THE IRISH CRUSADERS.

Colonist, Volume IV, Issue 314, 23 October 1860, Page 4

THE IRISH CRUSADERS.

We lately called the attention of our readers to the feelings of horrified amazement with which the inhabitants of Rome had looked for the first time upon the champions, who have rushed so devotedly to their defence. No considerations of expediency—not even loyalty to a paternal Government—could entirely prevent the shock which the peculiarities of Hibernian demeanour and| costume occasioned to the aesthetic sensibilities of an Italian populace. Eyes long accustomed to judge critically of picturesque outline, harmonious coloring, and symmetrical proportions, naturally found little that was gratifying in frieze coats,. knee breeches, and shillelaghs. The green habiliments provided by Papal benevolence can but have slightly alleviated the horror of the spectacle. A genuine Irish howl, such as would recall to every faithful child of Erin the wild enjoyments of his island home, would ring like the yell of doom amid the gentle modulations of a Southern dialect. To wait for your enemy in a dark passage and silently stab him in his back may be more wicked, but is certainly less barbarian, than playfully to break your dearest friend's head in a mid-day riot. " These terrible Irish " have no doubt by this time become the conventional bugbear with which the screaming infants of Italy are reduced to submission. Paddy must, we fear, have felt himself sadly misunderstood by the contemplated objects of his heroic benevolence. Other great philanthropists have shared a similar fate. The world has never appreciated its truest friends; and we can hardly wonder that Rome was unable to repress a transient shudder as the " Battalion of St. Patrick," with all the impetuosity of inexperienced enthusiasm, came tramping along the Via Sacra to add one more historical association to the thousand memories of the Eternal City. Such a reception must certainly have thrown a damp upon the zeal which had been burning so ardently all the way from Sligo or Tipperary. To have gone a thousand miles to serve a friend only to be greeted with an exclamation of disgust at one's personal appearance, must be even to the sanguine temperament of the Celt, a chilling and humiliating position. But other and still crueller vicissitudes were in store for these latest defenders of the faith. Per various casus, per tot discriminia rerum Tendiirms in Latium— but the " Pope's Own " were as yet only at the beginning of sorrows. The perverse stupidity of an unfeeling commander placed them at once in a position most opposite to their expectations and the most repugnant to the untutored sentiment of every Siberian crusader. They came prepared "to dictate, to choose, and to criticise " —they remained to drill. General Lamoricie're seems to have taken a most degradingly prosaic view of the necessities of the position. The uncalculating ardour which was burning to support the ascendancy of a spiritual Father against the intrigues of earthly Sovereigns and the outrages of unbelieving populations, did not, in his judgment, supercede the vulgar obligations of military routine. He has especially high aims for the Irish Brigade, and accordingly subjects it to a discipline proportionally severe. He looks upon it, we are told, "as a man would on a young horse of incomparable mettle and bottom, needing no great deal to break him in, but if once broke in, worth a score of ordinary stuff." Accordingly, after a few parts of encouragement, he has proceeded to tie up its legs, and is teaching it to walk on its knees preliminary to more advanced exercitations. The disappointment is of course intense. Many Volunteers, whose creative imaginations had already provided them with posts of the highest distinction, are condemned to serve the interests of religion in the unromantio capacity of simple" privates. Even young officers learn, to their astonishment, that they are relegated to the ranks till their duties are thoroughly known. Human infirmity can scarcely submit with patience to be disabused so cruelly of its fondest illusions. Burning crusaders naturally find it difficult to coerce their wild dreams of conquest into compliance with the conventional evolutions of goose-step or the reproachful mandate of "As you were." All the chivalry of a religious hero rises in rebellion against the revolting monotony of "eyes right." An Irish Volunteer's eyes should be fixed, he feels, not according to the arbitrary dictates of custom, but on the star which guides him to victory or death. He is quite prepared to go where glory waits him, but not to be the slave of a capricious sergeant. Eugene of Savoy, Lord Macaulay tells us, considered that those men made the greatest generals whose minds had not been cramped by a too long familiarity with the details of subordinate positions. The Dublin recruits are evidently afraid of incapacitating themselves for a successful discharge of the duties of commander-in-chief. General Lamorici6re, however, has been in Algiers, and holds that good officers are made out of good soldiers, and that Irishmen least of all can afford to dispense with the rudiments of a military education. But if the General was firm, the Volunteers were unconvinced. At last the prevailing discontent found relief in a congenial outburst of insubordination. Every detail of the story is delightfully characteristic. A healthy impetuosity colors it from beginning to end. Travellers we know, carry their own atmosphere with them. The Jews in Babylon wandered in mournful reverie to their deserted temple; and St. Patrick's voluntary exiles evidently imagined themselves once more m Donnybrook Fair. Laffan, a young man, " very respectable and nicely educated," but rather indiscreet, and excessively discontented, is the hero of

