"The earth does move notwithstanding," whispered Galileo, leaving the dungeon of the Inquisition: by which he meant his friends to understand, that if the earth did move, the fact would remain so in spite of his punishment. But a less orthodox assembly than the conclave of Cardinals might have been staggered by the novelty of the new philosophy. According to Laplace, the apparent diurnal phenomena of the heavens would be the same either from the revolution of the sun or the earth; and more than one reason made strongly in favor of the prevalent opinion that the earth, not the sun, was stationary. First, it was most agreeable to the impression of the senses; and next, to disbelieve in the fixity of the solid globe, was not only to eject from its pride of place our little planet, but to disturb the long-cherished sentiment that we ourselves are the centre—the be-all and end-all of the universe. However, the truth will out; and this is its great distinction from error, that while every new discovery adds to its strength, falsehood is weakened and at last driven from the field.
That the earth revolves round the sun, and rotates on its polar axis, have long been the settled canons of our system. But the rotation of the earth has been rendered visible by a practical demonstration, which has drawn much attention in Paris, and is beginning to excite interest in this country. The inventor is M. Foucault; and the following description has been given of the mode of proof:
"At the centre of the dome of the Panthéon a fine wire is attached, from which a sphere of metal, four or five inches in diameter, is suspended so as to hang near the floor of the building. This apparatus is put in vibration after the manner of a pendulum. Under and concentrical with it, is placed a circular table, some twenty feet in diameter, the circumference of which is divided into degrees, minutes, &c., and the divisions numbered. Now, supposing the earth to have the diurnal motion imputed to it, and which explains the phenomena of day and night, the plane in which this pendulum vibrates will not be affected by this motion, but the table over which the pendulum is suspended will continually change its position in virtue of the diurnal motion, so as to make a complete revolution round its centre. Since, then, the table thus revolves, and the pendulum which vibrates over it does not revolve, the consequence is, that a line traced upon the table by a point projecting from the bottom of the ball will change its direction relatively to the table from minute to minute and from hour to hour, so that if such point were a pencil, and that paper were spread upon the table, the course formed by this pencil would form a system of lines radiating from the centre of the table. The practiced eye of a correct observer, especially if aided by a proper optical instrument, may actually see the motion which the table has in common with the earth under the pendulum between two successive vibrations. It is, in fact, apparent that the ball, or rather the point attached to the bottom of the ball, does not return precisely to the same point of the circumference of the table after two successive vibrations. Thus is rendered visible the motion which the table has in common with the earth."
Crowds are said to flock daily to the Panthéon to witness this interesting experiment. It has been successfully repeated at the Russell Institution, and preparations are being made in some private houses for the purpose. A lofty staircase or room twelve or fourteen feet high would suffice; but the dome of St. Paul's, or, as suggested by Mr. Sylvestre in the Times, the transept of the Crystal Palace, offers the most eligible site. The table would make its revolution at the rate of 15° per hour. Explanations, however, will be necessary from lecturers and others who give imitations of M. Foucault's ingenuity, to render it intelligible to those unacquainted with mathematics, or with the laws of gravity and spherical motion. For instance, it will not be readily understood by every one why the pendulum should vibrate in the same plane, and not partake of the earth's rotation in common with the table; but this could be shown with a bullet suspended by a silk-worm's thread. Next, the apparent horizontal revolution of the table round its centre will be incomprehensible to many, as representative of its own and the earth's motion round its axis. Perhaps Mr. Wyld's colossal globe will afford opportunities for simplifying these perplexities to the unlearned.
The pendulum is indeed an extraordinary instrument, and has been a useful handmaid to science. We are familiar with it as the time-regulator of our clocks, and the ease with which they may be made to go faster or slower by adjusting its length. But neither this nor the Panthéon elucidation constitutes its sole application. By it the latitude maybe approximately ascertained, the density of the earth's strata in different places, and its elliptical eccentricity of figure. The noble Florentine already quoted was its inventor; and it is related of Galileo, while a boy, that he was the first to observe how the height of the vaulted roof of a church might be measured by the times of the vibration of the chandeliers suspended at different altitudes. Were the earth perforated from London to our antipodes, and the air exhausted, a ball dropped through would at the centre acquire a velocity sufficient to carry it to the opposite side, whence it would again descend, and so oscillate forward and backward from one side of the globe's surface to the other in the manner of a pendulum. Very likely the Cardinals of the Vatican would deem this heresy, or "flat blasphemy."
To clearly appreciate the following popular explanation, it will be necessary for the reader to convince himself of one property of the pendulum, viz., that of constantly vibrating in the same plane. Let it be imagined that a pendulum is suspended over a common table, the parts bearing the pendulum being also attached to the table. Suppose, also, that the table can move freely on its centre like a music-stool: the pendulum being put in motion will continue to move in the same plane between the eye and any object on the walls of the room, although the table is made to revolve, and during one revolution will have radiated through the whole circumference. A few moments' reflection are only necessary to prove this.
The above figure represents a plane or table on the top of a globe, or at the north pole of the earth. To this table are fixed two rods, from which is suspended a pendulum, moving freely in any direction. The pendulum is made to vibrate in the path a b; it will continue to vibrate in this line, and have no apparent circular or angular motion until the globe revolves, when it will appear to have vibrated through the entire circle, to an object fixed on the table and moving with it. It is scarcely necessary to say the circular motion of the pendulum is only apparent, since it is the table that revolves—the apparent motion of the pendulum in a circle being the same as the apparent motion of the land to a person on board ship, or the recession of the earth to a person in a balloon. The pendulum vibrates always in the same plane at the pole, and in planes parallel to each other at any intermediate point.
Fig. 2 represents the earth or a globe revolving once in twenty-four hours on its axis (s n). It is divided, on its upper half, by lines parallel to each other, representing the latitudes 60 degrees, 30 degrees, and the equator, where the latitude is nothing. The lines a b, at 90, 60, 30, and 0 represent the planes of those latitudes; or, in more familiar terms, tables, over which a pendulum is supposed to vibrate, and moving with them in their revolutions round the axis (s n). This being clearly understood, the next object is to show how the pendulum moves round the tables, for each of the latitudes; also to show the gradual diminution of its circular motion as it approaches the equator (e e), where, as was before observed, the latitude is nothing.
