History of Sir Conolly
Rackrent.

Sir Condy Rackrent, by the grace of
God, heir at law to the Castle Rackrent
estate, was a remote branch of the family:
born to little or no fortune of his
own, he was bred to the bar, at which
having many friends to push him, and no
mean natural abilities of his own, he
doubtless would in process of time, if he
could have borne the drudgery of that
study, have been rapidly made king’s
counsel at the least—But things were disposedposed E8v 64
of otherwise, and he never went
circuit but twice, and then made no figure
for want of a fee, and being unable to
speak in public. He received his education
chiefly in the college of Dublin;
but before he came to years of discretion,
lived in the country in a small but slated
house, within view of the end of the avenue.
I remember him bare-footed and
headed, running through the street of
O’Shaughlin’s town, and playing at pitch
and toss, ball, marbles, and what not,
with the boys of the town, amongst whom
my son Jason was a great favorite with him.
As for me, he was ever my white-headed
boy—Open note 7Back to note ⁷often’s the time when I would call in F1r 65
in at his father’s, where I was always
made welcome, he would slip down to
me in the kitchen, and love to sit on my
knee whilst I told him stories of the family
and the blood from which he was sprung,
and how he might look forward, if the
then present man should die without childer,
to being at the head of the Castle
Rackrent estate.—This was then spoke
quite and clear at random to please the
child, but it pleased Heaven to accomplish
my prophecy afterwards, which gave
him a great opinion of my judgment in
business. He went to a little grammar
school with many others, and my son
amongst the rest, who was in his class,
and not a little useful to him in his book
learning, which he acknowledged with
gratitude ever after. These rudiments of
his education thus completed, he got a F horse- F1v 66
horseback, to which exercise he was ever
addicted, and used to gallop over the
country whilst yet but a slip of a boy,
under the care of Sir Kit’s huntsman, who
was very fond of him, and often lent him
his gun and took him out a shooting under
his own eye. By these means he became
well acquainted and popular amongst the
poor in the neighbourhood early, for there
was not a cabin at which he had not
stopped some morning or other along with
the huntsman, to drink a glass of burnt
whiskey out of an egg-shell, to do him good,
and warm his heart, and drive the cold
out of his stomach.—The old people always
told him he was a great likeness of
Sir Patrick, which made him first have
an ambition to take after him, as far as
his fortune should allow. He left us
when of an age to enter the college, and there F2r 67
there completed his education and nineteenth
year; for as he was not born to an
estate, his friends thought it incumbent
on them to give him the best education
which could be had for love or money,
and a great deal of money consequently
was spent upon him at college and Temple
—He was very little altered for the
worse, by what he saw there of the great
world, for when he came down into the
country to pay us a visit we thought him
just the same man as ever, hand and glove
with every one, and as far from high,
though not without his own proper share
of family pride, as any man ever you see.
Latterly, seeing how Sir Kit and the
Jewish lived together, and that there was
no one between him and the Castle Rackrent
estate, he neglected to apply to the
law as much as was expected of him, and F2 secretly F2v 68
secretly many of the tenants, and others,
advanced him cash upon his note of hand
value received, promising bargains of
leases and lawful interest should he ever
come into the estate.—All this was kept
a great secret, for fear the present man
hearing of it should take it into his head
to take it ill of poor Condy, and so should
cut him off for ever by levying a fine, and
suffering a recovery to dock the entail—Open note Back to note
Sir Murtagh would have been the man
for that, but Sir Kit was too much taken
up philandering to consider the law in
this case—or any other.—These practices
I have mentioned account for the state of
of his affairs, I mean Sir Condy’s, upon his
coming into the Castle Rackrent estate.—
He could not command a penny of his
first year’s income, which, and keeping
no accounts, and the great sight of company
he did, with many other causes too numerous F3r 69
numerous to mention, was the origin of
his distresses.—My son Jason, who was
now established agent, and knew every
thing, explained matters out of the face
to Sir Conolly, and made him sensible of
his embarrassed situation. With a great
nominal rent-roll, it was almost all paid
away in interest, which being for convenience
suffered to run on, soon doubled
the principal, and Sir Condy was obligated
to pass new bonds for the interest,
now grown principal, and so on. Whilst
this was going on, my son requiring to
be paid for his trouble, and many years
service in the family gratis, and Sir Condy
not willing to take his affairs into his own
hands, or to look them even in the face,
he gave my son a bargain of some acres
which fell out of lease at a reasonable
rent; Jason set the land as soon as his F3 lease F3v 70
lease was sealed to under-tenants, to make
the rent, and got two hundred a year
profit rent, which was little enough, considering
his long agency.—He bought the
land at twelve years purchase two years
afterwards, when Sir Condy was pushed
for money on an execution, and was at
the same time allowed for his improvements
thereon. There was a sort of hunting
lodge upon the estate convenient to
my son Jason’s land, which he had his
eye upon about this time; and he was a
little jealous of Sir Condy, who talked of
setting it to a stranger, who was just
come into the country—Captain Moneygawl
was the man; he was son and heir
to the Moneygawls of Mount Juliet’s
town, who had a great estate in the next
county to ours, and my master was loth
to disoblige the young gentleman, whose heart F4r 71
heart was set upon the lodge; so he
wrote him back that the lodge was at his
service, and if he would honor him with
his company at Castle Rackrent, they
could ride over together some morning
and look at it before signing the lease.—
Accordingly the Captain came over to us,
and he and Sir Condy grew the greatest
friends ever you see, and were for ever
out a shooting or a hunting together, and
were very merry in the evenings, and Sir
Condy was invited of course to Mount
Juliet’s town, and the family intimacy
that had been in Sir Patrick’s time
was now recollected, and nothing would
serve Sir Condy but he must be three
times a week at the least with his new
friends—which grieved me, who knew by
the Captain’s groom and gentleman how
they talked of him at Mount Juliet’s town, F4 making F4v 72
making him quite, as one may say, a
laughing stock and a butt for the whole
company: but they were soon cured of
that by an accident that surprised ’em not
a little, as it did me.—There was a bit of
a scrawl found upon the waiting maid of
old Mr. Moneygawl’s youngest daughter
Miss Isabella, that laid open the whole;
and her father, they say, was like one
out of his right mind, and swore it was
the last thing he ever should have thought
of when he invited my master to his house,
that his daughter should think of such a
match.—But their talk signified not a
straw; for as Miss Isabella’s maid reported,
her young mistress was falen over
head and ears in love with Sir Condy,
from the first time that ever her brother
brought him into the house to dinner: the
servant who waited that day behind my master’s F5r 73
master’s chair was the first who knew it,
as he says; though it’s hard to believe
him, for he did not tell till a great while
afterwards; but however, it’s likely enough
as the thing turned out that he was not
far out of the way; for towards the middle
of dinner, as he says, they were talking
of stage plays, having a play-house, and
being great play actors at Mount Juliet’s
town, and Miss Isabella turns short to
my master and says—“Have you seen
the play-bill, Sir Condy?”—“No, I have
not,” said he.—“Then more shame for
you,” (said the Captain her brother) “not to
know that my sister is to play Juliet tonight,
who plays it better than any woman
on or off the stage in all Ireland.”—“I
am very happy to hear it,” said Sir Condy,
and there the matter dropped for the present,
but Sir Condy all this time, and a great F5v 74
great while afterwards, was at a terrible
nonplus, for he had no liking not he to
stage plays, nor to Miss Isabella either;
to his mind, as it came out over a bowl
of whiskey punch at home, his little Judy
M^cQuirk, who was daughter to a sister’s
son of mine, was worth twenty of Miss
Isabella—He had seen her often when he
stopped at her father’s cabin to drink
whiskey out of the egg-shell, out of hunting,
before he came to the estate, and as
she gave out was under something like a
promise of marriage to her—Any how I
could not but pity my poor master, who
was so bothered between them, and he
an easy-hearted man that could not disoblige
nobody, God bless him. To be
sure it was not his place to behave ungenerous
to Miss Isabella, who had disobliged
all her relations for his sake, as he F6r 75
he remarked; and then she was locked
up in her chamber and forbid to think of
him any more, which raised his spirit,
because his family was, as he observed,
as good as theirs at any rate, and the
Rackrents a suitable match for the Moneygawls
any day in the year; all which was
true enough; but it grieved me to see
that upon the strength of all this Sir Condy
was growing more in the mind to carry
off Miss Isabella to Scotland, in spite of
her relations, as she desired.

“It’s all over with our poor Judy!” said
I, with a heavy sigh, making bold to speak
to him one night when he was a little
cheerful, and standing in the servant’s
hall all alone with me, as was often his
custom—“Not at all” (said he) “I never was
fonder of Judy than at this present speaking,
and to prove it to you,” (said he, and he F6v 76
he took from my hand a halfpenny, change
that I had just got along with my tobacco);
“and to prove it to you, Thady,”
says he, “it’s a toss up with me which I
shall marry this minute, her or Mr. Moneygawl
of Mount Juliet’s Town’s daughter
—so it is”—“Oh, boo! boo!”Open note 8Back to note ⁸ (says
I, making light of it, to see what he would
go on to next)—“your honor’s joking, to
be sure, there’s no compare between our
poor Judy and Miss Isabella, who has a
great fortune, they say.”—“I’m not a man
to mind a fortune, nor never was,” (said Sir
Condy proudly,) “whatever her friends may
say; and to make short of it,” (says he) “I’m
come to a determination upon the spot;”
with that he swore such a terrible oath, as F7r 77
as made meOpen note 9Back to note ⁹ cross myself—“and by this
book,” (said he, snatching up my ballad
book, mistaking it for my prayer-book,
which lay in the window)—“and by this
book,” (said he) “and by all the books that
ever were shut and opened—it’s come to
a toss up with me, and I’ll stand or fall by
the toss, and so, Thady, hand me over
that pinOpen note 10Back to note ¹⁰ out of the ink-horn,” and he
makes a cross on the smooth side of the
halfpenny—“Judy M^cQuirk,” (said he) “her
mark,”Open note 11Back to note ¹¹ God bless him! his hand was a little F7v 78
little unsteadied by all the whiskey punch
he had taken, but it was plain to see his
heart was for poor Judy.—My heart was
all as one as in my mouth, when I saw
the halfpenny up in the air, but I said nothing
at all, and when it came down, I
was glad I had kept myself to myself, for
to be sure now it was all over with poor
Judy.—“Judy’s out a luck,” said I,
striving to laugh—“I’m out a luck,” said
he, and I never saw a man look so
cast down; he took up the halfpenny off
the flag, and walked away quite sobered
like by the shock.—Now though as easy a man F8r 79
a man you would think as any in the wide
world, there was no such thing as making
him unsay one of these sort of vows,Open note 12Back to note ¹²
which he had learned to reverence when
young, as I well remember teaching him
to toss up for bog berries on my knee.—
So I saw the affair was as good as settled between F8v 80
between him and Miss Isabella, and I
had no more to say but to wish her joy,
which I did the week afterwards upon
her return from Scotland with my poor
master.