the occasion. His lofty .spirit, -chafing under the performance of the, menial sefyices of rank,and .file, prompted ,him at last to strip off the uniform ..which, was at once the evidence of official unfairness,; and the badge of his own degradation. .His refusal to resume the discarded garments necessarily led the commanding lieutenant to order his arrest. But the sergeant to whom this unpleasing function was! entrusted was not so lost to all finer feeling as to lend himself to be, the instrument of such wanton tyranny. At once he! laid aside the sergeant and assumed the man; and instead of arresting Laffan, proceeded to rouse his comrades to resist the order. Others of the corps, seeing the prospect of a fight, had the good taste to side with the lieutenant; and the insubordinate faction, availing themselves of the privileges of asylum, retired gracefully into the Irish College, and there, with the true Celtic versatility, forthwith repented and succumbed. So promising a row was not, however, permitted thus prematurely to expire. St. Patrick's battalion felt that they would be doing dishonor to their national patron if so fine an opportunity were to slip away unused. Some were for taking summary vengeance on the insubordinates who had disgraced the brigade; others breathed forth their indignation against the intolerable strictness of the Lamorici6re regime. Swiss and French idlers gathered round in expectation of some tragical denouement; while the Roman crowd, shuddering in silent amazement, prepared themselves with stoical calmness for some new and still more horrible phase of Hibernian barbarism. Ominous mutterings of complaint, fervent ejaculations of piety or vengeance, busy whispers of ill-suppressed inquisitiveness, still filled the air when Miles O'Reilly, of Knockabbey Castle, the Major of the battalion—arrived, a most seasonable Deus ex machind for the solution of the critical entanglement. A brief but beautiful address soon charmed to rest the rising spirit jof the storm. Neptune waving his sceptre over the debris of the Trojan fleet scarcely [ produced a more instantaneous tranquility. i " You never saw any change so sudden | and complete." Every face beamed at once with cheerfulness and docility; not a voice but breathed contentment as the orator of Knockabbey Castle came to a glowing end. But the peace, so rapidly established, was proportionately shortlived. "A deplorable incident" soon made matters worse than ever. Some Belgian Volunteers had, at the commencement of the outbreak, been drawn up outside the Irish barrack, and Irish sensibility was naturally wounded at the idea of Belgian supervision. The thought was no sooner entertained "than it found practical expression. Paddy dashed his fist into a Belgian private's face; and a Belgian officer, unaccustomed probably to such little manifestations of feeling, gave his troops the order to fire. A moment more, and the defenders of the Church would have been on the high road to mutual extermination. Again, however, O'Reilly, providentially opportune, rushed upon the , scence, and took his stand between the hostile ranks; and his "voice of thunder" stayed the volley which was waiting to be poured from the Belgian barrels. Fresh Irish forces were by this time crowding in, j and Irish impetuosity—such is the modest account of the Nation— soon carried everything before it. Rushing unarmed upon the fully equipped Belgians, they soon, it is needless to say, completely mastered them in hand to hand fight. Guns were torn away, bayonets " twisted off like twigs and thrown into the air by dozens," stones were thrown, swords drawn, and all the luxury of a bear-fight as completely realized as the wildest Tipperay boy could possibly desire. The Belgians appear to have acquiesced with laudable good humor in a programme of amusements which, from their point of view, was certainly not without its objectionable features. They probably felt, however, that they were dealing with the strange and half-reclaimed inhabitants of a barbarous island, whose partial civilization presented enough that was curious in its sudden transitions and violent outbursts to atone for the occasional inconveniences to which on-lookers were exposed. In England we can hardly be expected to hear with regret of anything which throws contempt and ridicule on so disgraceful a development of religious partisanship. If ever anything was established by an overwhelming preponderance of evidence, it is the general disaffection with which the inhabitants of Rome regard their present Government. No one who is not either wilfully dishonest or blinded by fanaticism can doubt that it is unendurably vexatious, inefficient, and tyrannical. It is disgraceful that men should leave our shores to act as condottieri in its service; but it is perhaps a still deeper disgrace to the Throne which has to be propped up by so miserable an expedient. Catholic bishops fill their pastorals with rhetoric about the " independence and dignity" of the Holy See, and the pious efforts of the Volunteers for its effective maintenance. It is strange that even ecclesiastics can deceive themselves as to the degree in which Pio Nono is likely to be rendered either dignified or independent by his present supporters. History has shewn before this— : ■..■!■: How nations sink, by darling schemes oppressed, When vengeance listens to the fool's request. And it can surely have been no propitious deity which has granted a favorable response to the latest aspirations of the Papal Court, and has filled the streets of Rome, in a great political crisis, with a lawless rabble of scatterbrained and passionate Irishmen.— Saturday Review. IRISH BANNER. The more the men constituting the Irish