A pendulum vibrating over the plane, or table (a b), on the top of the globe, has been already shown (by Fig. 1) to go round the entire circle in twenty-four hours; or to have an angular velocity of 90, or quarter of a circle, in six hours. The plane (a b), at 60, has an inclination to the axis (s n), which will cause a pendulum vibrating over it to move through its circumference at a diminished rate. This will be shown by reference to the figure. The globe is revolving in the direction from left to right; the pendulum is vibrating over the line a b, which, at all times during its course, is parallel with the first path of vibration. The plane may now be supposed to have moved during six hours, or to have gone through a quarter of an entire revolution, equal to 90; but the pendulum has only moved from c to a, considerably less than 90. Again, if the plane is carried another six hours, making together 180, the Figure shows the pendulum to have moved only from c to a, considerably less than 180. The same remarks apply to the lower latitude of 30, where, it will be seen, the circular, or angular motion of the pendulum, is considerably slower than in the latitude of 60, continuing to diminish, until it becomes nothing at the equator, where it is clearly shown by the Figure to be always parallel to itself, and constant over its path of vibration through the entire circle.
I now took a long farewell of the horses, and turned northward, selecting a line close in by the base of the hills, going along at an improved pace, with a view of reaching the trading-post the same night; but stopping in a gully to look for water, I found a little pool, evidently scratched out by a bear, as there were foot-prints and claw-marks about it; and I was aware instinct prompts that brute where water is nearest the surface, when he scratches until he comes to it. This was one of very large size, the foot-mark behind the toes being full nine inches; and although I had my misgivings about the prudence of a tête-à-tête with a great grizzly bear, still the "better part of valor" was overcome, as it often is, by the anticipated honor and glory of a single combat, and conquest of such a ferocious beast. I was well armed, too, with my favorite rifle, a Colt's revolver, that never disappointed me, and a non-descript weapon, a sort of cross betwixt a claymore and a bowie-knife; so, after capping afresh, hanging the bridle on the horn of the saddle, and, staking my mule, I followed the trail up a gully, and much sooner than I expected came within view and good shooting distance of Bruin, who was seated erect, with his side toward me, in front of a manzanita bush, making a repast on his favorite berry.
The sharp click of the cock causing him to turn quickly round, left little time for deliberation; so, taking a ready good aim at the region of the heart, I let drive, the ball (as I subsequently found) glancing along the ribs, entering the armpit, and shattering smartly some of the shoulder bones. I exulted as I saw him stagger and come to his side; the next glance, however, revealed him, to my dismay, on all fours, in direct pursuit, but going lame; so I bolted for the mule, sadly encumbered with a huge pair of Mexican spurs, the nervous noise of the crushing brush close in my rear convincing me he was fast gaining on me; I therefore dropped my rifle, putting on fresh steam, and reaching the rope, pulled up the picket-pin, and springing into the saddle with merely a hold of the lariat, plunged the spurs into the mule, which, much to my affright produced a kick and a retrograde movement; but in the exertion having got a glimpse of my pursuer, uttering; snort of terror, he went off at a pace I did not think him capable of, soon widening the distance betwixt us and the bear; but having no means of guiding his motions, he brought me violently in contact with the arm of a tree, which unhorsed and stunned me exceedingly. Scrambling to my feet as well as I could, I saw my relentless enemy close at hand, leaving me the only alternative of ascending a tree; but, in my hurried and nervous efforts, I had scarcely my feet above his reach, when he was right under, evidently enfeebled by the loss of blood, as the exertion made it well out copiously. After a moment's pause, and a fierce glare upward from his blood-shot eyes, he clasped the trunk; but I saw his endeavors to climb were crippled by the wounded shoulder. However, by the aid of his jaws, he just succeeded in reaching the first branch with his sound arm, and was working convulsively to bring up the body, when, with a well-directed blow from my cutlass, I completely severed the tendons of the foot, and he instantly fell with a dreadful souse and horrific growl, the blood spouting up as if impelled from a jet; he rose again somewhat tardily, and limping round the tree with upturned eyes, kept tearing off the bark with his tusks. However, watching my opportunity, and leaning downward, I sent a ball from my revolver with such good effect immediately behind the head, that he dropped; and my nerves being now rather more composed, I leisurely distributed the remaining five balls in the most vulnerable parts of his carcase.
By this time I saw the muscular system totally relaxed, so I descended with confidence, and found him quite dead, and myself not a little enervated with the excitement and the effects of my wound, which bled profusely from the temple; so much so, that I thought an artery was ruptured. I bound up my head as well as I could, loaded my revolver anew, and returned for my rifle; but as evening was approaching, and my mule gone, I had little time to survey the dimensions of my fallen foe, and no means of packing much of his flesh. I therefore hastily hacked off a few steaks from his thigh, and hewing off one of his hind feet as a sure trophy of victory, I set out toward the trading-post, which I reached about midnight, my friend and my truant mule being there before me, but no horses.
I exhibited the foot of my fallen foe in great triumph, and described the conflict with due emphasis and effect to the company, who arose to listen; after which I made a transfer of the flesh to the traders, on condition that there was not to be any charge for the hotel or the use of the mule. There was an old experienced French trapper of the party, who, judging from the size of the foot, set down the weight of the bear at 1500 lbs., which, he said they frequently over-run, he himself, as well as Colonel Frémont's exploring party, having killed several that came to 2000 lbs. He advised me, should I again be pursued by a bear, and have no other means of escape, to ascend a small-girthed tree, which they can not get up, for, not having any central joint in the fore-legs, they can not climb any with a branchless stem that does not fully fill their embrace; and in the event of not being able to accomplish the ascent before my pursuer overtook me, to place my back against it, when, if it and I did not constitute a bulk capable of filling his hug, I might have time to rip out his entrails before he could kill me, being in a most favorable posture for the operation. They do not generally use their mouth in the destruction of their victims, but, hugging them closely, lift one of the hind-feet, which are armed with tremendous claws, and tear out the bowels. The Frenchman's advice reads rationally enough, and is a feasible theory on the art of evading unbearable compression; but, unfortunately, in the haunts of that animal those slim juvenile saplings are rarely met with, and a person closely confronted with such a grizzly vis-à-vis is not exactly in a tone of nerve for surgical operations.
