Manners: A Novel, Vol 3

Manners: A Novel, Vol 3

The lady who did the honours of Mr. O'Sullivan's house to our English travellers, on the night of their arrival at Ballinamoyle, Miss Fitzcarril by name, was in person extremely tall; and a carriage of extraordinary uprightness gave her, with a stiffness, a dignity also of appearance. Her face, though good natured in expression, was, at that period, rather plain; but yet sufficient evidence remained to corroborate her own frequent assertion, that "she had once been a fine woman;" in making which she flattered herself her auditors would imply, that she took the same license which the structure of a venerable language sometimes permits, of understanding, at pleasure, different tenses by the same word; and that they would from the past infer the present. In dress and manner she was old fashioned, but stately, generally wearing garments made of the antique tabinets and satins she inherited from her grandmother, and which, from the unbending nature of the material, would have stood alone, nearly in as erect a posture as that they maintained when encompassing her perpendicular figure; a double clear starched handkerchief, which Mr. Desmond wickedly called her transparency, enveloped her neck; and the costume of her person was completed by a fine muslin apron of curious work, derived from her own, or her progenitors' industry. Her headdress was the only part of her attire which was ever varied, and in this she was fantastic in the extreme, composing it of the most showy materials, and wearing in her caps and turbans colours only fit for the young and beautiful. Every acquaintance who visited Galway, Limerick, or Clare, was sure to have a commission to buy a cap or bonnet for Miss Fitzcarril; and the more outr in form and colour, the better pleased she was with their purchase. She was, in mind, the most singular mixture of pride and parsimony that was perhaps ever compounded; the one she derived from her highly valued ancestry, the other from her own peculiar fate, and a mistaken idea of principle; and she reconciled her frugality and her dignity, by declaring that "the Fitzcarrils and O'Sullivans needn't trouble their heads about what any one said of them; every body knew they were come of the kings of Connaught, and had a good right to do as they pleased." In early life she had lived in extreme poverty, and then had learned the ideas of management she afterwards laboured to enforce at Ballinamoyle. Mr. O'Sullivan had been deprived of his wife a few years before he had also the misfortune to lose his only child; and on the death of this beloved daughter, he chose Theresa Fitzcarril from amongst his female relatives, to superintend his establishment, at the same time settling a comfortable provision on her, in case she should survive himself; which he considered a mere act of justice, for he foresaw that the retirement of his residence would condemn her to a life of solitude and celibacy, the two precise circumstances which least accorded with her own wishes. Theresa, on her part, actuated by an excess of pride, resolved she would cancel her pecuniary obligations, not only to her original benefactor, but to his heir, by saving for the family a sum more than equivalent to all she should ever receive from it. She therefore endeavoured (though without much success) to introduce a system of penury at Ballinamoyle, that, had its owner been aware of her proceedings, he would not have suffered, as it was diametrically opposite to his wishes; he seldom however inquired into the minuti of his household; and indifferent to every thing, after the loss of his daughter, he permitted Theresa to do nearly as she pleased; and when he did object to any of her practices, she was so obstinate, that he found he must, to get rid of them, get rid of herself also with them, and this he never could resolve on; but consoled himself with the usual reflection of his countrymen, when trouble is necessary to avoid any thing unpleasant, "It will do well enough, my time won't be long." Miss Fitzcarril sought to relieve the monotony of her life by indulging in constant speculation. In every lottery she had a sixteenth share of a ticket; and to ascertain what she might possess in the matrimonial lottery, had frequent and protracted conferences with all the tribes of cup-tossers, card-cutters, and deaf and dumb men and women, who infested the country as fortune-tellers,"Who blind could every thing foresee""Who dumb could every thing foretell." This pleasure however Miss Fitzcarril was obliged to indulge in secret, as Mr. O'Sullivan and the worthy priest, who was his domestic pastor, used their best endeavours to banish this race of vagabonds from every place they had influence in; so that when she consulted any of these oracles, she was obliged to conceal herself and them in some remote cabin; but perhaps the impediment thus thrown in the way of this favourite indulgence made her but the more keenly enjoy and still more pertinaciously persist in the practice, notwithstanding the reiterated penances imposed for this offence by the good father Dermoody, which, though she ventured to commit, she did not dare to suppress at confessional. A family of the name of Stewart wandered about the country, presenting papers signed by respectable names, setting forth, that "their progenitors had been shipwrecked on the coast of Ireland, about a century agothat the whole race were deaf and dumbbut that Providence, in compensation, had bestowed on them the gift of second sight." To the predictions of a dumb woman, who claimed this name, and proved she was deaf, by showing that nature had left her unprovided with ears[1], Theresa gave the most implicit credit. This Pythoness had learned to write the printed character, and to draw rude representations of ships, trees, men, and animals, which she described on a board with a piece of white chalk; and of these hieroglyphics those who consulted her made what sense best pleased them. A sharp boy, who had all his senses in full activity, never failed to accompany her; apparently to assist in expounding her text, but, in reality, to collect information, which, by the language of signs, he certainly conveyed to his fellow conjuror, at the most -propos moment, as no body concealed from him the information she was supposed to be (humanly speaking) ignorant of; ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 40160
Author: Panache, Madame
Release Date: Jul 7, 2012
Format: eBook
Language: English