; of his name figuring in newspapers, and his health being drunk at a public dinner in his native town. To her he was invaluable; the very tenderest of nurses, and the best of all companions. She did n’t care for books, even those of the most amusing kind; but she loved to hear the little gossip of the place where the neighbors passed the evening; what topics they discussed; who had left and who had arrived, and every other little incident of their uneventful lives. Simple and easy of execution as such an office might have been to a kindred spirit, to Joseph Nelligan it proved no common labor. And certain it is that the mistakes he committed in names, and the blunders he fell into as regarded events, rather astonished his mother, and led that good lady to believe that Trinity College must not have been fertile in genius when poor Joe was regarded as one of the great luminaries of his time. “Ah,” would she say, “if he had his father’s head it would be telling him! but, poor boy, he remembers nothing!”

This digression – far longer than I cared to make it, but which has grown to its present extent under my hands – will explain young Nelligan’s presence at Mrs. Cronan’s “Tea,” where already a number of other notables had now assembled, and were gracefully dispersed through the small rooms which formed her apartment. Play of various kinds formed the chief amusement of the company; and while the whist-table, in decorous gravity, held the chief place in the sitting-room, a laughing round game occupied the kitchen, and a hardly contested “hit” of backgammon was being fought out on the bed, where, for lack of furniture, the combatants had established themselves.

The success of an evening party is not always proportionate to the means employed to secure it. Very splendid salons , costly furniture, and what newspapers call “all the delicacies of the season,” are occasionally to be found in conjunction with very dull company; while a great deal of enjoyment and much social pleasure are often to be met with where the material resources have been of the fewest and most simple kind. On the present occasion there was a great deal of laughing, and a fair share of love-making; some scolding at whist, and an abundance of scandal, at least of that cut-and-thrust-at character which amuses the speakers themselves, and is never supposed to damage those who are the object of it. All the company who had frequented the port – as Kilkieran was called – during the season were passed in review, and a number of racy anecdotes interchanged about their rank, morals, fortune, and pretensions. A very general impression seemed to prevail that in the several points of climate, scenery, social advantages, and amusements, Kilkieran might stand a favorable comparison with the first watering-places, not alone of England, but the Continent; and after various discursive reasons why its fame had not equalled its deserts, there was an almost unanimous declaration of opinion that the whole fault lay with the Martins; not, indeed, that the speakers were very logical in their arguments, since some were heard to deplore the change from the good old times, when everybody was satisfied to live anywhere and anyhow, when there was no road to the place but a bridle-path, not a loaf of bread to be had within twelve miles, no post-office; while others eloquently expatiated on all that might have been, and yet was not done.