第37章

Lady Clonbrony had assured him that, the last time she had been at the drawing-room at the Castle, a lady, whom she afterwards found to be a grocer's wife, had turned angrily when her ladyship had accidentally trodden on her train, and had exclaimed with a strong brogue, 'I'll thank you, ma'am, for the rest of my tail.'

Sir James Brooke, to whom Lord Colambre, without GIVING UP HISAUTHORITY, mentioned the fact, declared that he had no doubt the thing had happened precisely as it was stated; but that this was one of the extraordinary cases which ought not to pass into a general rule--that it was a slight instance of that influence of temporary causes, from which no conclusions, as to national manners, should be drawn.

'I happened,' continued Sir James, 'to be quartered in Dublin soon after the Union took place; and I remember the great but transient change that appeared.From the removal of both Houses of Parliament, most of the nobility, and many of the principal families among the Irish commoners, either hurried in high hopes to London, or retired disgusted and in despair to their houses in the country.Immediately, in Dublin, commerce rose into the vacated seats of rank; wealth rose into the place of birth.New faces and new equipages appeared; people, who had never been heard of before, started into notice, pushed themselves forward, not scrupling to elbow their way even at the Castle; and they were presented to my lord-lieutenant and to my lady-lieutenant;for their excellencies, for the time being, might have played their vice-regal parts to empty benches, had they not admitted such persons for the moment to fill their court.Those of former times, of hereditary pretensions and high-bred minds and manners, were scandalised at all this; and they complained, with justice, that the whole TONE of society was altered; that the decorum, elegance, polish, and charm of society was gone; and I among the rest (said Sir James) felt and deplored their change.But, now it is all over, we may acknowledge that, perhaps, even those things which we felt most disagreeable at the time were productive of eventual benefit.

'Formerly, a few families had set the fashion.From time immemorial everything had, in Dublin, been submitted to their hereditary authority; and conversation, though it had been rendered polite by their example, was, at the same time, limited within narrow bounds.Young people, educated upon a more enlarged plan, in time grew up; and, no authority or fashion forbidding it, necessarily rose to their just place, and enjoyed their due influence in society.The want of manners, joined to the want of knowledge in the new set, created universal disgust:

they were compelled, some by ridicule, some by bankruptcies, to fall back into their former places, from which they could never more emerge.In the meantime, some of the Irish nobility and gentry who had been living at an unusual expense in London--an expense beyond their incomes--were glad to return home to refit;and they brought with them a new stock of ideas, and some taste for science and literature, which, within these latter years, have become fashionable, indeed indispensable, in London.That part of the Irish aristocracy, who, immediately upon the first incursions of the vulgarians, had fled in despair to their fastnesses in the country, hearing of the improvements which had gradually taken place in society, and assured of the final expulsion of the barbarians, ventured from their retreats, and returned to their posts in town.So that now,' concluded Sir James, 'you find a society in Dublin composed of a most agreeable and salutary mixture of birth and education, gentility and knowledge, manner and matter; and you see pervading the whole new life and energy, new talent, new ambition, a desire and a determination to improve and be improved--a perception that higher distinction can now be obtained in almost all company, by genius and merit, than by airs and dress....So much for the higher order.Now, among the class of tradesmen and shopkeepers, you may amuse yourself, my lord, with marking the difference between them and persons of the same rank in London.'

Lord Colambre had several commissions to execute for his English friends, and he made it his amusement in every shop to observe the manners and habits of the people.He remarked that there are in Dublin two classes of tradespeople: one, who go into business with intent to make it their occupation for life, and as a slow but sure means of providing for themselves and their families;another class, who take up trade merely as a temporary resource, to which they condescend for a few years, trusting that they shall, in that time, make a fortune, retire, and commence or recommence gentlemen.The Irish regular men of business are like all other men of business--punctual, frugal, careful, and so forth; with the addition of more intelligence, invention, and enterprise than are usually found in Englishmen of the same rank.

But the Dublin tradesmen PRO TEMPORE are a class by themselves;they begin without capital, buy stock upon credit in hopes of making large profits, and, in the same hopes, sell upon credit.

Now, if the credit they can obtain is longer than that which they are forced to give, they go on and prosper; if not, they break, turn bankrupts, and sometimes, as bankrupts, thrive.By such men, of course, every SHORT CUT to fortune is followed; whilst every habit, which requires time to prove its advantage, is disregarded; nor with such views can a character for PUNCTUALITYhave its just value.In the head of a man who intends to be a tradesman to-day, and a gentleman to-morrow, the ideas of the honesty and the duties of a tradesman, and of the honour and the accomplishments of a gentleman, are oddly jumbled together, and the characteristics of both are lost in the compound.