Having hired an open boat and a crew of three hands, I left Hammerfest at nine p.m., July 2, 1850, to visit the celebrated Nordkap. The boat was one of the peculiar Nordland build—very long, narrow, sharp, but strongly built, with both ends shaped alike, and excellently adapted either for rowing or sailing. We had a strong head-wind from northeast at starting, and rowed across the harbor to the spot where the house of the British consul, Mr. Robertson, a Scotchman, is situated, near to the little battery (fæstning) which was erected to defend the approach to Hammerfest, subsequently to the atrocious seizure of the place by two English ships during the last war. Mr. Robertson kindly lent me a number of reindeer skins to lie on at the bottom of the boat; and spreading them on the rough stones we carried for ballast, I was thus provided with an excellent bed. I have slept for a fortnight at a time on reindeer skins, and prefer them to any feather bed. Mr. Robertson warned me that I should find it bitterly cold at sea, and expressed surprise at my light clothing; but I smiled, and assured him that my hardy wandering life had habituated me to bear exposure of every kind with perfect impunity. By an ingenious contrivance of a very long tiller, the pilot steered with one hand and rowed with the other, and we speedily cleared the harbor, and crept round the coast of Qual Oe (Whale-Island), on which Hammerfest is situated. About midnight, when the sun was shining a considerable way above the horizon, the view of a solitary little rock, in the ocean ahead, bathed in a flood of crimson glory, was most impressive. We proceeded with a tolerable wind until six in the morning, when heavy squalls of wind and torrents of rain began to beat upon us, forcing us to run, about two hours afterward, into Havösund; a very narrow strait between the island of Havöe and the mainland of Finmark. As it was impossible to proceed in such a tempest, we ran the boat to a landing-place in front of the summer residence of Herr Ulich, a great magnate in Finmark. This is undoubtedly the most northern gentleman's house in the world. It is a large, handsome, wooden building, painted white, and quite equal in appearance to the better class of villas in the North. The family only reside there during the three summer months; and extensive warehouses for the trade in dried cod or stockfish, &c. are attached. My crew obtained shelter in an outbuilding, and I unhesitatingly sought the hospitality of the mansion. Herr Ulich himself was absent, being at his house at Hammerfest, but his amiable lady, and her son and two daughters, received me with a frank cordiality as great as though I were an old friend; and in a few minutes I was thoroughly at home. Here I found a highly accomplished family, surrounded with the luxuries and refinements of civilization, dwelling amid the wildest solitudes, and so near the North Cape, that it can be distinctly seen from their house in clear weather. Madame Ulich and her daughters spoke nothing but Norwegian; but the son, a very intelligent young man of about nineteen, spoke English very well. He had recently returned from a two years' residence at Archangel, where the merchants of Finmark send their sons to learn the Russian language, as it is of vital importance for their trading interests—the greater portion of the trade of Finmark being with the White-Sea districts, which supply them with meal and other necessaries in exchange for stockfish, &c. Near as they were to the North Cape, it was a singular fact that Herr Ulich and his son had only once visited it; and the former had resided ten years at Havösund—not more than twenty-five miles distant—ere that visit took place! They said that very few travelers visited the Cape; and, strange to say, the majority are French and Italians.
I declined to avail myself of the pressing offer of a bed, and spent the morning in conversation with this very interesting family. They had a handsome drawing-room, containing a grand colossal bust in bronze of Louis-Philippe, King of the French. The ex-king, about fifty-five years ago, when a wandering exile (under the assumed name of Müller) visited the North Cape. He experienced hospitality from many residents in Finmark, and he had slept in this very room; but the house itself then stood on Maas Island, a few miles further north. Many years ago, the present proprietor removed the entire structure to Havöe; and his son assured me the room itself was preserved almost exactly as it was when Louis Philippe used it, though considerable additions and improvements have been made to other parts of the house. About sixteen years ago, Paul Garnard, the president of the commission shortly afterward sent by the French government to explore Greenland and Iceland, called on Herr Ulich, and said he was instructed by the king to ask what present he would prefer from his majesty as a memorial of his visit to the North. A year afterward, the corvette of war, La Recherche, on its way to Iceland, &c. put into Havösund, and left the bust in question, as the express gift of the king. It is a grand work of art, executed in the finest style, and is intrinsically very valuable, although of course the circumstances under which it became Herr Ulich's property add inestimably to its worth in his eyes. The latter gentleman is himself a remarkable specimen of the highly-educated Norwegian. He has traveled over all Europe, and speaks, more or less, most civilized languages. On my return to Hammerfest I enjoyed the pleasure of his society, and his eager hospitality; and he favored me with an introduction for the Norwegian states minister at Stockholm. I merely mention these things to show the warm-hearted kindness which even an unintroduced, unknown traveler may experience in the far North. Herr Ulich has resided twenty-five years at Havösund; and he says he thinks that not more than six English travelers have visited the North Cape within twenty years—that is to say, by way of Hammerfest; but parties of English gentlemen occasionally proceed direct in their yachts.
Fain would my new friends have delayed my departure; but, wind and tide serving, I resumed my voyage at noon, promising to call on my return. In sailing through the sound, I noticed a neat little wooden church, the most northern in Finmark. A minister preaches in it to the Fins and Laps at intervals, which depend much on the state of the weather; but I believe once a month in summer. The congregation come from a circle of immense extent. If I do not err, Mr. Robert Chambers mentions in his tour having met with the clergyman of this wild parish.
Passing Maas Oe, we sailed across an open arm of the sea, and reached the coast of Mager Oe, the island on which the North Cape is situated. Mager Oe is perhaps twenty miles long by a dozen broad, and is separated from the extreme northern mainland of Finmark by Magerösund. Although a favorable wind blew, my crew persisted in running into a harbor here, where there is a very extensive fish-curing establishment, called Gjesvohr, belonging to Messrs Agaard of Hammerfest. There are several houses, sheds, &c. and immense tiers of the split stockfish drying across horizontal poles. At this time about two hundred people were employed, and one or two of the singular three-masted White-Sea ships were in the harbor, with many Finmark fishing-boats. The water was literally black with droves of young cod, which might have been killed by dozens as they basked near the surface. My men loitered hour after hour; but as I was most anxious to visit the North Cape when the midnight sun illumined it, I induced them to proceed.
On resuming our voyage, we coasted along the shore, which was one mass of savage, precipitous rock, until the black massive Cape loomed very distinctly in the horizon. I landed at a bluff headland called Tunoes, and collected a few flowers growing in crevices in the rock. A little beyond that, in Sandbugt, a fragment of wreck was discernible, and I ordered the boat to be pulled toward it. It proved to be a portion of the keel of a large ship, about fifty feet long, and much worn. It had evidently been hauled on the reefs by some fishermen, and the fortunate salvors had placed their rude marks upon it. I mused over this fragment of wreck, which was mutely eloquent with melancholy suggestiveness. How many prayers had gone forth with the unknown ship! how many fathers, brothers, sisters, lovers, and unconscious widows and orphans, might at that moment be hoping against hope for her return! To what port did she belong? In what remote ocean had she met her doom? Perchance this keel had been borne by wind and tide from some region of thick-ribbed ice, and was the only relic to tell of the dark fate of a gallant bark and brave crew! Alas, what a thrilling history might that weed-tangled piece of wood be linked with, and what food did it supply for the wanderer's imagination!
Resuming the voyage, we came to a long promontory of solid rock, stretching far into the sea, where it tapers down to the level of the water. It is called Kniuskjœrodden; and I particularly draw attention to it for the following reason: at Hammerfest the consul favored me with an inspection of the charts recently published by the Norwegian government, from express surveys by scientific officers of their navy. The instant I cast my eye over the one containing Mager Oe, I perceived that Kniuskjœrodden was set down further north than the North Cape itself! The consul said that such was the actual fact, though he will not consent to its disputing the legitimacy of the ancient fame which the Cape worthily enjoys; since it is merely a low, narrow projection, of altogether insignificant character. I walked to its extremity, and narrowly escaped being washed by the roaring breakers into the deep transparent sea.