My new lady was young, as might be
supposed of a lady that had been carried
off by her own consent to Scotland, but
I could only see her at the first through
her veil, which, from bashfulness or fashion,
she kept over her face—“And am
I to walk through all this crowd of people,
my dearest love,” said she to Sir Condy,
meaning us servants and tenants, who had
gathered at the back gate—“My dear” (said
Sir Condy) “there’s nothing for it but to walk,
or to let me carry you as far as the house,
for you to see the back road’s too narrow
for a carriage, and the great piers have
tumbled down across the front approach, so G1r 81
so there’s no driving the right way by reason
of the ruins”—“Plato, thou reasonest
well!” said she, or words to that effect,
which I could no ways understand; and
again, when her foot stumbled against a
broken bit of a car wheel, she cried out—
“Angels and ministers of grace, defend
us!”—Well, thought I, to be sure if she’s
no Jewish like the last, she is a mad woman
for certain, which is as bad: it would
have been as well for my poor master to
have taken up with poor Judy, who is in
her right mind any how.

She was dressed like a mad woman,
moreover, more than like any one I ever
saw afore or since, and I could not take
my eyes off her, but still followed behind
her, and her feathers on the top of her hat
were broke going in at the low back
door, and she pulled out her little bottle G out G1v 82
out of her pocket to smell to when she
found herself in the kitchen, and said, “I
shall faint with the heat of this odious,
odious place”—“My dear, it’s only three
steps across the kitchen, and there’s a fine
air if your veil was up,” said Sir Condy,
and with that threw back her veil, so that
I had then a full sight of her face; she
had not at all the colour of one going to
faint, but a fine complexion of her own,
as I then took it to be, though her maid
told me after it was all put on; but even
complexion and all taken in, she was no
way, in point of good looks, to compare
to poor Judy; and with all she had a
quality toss with her; but may be it was
my over partiality to Judy, into whose
place I may say she stept, that made me
notice all this.—To do her justice, however,
she was, when we came to know her G2r 83
her better, very liberal in her house-keeping,
nothing at all of the Skin-flint in her;
she left every thing to the housekeeper,
and her own maid, Mrs. Jane, who went
with her to Scotland, gave her the best of
characters for generosity; she seldom or
ever wore a thing twice the same way,
Mrs. Jane told us, and was always pulling
her things to pieces, and giving them
away, never being used in her father’s
house to think of expence in any thing—
and she reckoned, to be sure, to go on
the same way at Castle Rackrent; but
when I came to enquire, I learned that
her father was so mad with her for running
off after his locking her up, and forbidding
her to think any more of Sir
Condy, that he would not give her a farthing;
and it was lucky for her she had a
few thousands of her own, which had been G2 left G2v 84
left to her by a good grandmother, and
these were very convenient to begin with.
My master and my lady set out in great
stile; they had the finest coach and chariot,
and horses and liveries, and cut the
greatest dash in the county, returning their
wedding visits!—and it was immediately
reported that her father had undertaken to
pay all my master’s debts, and of course
all his tradesmen gave him a new credit,
and every thing went on smack smooth,
and I could not but admire my lady’s
spirit, and was proud to see Castle Rackrent
again in all its glory.—My lady had
a fine taste for building and furniture, and
play-houses, and she turned every thing
topsy-turvy, and made the barrack-room
into a theatre, as she called it, and she
went on as if she had a mint of money
at her elbow; and to be sure I thought she G3r 85
she knew best, especially as Sir Condy
said nothing to it one way or the other.
All he asked, God bless him! was to live
in peace and quietness, and have his
bottle, or his whiskey punch at night to
himself.—Now this was little enough, to
be sure, for any gentleman, but my lady
couldn’t abide the smell of the whiskey
punch.—“My dear,” (says he) “you liked
it well enough before we were married,
and why not now?”—“My dear,” (said
she) “I never smelt it, or I assure you I
should never have prevailed upon myself
to marry you.”—“My dear, I am sorry
you did not smell it, but we can’t help
that now,” (returned my master, without
putting himself in a passion, or going out
of his way, but just fair and easy helped
himself to another glass, and drank it off to
her good health:) All this the butler told G3 me, G3v 86
me, who was going backwards and forwards
unnoticed with the jug, and hot
water, and sugar, and all he thought
wanting.—Upon my master’s swallowing
the last glass of whiskey punch, my lady
burst into tears, calling him an ungrateful,
base, barbarous wretch! and went off
into a fit of hysterics, as I think Mrs.
Jane called it, and my poor master was
greatly frighted, this being the first thing
of the kind he had seen; and he fell
straight on his knees before her, and, like
a good-hearted cratur as he was, ordered
the whiskey punch out of the room, and
bid ’em throw open all the windows, and
cursed himself, and then my lady came
to herself again, and when she saw him
kneeling there, bid him get up, and not
foreswear himself any more, for that she
was sure he did not love her, nor never had, G4r 87
had (this we learnt from Mrs. Jane, who
was the only person left present at all
this—“My dear,” (returns my master,
thinking to be sure of Judy, as well he
might) “whoever told you so is an incendiary,
and I’ll have ’em turned out of
the house this minute, if you’ll only let
me know which of them it was.”—
“Told me what?” says my lady, starting
upright in her chair.—“Nothing, nothing
at all,” (said my master, seeing he
had overshot himself, and that my lady
spoke at random) “but what you said just
now that I did not live you, Bella, who
told you that?”—“My own sense,” said
she, and she put her handkerchief to her
face, and leant back upon Mrs. Jane,
and fell to sobbing as if her heart would
break.—“Why now Bella, this is very
strange of you,” (said my poor master) “if nobodyG4 body G4v 88
has told you nothing, what is it you
are taking on for at this rent, and exposing
yourself and me for this way?”—
“Oh say no more, say no more, every
word you say kills me,” (cried my lady,
and she ran on like one, as Mrs. Jane
says, raving)—“Oh Sir Condy, Sir Condy!
I that had hoped to find a―”“Why
now faith this is a little too much; do
Bella, try to recollect yourself, my dear;
am not I your husband, and of your own
chusing, and is not that enough?”—“Oh
too much! too much!” cried my lady,
wringing her hands.—“Why, my dear,
come to your right senses for the love of
heaven—see is not the whiskey punch,
jug and bowl and all, gone out of the
room long ago? what is it in the wide
world you have to complain of?”—But
still my lady sobbed and sobbed, and called G5r 89
called herself the most wretched of women;
and among other out of the way
provoking things, asked my master, was
he fit company for her, and he drinking
all night.—This nettling him, which it
was hard to do, he replied, that as to
drinking all night, he was then as sober
as she was herself, and that it was no matter
how much a man drank, provided it did
no ways affect or stagger him—that as
to being fit company for her, he thought
himself of a family to be fit company for
any lord or lady in the land, but that he
never prevented her from seeing and keeping
what company she pleased, and that
he had done his best to make Castle
Rackrent pleasing to her since her marriage,
having always had the house full
of visitors, and if her own relations were
not amongst them, he said, that was their G5v 90
their own fault and their pride’s fault,
of which he was sorry to find her ladyship
had so unbecoming a share—So concluding,
he took his candle and walked
off to his room, and my lady was in her
tantarums for three days after, and would
have been so much longer, no doubt, but
some of her friends, young ladies and
cousins and second cousins, came to Castle
Rackrent, by my poor master’s express
invitation, to see her, and she was in a
hurry to get up, as Mrs. Jane called it, a
play for them, and so got well, and was
as finely dressed and as happy to look at
as ever, and all the young ladies who
used to be in her room dressing of her
said in Mrs. Jane’s hearing, that my
lady was the happiest bride ever they
had seen, and that to be sure a love
match was the only thing for happiness, where G6r 91
where the parties could any way afford
it.

