A LITTLE IRELAND IN AMERICA.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3079, 10 May 1881, Page 4

A LITTLE IRELAND IN AMERICA.

The humorous side of life was never more vividly brought bofore me than while living a few years ago in the vicinity of an Irish settlement in one of the suburbs of New York. What we call " characters " wore to be found in every cottage —the commonplace -was the exception. Indeed, I do not remember that it existed at all in " The Lane" as this locality was called. Perhaps among the inhabitants of The Lane none more deserved distinction than Mary Magovern. The grandmother of a numerous family, she united all the masculine and feminine virtues. About the stiff spotless and collossal frill of her cap curled ■wreaths of smoke from her stout dhudeen as she sat before the door blacking the small boots of her grandchildren, stopping from time to time to remove the pipe from her mouth, that she might deliver in her full bass voice a peremptory order to the large yellow dog that lay at her feet. It was usually on the occasion of a carriage passing when the dog would growl and rise. Very quickly out came the pipe, and immediately followed the words, " Danger, lay by thim intintions ; " and the pipe was used as an indicator for the next movement—namely, to patiently lie down again upon the ground.

Mary Magovern kept a drinking shop behind the living-rooms of her cottage, and the immeuse prestige she had in the Lane must have had some foundation in the power ■which this thriving business gave her, many of her neighbors being under the obligation of debt to her.

Mike QuinUri would have heen her most frequent visitor had it not been for the everopen eye of Mrs Quinlan, which caused her husba-ud to seek his delights by stealth at a village a mile away. Mike was an elderly and handsome man, but his wits had ebbed out as the contents of the wine-cup flowed in, and the beauty that had won so remar: table a person as Mrs Quinlan in its first glow was somewhat marred. He was the owner of a small cart and a mule, and those who had stones or earth to move usually remembered to employ poor Mike. But it was on foot, as a more conspicuous method of eluding the watchfulness of Mrs Quinlan, that Mike slipped away to the neighboring village of an afternoon, and it was on foot that I one night saw Mrs Quinlan going over the same road with an invincible determination in her countenance and a small birch rod in her hand. Mrs Quinlan was somewhat younger than her lord and master ; she had a clear, bright-blue eye, a roseate color in her little slender face, and grey hair tidily smoothed back beneath the dainty ruffles of her cap, about which a black ribbon was tied. She wore short petticoats and low . shoes, and as she walked briskly along she smoothed her apron with the disengaged hand, as if, the balance of the family respectability having so wholly fallen upon her own shoulders, she would not disturb it by permitting a disorderly wrinkle. Half-an-hour later she passed again over the road, her face turned homeward and wearing an even greater austerity, the birch rod grasped firmly in her hand, and her worser half preceding her with a foolish smile upon his lips, half of. concession, half of pride in the power to which he stooped. Another of Mrs Magovern's occasional visitors was Old Haley, who had regular employment upon our own place. Like Mike Quinlan, he rejohed in a wife who was an ornament to hex* sex—a most respectable handsome and intelligent woman, though education had done little to sharpen her wits or widen her experience. She could tell a one from a five-dollar bill, as her husband would proudly inform you, and she could cook a dinner, do up a skirt or a frilled cap, keep a house or tend a sick friend, as well as any woman in the land. "Maggie's a janeous!" her husband would remark with a look of intense admiration.

One evening Mrs Haley made her appearance at our house, asking for an audience of my mother. The object was to inform her—these sympathetic people like to be advised in all their affairs—that, being in need of various household supplies, she proposed on the following day to go to the city and purchase them at the Washington Market.

"I suppose you have been to the city before, Mrs Haley ?" remarked my mother.

"I have not, ma'am," said Mrs Haley. " Had you not better take some friend with you who has been there before, lest you should get lost ?"

" Faith, I had, ma'am ; I had a right to have moor sinse an' think o' that."

So Mrs Haley departed, returning again in company with Mary Magovern. Here's Mary Magovern, ma'am j she's goin' along with me."

"Ah, that's very well. You know the oity Mary P you've been there ?" " I have not, ma'am." " Why, what, then, is the use of your going with Mrs l/aley ?"