Rounding Kniuskjœrodden, the North Cape burst in all its sunlit grandeur on my delighted view. It was now a dead calm, and my vikings pulled very slowly across the grand bay of Kniusvœrig, to afford me an opportunity of sketching the object, which is one enormous mass of solid rock, upward of a thousand feet in elevation. I can compare it to nothing more fitly than the keep of a castle of a tremendous size; for it very gently tapers upward from the base, and presents a surface marvelously resembling time-worn masonry. The front approaches the perpendicular, and so does much of the western side also. The color of this mighty rock is a dark, shining, speckled gray, relieved by dazzling masses of snow lying in the gigantic fissures, which seem to have been riven by some dread convulsion. The impression I felt as the boat glided beneath its shadow was one of thrilling awe; for its magnificent stern proportions—its colossal magnitude—its position as the lonely, unchanging sentinel of nature, which for countless ages has stood forth as the termination of the European continent, frowning defiance to the maddening fury of the mystic Arctic Queen—all combine to invest it with associations and attributes of overpowering majesty. My ideas of its sublimity were more than realized; and as I landed on its base, in the blaze of the midnight sun, I felt an emotion of proud joy, that my long-feasted hope of gazing upon it at such an hour, and under such circumstances, was literally fulfilled.
The only place where a landing can be effected is on the western side, about a mile and a half from the head of the Cape; and it is usual for those who ascend it to go many miles round from this starting-place to gain the summit, because a direct upward ascent is considered impracticable. But having much confidence in my climbing capabilities, I resolved to adventure the latter feat; and although burdened with my sea-cloak and other things, I instantly commenced the task, leaving the crew to slumber in the boat until my return. I found the whole of the western side, opposite the landing-place, clothed with the most luxuriant vegetation to the height of about a hundred yards. There were myriads of flowers, including exquisite white violets with hairy stems; purple, red, and white star-flowers; the beautiful large yellow cup-flower, growing on stems two feet high, and called by the Norwegians knap-sul-len-öie-blomster (literally, button-sun-eye-flower); and many other varieties of species unknown to me. There were also several kinds of dwarf shrubs, including the juniper, then in green berry. Butterflies and insects flitted gayly from flower to flower. After resting on a ledge of rock to take breath, and look down on the glassy waters and the boat at my feet—now dwindled to a speck—I resumed my clambering; but to my extreme mortification, when I had ascended two-thirds of the way, at no small risk to my bones, I was mastered by overhanging masses of rock, all trickling with slimy moisture from the congealed snow above. Here I had a narrow escape from being killed by a fragment of loose rock giving way beneath me, and drawing down other pieces after it; but I clung tenaciously to a firm part, and the heavy stones bounded harmlessly over my head. I descended with difficulty; and after carefully surveying the face of the rocks, tried at a more favorable place, and even then I was above an hour in gaining the summit. I understand that I am the first adventurer who has scaled the Cape at that place; and I certainly was thankful when I could throw my weary frame down, and eat some frugal fare, slaking my thirst with a handful of snow from the solid patch by my side. Though I had been more than forty-eight hours without rest, bodily fatigue was little felt. I could behold from my airy elevation many miles of the surface of the island. The higher peaks and the sheltered hollows were clothed with snow, glittering in the midnight sun, and several dark lakes nestled amid the frowning rocks.
Resuming my progress, I passed over the surface of the Cape. It is covered with slaty débris, and, what struck me as very remarkable, quantities of a substance resembling coarse white marble, totally different from the Cape itself. The only vegetation on the summit is a species of moss, which bears most beautiful flowers, generally of a purple hue, blooming in hundreds and thousands together. These dumb witnesses of nature's benevolent handiwork filled my soul with pleasing, grateful thoughts, and uplifted it to the Divine Being who maketh flowers to bloom and waters to gush in the most desolate regions of the earth. In the bed of a ravine, crossed in my way toward the end of the Cape, I found a rapid stream of the purest water, which proved deliciously refreshing. I wandered along; and, after skirting much of the western precipice, drew nigh the bourne of my pilgrimage. The Cape terminates in a shape approaching a semicircle, but the most northern part swells out in a clear appreciable point. About a hundred yards from the latter I came upon a circle of stones, piled nearly breast high, inclosing a space some dozen feet in diameter. This had evidently been erected by a party of visitors as a shelter from the winds. Not far distant, a block of black rock rises above the level, which is otherwise smooth as a bowling-green, and covered with minute fragments of rock. Within two or three yards of the extreme point is a small pole, sustained in the centre of a pile of stones. I found several initials and dates cut on this very perishable register, and added my own. I believe it was set up by the government expedition three or four years ago as a signal-post for their trigonometrical survey.
I can not adequately describe the tide of emotion which filled my soul as I walked up to the dizzy verge. I only know that, after standing a moment with folded arms, beating heart, and tear-dimmed eye, I knelt, and with lowly-bowed head, returned thanks to God for permitting me to thus realize one darling dream of my boyhood!
Despite the wind, which here blew violently, I sat down by the side of the pole, and wrapping my cloak around me, long contemplated the grand spectacle of nature in one of her sublimest aspects. I was truly alone. Not a living being was in sight: far beneath was the boundless expanse of ocean, with a sail or two on its bosom, at an immense distance; above was the canopy of heaven, flecked with snowy cloudlets; the sun was gleaming through a broad belt of blood-red horizon; the only sounds were the whistling of the wind, and the occasional plaintive scream of hovering sea-fowl. My pervading feeling was a calm though deep sense of intellectual enjoyment and triumph—very natural to an enthusiastic young wanderer upon achieving one of the long-cherished enterprises of his life.
With reluctant and wildly-devious steps, I bade what is probably an eternal adieu to the wondrous Cape, and effected a comparatively easy descent to the place whence I had started. My men had dropped grapnel a considerable distance from the rock; and being unwilling to disturb their slumber, I spent some further time in exploring the western base. There is a very curious cavernous range of rock washed out by the terrific beating of wintry storms, so as to form a species of arcade. The sides are of immense thickness, but the sea has worn them open at the top. The water here, as along the whole coast of Norway and Finmark, is marvelously transparent. Weeds and fish may be seen at a prodigious depth clearly as in a mirror.