As to affording it, God knows it was
little they knew of the matter; my lady’s
few thousands could not last for ever,
especially the way she went on with
them, and letters from tradesfolk came
every post thick and threefold, with bills
as long as my arm of years and years standing;
my son Jason had ’em all handed
over to him, and the pressing letters were
all unread by Sir Condy, who hated trouble
and could never be brought to hear
talk of business, but still put it off and
put it off, saying—settle it any how, or
bid ’em call again to-morrow, or speak to
me about it some other time.—Now it
was hard to find the right time to speak,
for in the mornings he was a-bed and in
the evenings over his bottle, where no gen- G6v 92
gentleman chuses to be disturbed.—Things
in a twelvemonth or so came to such a
pass, there was no making a shift to go
on any longer, though we were all of us
well enough used to live from hand to
mouth at Castle Rackrent. One day, I
remember, when there was a power of
company, all sitting after dinner in the
dusk, not to say dark in the drawing-
room, my lady having rung five times for
candles and none to go up, the housekeeper
sent up the foorman, who went
to my mistress and whispered behind her
chair how it was.—“My lady,” (says he)
“there are no candles in the house.”—
“Bless me,” (says she) “then take a horse,
and gallop off as fast as you can to Carrick
O’Fungus and get some.”—“And
in the mean time tell them to step into the
play-house, and try if there are not some bits G7r 93
bits left,” added Sir Condy, who happened
to be within hearing. The man
was sent up again to my lady, to let her
know there was no horse to go but one
that wanted a shoe.—“Go to Sir Condy,
then, I know nothing at all about the
horses,” (said my lady) “why do you
plague me with these things?”—How it
was settled I really forget, but to the best
of my remembrance, the boy was sent
down to my son Jason’s to borrow candles
for the night. Another time in the
winter, and on a desperate cold day,
there was no turf in for the parlour and
above stairs, and scarce enough for the
cook in the kitchen, the little gossoonOpen note 13Back to note ¹³ was G7v 94
was sent off to the neighbours to see and
beg or borrow some, but none could he
bring back with him for love or money;
so as needs must we were forced to trouble
Sir Condy—“Well, and if there’s no
turf to be had in the town or country,
why what signifies talking any more about
it, can’t ye go and cut down a tree?”—
“Which tree, please your honor?” I
made bold to say.—“Any tree at all
that’s good to burn,” (said Sir Condy);
“send off smart, and get one down and
the fires lighted before my lady gets up to
breakfast, or the house will be too hot to
hold us.”—He was always very considerate
in all things about my lady, and she G8r 95
she wanted for nothing whilst he had it to
give.—Well, when things were tight with
them about this time, my son Jason put
in a word again about the lodge, and
made a genteel offer to lay down the purchase
money to relieve Sir Condy’s distresses.
—Now Sir Condy had it from the
best authority, that there were two writs
come down to the Sheriff against his person,
and the Sheriff, as ill luck would
have it, was no friend of his, and talked
how he must do his duty, and how he
would do it, if it was against the first
man in the county, or even his own brother,
let alone one who had voted against
him at the last election, as Sir Condy had
done.—So Sir Condy was fain to take the
purchase money of the lodge from my son
Jason to settle matters; and sure enough
it was a good bargain for both parties, for my G8v 96
my son bought the fee simple of a good
house for him and his heirs for ever for
little or nothing, and by selling of it for
that same my master saved himself from
a gaol. Every way it turned out fortunate
for Sir Condy; for before the money
was all gone there came a general election,
and he being so well beloved in the
county, and one of the oldest families, no
one had a better right to stand candidate
for the vacancy; and he was called upon
by all his friends, and the whole county I
may say, to declare himself against the old
member, who had little thought of a contest.
My master did not relish the thoughts
of a troublesome canvas, and all the ill
will he might bring upon himself by disturbing
the peace of the county, besides
the expence, which was no trifle; but all
his friends called upon one another to 4 sub- H1r 97
subscribe, and formed themselves into a
committee, and wrote all his circular letters
for him, and engaged all his agents,
and did all the business unknown to him,
and he was well pleased that it should be
so at last, and my lady herself was very
sanguine about the election, and there
was open house kept night and day at
Castle Rackrent, and I thought I never
saw my lady look so well in her life as
she did at that time; there were grand
dinners, and all the gentlemen drinking
success to Sir Condy till they were carried
off; and then dances and balls, and the
ladies all finishing with a raking pot of teaOpen note Back to note
in the morning. Indeed it was well the
company made it their choice to sit up
all nights, for there was not half beds
enough for the sights of people that were
in it, though there were shake downs in H the H1v 98
the drawing-room always made up before
sun-rise, for those that liked it. For my
part, when I saw the doings that were
going on, and the loads of claret that
went down the throats of them that had
no right to be asking for it, and the sights
of meat that went up to table and never
came down, besides what was carried off
to one or t’other below stairs, I couldn’t
but pity my poor master who was to pay
for all, but I said nothing, for fear of gaining
myself ill will. The day of election
will come some time or other, says I to
myself, and all will be over—and so it
did, and a glorious day it was as any I
ever had the happiness to see; huzza!
huzza! Sir Condy Rackrent for ever, was
the first thing I hears in the morning, and
the same and nothing else all day, and
not a soul sober only just when polling, enough H2r 99
enough to give their votes as became ’em
and to stand the brow-beating of the lawyers
who came tight enough upon us; and
many of our freeholders were knocked off,
having never a freehold that they could
safely swear to, and Sir Condy was not willing
to have any man perjure himself for his
sake, as was done on the other side, God
knows, but no matter for that.—Some of
our friends were dumb-founded, by the
lawyers asking them—had they ever been
upon the ground where their freeholds
lay?—Now Sir Condy being tender of the
consciences of them that had not been on
the ground, and so could not swear to a
freehold when cross-examined by them
lawyers, sent out for a couple of cleavesfull
of the sods of his farm of Gulteeshinnagh:
and as soon as the sods came into
town he set each man upon his sod, and H2 so H2v 100
so then ever after, you know, they could
fairly swear they had been upon the
ground.—Open note 14Back to note ¹⁴We gained the day by this
piece of honesty. I thought I should
have died in the streets for joy when I
seed my poor master chaired, and he bare-
headed and it raining as hard as it could
pour; but all the crowds following him
up and down, and he bowing and shaking
hands with the whole town.—“Is that
Sir Condy Rackrent in the chair?” says a
stranger man in the crowd—“The same,”
says I—“who else should it be? God bless
him!”—“And I take it then you belong
to him,” says he.—“Not at all,” (says I)
“but I live under him, and have done
so these two hundred years and upwards,
me and mine.”—“It’s lucky for you, then,” H3r 101
then,” rejoins he, “that he is where he
is, for was he any where else but in the
chair this minute he’d be in a worse place,
for I was sent down on purpose to put
him up,Open note 15Back to note ¹⁵ and here’s my order for so doing
in my pocket.”—It was a writ that villain
the wine merchant had marked against
my poor master, for some hundreds of an
old debt which it was a shame to be talk—
ing of at such a time as this.—“Put it in
your pocket again, and think no more of
it any ways for seven years to come, my honest
friend,” (says I), “he’s a member a Parliament
now, praised be God, and such
as you can’t touch him; and if you’ll take
a fool’s advice, I’d have ye keep out of
the way this day, or you’ll run a good
chance of getting your deserts amongst
my master’s friends, unless you chuse to H3 drink H3v 102
drink his health like every body else.”—
“I’ve no objection to that in life,” said
he; so we went into one of the public
houses kept open for my master, and we
had a great deal of talk about this thing
and that, and “how is it” (says he) “your
master keeps on so well upon his legs; I
heard say he was off Holantide twelve-
month past.”—“Never was better or
heartier in his life,” said I.—“It’s not
that I’m after speaking of,” (said he) “but
there was a great report of his being
ruined.”—“No matter,” (says I) “the Sheriffs
two years running were his particular
friends, and the Sub-sheriffs were
both of them gentlemen, and were properly
spoken to; and so the writs lay snug
with them, and they, and I understand by
my son Jason the custom in them cases
is, returned the writs as they came to them to H4r 103
to those that sent ’em, much good may it
do them, with word in Latin that no such
person as Sir Condy Rackrent, Bart. was
to be found in those parts.”—“Oh, I
understand all those ways better, no offence,
than you,” says he, laughing, and
at the same time filling his glass to my
master’s good health, which convinced
me he was a warm friend in his heart
after all, though appearances were a little
suspicious or so at first.—“To be sure,”
(says he, still cutting his joke) “when a
man’s over head and shoulders in debt,
he may live the faster for it and the better
if he goes the right way about it—or else
how is it so many live on so well, as we
see every day, after they are ruined?”—
“How is it,” (says I, being a little merry
at the time) “how is it but just as you see
the ducks in the kitchen yard just after H4 their H4v 104
their heads are cut off by the cook, running
round and round faster than when
alive.”—At which conceit he fell a
laughing, and remarked he had never had
the happiness yet to see the chicken yard
at Castle Rackrent.—“It won’t be long
so, I hope,” (says I) “you’ll be kindly welcome
there, as every body is made by my
master; there is not a freer spoken gentleman
or a better beloved, high or low,
in all Ireland.”—And of what passed after
this I’m not sensible, for we drank Sir
Condy’s good health and the downfal of
his enemies till we could stand no longer
ourselves—And little did I think at the
time, or till long after, how I was harbouring
my poor master’s greatest of enemies
myself. This fellow had the impudence,
after coming to see the chicken-
yard, to get me to introduce him to my son H5r 105
son Jason—little more than the man that
never was born did I guess at his meaning
by this visit; he gets him a correct
list fairly drawn out from my son Jason of
all my master’s debts, and goes straight
round to the creditors and buys them all
up, which he did easy enough, seeing the
half of them never expected to see their
money out of Sir Condy’s hands. Then
when this base-minded limb of the law,
as I afterwards detected him in being,
grew to be sole creditor over all, he takes
him out a custodiam on all the denominations
and sub-denominations, and every
carton and half cartonOpen note Back to note upon the estate—
and not content with that, must have an
execution against the master’s goods and
down to the furniture, though little worth,
of Castle Rackrent itself.—But this is
a part of my story, I’m not come to yet H5v 106
yet, and it’s bad to be forestalling—ill
news flies fast enough all the world over.
To go back to the day of the election,
which I never think of but with pleasure
and tears of gratitude for those good times;
after the election was quite and clean
over, there comes shoals of people from
all parts, claiming to have obliged my
master with their votes, and putting him
in mind of promises which he could never
remember himself to have made—one
was to have a freehold for each of his four
sons—another was to have a renewal of
a lease—another an abatement—one came
to be paid ten guineas for a pair of silver
buckles sold my master on the hustings
which turned out to be no better than
copper gilt—another had a long bill for
oats, the half of which never went into
the granary to my certain knowledge, and the H6r 107
the other half were not fit for the cattle to
touch; but the bargain was made the
week before the election, and the coach
and saddle horses were got into order for
the day, besides a vote fairly got by them
oats—so no more reasoning on that
head—but then there was no end to them
that were telling Sir Condy he had engaged
to make their sons excisemen, or
high constables, or the like; and as for
them that had bills to give in for liquor,
and beds, and straw, and ribbons, and
horses, and post-chaises for the gentlemen
freeholders that came from all parts and
other counties to vote for my master, and
were not, to be sure, to be at any charges,
there was no standing against all these;
and worse than all the gentlemen of my
master’s committee, who managed all for
him, and talked how they’d bring him in without H6v 108
without costing him a penny, and subscribed
by hundreds very genteely, forgot
to pay their subscriptions, and had
laid out in agents and lawyers, fees and
secret service money, the Lord knows
how much, and my master could never
ask one of them for their subscription,
you are sensible, nor for the price of a
fine horse he had sold one of them, so it
all was left at his door. He could never,
God bless him again, I say, bring himself
to ask a gentleman for money, despising
such sort of conversation himself;
but others, who were not gentlemen born,
behaved very uncivil in pressing him at
this very time, and all he could do to
content ’em all was to take himself out of
the way as fast as possible to Dublin,
where my lady had taken a house as fitting
for him, a Member of Parliament, to attend H7r 109
attend his duty in there all the winters.—
I was very lonely when the whole family
was gone, and all the things they had
ordered to go and forgot sent after them
by the stage. There was then a great
silence in Castle Rackrent, and I went
moping from room to room, hearing the
doors clap for want of right locks, and
the wind through the broken windows
that the glazier never would come to
mend, and the rain coming through the
roof and best cielings all over the house,
for want of the slater whose bill was not
paid; besides our having no slates or
shingles for that part of the old building
which was shingled, and burnt when the
chimney took fire, and had been open to
the weather ever since. I took myself to
the servants’ hall in the evening to smoke
my pipe as usual, but missed the bit of talk H7v 110
talk we used to have there sadly, and
ever after was content to stay in the kitchen
and boil my little potatoes,Open note 16Back to note ¹⁶ and put
up my bed there; and every post day I
looked in the newspaper, but no news of
my master in the house.—He never spoke
good or bad—but, as the butler wrote
down word to my son Jason, was very ill
used by the government about a place that
was promised him and never given, after
his supporting them against his conscience
very honorably, and being greatly abused
for it, which hurt him greatly, he having
the name of a great patriot in the country
before. The house and living in Dublin too H8r 111
too was not to be had for nothing, and
my son Jason said Sir Condy must soon be
looking out for a new agent, for I’ve done
my part and can do no more—if my lady
had the bank of Ireland to spend, it would
go all in one winter, and Sir Condy would
never gainsay her, though he does not care
the rind of a lemon for her all the while.

