“I believe yer Reverence is right,” replied Phaddhy, looking somewhat slyly in the priest's face; “I think it's best to make sure of it now, in regard that in the evening, your Reverence—do you persave?”
“Yes,” said his Reverence, “you're in a better frame of mind at present, Phaddhy, being fresh from confession.”
So saying, his Reverence—for whom Phaddhy, with all his shrewdness in general, was not a match—went into his room, that he might send home about four dozen of honest, good-humored, thoughtless, jovial, swearing, drinking, fighting Hibernians, free from every possible stain of sin and wickedness!
“Are you all ready now?” said the priest to a crowd of country people who were standing about the kitchen door, pressing to get the “first turn” at the tribunal, which on this occasion consisted of a good oaken chair, with his Reverence upon it.
“Why do you crush forward in that manner, you ill-bred spalpeens? Can't you stand back, and behave yourselves like common Christians?—back with you! or, if you make me get my whip, I'll soon clear you from about the dacent man's door. Hagarty, why do you crush them two girls there, you great Turk, you? Look at the vagabonds! Where's my whip,” said he, running in, and coming out in a fury, when he commenced cutting about him, until they dispersed in all directions. He then returned into the house; and, after calling in about two dozen, began to catechize them as follows, still holding the whip in his hand, whilst many of those individuals, who at a party quarrel or faction fight, in fair or market, were incapable of the slightest terror, now stood trembling before him, absolutely pale and breathless with fear.
“Come, Kelly,” said he to one of them, “are you fully prepared for the two blessed sacraments of Penance and the Eucharist, that you are about to receive? Can you read, sir?”
“Can I read, is id?—my brother Barney can, yor Rev'rence,” replied Kelly, sensible, amid all the disadvantages around him, of the degradation of his ignorance.
“What's that to me, sir?” said the priest, “what your brother Barney can do—can you not read yourself?”
“I can not, your Reverence,” said Kelly, in a tone of regret.
“I hope you have your Christian Doctrine, at all events,” said the priest. “Go on with the Confiteor.”
Kelly went on—“Confeetur Dimnipotenmti batchy Mary semplar virginy, batchy Mickletoe Archy Angelo, batchy Johnny Bartisty, sanctris postlis—Petrum hit Paulum omnium sanctris, et tabby pasture, quay a pixavit minus coglety ashy hony verbum et offer him smaxy quilia smaxy quilta—sniaxy maxin in quilia.” *
* Let not our readers suppose that the above version in
the mouth of a totally illiterate peasant is
overcharged; for we have the advantage of remembering
how we ourselves used to hear it pronounced in our
early days. We will back the version in the text
against Edward Irving's new language—for any money.—
Original note.
“Very well, Kelly, right enough, all except the pronouncing, which wouldn't pass muster in Maynooth, however. How many kinds of commandments are there?”
“Two, sir.”
“What are they?”
“God's and the Church's.”
“Repeat God's share of them.”
He then repeated the first commandment according to his catechism.
“Very good, Kelly, very good. Well now, repeat the commandments of the Church.”
“First—Sundays and holidays, Mass thou shalt sartinly hear;
“Second—All holidays sanctificate throughout all the whole year.
“Third—Lent, Ember days, and Virgins, thou shalt be sartain to fast;
“Fourth—Fridays and Saturdays flesh thou shalt not, good, bad or indifferent, taste.
“Fifth—In Lent and Advent, nuptial fastes gallantly forbear.
“Sixth—Confess your sins, at laste once dacently and soberly every year.
“Seventh—Resave your God at confission about great Easter-day;
“Eighth—And to his Church and his own frolicsome clargy neglect not tides (tithes) to pay.”
“Well,” said his Eeverence, “now, to great point is, do you understand them?”
“Wid the help of God, I hope so, your Rev'rence; and I have also the three thriptological vartues.”
“Theological, sirrah!”
“Theojollyological vartues; the four sins that cry to heaven for vingeance; the five carnal vartues—prudence, justice, timptation, and solitude; (* Temperance and fortitude) the seven deadly sins; the eight grey attitudes—”
“Grey attitudes! Oh, the Boeotian!” exclaimed his Eeverence, “listen to the way in which he's playing havoc among them. Stop, sir,” for Kelly was going on at full speed—“Stop, sir. I tell you it's not gray attitudes, but bay attitudes—doesn't every one know the eight beatitudes?”
“The eight bay attitudes; the nine ways of being guilty of another's sins; the ten commandments; the twelve fruits of a Christian; the fourteen stations of the cross; the fifteen mystheries of the passion—”
“Kelly,” said his Eeverence, interrupting him, and heralding, the joke, for so it was intended, with a hearty chuckle, “you're getting fast out of your teens, ma bouchal?” and this was of course, honored with a merry peal; extorted as much by an effort of softening the rigor of examination, as by the traditionary duty which entails upon the Irish laity the necessity of laughing at a priest's jokes, without any reference at all to their quality. Nor was his Reverence's own voice the first to subside into that gravity which became the solemnity of the occasion; or even whilst he continued the interrogatories, his eye was laughing at the conceit with which it was evident the inner man was not competent to grapple. “Well, Kelly, I can't say but you've answered very well, as far as the repealing of them goes; but do you perfectly understand all the commandments of the church?”
“I do, sir,” replied Kelly, whose confidence kept pace with his Reverence's good-humor.
“Well, what is meant by the fifth?”
“The fifth, sir?” said the other, rather confounded—“I must begin agin, sir, and go on till I come to it.”
“Well,” said the priest, “never mind that; but tell us what the eighth means?”
Kelly stared at him a second time, but was not able to advance “First—Sundays and holidays, mass thou shalt hear;” but before he had proceeded to the second, a person who stood at his elbow began to whisper to him the proper reply, and in the act of so doing received a lash of the whip across the ear for his pains.
“You blackguard, you!” exclaimed Father Philemy, “take that—how dare you attempt to prompt any person that I'm examining?”
Those who stood around Kelly now fell back to a safe distance, and all was silence, terror, and trepidation once more.
“Come, Kelly, go on—the eighth?”
Kelly was still silent.
“Why, you ninny you, didn't you repeat it just now. 'Eighth—And to his church neglect not tithes to pay.' Now that I have put the words in your mouth, what does it mean?”
Kelly having thus got the cue, replied, in the words of the Catechism, “To pay tides to the lawful pasterns of the church, sir.”
“Pasterns!—oh, you ass you! Pasterns! you poor; base, contemptible, crawling reptile,