On the return voyage, we ran into a creek near Sandbugt, and the crew went ashore to a Lap gamme (hut) to sleep; but as I had no desire to furnish a dainty fresh meal to the vermin with which every gamme swarms, I slept soundly on my reindeer skins in the boat, although it was now rainy and intensely cold. After the lapse of a few hours I joined them at the gamme, and bought a fine pœsk or tunic of reindeer skin from an old Lap; and learning that his herd of reins was in the vicinity, I had a long ramble in search of them, but without avail; for they had wandered far away, influenced by that remarkable instinct which impels reindeer to invariably run against the wind. I gathered some fine specimens of sponge in marshy hollows. In the course of our subsequent voyage, I made another pause of a few hours at Giesvohr, where I examined the works for curing the fish and extracting the oil, but declined taking any repose. Next morning, being favored with a powerful wind, our little craft fairly leaped over the waves; and I noted her dextrous management with the eye of an amateur receiving a valuable lesson. The old pilot kept the sheet of the lug-sail constantly ready to slip, and another hand stood by the greased halyard to let all go by the run; for there are frequent eddies and squalls of wind along this very dangerous coast, which would upset a boat in an instant, were not great tact and unremitting vigilance exercised. The sea ran exceedingly high, and we shipped water from stem to stern every time we settled in its trough, in such a way that the baling never ceased. Safely, however, did we run into Havösund once more at about eight o'clock.
Young Ulich welcomed my unexpectedly early return at the landing-place, and I was delighted to again become the eagerly-welcomed guest of his house. Happily, and only too quickly, did the time speed. I chatted in my sadly-broken Norwegian—the first to laugh at my own comical blunders; and the eldest young lady sweetly sang to me several of the most ancient and popular of her native ballads, accompanying them on her guitar—the fashionable instrument of music in the North, where many things which have fallen into desuetude with us universally flourish. As she could understand no other language, I in return did my best to chant the celebrated national Danish song, Den tappre Landsoldat, the fame of which has penetrated to the far North. So popular is this song in Denmark, that its author and composer have both recently received an order of knighthood for it. In the library were translations of Marryat, and other English novelists; and they showed me a copy of—Cruikshank's Bottle! I thought that if that gifted artist could have thus beheld how his fame and a genuine copy of his greatest work has penetrated, and is highly appreciated in the vicinity of the North Cape, he would have experienced a glow of enviable, and not undeserved satisfaction. The only teetotaller, by the way, whom I ever met with in Scandinavia, was one of the crew of the boat with me. He invariably declined the brændiviin, as I passed it round from time to time, and assured me he drank only water and milk.
The young ladies had about a score of pretty tame pigeons; and to my extreme regret a couple were killed, to give me an additional treat at a dinner served in a style which I should rather have expected to meet with in an English hotel than at a solitary house on an arctic island. They afterward conducted me to their—garden! Yes, a veritable garden, the fame of which has extended far and wide in Finmark; for there is nothing to compare to it for at least four hundred miles southward. It is of considerable size, inclosed by high wooden walls, painted black to attract the sun's rays, which are very fervid in the latter end of summer. Potatoes, peas, and other table vegetables, were in a thriving state, but only come to maturity in favorable seasons. I had some radishes at dinner, and excellent they were. Glazed frames protected cucumber and other plants, and many very beautiful and delicate flowers bloomed in the open air. The young ladies gathered some of the finest specimens of these, including large blue forget-me-nots, and placed them within the leaves of my Bible. Highly do I treasure them, for they will ever vividly recall a host of pleasant and romantic associations.
Most pressing were they all to induce me to stay some days with them, and gladly indeed would I have complied had circumstances permitted; but I felt compelled to hasten back to Hammerfest. In the afternoon, therefore, I bade adieu to a family which had shown me a degree of engaging kindness greater than any I had experienced since I left my warmly-attached Danish friends.
The remainder of our return voyage was wet and tempestuous. We sailed and rowed all night, and reached Hammerfest at eight a.m. on July 5, much to the astonishment of the good folks there, who had not anticipated seeing us again in less than a week or ten days. The consul and many others assured me that my voyage had been performed with unprecedented speed, the whole time occupied being not quite three and a half days.
I can not refrain from giving a conversation which I heard as we came by the coach to Louisville. One of the speakers was a very agreeable and apparently well-informed gentleman, who seemed to have seen a great deal of the world. When he first entered the "stage," it would seem it was with the benignant intention of giving a sort of converzatione in the coach, in which, after a few preliminary interrogatories to the various passengers (as if to take the size and measure of their capacities), he sustained all the active part, not calling upon them for the slightest exercise of their conversational powers. He varied the entertainment occasionally, by soliloquizing and monopolyguizing; and ever and anon it appeared as if he addressed the human race generally, or was speaking for posterity in a very elevated tone indeed, and seemingly oblivious of that fraction of the contemporaneous generation who were then largely benefiting by his really most animated and amusing discourse—for he was thoroughly original and very shrewd and entertaining.
Where had he not been? What had he not seen? what not met, tried, suffered, sought, found, dared, done, won, lost, said? The last we could give the most implicit credence to, no matter how large the demand. Now he told us, or the ceiling of the coach, how he had been eighteen months in the prairies (which keep very open house for all visitors), shooting herds of buffaloes, and with his cloak for his only castle, and all his household furniture, and how he had been all this time without bed or bread: and he described the longing for the last, much in the way Mr. Ruxton does in his account of prairie excursions; and now—but I will not attempt to follow him in all his wondrous adventures.
Suffice it to say, Robinson Crusoe, placed in juxtaposition with him, was a mere fire-side stay-at-home sort of personage, one who had never left his own comfortable arm-chair, in comparison. In short, the adventures were marvelous and manifold, and all told in the same agreeable, lively, Scheherezade-like sort of a manner—so agreeable, indeed, that I am sure had Judge Lynch himself had any little account to settle with him, he would have postponed—à la Sultan of the Indies—any trifling beheading or strangling, or unpleasant little operation of the sort, to hear the end of the tale.
After these narratives and amusing lectures had been poured forth continuously for a length of time, it chanced that a quiet countryman-like person got into the coach, bundle and stick in hand. After a few questions to this rustic wayfarer, our eloquent orator left off his historic and other tales, and devoted himself to drawing out, and "squeezing the orange of the brains" of this apparently simple-minded and unlettered man. The discourse that ensued was a singular one—to take place, too, in the United States between Americans.
The new-comer was a Kentuckian by birth, who had not very long ago gone to settle in Indiana. He called himself a mechanic—these facts came out in answer to the queries put to him by our unwearied talker—but he had, as I have said, much more the appearance of a respectable country farming man—and, indeed, I believe, mechanic means here, in a general sense, a laborer. He seemed a fine, honest-hearted, straight-forward, noble-spirited son of the plow; and his lofty, earnest, generous sentiments were spoken in somewhat unpolished but energetic and good language; and what particularly struck me was a really beautiful and almost child-like simplicity of mind and manner, that was combined with the most uncompromising firmness and unflinching adherence in argument, to what he conceived to be right.
His features were decidedly plain, but the countenance was very fine, chiefly characterized by great ingenuousness, commingled with gentleness and benevolence; and yet bearing evident traces of strength, determination, and energetic resolution. It was rather a complicated countenance, so to say, notwithstanding its great openness and expression of downright truth and goodness.