Now I could not bear to hear Jason
giving out after this manner against the
family, and twenty people standing by in
the street. Ever since he had lived at the
Lodge of his own he looked down, howsomever,
upon poor old Thady, and was
grown quite a great gentleman, and had
none of his relations near him—no wonder
he was no kinder to poor Sir Condy than
to his own kith and kin.—Open note 17Back to note ¹⁷In the spring it H8v 112
it was the villain that got the list of the
debts from him brought down the Custodiam,
Sir Condy still attending his duty
in Parliament; and I could scarcely believe
my own old eyes, or the spectacles
with which I read it, when I was shewn
my son Jason’s name joined in the Custodiam;
but he told me it was only for
form’s sake, and to make things easier,
than if all the land was under the power
of a total stranger.—Well, I did not know
what to think—it was hard to be talking
ill of my own, and I could not but grieve
for my poor master’s fine estate, all torn
by these vultures of the law; so I said
nothing, but just looked on to see how
it would all end.

It was not till the month of June that
he and my lady came down to the country.
—My master was pleased to take me aside I1r 113
aside with him to the brewhouse that same
evening, to complain to me of my son and
other matters, in which he said he was
confident I had neither art nor part: he
said a great deal more to me, to whom he
had been fond to talk ever since he was
my white-headed boy before he came to
the estate, and all that he said about poor
Judy I can never forget, but scorn to repeat.
—He did not say an unkind word
of my lady, but wondered, as well he
might, her relations would do nothing for
him or her, and they in all this great distress.
—He did not take any thing long to
heart, let it be as it would, and had no
more malice or thought of the like in him
than the child that can’t speak; this night
it was all out of his head before he went
to his bed.—He took his jug of whiskey
punch—My lady was grown quite easy I about I1v 114
about the whiskey punch by this time, and
so I did suppose all was going on right
betwixt them, till I learnt the truth through
Mrs. Jane, who talked over their affairs
to the housekeeper, and I within hearing.
The night my master came home, thinking
of nothing at all, but just making
merry, he drank his bumper toast “to
the deserts of that old curmudgeon my
father-in-law, and all enemies at Mount
Juliet’s town.”—Now my lady was no
longer in the mind she formerly was, and
did no ways relish hearing her own friends
abused in her presence, she said.—“Then
why don’t they shew themselves your
friends,” (said my master,) “and oblige me
with the loan of the money I condescended,
by your advice, my dear, to ask?—
It’s now three posts since I sent off my
letter, desiring in the postscript a speedy answer I2r 115
answer by the return of the post, and no
account at all from them yet.”—“I expect
they’ll write to me next post,” says
my lady, and that was all that passed
then; but it was easy from this to guess
there was a coolness betwixt them, and
with good cause.

The next morning being post day, I
sent of the gossoon early to the post-
office to see was there any letter likely to
set matters to rights, and he brought back
one with the proper post-mark upon it,
sure enough, and I had no time to examine,
or make any conjecture more about
it, for into the servants’ hall pops Mrs.
Jane with a blue bandbox in her hand,
quite entirely mad.—“Dear Ma’am, and
what’s the matter?” says I.—“Matter
enough,” (says she) “don’t you see my bandbox
is wet through, and my best bonnet I2 here I2v 116
here spoiled, besides my lady’s, and all
by the rain coming in through that gallery
window, that you might have got mended
if you’d had any sense, Thady, all the
time we were in town in the winter.”—
“Sure I could not get the glazier,
Ma’am,” says I.—“You might have
stopped it up any how,” says she.—“So
I did, Ma’am, to the best of my ability,
one of the panes with the old pillow-case,
and the other with a piece of the old stage
green curtain—sure I was as careful as possible
all the time you were away, and not
a drop of rain came in at that window of
all the windows in the house, all winter,
Ma’am, when under my care; and now the
family’s come home, and it’s summer time,
I never thought no more about it to be
sure—but dear, it’s a pity to think of your
bonnet, Ma’am,—but here’s what will please I3r 117
please you, Ma’am, a letter from Mount
Juliet’s town for my lady.” With that
she snatches it from me without a word
more, and runs up the back stairs to my
mistress; I follows with a slate to make
up the window—this window was in the
long passage, or gallery, as my lady gave
out orders to have it called, in the gallery
leading to my master’s bed-chamber
and her’s, and when I went up with the
slate, the door having no lock, and the
bolt spoilt, was a-jar after Mrs. Jane,
and as I was busy with the window, I
heard all that was saying within.

“Well, what’s in your letter, Bella,
my dear?” (says he) “you’re a long time
spelling it over.”—“Won’t you shave
this morning, Sir Condy,” says she, and
put the letter in her pocket.—“I shaved
the day before yesterday,” (says he) “my I3 dear, I3v 118
dear,and that’s not what I’m thinking of now—
but any thing to oblige you, and to have
peace and quietness, my dear”—and presently
I had a glimpse of him at the
cracked glass over the chimney-piece,
standing up shaving himself to please my
lady.—But she took no notice, but went
on reading her book, and Mrs. Jane doing
her hair behind.—“What is it you’re
reading there, my dear?—phoo, I’ve cut
myself with this razor; the man’s a cheat
that sold it me, but I have not paid him
for it yet—What is it you’re reading there?
did you hear me asking you, my dear?”
“The sorrows of Werter,” replies my
lady, as well as I could hear.—“I think
more of the sorrows of Sir Condy,” (says
my master, joking like).—“What news
from Mount Juliet’s town?”—“No news,”
(says she) “but the old story over again; my I4r 119
my friends all reproaching me still for
what I can’ help now.”—“Is it for marrying
me,” (said my master, still shaving)
“what signifies, as you say, talking of that
when it can’t be helped now.”

With that she heaved a great sigh, that
I heard plain enough in the passage.—
“And did not you use me basely, Sir
Condy,” (says she) “not to tell me you were
ruined before I married you?”—“Tell
you, my dear,” (said he) “did you ever ask
me one word about it? and had not you
friends enough of your own, that were
telling you nothing else from morning to
night, if you’d have listened to them
slanders.”—“No slanders, nor are my
friends slanderers; and I can’t bear to
hear them treated with disrespect as I do,”
(says my lady, and took out her pocket
handkerchief)—“they are the best of friends, I4 and I4v 120
and if I had taken their advice—But my
father was wrong to lock me up, I own;
that was the only unkind thing I can
charge him with; for if he had not locked
me up, I should never have had a serious
thought of running away as I did.”—
“Well, my dear,” (said my master) “don’t
cry and make yourself uneasy about it
now, when it’s all over, and you have the
man of your own choice in spite of ’em
all.”—“I was too young, I know, to
make a choice at the time you ran away
with me, I’m sure,” says my lady, and
another sigh, which made my master,
half shaved as he was, turn round
upon her in surprise—“Why Bella,”
(says he) “you can’t deny what you know
as well as I do, that it was at your own
particular desire, and that twice under
your own hand and seal expressed, that I
should carry you off as I did to Scotland, and I5r 121
and marry you there.”—“Well, say no
more about it, Sir Condy,” (said my lady,
pettish like)—“I was a child then, you
know.”—“And as far as I know, you’re
little better now, my dear Bella, to be
talking in this manner to your husband’s
face; but I won’t take it ill of you, you, for I
know it’s something in that letter you put
in your pocket just now, that has set you
against me all on a sudden, and imposed
upon your understanding.”—“It is not
so very easy as you think it, Sir Condy,
to impose upon my understanding”, (said
my lady)—“My dear,” (says he) “I have,
and with reason, the best opinion of your
understanding of any man now breathing,
and you know I have never set my own
in competition with it; till now, my dear
Bella,” (says he, taking her hand from her
book as kind as could be,) “till now— when I5v 122
when I have the great advantage of being
quite cool, and you not; so don’t believe
one word your friends say against your
own Sir Condy, and lend me the letter
out of your pocket, till I see what it is
they can have to say.”—“Take it then,”
(says she,) “and as you are quite cool, I
hope it is a proper time to request you’ll
allow me to comply with the wishes of
all my own friends, and return to live
with my father and family, during the
remainder of my wretched existence, at
Mount Juliet’s Town.”

At this my poor master fell back a
few paces, like one that had been shot—
“You’re not serious, Bella,” (says he) “and
could you find it in your heart to leave me
this way in the very middle of my dis—
tresses, all alone?”—But recollecting himself
after his first surprise, and a moment’sment’s I6r 123
time for reflection, he said, with
a great deal of consideration for my lady
—“Well, Bella, my dear, I believe you
are right; for what could you do at Castle
Rackrent, and an execution against the
goods coming down, and the furniture
to be canted, and an auction in the house
all next week—so you have my full consent
to go, since that is your desire, only
you must not think of my accompanying
you, which I could not in honour do upon
the terms I always have been since our
marriage with your friends; besides I have
business to transact at home—so in the
mean time, if we are to have any breakfast
this morning, let us go down and
have it for the last time in peace and
comfort, Bella.”

