CHAPTER XIII. ON THE ART OF COLOURING.

THE people of the village of Ballycruiskeen showed themselves quite ready to enter into the plans of their pastor in the profitable enterprise of making entertainment for Lady Innisfail and her guests. The good pastor had both enterprise and imagination. Lady Innisfail had told him confidentially that day that she wished to impress her English visitors with the local colour of the region round about. Local colour was a phrase that she was as fond of as if she had been an art critic; but it so happened that the pastor had never heard the phrase before; he promptly assured her, however, that he sympathized most heartily with her ladyship’s aspirations in this direction. Yes, it was absolutely necessary that they should be impressed with the local colour, and if, with this impression, there came an appreciation of the requirements of the chapel in the way of a new roof, it would please him greatly.

The roof would certainly be put on before the winter, even if the work had to be carried out at the expense of his Lordship, Lady Innisfail said with enthusiasm; and if Father Constantine could only get up a wake or a dance or some other festivity for the visitors, just to show them how picturesque and sincere were the Irish race in the West, she would take care that the work on the roof was begun without delay.

Father Constantine—he hardly knew himself by that name, having invariably been called Father Conn by his flock—began to have a comprehensive knowledge of what was meant by the phrase “local colour.” Did her ladyship insist on a wake, he inquired.

Her ladyship said she had no foolish prejudices in the matter. She was quite willing to leave the whole question of the entertainment in the hands of his reverence. He knew the people best and he would be able to say in what direction their abilities could be exhibited to the greatest advantage. She had always had an idea, she confessed, that it was at a wake they shone; but, of course, if Father Constantine thought differently she would make no objection, but she would dearly like a wake.

The priest did not even smile for more than a minute; but he could not keep that twinkle out of his eyes even if the chapel walls in addition to the roof depended on his self-control.

He assured her ladyship that she was perfectly right in her ideas. He agreed with her that the wake was the one festivity that was calculated to bring into prominence the varied talents of his flock. But the unfortunate thing about it was its variableness. A wake was something that could not be arranged for beforehand—at least not without involving a certain liability to criminal prosecution. The elements of a wake were simple enough, to be sure, but simple and all as they were, they were not always forthcoming.

Lady Innisfail thought this very provoking. Of course, expense was no consideration—she hoped that the pastor understood so much. She hoped he understood that if he could arrange for a wake that night she would bear the expense.

The priest shook his head.

Well, then, if a wake was absolutely out of the question—she didn’t see why it should be, but, of course, he knew best—why should he not get up an eviction? She thought that on the whole the guests had latterly heard more about Irish evictions than Irish wakes. There was plenty of local colour in an eviction, and so far as she could gather from the pictures she had seen in the illustrated papers, it was extremely picturesque—yes, when the girls were barefooted, and when there was active resistance. Hadn’t she heard something about boiling water?

The twinkle had left the priest’s eyes as she prattled away. He had an impulse to tell her that it was the class to which her ladyship belonged and not that to which he belonged, who had most practice in that form of entertainment known as the eviction. But thinking of the chapel roof, he restrained himself. After all, Lord Innisfail had never evicted a family on his Irish estate. He had evicted several families on his English property, however; but no one ever makes a fuss about English evictions. If people fail to pay their rent in England they know that they must go. They have not the imagination of the Irish.

“I’ll tell your ladyship what it is,” said Father Conn, before she had quite come to the end of her prattle: “if the ladies and gentlemen who have the honour to be your ladyship’s guests will take the trouble to walk or drive round the coast to the Curragh of Lamdhu after supper—I mean dinner—to-night, I’ll get up a celebration of the Cruiskeen for you all.”

“How delightful!” exclaimed her ladyship. “And what might a celebration of the Cruiskeen be?”

It was at this point that the imagination of the good father came to his assistance. He explained, with a volubility that comes to the Celt only when he is romancing, that the celebration of the Cruiskeen was a prehistoric rite associated with the village of Ballycruiskeen. Cruiskeen was, as perhaps her ladyship had heard, the Irish for a vessel known to common people as a jug—it was, he explained, a useful vessel for drinking out of—when it held a sufficient quantity.

Of course Lady Innisfail had heard of a jug—she had even heard of a song called “The Cruiskeen Lawn”—did that mean some sort of jug?

It meant the little full jug, his reverence assured her. Anyhow, the celebration of the Cruiskeen of Ballycruiskeen had taken place for hundreds—most likely thousands—of years at the Curragh of Lamdhu—Lamdhu meaning the Black Hand—and it was perhaps the most interesting of Irish customs. Was it more interesting than a wake? Why, a wake couldn’t hold a candle to a Cruiskeen, and the display of candles was, as probably her ladyship knew, a distinctive feature of a wake.

Father Conn, finding how much imaginary archæology Lady Innisfail would stand without a protest, then allowed his imagination to revel in the details of harpers—who were much more genteel than fiddlers, he thought, though his flock preferred the fiddle—of native dances and of the recitals of genuine Irish poems—probably prehistoric. All these were associated with a Cruiskeen, he declared, and a Cruiskeen her ladyship and her ladyship’s guests should have that night, if there was any public spirit left in Ballycruiskeen, and he rather thought that there was a good deal still left, thank God!

Lady Innisfail was delighted. Local colour! Why, this entertainment was a regular Winsor and Newton Cabinet.

It included everything that people in England were accustomed to associate with the Irish, and this was just what the guests would relish. It was infinitely more promising than the simple national dance for which she had been trying to arrange.

She shook Father Conn heartily by the hand, but stared at him when he made some remark about the chapel roof—she had already forgotten all about the roof.

The priest had not.

“God forgive me for my romancing!” he murmured, when her ladyship had departed and he stood wiping his forehead. “God forgive me! If it wasn’t for the sake of the slate or two, the ne’er a word but the blessed truth would have been forced from me. A Cruiskeen! How was it that the notion seized me at all?”

He hurried off to an ingenious friend and confidential adviser of his, whose name was O’Flaherty, and who did a little in the horse-dealing line—a profession that tends to develop the ingenuity of those associated with it either as buyers or sellers—and Mr. O’Flaherty, after hearing Father Conn’s story, sat down on the side of one of the ditches, which are such a distinctive feature of Ballycruiskeen and the neighbourhood, and roared with laughter.

“Ye’ve done it this time, and no mistake, Father Conn,” he cried, when he had partially recovered from his hilarity. “I always said you’d do it some day, and ye’ve done it now. A Cruiskeen! Mother of Moses! A Cruiskeen! Oh, but it’s yourself has the quare head, Father Conn!”

“Give over your fun, and tell us what’s to be done—that’s what you’re to do if there’s any good in you at all,” said the priest.

“Oh, by my soul, ye’ll have to carry out the enterprise in your own way, my brave Father Conn,” said Mr. O’Flaherty. “A Cruiskeen! A——”

“Phinny O’Flaherty,” said the priest solemnly, “if ye don’t want to have the curse of the Holy Church flung at that red head of yours, ye’ll rise and put me on the way of getting up at least a jig or two on the Curragh this night.”

After due consideration Mr. O’Flaherty came to the conclusion that it would be unwise on his part to put in motion the terrible machinery of the Papal Interdict—if the forces of the Vatican were to be concentrated upon him he might never again be able to dispose of a “roarer” as merely a “whistler” to someone whose suspicions were susceptible of being lulled by a brogue. Mr. Phineas O’Flaherty consequently assured Father Conn that he would help his reverence, even if the act should jeopardize his prospects of future happiness in another world.