After opening the conversation with him, as you would an oyster, by the introduction of a pretty keen knife of inquisitorial questions, the chief speaker began to hold forth, capriciously enough, on the essentials and distinguishing attributes of a gentleman. He declared, emphatically, that one qualification alone was necessary, and that money only made a gentleman, according to the world, and, above all, in the United States (quite a mistake is this, I fully believe). "Let a man," said he, "be dressed here in every thing of the best, with splendid rings on his fingers, and plenty of money to spend at the ends of them, and he may go where he will, and be received as a gentleman; ay, though he may be a gambler, a rogue, or a swindler, and you, now, you may be a good honest mechanic; but he will at once get into the best society in these parts, which you would never dream even of attempting to accomplish—"
"But he would not be a gentleman," broke in the Kentuckian, indignantly. "No, sir; nor will I ever allow that money only makes the gentleman: it is the principle, sir, and the inner feeling, and the mind—and no fine clothes can ever make it; and no rough ones unmake it, that's a fact. And, sir, there's many a better gentleman following the plow in these parts than there is among the richer classes: I mean those poor men who're contented with their lot, and work hard and try no mean shifts and methods to get on an' up in the world; for there's little some 'ill stick at to get at money; and such means a true gentleman (what I call a gentleman) will avoid like poison, and scorn utterly."
"Now, that's all very well for you to talk so here just now; but you know yourself, I don't doubt, that your own object, as well as all the world's around you, is to make money. It is with that object that you work hard and save up: you do not work only to live, or make yourself more comfortable, but to get money: and money is the be-all and end-all of all and every body; and that only commands consideration and respect."
"That only, sir, would never command mine, and—"
"Why, how you talk now! if you meet a fine dressed-out gentleman in one of these stages, you look on him as one directly—you don't ask him did he make or take his money—what's that to you?—there he is, and it is not for you to busy or bother yourself to find out all the private particulars of his history; and if you find him, as I say, well dressed in superfine, and he acts the gentleman to you, he may be the greatest rogue in existence, but he will be treated by you like a gentleman—yes, even by you."
"Yes, sir, that maybe while I know nothing of him—while, as you say, he acts the gentleman to me; but let me once find out what he is, and I would never show him respect more—no! though he had all the gold of California."
"Ah, California! just look at that now—look at people by scores and thousands, leaving their families, and friends, and homes—and what for but for gold? people with a comfortable competence already; but it's fine talking. Why, what are you taking this very journey for?—why, I can answer for you—for gold, I doubt not; and every other action of your life is for that object: confess the real truth now."
"I will, sir—I am come here from Indiana, for though I'm a Kentucky man, I live in the Hoosier State. I'm come here to see a dear brother; and instead of gaining money I'm spending it in these stages to get to see him and 'old Kentuck' agin. So you see, Sir, I love my brother—I do, more than money, poor man as I am; ay, and that I do, too."
"Well, I dare say you do; but come now, just tell me—haven't you a little bit of a speculation, now, here, that you're come after, as well as your brother—some trifle of a speculation afoot? You know you have now. You must have. Some horse, perhaps—"
It was quite delightful to see and hear the indignant burst of eager denial which this elicited from the ingenuous Kentuckian.
"No, sir! no, I have not—none whatever, indeed I have not:" his voice quivered with emotion; the earnest expression of his countenance was more than eloquent. If his interrogator had accused him of a serious crime he could hardly more anxiously and more earnestly have disclaimed it. To him, I thought the bare suspicion seemed like a coarse desecration of his real motives, a kind of undervaluing even of his "dear brother," to suppose he must have had a "little speculation on hand" to make it worth his while to go to see him.
He went on in an agitated, eager tone:
"And look ye here; I am leaving off my work and money-making for some days on purpose—only for that, and spending money at it, too!"
His somewhat case-hardened antagonist looked the least in the world discomfited; for that angry denial was a magnificent burst, and uttered in a tone that actually seemed to give an additional jolt to the rough coach; and I might say it had really a splendid theatrical effect, but that I should hesitate to use that expression with reference to one of the most beautiful natural exhibitions of deep feeling and generous sentiment I ever witnessed.
"Where are you going to?" at last inquired the other, apparently about to commence a little cross-examination.
"About twenty miles beyond Munsfordville," replied Kentucky, in his simple direct manner, "to"—I forget the name.
"Why, you're come by the wrong stage, then," exclaimed the other, "you should have waited till to-morrow, and then taken the stage to ——, and then you would have gone direct."
"Well, yes, sir; it's true enough, sir; but you see—in short, I couldn't wait—no, that I couldn't. I was so anxious, and I felt so like seeing my brother; and I was in such a mortal hurry to get to him."
"Hurry, man! why how will you see him any sooner by this? Why, you might as well have walked up and down Main-street till to-morrow; it would have advanced you just as much on your journey."
"You're right, sir, I know that; but I really couldn't wait: I wanted to feel I was going ahead, and getting nearer my brother at any rate; I got so impatient-like. No, sir; I couldn't have staid till the morning any how you could fix it."
"You'll have to walk for your folly, for you'll get no conveyance this way, I tell you."
"I'll have to walk the twenty miles to-night, I suppose," said Kentucky, with the most imperturbable smiling composure; "but never mind that! I shall be getting near my brother, then. Ha," he said, after a pause, "you see I do love my brother, sir, and I don't regard trouble for him. I'll have to walk the twenty miles to-night with my bundle, I dare say, and spending money at that, too, perhaps, for a bit of food; but I couldn't have waited—no! not another hour at Louisville—I felt so like getting nearer to my brother."
At the end of the argument about money-making being the all in all, one or two of us signified briefly that we thought Kentucky was right. You never saw any body so surprised. He had evidently entertained a deep conviction that all in the stage-coach were opposed to his opinions, and that he stood alone in his view on the matter. He replied he was glad any body thought as he did, and reiterated with strong emphasis to his opponent:
"I'm sure, sir, I'm right; it is the principle, and the manners, and the mind, and not money that makes a gentleman. No, no; money can never make half a one."
I shall feel a respect for "old Kentucky" forever after for his sake.