Then as I heard my master coming to
the passage door, I finished fastening up my I6v 124
my slate against the broken pane, and
when he came out, I wiped down the
window seat with my wig,Open note 18Back to note ¹⁸ bade him a
good morrow as kindly as I could, seeing
he was in trouble, though he strove and
thought to hide it from me.—“This windowdow I7r 125
is all racked and tattered,” (says I,)
“and it’s what I’m striving to mend.”
“It is all racked and tattered plain
enough,” (says he) “and never mind mending
it, honest old Thady,” says he, “it will
do well enough for you and I, and that’s
all the company we shall have left in
the house by-and-bye.”—“I’m sorry to
see your honour so low this morning,”
(says I,) “but you’ll be better after taking
your breakfast.”—“Step down to the
servant’s hall,” (says he) “and bring me up
the pen and ink into the parlour, and get
a sheet of paper from Mrs. Jane, for I
have business that can’t brook to be delayed,
and come into the parlour with
the pen and ink yourself, Thady, for I
must have you to witness my signing a
paper I have to execute in a hurry.”—
Well, while I was getting of the pen and ink- I7v 126
ink-horn, and the sheet of paper, I ransacked
my brains to think what could
be the papers my poor master could have
to execute in such a hurry, he that never
thought of such a thing as doing business
afore breakfast in the whole course of his
life for any man living—but this was
for my lady, as I afterwards found, and
the more genteel of him after all her
treatment.

I was just witnessing the paper that
he had scrawled over, and was shaking
the ink out of my pen upon the carpet,
when my lady came in to breakfast, and
she started as if it had been a ghost, as
well she might, when she saw Sir Condy
writing at this unseasonable hour.—
“That will do very well, Thady,” says
he to me, and took the paper I had
signed to, without knowing what upon the earth I8r 127
earth it might be, out of my hands, and
walked, folding it up, to my lady—

“You are concerned in this, my lady
Rackrent,” (says he, putting it into her
hands,) “and I beg you’ll keep this memorandum
safe, and shew it to your friends
the first thing you do when you get
home, but put it in your pocket now,
my dear, and let us eat our breakfast, in
God’s name.”—“What is all this?” said
my lady, opening the paper in great curiosity
—“It’s only a bit of a memorandum
of what I think becomes me to do
whenever I am able,” (says my master);
“you know my situation, tied hand and
foot at the present time being, but that
can’t last always, and when I’m dead
and gone, the land will be to the good,
Thady, you know; and take notice it’s
my intention your lady should have a clear I8v 128
clear five hundred a year jointure off the
estate, afore any of my debts are paid.”—
“Oh, please your honour,” says I, “I can’t
expect to live to see that time, being
now upwards of fourscore and ten years
of age, and you a young man, and likely
to continue so, by the help of God.”—I
was vexed to see my lady so insensible
too, for al she said was—“This is very
genteel of you, Sir Condy—You need not
wait any longer, Thady”—so I just picked
up the pen and ink that had tumbled
on the floor, and heard my master finish
with saying—“You behaved very genteel
to me, my dear, when you threw all
the little you had in your own power,
along with yourself, into my hands; and
and as I don’t deny but what you may
have had some things to complain of,”
(to be sure he was thinking then of Judy, or K1r 129
or of the whiskey punch, one or t’other,
or both); “and as I don’t deny but you
may have had something to complain
of, my dear, it is but fair you should
have something in the form of compensation
to look forward to agreeably in
future; besides it’s an act of justice to
myself, that none of your friends, my
dear, may ever have it to say against
me I married for money, and not for
love.”—“That is the last thing I should
ever have thought of saying of you, Sir
Condy,” said my lady, looking very gracious

cious.—“Then, my dear,” (said Sir Condy)
“we shall part as good friends as we met,
so, all’s right.”

I was greatly rejoiced to hear this, and
went out of the parlour to report it all
to the kitchen.—The next morning my
lady and Mrs. Jane set out for Mount K Juliets K1v 130
Juliet’s town in the jaunting car; many
wondered at my lady’s chusing to go
away, considering all things, upon the
jaunting car, as if it was only a party of
pleasure; but they did not know till I
told them, that the coach was all broke
in the journey down, and no other vehicle
but the car to be had; besides, my lady’s
friends were to send their coach to meet
her at the cross roads—so it was all done
very proper.

My poor master was in great trouble
after my lady left us.—The execution
came down, and every thing at Castle
Rackrent was seized by the gripers,
and my son Jason, to his shame be it
spoken, amongst them—I wondered, for
the life of me, how he could harden himself
to do it, but then he had been studying
the law, and had made himself attorneytorney K2r 131
Quirk; so he brought down at
once a heap of accounts upon my master’s
head—To Cash lent, and to ditto, and to
ditto, and to ditto, and oats, and bills paid
at the milliner’s and linen-draper’s, and
many dresses for the fancy balls in Dublin
for my lady, and all the bills to the
workmen and tradesmen for the scenery
of the theatre, and the chandler’s and
grocer’s bills, and taylor’s, besides butcher’s
and baker’s, and worse than all, the old
one of that base wine-merchant’s, that wanted
to arrest my poor master for the amount
on the election day, for which amount
Sir Condy afterwards passed his note of
hand, bearing lawful interest from the
date thereof; and the interest and compound
interest was now mounted to a
terrible deal on many other notes and
bonds for money borrowed, and there was K2 besides K2v 132
besides hush-money to the sub-sheriffs,
and sheets upon sheets of old and new
attornies’ bills, with heavy balances, as
per former account furnished, brought
forward with interest thereon; then there
was a powerful deal due to the Crown
for sixteen years arrear of quit-rent of the
town lands of Carrickshaughlin, with drivers’
fees, and a compliment to the receiver
every year for letting the quit-rent
run on, to oblige Sir Condy and Sir Kit
afore him.—Then there was bills for spirits,
and ribbons at the election time,
and the gentlemen of the Committee’s
accounts unsettled, and their subscriptions
never gathered; and there was cows
to be paid for, with the smith and farrier’s
bills to be set against the rent of the demesne,
with calf and hay-money: then
there was all the servants’ wages, since I don’t K3r 133
don’t know when coming due to them,
and sums advanced for them by my son
Jason for clothes, and boots, and whips,
and odd monies for sundries expended
by them in journies to town and elsewhere,
and pocket-money for the master
continually, and messengers and postage
before his being a parliament man—I
can’t myself tell you what besides; but
this I know, that when the evening came
on the which Sir Condy had appointed to
settle all with my son Jason; and when
he comes into the parlour, and sees the
sight of bills and load of papers all gathered
on the great dining table for him,
he puts his hands before both his eyes,
and cries out—“Merciful Jasus! what
is it I see before me!”—The I sets an
arm chair at the table for him, and with
a deal of difficulty he sits him down, and K3 my K3v 134
my son Jason hands him over the pen and
ink to sign to this man’s bill and t’other
man’s bill, all which he did without making
the least objections; indeed, to give him
his due, I never seen a man more fair,
and honest, and easy in all his dealings,
from first to last, as Sir Condy, or more
willing to pay every man his own as far
as he was able, which is as much as
any one can do.—“Well,” (says he, joking
like with Jason) “I wish we could
settle it all with a stroke of my grey-
goose-quill.—What signifies making me
wade through all this ocean of papers
here; can’t you now, who understand
drawing out an account, Debtor and Creditor,
just sit down here at the corner of
the table, and get it done out for me,
that I may have a clear view of the balance,
which is all I need to be talking about, you K4r 135
you know?”—“Very true, Sir Condy, nobody
understands business better than
yourself?” says Jason—“So I’ve a right
to do, being born and bread to the bar,”
(says Sir Condy)—“Thady, do step out and
see are they bringing in the tings for the
punch, for we’ve just done all we have
to do for this evening.”—I goes out accordingly,
and when I came back, Jason
was pointing to the balance, which was
a terrible sight to my poor master.—
“Pooh! pooh! pooh!” (says he) “here’s so
many noughts they dazzle my eyes, so
they do, and put me in mind of all I suffered,
larning of my numeration table,
when I was a boy, at the day-school along
with you, Jason—Units, then, hundreds,
tens of hundreds.—Is the punch ready,
Thady?” says he, seeing me—“Immediately,
the boy has the jug in his hand; K4 it’s K4v 136
it’s coming up stairs, please your honour,
as fast as possible,” says I, for I saw
his honour was tired out of his life, but
Jason, very short and cruel, cuts me off
with—“Don’t be talking of punch yet a
while, it’s no time for punch yet a bit—
Units, tens, hundreds, goes he on, counting
over the master’s shoulder—units, tens,
hundreds, thousands”—“A-a-agh! hold
your hand,” (cries my master,) “where in this
wide world am I to find hundreds, or units
itself, let alone thousands.”—“The balance
has been running on too long,” (says
Jason, sticking to him as I could not have
done at the time if you’d have given both
the Indies and Cork to boot); “the balance
has been running on too long, and I’m
distressed myself on your account, Sir
Condy, for money, and the thing must be
settled now on the spot, and the balance cleared K5r 137
cleared off,” says Jason. “I’ll thank
you, if you’ll only shew me how,” says
Sir Condy.—“There’s but one way,” (says
Jason) “and that’s ready enough; when
there’s no cash, what can a gentleman
do but go to the land?”—“How can
you go to the land, and it under custodiam
to yourself already,” (says Sir Condy)
“and another custodiam hanging over it?
and no one at all can touch it, you know,
but the custodees.”—“Sure can’t you sell,
though at a loss?—sure you can sell, and
I’ve a purchaser ready for you,” says Jason.
―“Have ye so?” (said Sir Condy)
“that’s a great point gained; but there’s a
thing now beyond all, that perhaps you
don’t know yet, barring Thady has let
you into the secret.”—“Sarrah bit of a
sacret, or any thing at all of the kind
has he learned from me these fifteen weeks K5v 138
weeks come St. John’s eve,” (says I) “for
we have scarce been upon speaking terms
of late—but what is it your honor means
of a secret?”—“Why the secret of the little
keepsake I gave my lady Rackrent the
morning she left us, that she might not go
back empty-handed to her friends.”—
“My lady Rackrent, I’m sure, has baubles
and keepsakes enough, as those bills
on the table will shew,” (says Jason); “but
whatever it is,” (says he, taking up his
pen) “we must add it to the balance, for
to be sure it can’t be paid for.”—“No,
nor can’t till after my decease,” (said Sir
Condy) “that’s one good thing.”—Then
coloring up a good deal, he tells Jason of
the memorandum of the five hundred a
year jointure he had settled upon my lady;
at which Jason was indeed mad, and
said a great deal in very high words, that it K6r 139
it was using a gentleman who had the
management of his affairs, and was moreover
his principal creditor, extremely ill,
to do such a thing without consulting him,
and against his knowledge and consent.
To all which Sir Condy had nothing to
reply, but that, upon his conscience, it
was in a hurry, and without a moment’s
thought on his part, and he was very
sorry for it, but if it was to do over again
he would do the same; and he appealed
to me, and I was ready to give my evidence,
if that would do, to the truth of
all he said.

