Hudy I

Chapter I - Genealogy

Jack Sheppard? - Faugh! - His Grace of Wellington? Poh! - We fly at higher game - we have no sympathies in common with pickpockets, or black-legs, cut-purses, or cut-throats, the midnight felon, or the wholesale licensed ravager! By no means.

An honest man's the noblest work of God.

To such sentiment we cling, with such a spirit have we to deal, and we may exult! But happy in our own selection of a subject, we make it a point not to interfere with the tastes of others; and as a proof of our forbearance and good feeling, we are bold to affirm that we never even dreamed of censuring the author of "The Wild Sports of the West" for limiting our entertainment by relinquishing his rambling rides through Cunnemara, or for throwing his legs round the neck of the Duke of Wellington, and making a pack-horse of his Grace, to carry him to fame, fortune, and immortality; by no means! Nor do we at all feel jealous of the martial person's lucky hit in his choice of a hero, satisfied as we are that ours cannot lose by comparison; for surely "the hero of a hundred fights" meets his match in "The Quarterclift", the unconquered hero of a thousand splores, the triumphant victor in ten thousand proud feats and glorious stramashes; but as fact is a better test than opinion, we fancy the more judicious course will be to

Let deeds approve the man

and permit our readers to draw their own conclusion, so

Teidheam air ar naighe. [Let us go forward]

Those who are at all conversant with the ancient history of Ireland, who have traced with delight the deeds of other days, who have marked the bold daring of her chiefs and warriors, and drawn lessons of instruction from her bards and her sages, cannot be ignorant of the distinguished part acted by the honorable and heroic sept of "The McGuigan", from the earliest period through the golden age of the glorious "Breithean Laws", when justice sat enthroned in the heart of every Irishman, down till the melancholy extinction of the feudal power in Ulster during the ruthless reign of the red-haired woman, who ruled the roast with the high hand, and the hard heart, as well in her own country as in unfortunate Ireland.

But alas! during that unhappy period, ruin visited us not by detail; a mildew passed across the face of the nation, the baleful influence of which blasted everything wholesome, and spared only the corrupt and loathsome reptiles that crawled upon its surface. When the whirlwind sweeps the forest, the monarch oak is the first to fall beneath its fury - when the lightning scathes, the loftiest tower first invites destruction: it is not therefore a matter of surprise that the O's and the Mac's were the marked objects of vengeful rapacity; and the chief of the sept McGuigan fell a victim to his own unbending patriotism. From this time forward, the honored race sunk by gradual declension in the scale of wealth and importance, till in process of time only a single townland remained of all their rich and extensive possessions. But notwithstanding the frowns of fortune and the unprincipled persecution of remorseless enemies, that townland, that miniature manor, was destined to preserve the ancient name to the latest posterity - happily it was called "Bally McGuigan", though corrupted in degenerate times, either by the ignorance or the anti-national spleen of succeeding possessors, into the anything-but-euphonious name of "Ballymaquiggan".

But in the further lapse of years that too vanished; and previously to the birth of our hero, his father, then the only direct representative of the olden chiefs, had been translated by virtue of some malign influence to the townland of Stramore (Parish of Ballinascreen, County of Londonderry, and a component part of that district locally known as the "Ten Towns", whilome the property of Colonel Cary, now in the possession of the "O'Gilby"s) there to vegetate on some half-dozen acres of poor land, such no doubt as had been reclaimed by persecuted industry from the inhospitable breast of the cold and naturally infertile mountain.

From such ancient and honorable stock sprung our hero by paternal descent; and not less noble or chivalrous was the blood he claimed by the maternal line. Herself a Lalor, his mother was legitimately descended from that ancient chieftain race; claiming too the additional pride of its having been ingrafted on the still more noble stem of "the O'More"; and clearly did our hero's actions, through a long life, evince that the same blood warmed his veins which so rollickingly careered through those of his bright kinsman "Rory", who, by-the-bye, though now immortalized by the genius of Lover, was, like many another high-minded Irishman, kept too long in the back ground.

The reader must not expect at our hands any lengthened or minute genealogy; having so many feats to record, the mere stringing up of a chain of names, however honorable, might be considered a waste of time, and - and - well, out it shall - and of patience also. This short ancestral sketch has been given merely to prove one plain fact, or one that, we modestly presume, will appear plain before the close of our narrative, viz: that our hero's pedigree warranted his proud deeds, and that his deeds shamed not his pedigree, traceable though it is through the most venerated names which illumine the classic and chivalrous chronicles of Ulster, Munster, Leinster, yea, and Connaught.

In the year of grace 1768 (or thereabouts), the humble cottage of Jack Roe Phaidrig McGuigan was rendered for ever famous by the birth of a boy, whose actions were destined to cast a splendour not only round the immediate spot of his nativity, but to add glory and honor to the history of that beautiful and loved island for which, as a certain genius has said, "God has done so much, and man so little" - but here, by way of some Rhetorical figure, it may be fairly remarked that this same genius turns out to be more plausible than correct in his views; for man has done his part; and who that has read our country's tale of wo since the days of "the Gay Plantagenet" can deny that woman occasionally contrived to have her finger in the pie also. Oh yes! Englishmen and Englishwomen, to wit their Henrys and their Edwards and Jameses and Charleses and Olivers and Williams and Georges and Marys and Besses and Anns, and - and - and their who-nots, have rendered Ireland what she is; consequently they are fairly entitled to the glory, or the odium, which ever may attach.

Lewis the Eighteenth of France was an ass, - if not on the score of patient endurance, at least so far as regards knowledge; for his words at times conveyed as little clearness of meaning or fitness of application as may be gathered from the brayings of the long-eared tribe. Wishing, on his restoration, to say something fine by way of a compliment to the conqueror of Spain and France and, if anybody pleases, of liberty also, he exclaimed, with graceful, that is French, that is polite and measured enthusiasm - "Fate, regretting the curse inflicted on mankind by the birth of Napoleon, gave us as a countervail - the unconquered Wellington." Bah! the old bosthoon - he should have said "Hudy McGuigan"! - And yet his ignorance, more than malice, or natural want of discrimination, may have been to blame - for it is not clearly proved that he ever had the honor of being introduced to our hero; but, notwithstanding this palliation, Hudy was not the less unjustly treated, - his claims were equal in two points, superior in a third: both were "eelings" [born in the same year], both the production of the same "dear ould sod" - therein did they stand on equal terms; Wellington despised, scorned, hated, and oppressed the country of his birth; the Clift, with the lofty sentiments of stern unbending patriotism, loved, honored, cherished, and ("whew, your sowls!") fought for his father land! - therein was he vastly superior to him who so unmeritedly bore away the honor!! But Naboclish!

This page was last updated 7 Nov 2018