After toiling for a very inadequate recompense at the sessions of Cork, and wearing, as he said himself, his teeth almost to their stumps, Curran proceeded to the metropolis, taking for his wife and young children a miserable lodging upon Hay Hill. Term after term, without either profit or professional reputation, he paced the hall of the Four Courts. Among those who had the discrimination to appreciate, and the heart to feel for him, luckily for Curran, was Mr. Arthur Wolfe, afterward the unfortunate but respected Lord Kilwarden. The first fee of any consequence which he received was through his recommendation; and his recital of the incident can not be without its interest to the young professional aspirant whom a temporary neglect may have sunk into dejection. "I then lived," said he, "upon Hay Hill; my wife and children were the chief furniture of my apartments; and as to my rent, it stood pretty much the same chance of liquidation with the national debt. Mrs. Curran, however, was a barrister's lady, and what she wanted in wealth she was well determined should be supplied by dignity. The landlady, on the other hand, had no idea of any gradation except that of pounds, shillings, and pence. I walked out one morning to avoid the perpetual altercations on the subject, with my mind, you may imagine, in no very enviable temperament. I fell into the gloom to which, from my infancy, I had been occasionally subject. I had a family for whom I had no dinner, and a landlady for whom I had no rent. I had gone abroad in despondence—I returned home almost in desperation. When I opened the door of my study, where Lavater alone could have found a library, the first object which presented itself was an immense folio of a brief, twenty golden guineas wrapped up beside it, and the name of Old Bob Lyons marked upon the back of it. I paid my landlady—bought a good dinner—gave Bob Lyons a share of it—and that dinner was the date of my prosperity." Such was his own exact account of his professional advancement.
In one of Curran's professional excursions, a very singular circumstance had almost rendered this the termination of his biography. He was on a temporary visit to the neighboring town of Sligo, and was one morning standing at his bedroom window, which overlooked the street, occupied, as he told me, in arranging his portmanteau, when he was stunned by the report of a blunderbuss in the very chamber with him, and the panes above his head were all shivered into atoms. He looked suddenly around in the greatest consternation. The room was full of smoke, the blunderbuss on the floor just discharged, the door closed, and no human being but himself discoverable in the apartment! If this had happened in his rural retreat, it could readily have been reconciled through the medium of some offended spirit of the village mythology; but, as it was, he was in a populous town, in a civilized family, among Christian doctrines, where the fairies had no power, and their gambols no currency; and, to crown all, a poor cobbler, into whose stall on the opposite side of the street the slugs had penetrated, hinted in no very equivocal terms that the whole affair was a conspiracy against his life. It was by no means a pleasant addition to the chances of assassination to be loudly declaimed against by a crazed mechanic as an assassin himself. Day after day passed away without any solution of the mystery; when one evening, as the servants of the family were conversing round the fire on so miraculous an escape, a little urchin, not ten years old, was heard so to wonder how such an aim was missed, that a universal suspicion was immediately excited. He was alternately flogged and coaxed into a confession, which disclosed as much precocious and malignant premeditation as perhaps ever marked the annals of juvenile depravity. This little miscreant had received a box on the ear from Mr. Curran for some alleged misconduct a few days before; the Moor's blow did not sink into a mind more furious for revenge, or more predisposed by nature for such deadly impressions. He was in the bedroom by mere chance when Mr. Curran entered; he immediately hid himself in the curtains till he observed him too busy with his portmanteau for observation; he then leveled at him the old blunderbuss, which lay charged in the corner, the stiffness of whose trigger, too strong for his infant fingers, alone prevented the aim which he confessed he had taken, and which had so nearly terminated the occupations of the cobbler. The door was ajar, and, mid the smoke and terror, he easily slipped out without discovery. I had the story verbatim a few months ago from Mr. Curran's lips, whose impressions on the subject it was no wonder that forty years had not obliterated.
At cross-examination, the most difficult and by far the most hazardous part of a barrister's profession, Curran was quite inimitable. There was no plan which he did not detect, no web which he did not disentangle; and the unfortunate wretch, who commenced with all the confidence of preconcerted perjury, never failed to retreat before him in all the confusion of exposure. Indeed, it was almost impossible for the guilty to offer a successful resistance. He argued, he cajoled, he ridiculed, he mimicked, he played off the various artillery of his talent upon the witness; he would affect earnestness upon trifles, and levity upon subjects of the most serious import, until at length he succeeded in creating a security that was fatal, or a sullenness that produced all the consequences of prevarication. No matter how unfair the topic, he never failed to avail himself of it; acting upon the principle that, in law as well as in war, every stratagem was admissible. If he was hard pressed, there was no peculiarity of person, no singularity of name, no eccentricity of profession at which he would not grasp, trying to confound the self-possession of the witness by the, no matter how excited, ridicule of the audience. To a witness of the name of Halfpenny he once began: "Halfpenny, I see you're a rap, and for that reason you shall be nailed to the counter." "Halfpenny is sterling," exclaimed the opposite counsel. "No, no," said he, "he's exactly like his own conscience—only copper washed." This phrase alluded to an expression previously used on the trial.
To Lundy Foot, the celebrated tobacconist, once hesitating on the table: "Lundy, Lundy—that's a poser—a devil of a pinch." This gentleman applied to Curran for a motto when he first established his carriage. "Give me one, my dear Curran," said he, "of a serious cast, because I am afraid the people will laugh at a tobacconist setting up a carriage, and, for the scholarship's sake, let it be in Latin." "I have just hit on it," said Curran; "it is only two words, and it will at once explain your profession, your elevation, and your contempt for their ridicule, and it has the advantage of being in two languages, Latin or English, just as the reader chooses. Put up 'Quid rides' upon your carriage."
Inquiring his master's age from a horse-jockey's servant, he found it almost impossible to extract an answer. "Come, come, friend, has he not lost his teeth?" "Do you think," retorted the fellow, "that I know his age, as he does his horse's, by the mark of mouth?" The laugh was against Curran, but he instantly recovered: "You were very right not to try, friend, for you know your master's a great bite."
Having one day a violent argument with a country schoolmaster on some classical subject, the pedagogue, who had the worst of it, said, in a towering passion, that he would lose no more time, and must go back to his scholars. "Do, my dear doctor," said Curran, "but don't indorse my sins upon their backs."
Curran was told that a very stingy and slovenly barrister had started for the Continent with a shirt and a guinea: "He'll not change either till he comes back," said he.
It was well known that Curran entertained a dislike and a contempt for Downes. "Bushe," said he, "came up to me one day with a very knowing look, and said, 'Do you know, Curran, I have just left the pleasantest fellow I ever met?' 'Indeed! who is he?' 'The chief justice,' was the answer. My reply was compendious and witty. I looked into his eye, and said 'hum.' It required all his oil to keep his countenance smooth."
A very stupid foreman once asked a judge how they were to ignore a bill. "Why, sir," said Curran, "when you mean to find a true one, just write Ignoramus for self and fellows on the back of it."
A gentleman just called to the bar took up a pauper case. It was remarked upon. "The man's right," said Curran; "a barber begins on a beggar, that when he arrives at the dignity he may know how to shave a duchess."