So Jason with much ado was brought
to agree to a compromise.—“The purchaser
that I have ready” (says he) “will be
much displeased to be sure at the incumbrance
on the land, but I must see and
manage him—here’s a deed ready drawn up K6v 140
up—we have nothing to do but to put in
the consideration money and our names
to it.—And how much am I going to sell?
—the lands of O’Shaughlin’s-town,
and the lands of Gruneaghoolaghan, and
the lands of Crookaghnawaturgh,” (says
he, just reading to himself)—and—“Oh,
murder, Jason!—sure you won’t put this
in—the castle, stable, and appurtenances
of Castle Rackrent—Oh, murder!” (says
I, clapping my hands) “this is too bad,
Jason.”—“Why so?” (said Jason) “when
it’s all, and a great deal more to the back
of it, lawfully mine was I to push for it.”
“Look at him” (says I, pointing to Sir
Condy, who was [Gap in transcription—2 lettersobscured]st leaning back in his
arm chair, with his arms falling beside
him like one stupified) “is it you, Jason,
that can stand in his presence and recollect
all he has been to us, and all we have been K7r 141
been to him, and yet use him so at the
last?”—“Who will he find to use him
better, I ask you?” (said Jason)—“If he
can get a better purchaser, I’m content;
I only offer to purchase to make things
easy and oblige him—though I don’t see
what compliment I am under, if you
come to that; I have never had, asked,
or charged more than sixpence in the
pound receiver’s fees, and where would
he have got an agent for a penny less?”
“Oh Jason! Jason! how will you stand
to this in the face of the county, and all
who know you,” (says I); “and what will
people tink and say, when they see you
living here in Castle Rackrent, and the
lawful owner turned out of the seat of his
ancestors, without a cabin to put his head
into, or so much as a potatoe to eat?”—
Jason, whilst I was saying this and a great K7v 142
great deal more, made me signs, and
winks, and frowns; but I took no heed,
for I was grieved and sick at heart for
my poor master, and couldn’t but speak.

“Here’s the punch!” (says Jason, for
the door opened)—“here’s the punch!”—
Hearing that, my master starts up in his
chair and recollects himself, and Jason
uncorks the whiskey—“Set down the
jug here,” says he, making room for it
beside the papers opposite to Sir Condy,
but still not stirring the deed that was to
make over all. Well, I was in great
hopes he had some touch of mercy about
him, when I saw him making the punch,
and my master took a glass; but Jason
put it back as he was going to fill again,
saying, “No, Sir Condy, it shan’t be said
of me, I got your signature to this deed
when you were half-seas over; you know, your K8r 143
your name and hand-writing in that condition
would not, if brought before the
courts, benefit me a straw, wherefore let
us settle all before we go deeper in the
punch-bowl.”—“Settle all as you will,”
(said Sir Condy, clapping his hands to his
ears) “but let me hear no more, I’m bothered
to death this night.”—“You’ve
only to sign,” said Jason, putting the pen
to him.—“Take all and be content,”
said my master—So he signed—and the
man who brought in the punch witnessed
it, for I was not able, but crying like a
child; and besides Jason said, which I
was glad of, that I was no fit witness,
being so old and doating. It was so bad
with me, I could not taste a drop of the
punch itself, though my master himself,
God bless him! in the midst of his trouble,
poured out a glass for me and brought it K8v 144
it up to my lips.—“Not a drop, I thank
your honor’s honor as much as if I took
it though,” and I just set down the glass
as it was and went out; and when I got
to the street door, the neighbour’s childer
who were playing at marbles there, seeing
me in great trouble, left their play,
and gathered about me to know what
ailed me; and I told them all, for it was
a great relief to me to speak to these poor
childer, that seemed to have some natural
feeling left in them: and when they were
made sensible that Sir Condy was going
to leave Castle Rackrent for good and
all, they set up a whillalu that could be
heard to the farthest end of the street;
and one fine boy he was, that my master
had given an apple to that morning, cried
the loudest, but they all were the same
sorry, for Sir Condy was greatly beloved amongst L1r 145
amongst the childerOpen note 19Back to note ¹⁹ for letting them go
a nutting in the demesne without saying a
word to them, though my lady objected
to them.—The people in the town who
were the most of them standing at their
doors, hearing the childer cry, would
know the reason of it; and when the report
was made known, the people one and
all gathered in great anger against my son
Jason, and terror at the notion of his
coming to be landlord over them, and
they cried, No Jason! No Jason!—Sir
Condy! Sir Condy! Sir Condy Rackrent
for ever! and the mob grew so great and
so loud I was frighted, and made my way
back to the house to warn my son to
make his escape, or hide himself for fear
of the consequences.—Jason would not
believe me, till they came all round the L house L1v 146
house and to the windows with great
shouts—then he grew quite pale, and
asked Sir Condy what had he best do?—
“I’ll tell you what you’d best do,” (said
Sir Condy, who was laughing to see his
fright) “finish your glass first, then let’s go
to the window and shew ourselves, and
I’ll tell ’em, or you shall if you please,
that I’m going to the Lodge for change of
air for my health, and by my own desire,
for the rest of my days.”—“Do so,” said
Jason, who never meant it should have
been so, but could not refuse him the
Lodge at this unseasonable time. Accordingly
Sir Condy threw up the sash and
explained matters, and thanked all his
friends, and bid ’em look in at the punch
bowl, and observe that Jason and he had
been sitting over it very good friends; so
the mob was content, and he sent ’em
out some whiskey to drink his health, and that L2r 147
that was the last time his honor’s health
was ever drank at Castle Rackrent.

The very next day, being too proud,
as he said to me, to stay an hour longer
in a house that did not belong to him, he
sets off to the Lodge, and I along with
him not many hours after. And there
was a great bemoaning through all O’Shaughlin’s
town, which I stayed to witness, and
gave my poor master a full account of
when I got to the Lodge.—He was very
low and in his bed when I got there, and
complained of a great pain about his heart,
but I guessed it was only trouble, and all
the business, let alone vexation, he had
gone through of late; and knowing the
nature of him from a boy, I took my
pipe, and while smoking it by the chimney,
began telling him how he was beloved
and regretted in the county, and it L2 did L2v 148
did him a deal of good to hear it.—
“Your honor has a great many friends
yet that you don’t know of, rich and poor,
in the county” (says I); “for as I was coming
along on the road I met two gentlemen in
their own carriages, who asked after you,
knowing me, and wanted to know where
you was, and all about you, and even
how old I was—think of that.”—Then he
wakened out of his doze, and began
questioning me who the gentlemen were.
And the next morning it came into my
head to go, unknown to any body, with
my master’s compliments round to many
of the gentlemen’s houses where he and
my lady used to visit, and people that I
knew were his great friends, and would
go to Cork to serve him any day in the
year, and I made bold to try to borrow a
trifle of cash from them.—They all treated me L3r 149
me very civil for the most part, and asked
a great many questions very kind about
my lady and Sir Condy and all the family,
and were greatly surprised to learn from
me Castle Rackrent was sold, and my
master at the Lodge for his health; and
they all pitied him greatly, and he had
their good wishes of that would do, but
money was a thing they unfortunately had
not any of them at this time to spare. I
had my journey for my pains, and I, not
used to walking, nor supple as formerly,
was greatly tired, but had the satisfaction
of telling my master when I got to the
Lodge all the civil things said by high
and low.

“Thady,” (says he) “all you’ve been telling
me brings a strange thought into my
head; I’ve a notion I shall not be long
for this world any how, and I’ve a great L3 fancy L3v 150
fancy to see my own funeral afore I die.”
I was greatly ahockedshocked at the first speaking
to hear him speak so light about his
funeral, and he to all appearance in good
health, but recollecting myself, answered
—“To be sure it would be a fine sight
as one could see, I dared to say, and one
I should be proud to witness, and I did
not doubt his honor’s would be as great a
funeral as ever Sir Patrick O’Shaughlin’s
was, and such a one as that had never
been known in the county afore or since.”
But I never thought he was in earnest
about seeing his own funeral himself, till
the next day he returns to it again.—
“Thady,” (says he) “as far as the wakeOpen note 20Back to note ²⁰
goes, sure I might without any great trouble L4r 151
trouble have the satisfaction of seeing a
bit of my own funeral.”—“Well, since
your honor’s honor’s so bent upon it,” (says
I, not willing to cross him, and he in
trouble) “we must see what we can do.”—
So he fell into a sort of sham disorder,
which was easy done, as he kept his bed
and no one to see him; and I got my
shister, who was an old woman very handy
about the sick, and very skilful, to come
up to the Lodge to nurse him; and we
gave out, she knowing no better, that he
was just at his latter end, and it answered
beyond any thing; and there was a great
throng of people, men, women and childer,
and there being only two rooms at
the Lodge, except what was locked up
full of Jason’s furniture and things, the
house was soon as full and fuller than it L4 could L4v 152
could hold, and the heat, and smoke, and
noise wonderful great; and standing
amongst them that were near the bed,
but not thinking at all of the dead, I was
started by the sound of my master’s voice
from under the great coats that had been
thrown all at top, and I went close up,
no one noticing.—“Thady,” (says he) “I’ve
had enough of this, I’m smothering, and
I can’t hear a word of all they’re saying
of the deceased.”—“God bless you, and
lie still quiet” (says I) “a bit longer, for my
shister’s afraid of ghosts, and would die
on the spot with the fright, was she to
see you come to life all on a sudden this
way without the least preparation.”—So
he lays him still, though well nigh stifled,
and I made all haste to tell the secret of
the joke, whispering to one and t’other,
and there was a great surprise, but not
so great as we had laid out it would.— “And L5r 153
“And aren’t we to have the pipes and
tobacco, after coming so far to-night,”
says some; but they were all well enough
pleased when his honor got up to drink
with them, and sent for more spirits from
a shebean-house,Open note 21Back to note ²¹ where they very civilly
let him have it upon credit—so the
night passed off very merrily, but to my
mind Sir Condy was rather upon the sad
order in the midst of it all, not finding
there had been such a great talk about
himself after his death as he had always
expected to hear.