" We'll make a shtrict inquiry, ma'am." The next morning they started, and at four o'clock Old Haley came in much anxiety of mind to seek comfort of my mother: " Maggie's not come, ma'am. Faith, I'm throubled, for the city is a quare place."

When it grew late Haley returned again and again, in ever increasing anxiety, to be reassured. At last, when the family were retiring to bed, came Mrs Haley and Mrs Magovern to report their arrival. In spite of the lateness of the hour my mother received them, and in spite of their wearied and worn faces administered a gentle rebuke for the anxiety that Mrs Haley had caused her spouse.

" Well, indade it's no wonder he was fchroubled," said Mrs Haley, " an' it's a "Wonder we got here at all. We got nothing at the Washington Market, for we couldn't find it at all: I think they tuk it away to Washington. It was in the mornin' airly that we got to the city, ma'am, an' there was a koind of a carr, an' a gintleman up on the top of it, an' anuther gintleman at the dure of it, wid the dure in his hand, an" he sez, sez he, '' Git in, ladies," sez he. " We're goin' to the Washington Market, sur," sez I. "That's where I'll take yez, ladies," sez he. " Pay yer fares, ladies." An' we got in, ma'am, an' wint up to the top of the city, an' paid tin cints, the both of us. A n' there was a great many ladies gintlewien got in an' done the samo, ma'am, an' some got out one place an' somo another. An' whin we got up to the top or the city, " Mrs Magovern," sez I, " this jsn t the Washington Market," sez I. " It is not, Mrs Haley," sez she. " We'll git out, Mrs Magovern," Bez I. "We will, Mrs Haley," sez she. An' thin, ma'am there was a small bit of a howl in the car and it was through the the ladies an' gmtlemen would cry to the gentleman on the top o' the carr, and he'd put his face down foriiinst it an' spake wid thim ; an' I cried up through the howl to him, an' sez I, "Me an' Mrs Magovern will git out, sur," : sez I, "for this isn't the Washington: Market at all." " it is not, ma/am," sez he, "bub that's where I'll take yez,' sez he. 'Sit down, ladies,' >ez he, " and pay me the money,' sez he. .;..,'. I had a great many paple to lave,' sez he. An' indade he bad, ma'am. An' we paid the money agin, an'we wint down to the .bottom o'the city. 'This is not the Washington Market, Mrs Magovern,' sez I. ' It is not, Mrs Haley,' sez she. ' We'll git out, Mrs Magovern,' sez I. 'We will, Mrs Haley,' sez she. Thin came the gintleman that first had the dure in his hand. ' What's the matther, ladies ?" sez he. ' This isn't the Washington Market, sur,' sez I. ' It is not ma'am,' says he, _' but the city is a great place,' Bez he, ' an' it's not easy to go everywhere at wonst,' sez he ; an' if yez will have patience,' sez he, ' yell git there,' sez he. ' Git in, ladies,' sez he, ' an' pay yer fares.' Wid all the houses there's in the city, an' allthe sthrates there's in it, faith, it was no food at all to thry to foind our way alone ; \x\ thim wur false paple—they niver took us to the Washington Market at all ; an' it was all the day when we wint up to the top o' the city, end down to the bottom o' the city, and spinding our money at it. An' sez I, * Mrs Magovern, it would be better for us

if we -wint home,? sez 1.-r'.lt would, Mrs Haley,' sez she ; an' we come down to the boat, an'it was two hours agin: befoor the boat would go, an' thin we come home: an' it's toired we aie, an' it's an awful place, the city is." i Haley's statements could seldom be relied on, but his untruthfulness was never a matter of self-interest, but rather of amiability. He desired to tell you whatever you desired to. know, and to tell it as you would like to hear it, even if facts "were so perverse as to be contrary 1 One day I: wanted to do an errand in the village, and called for the horse and carriage. Haley brought them to the door. As I took the reins I remembered that it was noon and the horse's dinner-time: " Did the horse have his dinner, Haley ?"

