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قراءة كتاب By the Barrow River, and Other Stories

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‏اللغة: English
By the Barrow River, and Other Stories

By the Barrow River, and Other Stories

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دار النشر: Project Gutenberg
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“Troth thin, she was married, or at laste the poor crater thought she was, and her husband was an illegant man, too. He was taller nor yer honour, but twice as dark. He was a foreigner of some kind, but his name was English, or sounded like it. It was Duran. And sure ’twas happy enough they seemed to be, although there were no childre, and they wor livin’ there more nor three years, your honour, and you couldn’t tell which of thim was fonder of the other. And the cottage, yer honour, t’was all covered with roses, and sure, ’tis myself that many a time trimmed the rosebushes that ye might see up by the strame at the back of the cottage, where the summer-house was. And did ye mind the pond in front of it, yer honour?”

“I did,” I replied.

“Well then ’twasn’t a pond at all, yer honour but a quarry hole, and nothing would do the young mistress but that a lake should be made out of it, and didn’t myself help to dam up the strame to let the water run into the hollow ye see in the field, and a purty little lake it made, to be sure. Ay, sure, ’tis I mind it well, for a few days after ’twas finished, the news kem in that Boney was bet.”

“And did they live there long after that?” I asked.

“Little more nor two years, yer honour, for the lake was made the first year they wor there. But sure, ’tis the quare story it was, but no one minds it about here now but myself. The neighbours’ childre, that wor childre wud me are all dead and gone, and sure they were foreigners, and they didn’t mix nor make with anyone outside their own two selves, and till the cross kem they were as happy as the day’s long.”

“And what was the cross?”

“Oh, then, meself doesn’t rightly know the ins and outs of it, yer honour; but ye see the way it was—one day when the master was away in Dublin, there drove up to the door a dark woman, that was more like a gipsy than anything else, and with big goold rings in her ears, and myself chanced to be in the garden behind the house trimmin’ them same rose bushes, an’ I only heard an odd word or two. But as far as I could hear, the dark woman, she was saying that the poor darlin’ lady had no right to call herself Mrs. Duran at all, for that he was ayther promised to marry her, or was married to her, meself didn’t rightly know till after, for I was only a gorsoon then, yer honour, and didn’t know much about it; but when the strange woman went away, and I went into the cottage to ask the mistress if she had any more for me to do, she was as white as a ghost, she, that used always to be bloomin’ like one of the roses ye’d see in them hedges there in the month of June. Well, yer honour, she told me she wouldn’t want anythin’ till mornin’, and sure meself never set eyes on her alive again.”

“Why, what happened?”

“What happened is it, yer honour? Sure there never was a mournfuller story. The master kem home that night, but there was no sign of the poor mistress. I heard long after that she had left a letter, but I never heard tell of what was in it. Well, sure, he was nearly out of his mind, and then when there was no sign of her comin’ back he went away to foreign parts, and myself thought he’d never come back ayther, but he came home one mornin’ and he went on livin’ in the cottage as he did before when they wor together. The only one, barrin’ an old woman of a servant, that he ever let about the house, was myself, for ye see, yer honour, he knew the poor young mistress had a likin’ for me, and he used to employ me in lookin’ after the roses and keepin’ the summer house in order, where I often saw himself and herself sitting together, and often it was he sat there lookin’ as lonesome as a churchyard in the night, yer honour, and sure ’twas hardly a word he ever spoke. And then I knew that he was as fond as ever of the poor mistress, and that ’twas thinkin’ of her all the time he was. And didn’t myself see her picture in his bedroom, and ye’d think ’twas smilin’ at ye she was out o’ the frame, and then I knew the strange woman had wronged her and him.”

“And how long did he live there alone?”

“Sure, that’s the quarest part of the story, yer honour. Ye see, when the poor mistress was gone he didn’t mind the lake, and the water began to sink into the ground, and then there kem one dry summer when all the strames in the country ran dry. It was the driest summer I ever remember, and the grass was as thin and as brown as my old coat, and as little nourishin’, and sure one mornin’ we noticed somethin’ under the shallow water of the lake, and what was it but the body of the poor mistress? And after that when we buried her in the churchyard beyond the hill there, the poor master left the place and the cottage was shut up, for no one would live in it, and the fields around it were tuk by Mr. Toole that had a farm next to it, and ’tis in the hollow where you might see the sheep browsin’ this minnit the poor lady was found.”


A
NIGHT WITH THE RAPPAREES.

(From the Memoirs of an Officer of the Irish Brigade.)

It was towards the end of October in the year before the Battle of Fontenoy, and a few months before I joined one of the flocks of “the Wild Geese” in their flight to France, that I fell in with the experience which I am now about to relate. I had been staying for a few days with a friend in the west of the County of Cork, and I had started for home in full time, as I had hoped, to reach it before nightfall. My shortest way, about five miles, lay across the mountains. It was familiar to me since I was a child, and I felt sure I could make it out in dark as well as in daylight. When I started a light wind was blowing. Some dark clouds were in the sky, but the wind was not from a rainy point, and I was confident that the weather would keep up. When, however, I had traversed half the way, the wind changed suddenly and a light rain began to fall. I pushed on more quickly, yet without misgiving, but before I had gone a half-mile further the mountain was suddenly enveloped in mist that became denser at every step. I could scarcely see my hand when I stretched it out before me. The mossy sheep-track beneath my feet was scarcely distinguishable, and now and again I was almost tripped up by the heather and bracken that grew high at either side.

I found it necessary to move cautiously and very slowly; yet, notwithstanding my caution, I frequently got tangled in the heather, but succeeded in regaining the path. I continued on until I judged that I had made another half-mile from the spot in which I was first surrounded by the mist. How long I had been making this progress it was difficult for me to estimate, but I became aware that the night had fallen, and I was no longer able to distinguish anything even at my feet. I began to doubt whether I was on the proper path, for sheep tracks traversed the mountain in all directions. It occurred to me to turn into the bracken and try to make the best shelter I could. The bracken here grew to a height of nearly three feet, and some of the stalks were thick and strong. I had often amused myself when a child twining the stalks together, and making them into a cosy house, and often escaped thereby from a heavy summer shower. The mere recollection of my childish efforts lightened my heart, though I was conscious enough that the experiment I was about to make was not likely to be very successful. But I set to, and tore up some of the bracken, and began to twist it around the standing clumps so as to form a roof, but when I

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