The next morning when the house was
cleared of them, and none but my shister
and myself left in the kitchen with Sir
Condy, one opens the door and walks in,
and who should it be but Judy M^cQuirk herself. L5v 154
herself.—I forgot to notice that she had
been married long since, whilst young
Captain Moneygawl lived at the Lodge,
to the Captain’s huntsman, who after a
while listed and left her, and was killed
in the wars. Poor Judy fell off greatly in
her good looks after her being married a
year or two, and being smoke-dried in
the cabin and neglecting herself like, it
was hard for Sir Condy himself to know
her again till she spoke; but when she
says, “It’s Judy M^cQuirk, please your
honor, don’t you remember her?”—“Oh,
Judy, is it you?” (says his honor)—“yes,
sure I remember you very well—but
you’re greatly altered, Judy.”—“Sure it’s
time for me,” (says she) “and I think your
honor since I seen you last, but that’s a
great while ago, is altered too.”—“And
with reason, Judy,” (says Sir Condy, fetchinging L6r 155
a sort of sigh)—“but how’s this, Judy,”
(he goes on) “I take it a little amiss of you
that you were not at my wake last night?”
“Ah, don’t be being jealous of that,”
(says she) “I did’nt hear a sentence of your
honor’s wake till it was all over, or it
would have gone hard with me but I
would have been at it sure—but I was
forced to go ten miles up the country
three days ago to a wedding of a relation
of my own’s, and didn’t get home till
after the wake was over; but” (says she)
“it won’t be so, I hope, the next time,Open note 22Back to note ²²
please your honor.”—“That we shall
see, Judy,” (says his honor) “and may be sooner L6v 156
sooner than you think for, for I’ve been
very unwell this while past, and don’t
reckon any way I’m long for this world.”
At this Judy takes up the corner of her
apron, and puts it first to one eye and
then to t’other, being to all appearance in
great trouble; and my shister put in her
word, and bit his honor have a good
heart, for she was sure it was only the
gout that Sir Patrick used to have flying
about him, and that he ought to drink a
glass or a bottle extraordinary to keep it
out of his stomach, and he promised to
take her advice, and sent out for more
spirits immediately; and Judy made a sign
to me, and I went over to the door to
her, and she said—“I wonder to see Sir
Condy so low!—Has he heard the news?”
“What news?” says I.—“Did’nt ye
hear it, then?” (says she) “my lady Rackrentrent L7r 157
that was is kilt and lying for dead,
and I don’t doubt but it’s all over with her
by this time.”—“Mercy on us all,” (says
I) “how was it?”—“The jaunting car, it
was that that ran away with her,” (says
Judy).—“I was coming home that same
time from Biddy M^cGuggin’s marriage,
and a great crowd of people too upon the
road coming from the fair of Crookaghnawatur,
and I sees a jaunting car standing in
the middle of the road, and with the two
wheels off and all tattered.—What’s this?
says I.”—“Did’nt ye hear of it?” (says they
that were looking on) “it’s my lady Rackrent’s
car that was running away from her
husband, and the horse took fright at a
carrion that lay across the road, and so
ran away with the jaunting car, and my
lady Rackrent and her maid screaming,
and the horse ran with them against a car L7v 158
car that was coming from the fair, with
the boy asleep on it, and the lady’s petticoat
hanging out of the jaunting car
caught, and she was dragged I can’t tell
you how far upon the road, and it all
broken up with the stones just going to
be pounded, and one of the road makers
with his sledge hammer in his hand stops
the horse at the last; but my lady Rackrent
was all kilt and smashed,Open note 23Back to note ²³ and they lifted L8r 159
lifted her into a cabin hard by, and the
maid was found after, where she had
been thrown, in the gripe of the ditch,
her cap and bonnet all full of bog water—
and they say my lady can’t live any way.
Thady, pray now is it true what I’m told
for sartain that Sir Condy has made over
all to your son Jason?”—“All,” says I.—
“All entirely,” says she again.—“All
entirely,” says I.—“Then” (says she)
“that’s a great shame, but don’t be telling
Jason what I say.”—“And what
is it you say?” (cries Sir Condy, leaning
over betwixt us, which made Judy start
greatly)—“I know the time when Judy
M^cQuirk would never have stayed so long
talking at the door, and I in the house.”
“Oh,” (says Judy) “for shame, Sir Condy, times L8v 160
times are altered since then, and it’s my
lady Rackrent you ought to be thinking
of.”—“And why should I be thinking of
her, that’s not thinking of me now?” says
Sir Condy.—“No matter for that,” (says
Judy, very properly) “it’s time you should
be thinking of her if ever you mean to do
it at all, for don’t you know she’s lying
for death?”—“My lady Rackrent!” (says
Sir Condy in a surprise) “why it’s but two
days since we parted, as you very well
know, Thady, in her full health and spirits,
and she and her maid along with her
going to Mount Juliet’s town on her
jaunting car.”—“She’ll never ride no
more on her jaunting car,” (said Judy)
“for it has been the death of her sure
enough.”—“And is she dead then?” says
his honor.—“As good as dead, I hear,”
(says Judy) “but there’s Thady here has just M1r 161
just learnt the whole truth of the story as
I had it, and it is fitter he or any body
else should be telling it you than I, Sir
Condy—I must be going home to the
childer.”—But he stops her, but rather
from civility in him, as I could see very
plainly, than any thing else, for Judy was,
as his honor remarked, at her first coming
in, greatly changed, and little likely, as
far as I could see—though she did not
seem to be clear of it herself—little likely
to be my lady Rackrent now, should
there be a second toss-up to be made.—
But I told him the whole story out of the
face, just as Judy had told it to me, and
he sent off a messenger with his compliments
to Mount Juliet’s town that evening
to learn the truth of the report, and
Judy bid the boy that was going call in
at Tim M^cEnerney’s shop in O’Shaughlin’sM lin’s M1v 162
town and buy her a new shawl.—
“Do so,” (says Sir Condy) “and tell Tim
to take no money from you, for I must
pay him for the shawl myself.”—At this
my shister throws me over a look, and I
says nothing, but turned the tobacco in
my mouth, whilst Judy began making a
many words about it, and saying how she
could not be beholden for shawls by any
gentleman. I left her there to consult
with my shister, did she think there was
any thing in it, and my shister thought I
was blind to be asking her the question,
and I thought my shister must see more
into it than I did, and recollecting all
past times and every thing, I changed
my mind, and came over to her way of
thinking, and we settled it that Judy was
very like to be my lady Rackrent after
all, if a vacancy should have happened.

The next day, before his honor was
up, somebody comes with a double knock
at the door, and I was greatly surprised
to see it was son Jason.—“Jason, is
it you?” (says I) “what brings you to the
Lodge?” (says I) “is it my lady Rackrent?
we know that already since yesterday.”
“May be so,” (says he) “but I must see
Sir Condy about it.”—“You can’t see
him yet,” (says I) “sure he is not awake.”
“What then,” (says he) “can’t he be
wakened? and I standing at the door.”—
“I’ll not be disturbing his honor for you,
Jason” (says I); “many’s the hour you’ve
waited in your time, and been proud to
do it, till his honor was at leisure to speak
to you.—His honor,” says I, raising my
voice—at which his honor wakens of his
own accord, and calls to me from the
room to know who it was I was speaking M2 to M2v 164
to. Jason made no more ceremony, but
follows me into the room.—“How are
you, Sir Condy,” (says he) “I’m happy to
see you looking so well; I came up to
know how you did to-day, and to see did
you want for any thing at the Lodge.”—
“Nothing at all, Mr. Jason, I thank
you,” (says he, for his honor dad his own
share of pride, and did not chuse, after
all that had passed, to be beholden, I
suppose, to my son)—“but pray take a
chair and be seated, Mr. Jason.”—Jason
sat him down upon the chest, for chair
there was none, and after he had sat there
some time, and a silence on all sides—
“What news is there stirring in the country,
Mr. Jason M^cQuirk?” says Sir Condy,
very easy, yet high like.—“None that’s
news to you, Sir Condy, I hear” (says Jason)
“I am sorry to hear of my lady Rackrent’s accident.” M3r 165
accident.”—“I am much obliged to you,
and so is her ladyship, I’m sure,” answers
Sir Condy, still stiff; and there was another
sort of silence, which seemed to
lie the heaviest on my son Jason.

“Sir Condy,” (says he at last, seeing
Sir Condy disposing himself to go to sleep
again) “Sir Condy, I dare say you recollect
mentioning to me the little memorandum
you gave to lady Rackrent about the
£. 500 a year jointure.”—“Very true,”
(said Sir Condy) “it is all in my recollection.”
—“But if my lady Rackrent dies
there’s an end of all jointure,” says Jason.
“Of course,” says Sir Condy.—“But
it’s not a matter of certainty that my lady
Rackrent won’t recover,” says Jason.—
“Very true, Sir,” says my master.—
“It’s a fair speculation then, for you to
consider what the chance of the jointure M3 on M3v 166
on those lands when out of custodiam will
be to you.”—“Just five hundred a year,
I take it, without any speculation at all,”
said Sir Condy.—“That’s supposing the
life dropt and the custodiam off, you
know, begging your pardon, Sir Condy,
who understand business, that is a wrong
calculation.”—“Very likely so,” (said Sir
Condy) “but Mr. Jason, if you have any
thing to say to me this morning about it,
I’d be obliged to you to say it, for I had
an indifferent night’s rest last night, and
wouldn’t be sorry to sleep a little this
morning.”—“I have only three words to
say, and those more of consequence to
you, Sir Condy, than me. You are a
little cool, I observe, but I hope you will
not be offended at what I have brought
here in my pocket,”—and he pulls out
two long rolls, and showers down golden guineas M4r 167
guineas upon the bed. “What’s this?”
(said Sir Condy) “it’s long since”—but his
pride stops him—“All these are your
lawful property this minute, Sir Condy, if
you please,” said Jason.—“Not for nothing,
I’m sure,” (said Sir Condy, and
laughs a little)—“nothing for nothing, or
I’m under a mistake with you, Jason.”―
“Oh, Sir Condy, we’ll not be indulging
ourselves in any unpleasant retrospects,”
(says Jason) “it’s my present intention to
behave, as I’m sure you will, like a gentleman
in this affair.—Here’s two hundred
guineas, and a third I mean to add,
if you should think proper to make over
to me all your right and title to those
lands that you know of.”—“I’ll consider
of it,” said my master; and a great deal
more, that I was tired listening to, was
said by Jason, and all that, and the M4 sight M4v 168
sight of the ready cash upon the bed
worked with his honor; and the short and
the long of it was, Sir Condy gathered up
the golden guineas and tied up in a
handkerchief, and signed some paper Jason
brought with him as usual, and there
was an end of the business; Jason took
himself away, and my master turned himself
round and fell asleep again.