He was just rising to cross-examine a witness before a judge who could not comprehend any jest that was not written in black letter. Before he said a single word, the witness began to laugh. "What are you laughing at, friend—what are you laughing at? Let me tell you that a laugh without a joke is like—is like—" "Like what, Mr. Curran?" asked the judge, imagining he was nonplused. "Just exactly, my lord, like a contingent remainder without any particular estate to support it." I am afraid that none but my legal readers will understand the admirable felicity of the similitude, but it was quite to his lordship's fancy, and rivaled with him all "the wit that Rabelais ever scattered."
Examining a country squire who disputed a collier's bill: "Did he not give you the coals, friend?" "He did, sir, but—" "But what? On your oath, wasn't your payments slack?"
It was thus that, in some way or other, he contrived to throw the witnesses off their centre, and he took care they seldom should recover it. "My lard, my lard!" vociferated a peasant witness, writhing under this mental excruciation, "I can't answer yon little gentleman, he's putting me in such a doldrum." "A doldrum! Mr. Curran, what does he mean by a doldrum!" exclaimed Lord Avonmore. "Oh! my lord, it's a very common complaint with persons of this description: it's merely a confusion of the head arising from the corruption of the heart."
To the bench he was at times quite as unceremonious; and if he thought himself reflected on or interfered with, had instant recourse either to ridicule or invective. There is a celebrated reply in circulation of Mr. Dunning to a remark of Lord Mansfield, who curtly exclaimed at one of his legal positions, "O! if that be law, Mr. Dunning, I may burn my law-books!" "Better read them, my lord," was the sarcastic and appropriate rejoinder. In a different spirit, but with similar effect, was Mr. Curran's retort upon an Irish judge, quite as remarkable for his good-humor and raillery as for his legal researches. He was addressing a jury on one of the state trials in 1803, with his usual animation. The judge, whose political bias, if any judge can have one, was certainly supposed not to be favorable to the prisoner, shook his head in doubt or denial of one of the advocate's arguments. "I see, gentlemen," said Mr. Curran, "I see the motion of his lordship's head; common observers might imagine that implied a difference of opinion, but they would be mistaken: it is merely accidental. Believe me, gentlemen, if you remain here many days, you will, yourselves perceive that, when his lordship shakes his head, there's nothing in it!"
Grattan was short in stature, and unprepossessing in appearance. His arms were disproportionably long. His walk was a stride. With a person swaying like a pendulum, and an abstracted air, he seemed always in thought, and each thought provoked an attendant gesticulation. Such was the outward and visible form of one whom the passenger would stop to stare at as a droll, and the philosopher to contemplate as a study. How strange it seems that a mind so replete with grace and symmetry, and power and splendor, should have been allotted such a dwelling for its residence. Yet so it was; and so also was it one of his highest attributes, that his genius, by its "excessive light," blinded the hearer to his physical imperfections. It was the victory of mind over matter. The man was forgotten in the orator. Mr. Grattan, whose father represented the city of Dublin in Parliament, and was also its recorder, was born in the year 1746. He entered the Middle Temple in 1767 and was called to the Irish bar in 1772. In the University of Dublin he was eminently distinguished, sharing its honors, in then amicable contention, with Fitzgibbon—not merely the antagonist, but the enemy, and the bitter one of an after day. We have a record, more authentic than usual, of his pursuits while at the Temple. The study of the law occupied but little of his attention. He never relished it, and soon abandoned the profession altogether. Of the theatre he was very fond—little wonder in the zenith of Garrick—and it was a taste he indulged in to the last. I well remember, somewhere about the year 1813, being in Crow-street when he entered with Catalani leaning on his arm. The house was crowded, and he was hailed with acclamations. In vain he modestly consigned them to the lovely siren his companion. His name rang wildly through the theatre. I think I still hear the shouts when his person was recognized, and still behold his venerable figure bowing its awkward gratitude. No one knew better the true value of that bubble tribute. Another of his amusements, if indeed it was not something more, when he was at the Temple, seems to have been a frequent attendance in both houses of Parliament. He sketched the debates and the speakers by whom he was most attracted.
Living, as he did, in constant turmoil, and careless, as he was, to whom he gave offense, O'Connell of course had a multitude of enemies. Of this, himself the cause, he had no right to complain; but he had a right to complain of the calumnies they circulated. Most rife of these was a charge of want of courage—in Ireland a rare and very detrimental accusation. O'Connell, during his latter years, declined dueling, and publicly avowed his determination. The reason given, and given in the House of Commons, was, that having "blood upon his hands, he had registered a vow in heaven." To this there could have been no possible objection had he included in the registry a vow not to offend. The real charge to which he made himself amenable was his perseverance at once in insult and irresponsibility. The truth is, O'Connell's want of courage consisted in his fighting the duel in which the vow originated. The facts of the case are few and simple. In one of his many mob speeches he called the corporation of Dublin a "beggarly corporation." A gentleman named D'Esterre affected to feel this as a personal affront, he being one of that very numerous body, and accordingly fastened a quarrel on the offender. It is quite true that O'Connell endeavored to avoid the encounter. He did not do enough. He should have summoned D'Esterre before the tribunals of the country, after failing to appease him by a repeated declaration that he meant him no personal offense, and could not, he being a total stranger to him. However, in an evil hour, he countenanced a savage and anti-Christian custom—the unfortunate D'Esterre paid for his perverseness with his life, and the still more unfortunate O'Connell expiated his moral timidity with much mental anguish to the day of his death. The perpetration of a duel appears to me no proof whatever of personal courage; the refusal, in the then state of society, would have shown much more. However, on the occasion in question he showed a total absence of what is vulgarly called fear; indeed, his frigid determination was remarkable. Let those who read the following anecdote remember that he most reluctantly engaged in the combat; that he was then the father of seven children; and that it was an alternative of life or death with him, D'Esterre being reputed an unerring marksman. Being one of those who accompanied O'Connell, he beckoned me aside to a distant portion of the very large field, which had a slight covering of snow. "Phillips," said he, "this seems to me not a personal, but a political affair. I am obnoxious to a party, and they adopt a false pretense to cut me off. I shall not submit to it. They have reckoned without their host, I promise you. I am one of the best shots in Ireland at a mark, having, as a public man, considered it a duty to prepare, for my own protection, against such unprovoked aggression as the present. Now, remember what I say to you. I may be struck myself, and then skill is out of the question; but if I am not, my antagonist may have cause to regret his having forced me into this conflict." The parties were then very soon, placed on the ground, at, I think, twelve paces distance, each having a case of pistols, with directions to fire when they chose after a given signal. D'Esterre rather agitated himself by making a short speech, disclaiming all hostility to his Roman Catholic countrymen, and took his ground, somewhat theatrically crossing his pistols upon his bosom. They fired almost together, and instantly on the signal. D'Esterre fell, mortally wounded. There was the greatest self-possession displayed by both. It seemed to me a duty to narrate these details in O'Connell's lifetime wherever I heard his courage questioned, and justice to his memory now prompts me to record them here.