Brigade are seen here, the more universally are they declared to be a fine, soldierly, respectable body of men, animated with the best spirit, and, if you except some few. who will be soon dismissed and sent home, admirably well-conducted, orderly, sober and religious. \ Mr. Myles O'ffceilly h^s introduced proper discipline among -them without the least opposition, and has won golden opinions not only of the men, but of all the civil and military authorities'. _ On yesterday, the Feast of the visitation of the Blessed Virgin, we had a grand display. A magnificent banner of green and and gold was presented to the Ist Irish Battalion by the Rev. Mr. Meany, an! Irish missionary from Lancashire, whose congregation (I believe exclusively Irish) subscribed £30 towards purchasing this beautiful present to their brave countrymen. On one side of the banner St. Patrick is represented, and on the other side the Immaculate Conception. All around, in gold, on the " immortal green " of Erin, are to be seen the Irish cross, the shamrock, and various other emblems of " faithful Catholic Ireland." The Brigade was drawn up in the square opposite the Church of St. Agatha, which belongs to the Irish College; and the Rev. Mr. Meany, in presenting the banner, delivered a beautiful and soul-stir-ring address, exhorting the men to be animated with a true spirit of religion, to imitate the faith and valour of the old Crusaders, and prove themselves worthy of Ireland—their native land—its glorious memories, and its still more glorious aspirations. You should have beheld the scene. I cannot describe it. When the Green Flag was solemnly raised aloft, and a breeze unfurled it to view, there arose a cheer. JSo ;it was a cry—a wild passionate cry of joy that burst like the war of artillery; it was the strong motion of a thousand hearts, emotions that had slept in the hearts of their race since the day Sarsfield sailed from Limerick, leaving Catholic altars trusting to " Saxon faith." Ah, could those who talk about the Irish have witnessed that scene, and heard the burpt of joy ! Joy ? It was not all joy. There was many a feeling, many a deep chord,, touched by the sight of that banner with the color of fatherland, and the symbols of the faith dearer to them than life. Poor fellows! they wept with excitement of feeling; though they smiled and cheered with wild energy. They would have clasped the green folds of the flag to their hearts, as if it spoke to them of father, mother, friends, country, home; as if it spoke to them of all that was expected of them, and all that they swore, by its every bright fold, to do for the holy cause in which it was raised. Major O'Reilly stepped forward and spoke a few words, calling for a cheer for Pius the Ninth. All I can say is that the seven hills of Rome never before echoed to such a cheer. No one who witnessed the whole scene will ever forget it. I can assure you that the deep earnestness, the fervour of the " Irlandese," has moved to admiration and sympathy men whose prejudices^ were strong, not only against them, but the cause they have so nobly espoused. Major O'Reilly leaves to-day for Spoleto —■all his brigade will follow him immediately—sailing up the Tiber as far as Civita Castellana. Spoleto, which is considered one of the most important military positions in the Pope's States, will be left altogether in the hands of the Irish; it is the key of the Appennies. If the Garibaldians from Tuscany or from Naples move on the Pope's territory, the garrison of Spoleto will be near to meet them, and I can vouch for it, that under the banner of St. Patrick and the Blessed Virgin they will do honor to their country and keep up the ancient fame of the Celtic race.—Morning News.

