550 ST. MARTIN'S EVE. 



basket, and his shoulder sustained a portable rod consisting of four 

 or five lengths or joints kept together by a band of red tape, some- 

 what after the fashion of the painted riband on a barber's pole, or the 

 fillet that bound the fasces of the Roman lictors. A pair of thick 

 brogues* and warm Connemara woollen stockings incased his legs 

 and feet, while his upper works were defended by a stout double- 

 breasted frock remarkable for the number and variety of its interior 

 and exterior pockets and pouches, containing the multifarious nick- 

 nackeries of the brethren of the angle ; hooks, lines, silk, hair, 

 bristles, gut, gimp, wax, feathers, fur, artificial flies, black, red, and 

 yellow, 



" With all their relations, green, orange, and blue." 



Thus accoutred, Jack aroused me from a delightful dream of Houris 

 and hookahs, musnuds and music, to accompany him on his expedi- 

 tion. When I opened my eyes, and beheld before me the outre figure 

 of my companion, I fancied it was one of those whimsical phantas- 

 magoria of the night, and was about to close myjeyes'again, until a 

 rough shake of the shoulder convinced me of the corporeal identity 

 of my visitant, and recalled my senses from the land of dreams. I 

 was on the floor in an instant ; and, in some degree, encouraged by 

 the inviting freshness of the morning-breeze pouring through my 

 window, which had been thrown open by Wilson, I hurried on my 

 clothes, and before I had time to reflect on the absurdity of a man 

 profoundly ignorant of the distinction between a "black hackle" and an 

 "orange palmer" joining in such a scientific pursuit, I found myself 

 seated dos ci dos to Jack Wilson on the scanty cushion of an Irish 

 jaunting car, jolting, as fast as the united efforts of three legs of a 

 melancholy-looking spavined yarran, and two hands of our ragged 

 little charioteer could impel us, towards the celebrated resort of Hiber- 

 nian valetudinarians, latitudinarians, water-drinkers, other drinkers, 

 law, spa, scandal, and salmon. 



Scarcely had we drawn up before the door of "the first hotel" 

 than our vehicle was surrounded by a group of sturdy mendicants, 

 hostlers, stable-boys, helpers, porters, and waiters, whom our hasty 

 arrival had roused from that state of lethargic idleness which marked 

 their attitudes as they lounged lazily round the inn-door, gossipping, 

 smoking, and jesting with all that characteristic defiance of care and 

 contempt for the future which distinguishes this peculiar class of 

 people in Ireland. My attention was particularly attracted by a 

 young man dressed in a faded green hunting frock (a cast-off most 

 probably of some of the neighbouring squires), with a hat, as destitute 

 of a leaf as an ash-tree at Christmas, set airily on one side of his 

 head, who, with a look of knowing intelligence, and a skipping 

 motion which was neither a hop nor a step, but partook of both, 

 approached the side of the car on which Jack was seated, and intro- 

 duced himself briefly with an accompanying pluck of |his caubeen,\ 

 as " Rattigan, the boy that guides the quality on the Shannon." 



* A sort of strong shoe worn by the Irish peasantry. f An old hat. 



