Doreen's Wedding

WAS out making hay during the spasmodic intervals in which in Ireland the sun may be relied upon to shine. Jim

Kane had reported that he had "the tedder broken on him," and had gone to John Lowry's, "below at the forge," to have a "yoke" constructed to replace the damaged part. Meanwhile I was engaged in a vain endeavor to insert a nut through a hole which Lowry had bored too small, hammering my fingers till they bled with a flat-iron from the kitchen, supplied in response to my request for a hammer. Kathleen descended upon me like a bolt from the blue while I was thus engaged. She was dressed in garments that I had not seen before, and which my practised eye told me betokened some event of unusual importance.

"Come, Nicholas," she called; "you'll be late. We 've promised to lunch with Canon Shaw at Rathnane for Doreen's wedding."

I threw down the flat-iron and looked at my watch. A drive of three good Irish miles, and only half an hour in which to change and get there. It did not take me long to dash up to the house and dress myself suitably for the occasion, and the Baroness is a good mare both after hounds and between the shafts of a side-car.

The way to Rathnane runs upward from the valley. The village itself lies at the foot of a ridge, up which a steep road runs straight. It rises a thousand feet in a mile, breasting the hill

without a quiver, as a good horse will a bank, changes feet on the top, and drops down gaily on Castleroach. The place itself now consists of a few paltry cabins, with a post-office and three public houses. I am visited at constant intervals by aspirants to the office of post-mistress, a post which seems to bring fortune and marriage through its lucrative duties. They all seem to think that a humble word from me will weigh down the scales in their favor when these things are settled at "the gineral" in Sackville Street.

Abundant walls and remains of walls, sticking out into the fields around, testify to the former greatness and prosperity of a borough which once returned two members to College Green. And here and there a name, such as "Mensal Lodge," survives to tell of the church lands which still enrich the landscape under other owners.

The cathedral stands above the houses, just where the hill begins to rise. The main fabric remains, but many of the fine windows are built over with buttresses to stay the sagging walls. Irish yew-trees, grown unchecked, block out the eastern light. Ivy holds together the tower, but threatens to throw it down with the weight of its veteran tendrils. A hawk has always nested above the belfry, which is reached by worm-eaten ladders.

St. Kenan, an ancient saint who gave to the cathedral church its name, was its first bishop. He lies buried there, and his bones are walled up in a hollow in the choir. Since his day the old church has passed through great vicissitudes, and has been built and rebuilt

many times. In the churchyard all men find a common resting-place without regard for creed, and mournful relatives erect massive slabs of local stone to the glory of their own piety and the faithful remembrance of the dead. These sentinels remain standing clean and bright till the lapse of a few years and the lack of care make them bow their

Bessie Nolan

heads and fall. Then they lie overgrown with rank grass, while goats browse over them, until in time they serve as flat stones to cover the graves of another generation.

In one corner is the holy cross of the common type, but the writing is gone, and the fingers of time have rubbed away the legend and the emblems which were carved upon it.

Higher up the hills is the holy well of St. Kenan. Here the good saint may have slaked his thirst or caught fat perch in years gone by. All that now remains is a muddy hollow with a thornbush overhanging it, from which flutter rags and rosaries left by the few pilgrims who still climb the hills to seek

a cure.

I have read that, before King Henry wrought changes and reforms, a parish priest of Tyrrellstown was rich from the offerings of the hordes who flocked to wash in the holy water. The good man could not reconcile these gains with

his conscience, and banned the pilgrims. Since then the water has fallen into disuse except as drink for cattle; but a few old-fashioned people even now prefer the holy well and the blessings of the saint to the attention of the dispensary doctor.

To me it is a charming spot. The mountains are blue, and the Murrow stream falls from them through gorse and bramble thickets. The cattle graze peacefully among boulders in a little map of fields that stretch upward. Nothing disturbs the quiet save flocks of green plover, and sometimes a child running barefoot to fetch water or to milk the spanceled goats.

We Irish, more than most races, love our own country, and sitting by the well, I have often blessed the saint. I have sometimes wondered whether he knew that his healing streams owes much to a setting which time has left unchanged.