" I just gave it too him, ma'am ; and an ilegint dinner he had." . " Why did you feed him just when I was aboxit to drive him P"

" Oh, well, it's not much-he got." " He should have had nothing." " Faith, me lady, I ownly showed it to him." - ■■

There were no more respectable people in Tbe Lane that John Godfrey and his family. His pretty little wife, with an anxious face, tenderly watched over an ever-increasing family of daughters, till on one most providential occasion the expected girl turned out to be a boy, and I went with my sisters to congratulate the happy mother. "What will you name the little fellow, Mrs Godfrey ?" I asked, sympathetically. The poor woman looked up with a smile, saying, weakly, " John Patrick, mi*s—John afther the father, an' Patrick afther the saint." The following year the same unexpected luck brought another boy, and again we young girls, being much at leisure, carried our congratulations :. " What will be the name of this little boy, Mrs Godfrey ?" " Pathrick John, miss—Pathrick afther the saint, an' John, afther the father." A confused sense of having heard that sentence before came over me. " Why, Mrs Godfrey,"Tsaid, "was not that the name of yoxir last child ?" "To be sure miss. Why would Ibe treating :One better than the other ?" A member of this same family, upon receiving a blow with a stone, in the eye, left her somewhat overcrowded paternal home for the quieter protection of her widowed aunt, Mrs King, and one day my sister and myself knocked at Mrs door to inquire about the state of the injured organ. " Troth, miss, it's very had," said Mrs King. " What do you do for it, Mrs King ?" " Do ?" said Mrs King, suddenly applying the corner of her apron to her overflowing eyes—" Do ?" she continued in a broken voice. " I've been crying these three days." " But what do you do to make it better ?"

Mrs King took heart, folded her : arms, : and thus applied herself to the setting forth of her humane exertions : " In comes Mistress Magoven, an', ' Mrs King', sez she, 1 put rar bafesteak to the choild's oye ;' an' that minit, ma'am, tho rar bafesteak wint to it. Thin comes Mrs Haley. 'Is it rar bafesteak ye'd be putting to it, Mrs King ?' sez she. ' Biling clothes, Mrs King,' sez she. That minit, ma'am, the rar bafesteak come, aff an* the biling clothes wint to it. In cornea Mrs Quinlan. ' Will ye be destryin'" the ohoild's oye iritirely, Mrs King ?' sez she. ' Cowld ice, Mrs King.' An'that minit, ma'am, the biling clothes come aff an' the cowld ice wint to it. Oh, Idobe.doin' iverything anybody do tell me." .*:'.■'.'''

It was a memorable sight to see the Gunning twins wandering down The Lane hand in hand when their maternal relatives had gone out washing for the day and taken the door-key with her. "Thim lads is big enough to take care of thimselves," she vTOulcl remark, though '"the lads ". were not yet capable of coherent speeoh. No doubt they wandered into some neighbour's at meal-time and received a willingly-given potato or a drink of milk. They seemed happy enough, and their funny, ugly little faces were defaced by no tears. They grew in time old enough to explain their position to inquiring passers-by and to pick up and eat an amazing quantity of green apples. A lady passing one day stopped and remonstrated with one of them. " Barney," she said, "it will make you ill if you eat those green apples."—" Ido be always atin' of them, ma'am," replied Barney, stolidly.

Perhaps it may have been the green apples, but from whatever cause Barney fell ill, and all that the doctor prescribed made him no better. " It's no matther, sur," said Mrs Gunning one morning: " yer needn't come agin. I'll just go an' ask Mrs "(my mother).

The next morning the doctor, meeting my mother, laughingly remarked that it was very plain that they couldn't practise in the same district: he had just met Mrs (3-unning, who informed him that " what Mrs gave her the night before . done the ehoild a power of good."

The day preceding our departure from the place my sister and I passed through The Lane, and received the most amiable farewells, accompanied with blessings, and even tears. The figure I best remember is that of Mrs Began, who, bursting out from her doorway, stood in our path, and, dissolving in tears, sobbed out, " Faith, I'm sorry yez be goin." " I don't know what I'll do at all widout yez •" and, seizing my sister's hand, gave her this unique recommendation : "Ye were always passing by mannerly—niver sassy, nor impudent, nor nothing."

The Lane has changed to-day. A Chinese grocer has, I hear, set up a shop in its midst. Some of its most _ noted characters have passed away, and the younger generation have taken on habits more American than those of their prodecessorß.--M, R. 0., in Lippincot's Magazine.