I soon found what had put Jason in
such a hurry to conclude this business.
The little gossoon we had sent off the day
before with my master’s compliments to
Mount Juliet’s town, and to know how
my lady did after her accident, was stopped
early this morning, coming back with
his answer through O’Shaughlin’s town,
at Castle Rackrent by my son Jason, and
questioned of all he knew of my lady
from the servants at Mount Juliet’s town; and M5r 169
and the gossoon told him my lady Rackrent
was not expected to live over night,
so Jason thought it high time to be moving
to the Lodge, to make his bargain with
my master about the jointure afore it should
be too late, and afore the little gossoon
should reach us with the news. My
master was greatly vexed, that is, I may
say, as much as ever I seen him, when
he found how he had been taken in; but
it was some comfort to have the ready
cash for immediate consumption in the
house any way.

And when Judy came up that evening,
and brought the childer to see his honor,
he unties the handkerchief, and God
bless him! whether it was little or much
he had, ’twas all the same with him, he
gives ’em all round guineas a-piece.—
“Hold up your head,” (says my sister to Judy, M5v 170
Judy, as Sir Condy was busy filling out a
glass of punch for her eldest boy)—“Hold
up your head, Judy, for who knows but
we may live to see you yet at the head of
the Castle Rackrent estate.”—“May be
so,” (says she) “but not the way you are
thinking of.”—I did not rightly understand
which way Judy was looking when she
makes this speech, till a while after.—
“Why Thady, you were telling me yesterday
that Sir Condy had sold all entirely
to Jason, and where then does all them
guineas in the handkerchief come from?”
“They are the purchase money of my
lady’s jointure,” says I.—Judy looks a
little bit puzzled at this.—“A penny for
your thoughts, Judy,” (says my shister)—
“hark, sure Sir Condy is drinking her
health.”—He was at the table in the room, M6r 171
room,Open note 24Back to note ²⁴ drinking with the exciseman and
the gauger, who came up to see his honor,
and we were standing over the fire in the
kitchen.—“I don’t much care is he
drinking my health or not” (says Judy),
“and it is not Sir Condy I’m thinking of,
with all your jokes, whatever he is of me.”
“Sure you wouldn’t refuse to be my lady
Rackrent, Judy, if you had the offer?”
says I.—“But if I could do better?” says
she. “How better?” says I and my shister
both at once.—“How better!” (says she)
“why what signifies it to be my lady Rackrent
and no Castle? sure what good is
the car and no horse to draw it?”—
“And where will ye get the horse, Judy,”
says I.—“Never you mind that,” (says
she)—“may be it is your own son Jason
might find that.”—“Jason!” (says I) “don’t be M6v 172
be trusting to him, Judy. Sir Condy, as
I have good reason to know, spoke well of
you, when Jason spoke very indifferently
of you, Judy.”—“No matter” (says Judy),
“it’s often men speak the contrary just to
what they think of us.”—“And you the
same way of them, no doubt,” (answers
I).—“Nay don’t be denying it, Judy, for I
think the better of ye for it, and shouldn’t
be proud to call ye the daughter of a
shister’s son of mine, if I was to hear ye
talk ungrateful, and any way disrespectful
of his honor.”—“What disrespect,”
(says she) “to say I’d rather, if it was my
luck, be the wife of another man?”
“You’ll have no luck, mind my words,
Judy,” says I; and all I remembered
about my poor master’s goodness in tossing
up for her afore he married at all came
across me, and I had a choaking in my throat M7r 173
throat that hindered me to say more.—
“Better luck, any how, Thady,” (says
she) “that to be like some folk, following
the fortunes of them that have none left.”
“Oh King of Glory!” (says I) “hear the
pride and ungratitude of her, and he giving
his last guineas but a minute ago to
her childer, and she with the fine shawl
on her he made her a present of but yesterday!”
—“Oh troth, Judy, you’re wrong
now,” says my shister, looking at the
shawl.—“And was not he wrong yesterday
then,” (says she) “to be telling me I
was greatly altered, to affront me.”—
“But Judy,” (says I) “what is it brings
you here then at all in the mind you are
in—is it to make Jason think the better
of you?”—“Ill tell you no more of my
secrets, Thady,” (says she) “nor would
have told you this much, had I taken you for M7v 174
for such an unnatural fader as I find you
are, not to wish your own son prefarred
to another.”—“Oh troth, you are wrong,
now, Thady,” says my shister.—Well, I
was never so put to it in my life between
these womens, and my son and my master,
and all I felt and thought just now,
I could not upon my conscience tell which
was the wrong from the right.—So I said
not a word more, but was only glad his
honor had not the luck to hear all Judy
had been saying of him, for I reckoned
it would have gone nigh to break his
heart; not that I was of opinion he cared
for her as much as she and my shister
fancied, but the ungratitude of the whole
from Judy might not plase him, and he
could never stand the notion of not being
well spoken of or beloved like behind his
back. Fortunately for all parties concerned,cerned, M8r 175
he was so much elevated at this
time, there was no danger of his understanding
any thing, even if it had reached
his ears. There was a great horn at the
Lodge, ever since my master and Captain
Moneygawl was in together, that used to
belong originally to the celebrated Sir
Patrick, his ancestor, and his honor was
fond often of telling the story that he larned
from me when a child, how Sir Patrick
drank the full of this horn without stopping,
and this was what no other man
afore or since conldcould without drawing
breath.—Now Sir Condy challenged the
gauger, who seemed to think little of the
horn, to swallow the contents, and it
filled to the brim, with punch; and the
gauger said it was what he could not do
for nothing, but he’d hold Sir Condy a
hundred guineas he’d do it.—“Done,”
(says my master) “I’ll lay you a hundred golden M8v 176
golden guineas to a testerOpen note 25Back to note ²⁵ you don’t.”—
“Done,” says the gauger, and done and
done’s enough between two gentlemen.
The gauger was cast, and my master won
the bet, and thought he’d won a hundred
guineas, but by the wording it was adjudged
to be only a tester that was his
due, by the exciseman. It was all one
to him, he was as well pleased, and I
was glad to see him in such spirits again.

The gauger, bad luck to him! was the
man that next proposed to my master to
try himself could he take at a draught the
contents of the great horn.—“Sir Patrick’s
horn!” (said his honor) “hand it to
me—I’ll hold you your own bet over again
I’ll swallow it.”—“Done,” (says the gauger)ger) N1r 177
“I’ll lay ye any thing at all you do
no such thing.”—“A hundred guineas
to sixpence I do,” (says he) “bring me the
handkerchief.”—I was loath, knowing he
meant the handkerchief with the gold in
it, to bring it out in such company, and
his honor not very well able to reckon it.
“Bring me the handkerchief then, Thady,”
says he, and stamps with his foot; so
with that I pulls it out of my great coat
pocket, where I had put it for safety.—
Oh, how it grieved me to see the guineas
counting upon the table, and they the last
my master had. Says Sir Condy to me—
“Your hand is steadier than mine tonight,
Old Thady, and that’s a wonder;
fill you the horn for me.”—And so wishing
his honor success, I did—but I filled
it, little thinking of what would befall
him.—He swallows it down, and drops N like N1v 178
like one shot.—We lifts him up, and he
was speechless and quite black in the face.
We put him to bed, and in a short time
he wakened raving with a fever on his
brain. He was shocking either to see or
hear.—“Judy! Judy! have ye no touch
of feeling? won’t you stay to help us nurse
him?” says I to her, and she putting on
her shawl to go out of the house.—“I’m
frighted to see him,” (says she) “and
wouldn’t, nor could’nt stay in it—and
what use?—he can’t last till the morning.”
With that she ran off.—There was none
but my shister and myself left near him of
all the many friends he had. The fever
came and went, and came and went, and
lasted five days, and the sixth he was
sensible for a few minutes, and said to
me, knowing me very well—“I’m in
burning pain all within side of me, Thady,” N2r 179
Thady,”—I could not speak, but my
shister asked him, would he have this
thing or t’other to do him good?—“No,”
(says he) “nothing will do me good no
more”—and he gave a terrible screech
with the torture he was in—then again a
minute’s ease—“brought to this by drink”
(says he)—“where are all the friends?—
where’s Judy?—Gone, hey?—Aye, Sir
Condy has been a fool all his days”—said
he, and there was the last word he spoke,
and died. He had but a very poor funeral,
after all.

If you want to know any more, I’m
not very well able to tell you; but my
lady Rackrent did not die as was expected
of her, but was only disfigured in
the face ever after by the fall and bruises
she got; and she and Jason, immediately
after my poor master’s death, set about N2 going N2v 180
going to law about that jointure; the
memorandum not being on stamped paper,
some say it is worth nothing, others
again it may do; others say, Jason won’t
have the lands at any rate—many wishes
it so—for my part, I’m tired wishing for
any thing in this world, after all I’ve seen
in it—but I’ll say nothing; it would be a
folly to be getting myself ill will in my
old age. Jason did not marry, nor think
of marrying Judy, as I prophesied, and I
am not sorry for it—who is?—As for all
I have here set down from memory and
hearsay of the family, there’s nothing but
truth in it from beginning to end, that
you may depend upon, for where’s the
use of telling lies about the things which
every body knows as well as I do?