The Floods live at Clonilty. They have lived there, I think, since the days of the first Flood, who came over in Cromwell's time in the train of one of his generals. Doreen Flood is the elder daughter of Horace. Her exploits have been many-sided, but all to her credit. Her last is her engagement to young Platt-Waddington, who has come across the water to take Peermount and to breed polo ponies.

I did not want to be late for the canon's luncheon party, which was to precede the wedding. Thanks to the Baroness, we got to Rathnane in record time, and as soon as we arrived we all sat down in the dining-room of the rectory, the canon, before a baron of beef, at the head of his table. This table had been elongated for the ceremony with various others of smaller breed, perched somewhat uncertainly upon volumes of sermons from the canon's library in order to attain the required height. Bessie Nolan, his own serving-maid, who also acted as sextoness in the cathedral, and who suffered normally from an affection of the feet, was reinforced by the wife of a laborer from the hill, and comfortably installed in a discarded pair of the canon's slippers. The bishop faced the canon, veiled from his view by a prodigious turkey,

with Kathleen on his right, and me on his left. The intervening space was filled in with a miscellany of clergy and parishioners. At intervals along the table in rich luxuriance were marshaled dishes containing everything from poached eggs to jelly, and potatoes in their jackets. Bessie hurried round, drawing the corks of bottles which suspiciously resembled champagne; the contents, however, exhaled an aromatic fragrance. I heard his lordship inquire from Bessie with some asperity, "What have you there, girl?" To which she answered, "Dry gin, yer Riverince." This apparently satisfied his scruples. The canon piled up layers of beef on plates, with which the lady from the hill rushed to the bishop for a crowning layer of turkey.

Throughout the meal and after it a procession of visitors continued to file up the drive in vehicles of every class and condition, all bent on stabling their steeds in the canon's roomy yard. Mrs. Booker was the first, in an ancient barouche, with men-servants who, though workers on the land, were clad in liveries of claret color piped with yellow. The coachman's hat had clearly been originally acquired for one of his predecessors, and was prevented from slipping over his face only by liberal

supplies of newspaper, while the cockade flapped uncertainly in the breeze. His lack of teeth was concealed by a flowing mustache.

Canon Fennell came later in a car drawn by an ass, which he urged forward with a stout umbrella. He alighted at the door, and advanced upon us with a curtseying stride, dangling from his hand a light-blue enamel sloppail containing a bird-cage and some packages of groceries purchased on his way, and to be left for greater security in the house.

Miss O'Shea's "inside" arrived later, a vehicle resembling a covered wagonette on two wheels, and seating one person on each side. It was drawn by a shaggy white mare, and driven by her useful man. Miss O'Shea was an old maid of uncertain years, and had made an early start for the long drive from Bathington. Some portions of ham and bread-crumbs which clung to her person showed that she had wisely made provision for her own sustenance. I never can describe feminine attire, but I know that her bonnet, which she had carried with her to put on when she arrived, and upon which she had accidentally sat, bore no resemblance to my previous recollections of its appear

ance.

She also wore white kid gloves,

clearly cherished for these occasions, but some sizes too large, for they hung about an inch beyond the end of each finger.

She was followed by a mongrel white fox-terrier which, though left at home, locked up in the meat-safe, had succeeded in following her on her journey. He was caught and removed to the henhouse, where he was incarcerated by the kindly Canon Shaw.

The curate of Agha, Mr. Spong, rode over on his bicycle. The day was hot, and he had punctured his tire on the way, which had limited his time. He came perspiring and covered with dust, a small, but stout, cherubic person. He was absent-minded, and I noticed that his shoes did not match. As he was a musician of considerable gifts, it had been arranged that he was to play the wedding music. But when he punctured, he had detached his surplice from the saddle to mend his tire and had omitted to replace it. It was now lying by the roadside, where, as I later heard, it became the sport of two curi

ous goats. Canon Shaw, although tall and large of frame, suggested that he should lend him a surplice of his own, which, though it descended many inches below the extremities of Mr. Spong, got over the difficulty.