The Gentleman.—A low bred, ignorant person, can no more be a gentleman than a stone can be made into a diamond by the process of polishing. A gentleman is not merely a person acquainted with certain forms and etiquettes in life, easy and self-possessed in society, able to speak, and act, and move in the world without awkwardness, and free from habits which are vulgar and in bad taste. A gentleman is something beyond all this; that which lies at the root of his ease, and refinement, and tact, his power of pleasing—how he can show respect for others; how he may avoid hurting their feelings. When he is in society, he scrupulously ascertains the position and relation of every one with whom he comes in contact, that he may give to each his due honor; his proper position. He studies how he may avoid touching in conversation uj.bn any subject which may needlessly hurt their feelings, how he may abstain from any allusion which may call up a disagreeable or offensive association. A gentleman never alludes to, never even appears conscious of, any personal defect, deformity, inferiority of intellect, of rank, reputation, in the person in whose society .he is placed. He never assumes any superiority for himself—he never ridicules, he never sneers, never boasts, never makes a display of his power, or rank, or advantage •—such as is implied in ridicule, or sarcasm, or abuse; and he never indulges in habits or tricks, or inclinations which may be offensive to others. On a visit Queen Elizabeth made to Sir Nicholas Bacon, at a small country seat, which he had built for himself before his preferment, she asked him how it came that he had made himself so small a house? " It is not I, Madam," answered he, " who have made my house too small for myself, but your Majesty, who have made me too big for my house." ' • My son,' said an affectionate mother to her son, who resided at a distance, and expected in a short time to be married, • you are getting thin.' ' ¥es, mother,' he .replied, 'I am; when I come next, I think you may see my rib.'

A Cowardly Question.—" Now, I have three hundred a year, and yet my" wife ex- | pectsmetodresshermfirst-classstyle ! ; jWhat! would, you advise me to do ?" These words I unintentionally overheard in an omnibus. I went home, pondering them over. Were you, not to blame, sir, in selecting a foolish, frivolous wife, and expecting her to confine her desires, as a sensible woman ought, and would, within the limits Of your salary? Have .you, yourself, no "first-class.'■ ex;pen<3es,i which it might be well for you to consider while talking to r her of retrenchment? Did it every occur to you, that under all that frivolity, which you admired in the girl, but deplore and condemn in the wife, there may be, after all, enough of the true woman to appreciate and sympathise with a kind, loving statement of the case, in its parental as well as marital relations? Did it ever occur to you, that if you require no more from her, in. the way of self-denial, than you are willing to endure yourself— in short, if you were just in this matter, as many husbands are not-—it might bring a pair of loving arms about your neck, that would be a talisman amid future toil, and a pledge of co-operation in it, that would give wings to effort ? And to all young men we would say, if you marry a pretty fly, don't expect that marriage will instantly convert it into a bee; and if you have caught it and caged it without thought of consequences, don't, like a coward, shrink from your self-assumed responsibility. Lock for Lock.—-The gossips tell a funny story,* in which two Russian noblemen and a favorite Parisian actress play the principal parts. Both of them were suitors for the fair lady's smiles, and both seemed to be equally esteemed by her. It would appear that in Russia, as well as in many other countries, a lock of hair is considered a signal pledge of the tender passion; but, if the truth must be told, few of our theatrical divinities are endowed with profuse cheveleitres ; and, if they were, the incessant demand would soon exhaust the supply! Mademoiselle Alice glories in the possession of auburn ringlets, and wouldn't part with one of them for less than a duchy. Her Russian admirers, the Count de L. and the Baron de M., both happen to have hair of the same golden hue as that of their mutual Dulcinea. Each b6gged a tress of her hair in exchange for a lock of his own; to which the charming creature readily assented, and, without touching a single curl of her head, cunningly managed to effect an exchange of parcels, by which each gentleman received a tuft of his rival's capillaries. The Count now wears the Baron's " wool" next his heart, and the Baron sleeps with the Count's lock under his pillow. What terrible deceivers these " female women " are ! Mbms. for the Misses.—Cry at a wedding. Scream at a spider. Never leave your curl papers in the drawing-room. Drop your handkerchief when you are going to faint. Mind you are engaged if you don't like your partner. Abjure ringlets on a wet day. It's vulgar to know what's for dinner. An elderly female, on being examined before the magistrates of Bungay as to her pi ace of legal settement, was asked wha£ reasons she had for supposing that her deceased husband's settlement was at St. Andrew's. The old lady, looking earnestly at the Bench, said; —" He was born and married there, and they buried him there, and if that isn't settling him there, I don't know what is." A Fire-Escape.—At dinner Mr. Rogers related a story of a nervous gentleman who kept a fire-escape—a kind of sack in which he could lower himself from his window. Being suddenly awakened, one night, by the sound, as he thought, of the wheels of a fire-engine, followed by a trenmendous knocking at the door, he descended in his sack in great haste, and reached the street just in time to hand his wife (who had been to the opera) out of her carriage.