I do not know that the cathedral can be said to lend itself to a wedding. The bare rows of grained deal pews with stiff, straight backs do not conduce to ornament or comfort. The pulpit of oak is perched on a pedestal of painted deal, and its only decoration is a comfortable pillow of purple plush upon which Canon Shaw is accustomed to recline when delivering to us his weekly homily. The bishop's throne is in the center of a square pew, and surmounted by a canopy of imitation marble. The Floods for generations back have occupied this pew on Sundays, kneeling up against the throne from each of the four sides, as if to inspect the condition of its upholstery. They vacate it only to make way for the bishop.

For the wedding, wedding, however, however, the cathedral was in gala-dress. The pulpit was swathed with bandages of foliage, so that the occupant must resemble a jack-in-the-green. Enormous clumps of wild flowers filled every possible recess, and hothouse blooms and pot plants were jostled by festoons of ivy and holly.

We did not spend in silence the few minutes which preceded the bride's arrival. Our expectancy was first satisfied by the arrival of Miss O'Shea's fox-terrier, which had escaped from the canon's hen-house through the hole left for the egress of the fowl. Not finding his mistress, he had started in pursuit. She, poor lady, was so much overcome that she could only moan out: "Ah, now, just to think of it! And did n't I see Tom shut him up in the meat-safe and me leaving home, and not a hole in it that would let through a bluebottle!"

Bessie Nolan, however, who had dropped the part of parlor-maid to resume that of sextoness, pursued him up to church, and heading him into the pew which contained the bishop's throne, slammed the door after him. At this moment attention was diverted by what appeared to be the bridal procession, but it was in fact the arrival of

full gallop, checked only by contact with the churchyard wall, while Jim, his purple nose concealed behind a large wedding favor, clung shouting to the box, inquiring vainly of the beasts what ailed them, and calling down anathemas in the name of every saint upon the calendar.

It may be that this lighting journey made them arrive before their time, for

Sir Charles and Lady Townsend of Oldencourt. Sir Charles had driven over from an adjoining county with his young wife, his third, whom he had recently acquired on an excursion to the northern capitals of Europe on a P. O. liner. Mr. Spong at the organ, entangled in and embarrassed by the encircling folds of the canon's surplice, and being somewhat short of sight, mistook the racket created by the dog and the slamming of the pew-door for the "slap ag'in' the screen" which Bessie was to give as a signal to begin the proceedings. Sir Charles therefore advanced, to his own astonishment and that of his blushing bride, heralded by the tune of "The Voice That Breathed o'er Eden," which the choir, suspicious of some error, voiced tremblingly at uncertain intervals. It was cut short only by the presence of mind of Bessie herself, who rushing to the canon's man as he sat blowing the organ, forcibly restrained him from a continuance of his duties, until "The Voice" happily blew itself out.

It had only just done so when Horace Flood arrived with his daughter, in a brougham lent by Captain Rice, and drawn by horses supplied by Costigan's Hotel. These horses as a rule led a prosaic, but strenuous, life, meeting the trains with jaunting-cars, . on which mercial travelers drive with their wares to outlying villages. But funerals and weddings are their fête-days. At funerals, with nodding plumes, they crawl for many miles, swathed in black velvet to hide their motley colors; while at weddings their work is short and sweet, with prolonged intervals of rest. Jim Whelan, Costigan's head driver, finds them fête-days, too, for it is his privilege never to leave the hall-door on either mission without a noggin of whiskey to cheer him on his doleful course or to celebrate the event. Today he must have had a second noggin or the horses found the captain's brougham light of draft after Costigan's hearse, for the horses arrived at

as the bride advanced, she was preceded up the aisle by a small and perspiring cleric, heading for the vestry, and followed by a serving-man, who carried his robes in two brown paper parcels.

As a result of loud and repeated promptings, "The Voice" again came to life, and the bishop, followed by Horace Flood with his daughter on his arm, approached the expectant bridegroom. His lordship left them to turn toward the canopied throne and throw back the door. There seems to be luck in odd numbers even for Miss O'Shea's foxterrier. He, finding himself for the third time liberated, bounded out with barks of appreciation, while the bishop who, it must be admitted, rarely lost his presence of mind, collapsed upon the episcopal seat. As the dog scampered to the door hands were thrust out for his collar from every pew, but nothing stopped him. Mercifully he escaped, and was lost in the nave beyond.

I have no vivid recollection of the